THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES GIFT GOVERNMENT OR HUMAN EVOLUTION Individualism and Collectivism GOVERNMENT OR HUMAN EVOLUTION tit •5;? INDIVIDUALISM AND COLLECTIVISM BY EDMOND KELLY, M.A, F.G.S. LATE LKCTUKEB ON MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT AT COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY IN THE CITT OF NEW YORK AUTHOR OF "EVOLUTION AND EFFORT" LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON NEW YORK AND BOMBAY 1901 Copyright, 1901, Bt Edmond Kellt All rights reserved ^Unibrrsitg iDrtss John Wilson and Son, Cambridok, U.S.A. 5^ PREFACE ^ Ik attempting to apply to the problem of Government the definition of Justice proposed at the close of the first volume, we find ourselves confronted by two theories, known imder the names Individualism and Collectivism respectively. In this volume we shall endeavour to define these theories and determine their respective use and consequence. But before doing so, there is a double meaning to the word " collectivism " which it is important very carefully to distinguish ; for it is used to mean not only the method by which justice may be promoted, but also the condition of society in which justice might be ultimately attained. Now with collectivism in the latter of these two meanings this work has comparatively little to do ; for it has already been explained that we have no reason for believing that justice ever will be attained in the perfection pro- posed by the ideal collectivist State. Our definition of justice describes it as the " effort to eliminate from our social conditions the effects of the inequalities of nature upon the happiness and advancement of man," and it has been explained that there are certain inequalities of nature the effects of which no political scheme can ever eliminate.^ If, therefore, an examination into the na- ture of justice has led to the conclusion that justice can never be perfectly attained, it is clearly not incum- ^ Vol. i. book iii. chap. iii. sec. 10, p. 307. The previous volume, entitled "Government or Human Evolution* Justice," will be quoted herein as vol. i. VI PREFACE bent upon us to present a political scheme that under- takes to attain it. Collectivism, then, as an ideally perfect state of society, forms no essential part of the collectivist programme studied in this volume. It is true that the challenge thrown down by individualists to show how collectivism can ever result in permanent improvement has in part been taken up ; that is to say, an effort has been made to show that a slow adoption of collectivist methods can be reasonably expected to put an end to the economic causes of poverty, prostitution, and crime. And in the explanation of what collectiv- ism is, it has been necessary to explain the ideal collec- tivist State in the practicability of which some believe. But the demonstration of the practicability of ideal collectivism has not been attempted. Upon this point it is impossible to be too emphatic. Many people regard collectivism as an unattainable Utopia with which practical men have nothing to do. So far from being Utopian and unpractical, collectivism has within certain limits already become an accom- plished fact in the best-governed cities in the world, and is rapidly becoming the programme of the rest. In other words, by collectivism is not meant the paradise of angels described in "Looking Backward," but the theory of government which has partially been adopted in almost all the civilised countries of the world. There are pernicious extremes of both individualism and col- lectivism. Few political students any longer entertain the opinions of Herbert Spencer as regards the one, and still fewer those of the author of " Looking Back- ward," as regards the other. Nevertheless, there remain afloat in the minds of men some of the errors that re- sult from Spencerian philosophy, and some of the hopes inspired by the romances of Edward Bellamy. It becomes, then, the duty of the political student to PREFACE Vil study these two theories free from the pessimism of one school or the optimism of the other, profiting by the light science has thrown on evolution to escape from the law of necessity in which determinism sought to hold us bound, and by the experience which some decades of quasi-collectivism have furnished us during the closing years of last century. It is perfectly pos- sible to believe that collectivism offers a higher ideal of government than individualism, without for that reason believing in the possibility of a purely collectiv- ist State. Collectivism can be applied in small doses as well as large ; it can come by imperceptible steps as well as by revolutionary cataclysms ; there is such a thing as conservative as well as radical collectivism. The greatest disadvantage against which collectivism labours is the extra.vagant hopes which it has raised. So extravagant are the}^ that every man who seems to favour collectivism is set down by the practical element of the community as a demagogue, a dreamer, or a fool. Against this extravagance on the part of both collec- tivists and their critics too earnest a protest cannot be made ; and to make the protest effectual collectivism as a method must be distinguished from collectivism as an end. In the latter capacity it is open to the criticism which is never wanting to any Utopian scheme ; but as a method it is more practical than individualism, if by practical is meant the seeming of the maximum of re- sult in return for the minimum of toil. But collectiv- ism, without being recommended as an end, is more than a method : it can become a creed ; it can also serve as a programme. It is the privilege of man to be alile to see a little way into the future ; but it is the privilege of no man to see all the way into it. With collectivism as an end, therefore, — as a Utopia, — this book has little to do ; but viu PREFACE in three far more useful aspects collectivism is worthy of our attention : for in economics it presents a method ; in politics, a programme ; and in religion, a creed. In the preface to the first volume a strong bias in favour of Individualism was admitted to have influenced the initial study of the subject. Under the stimulus of this bias, the Social Reform Club was organised in New York for the purpose of bringing into social contact men who worked with their hands and men who worked with their heads, and of rescuing the leaders of Trade Unions from what then seemed to be the manifest errors of Col- lectivism. A very few months of this social contact, how- ever, persuaded some of us that we had caught a Tartar. The effort to escape from the Tartar involved a careful revision of the scientific grounds of Herbert Spencer's Individualism on the one hand, and of the economic fallacies of socialism on the other. The following pages are the result of this revision. They record an effort to glean the truth from both philosophies ; to preserve the care for the individual which distinguishes human from pre-human evolution on the one hand, and to recover the care for the race — for the community — which man in departing from Nature seems unwisely to have ne- glected. The progress of man is not likely to lie in the direction of either one extreme or the other ; by leaning over too much in the direction of Individualism we have moved in a circle rather than in advance ; were we now to lean too much on the side of Collectivism we should make a similar mistake. What we need is equilibrium, and, as Aristotle told us many years ago, the essential of all virtue, moderation. I have again to thank the same friends whose kind- ness and help were acknowledged in the Preface to the fii-st volume, and to add a word of apology for the PREFACE IX absence of both bibliography and references, of wliich one of these friends has very justly complained. Circum- stances have made it impossible for me either to supple- ment or confirm the references in my original manuscript. Inasmuch, however, as I have dealt for the most part with undisputed facts, the absence of references will not much be felt ; in most cases, when I have had occa- sion to refer to facts that are unfamiliar or been lately established, I have inserted a reference. I wish, how- ever, to express my special indebtedness to Mr. and Mrs. Sidney Webb for the help given me by their work on Industrial Democracy, from which I have largely drawn in all matters connected with trade unions, and without which I should have felt greatly at a loss for material upon a subject concerning which there were so few accessible data until the publication of their book, I also feel particularly indebted to the numerous works of Richard T. Ely and Carroll D, Wright, as, indeed, to the Labour Bulletin published by the Labour Bureau of which Mr. Wright is the Superintendent. Since this volume has been written my attention has been directed to the testimony taken before the Industrial Commission in 1899, and I have added an Appendix on Trusts, for most of the material of which I am indebted to Professor J. W. Jenks, whose book on this subject, and whose contributions as Expert of the Commission, cannot be too highly appreciated. CONTENTS BOOK I IND I VID UAL ISM CHAPTER PAGE I. INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER 1 § 1. The Definition of Justice 5 § 2. Justice and Government 7 § 3. Individualism Described 10 II. INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 16 § 1. The Religious Idea — Christianity and Mo- hammedanism 20 {a) The Mohammedan Idea 21 (6) The Power of the Idea in Religion 23 (c) The Power of the Idea in Disease 29 (d) The Power of the Idea in Politics 32 § 2. The Christian Idea 38 § 3. Decay of the Religious Idea and Growth of THE Idea of Individualist Government . 60 § 4. Forces at Work in the Development of the Idea of Individualist Government ... 65 § 5. The Idea of Chivalry 75 § 6. Decay op the Idea of Chivalry 82 (a) The Code of Love 82 (b) The Code of Honour 85 m. THE INSTRUMENT OE INDIVIDUALISM — PRI- VATE PROPERTY § 1. The Civilising Force of Private Property — By Promoting Self-Control 89 xii CONTENTS CHAPTER PAOS m. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM — PRI- VATE PROPERTY (co7itmued) § 2. The Democratic Force of Private Property — By Overthrowing Aristocracy of Birth 96 § 3. The Socialising Force of Private Property — By Association in Guilds 102 § 4. The Tyranny of Private Property — The Market Ill § 5. The Industrial Results of Private Prop- erty — Irregularity of Employment, Colonisation and War 124 § 6. The Proletarian Combination against Pri- vate Property — Trade Unions — Un- solved Problems of Trade Unions . 137 (a) Restriction on Trade 138 (b) Sweating 145 (c) The Unemployed 148 (d) The Limitations of Trade Unions 148 § 7. The Social Results of Private Property . 152 (a) Poverty 154 (b) Militarism 157 (c) Corruption 160 § 8. Private Property and the Church .... 170 § 9. Conclusion 173 IV. THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM — THE SO- CALLED SOCIAL MIND 175 § 1. Social Mind in the Lower Animals . . . 179 § 2. The Social Mind of Man 184 § 3. Physiology of the Mind 190 V. LIBERTY 203 § 1. Liberty of Contract 209 § 2. Analysis of Liberty 217 § 3. Property, Right, and Duty 223 § 4. Economic Liberty 227 § 5. Conclusion 237 CONTENTS xm BOOK II COLLECTIVISM CHAPTEB "«" INTRODUCTION 241 I. WHAT IS COLLECTIVISM? 250 11. THE ECONOMY OF COLLECTIVISM 273 IIL SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 293 § 1. Pauperism and Crimk 294 § 2. Distribution of Work 298 § 3. Leisure Secured by Collectivism .... 303 § 4. Ignorance the Enemy of Collectivism and Eliminated by It 305 § 5. Diversity of Work 320 § 6. Internal Policy 324 § 7. External Policy 328 § 8. Value, Exchange Value, Currency, and Foreign Trade 330 (a) Internal Industrial Conditions 331 (6) External Industrial Conditions, or Foreign Trade 337 IV. OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED . § 1. That It Would Promote Over-Population , 339 § 2. That It Would Be Destructive of the Home 341 § 3. That It Would Be Destructive of Liberty 348 (a) Economic Liberty 348 {b) Political LiheHy 351 (c) Personal Liberty 352 {d) Summary and Conclusion 356 § 4. That It Would Furnish Insufficient Stimu- lation 365 § 5. That It Would Be Artificial or Contrary to Nature 371 § 6. That It Would Be Prejudicial to Art . . 374 V. PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM . . 383 § 1. Introductory 383 § 2. Preparedness of Different Countries for Collectivism 384 xiv CONTENTS CHAPTER PAOB V. PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM (con- tinue g?) § 3. Theokies of Karl Marx and the Fabians . 385 § 4. Hypothetical Development of Collectivism IN THE United States 387 (a) Present Political Conditions 387 (6) Extension of Municipal Ownership and Ad- ministration 389 (c) Extension of National Ownership and Ad- ministration 393 (d) Public Stores 395 (e) Farm Colonies, Pauperism, Prostitution, and tjrime 399 (/) Advance from Partial Collectivism to Collec- tivism Proper 401 (g) D^rmination of Exchange Value of Com- modities Expressed in Dividend Coupons . 402 {h) Choice of Occupation 405 {i) ' ^luntary Labour Cheques 410 (j) Limits of State and Individual Enterprise . 412 {k) Dividend Coupons, Labour Cheques, and Currency 416 (I) EliMination of Corruption by Substitution of Labour Cheques for Coin as Medium of Ex- »^ ,*change 419 (m) Land 420 (n) D(kaiestic Service 424 § 5. Summar/ 427 § 6. The Ideal Collectivist State 429 VL SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 433 § 1. Rational View of Collectivism 449 § 2. Practical View of Collectivism 452 § 3. Moral View of Collectivism 461 (a) Faith 466 (b) Morality of Compensation 475 (c) Morality of Collectivism 482 {d) Morality and Religion 494 § 4. Political View of Collectivism 505 § 5. Conclusion 527 CONTENTS XV APPENDIX TRUSTS PAGE I. OVER-PRODUCTION 536 II. ECONOMY 543 1. Economies in Production 544 (a) Economy Occasioned by Working Factories at Maximum Efficiency 544 (6) Economy of Time in Manufacturing Only One Dimension 545 2. Economy of Distribution 545 (a) Cross-Freights 545 (6) " Getting the Market " 546 3. Prices 547 m. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 553 INDEX 561 INDIVIDUALISM AND COLLECTIVISM BOOK I. INDIVIDUALISM CHAPTER I INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER EuEOPE is moving towards collectivism with a rapidity of which she is herself hardly conscious. The eager- ness of some cities in England to extend the scope of municipal enterprise has in some cases resulted in extravagance and discontent. And, like yachts which capsize and lose a race in which they already lead, by injudiciousness in spreading more sail than they can carry, some cities are already being pointed to as a warninsf. America, on the contrary, is far behind Europe in municipal collectivism ; but, on the other hand, she seems to be ahead of Europe in industrial and com- mercial preparedness for it. For intelligence in the United States tends to turn away from the doubtful prizes offered in the political arena in order to seek the more substantial rewards furnished by business careers ; and consequently the wasteful method of competition is being abandoned by our shrewdest business men through 1 2 INDIVIDUALISM large combinations of allied industries known under the name of Trusts. It would seem, then, that Europe is politically better prepared for collectivism than the United States, but that commercially the United States is riper for col- lectivism than Europe. Europe is probably in the more wholesome condition of the two ; for the obstacle to municipal ownership in the United States is bad government ; and the combina- tion of allied industries into powerful trusts introduces a new motive for corruption in politics which tends to make bad government worse. Now one of the greatest objections not only to municipal ownership, but to all extension of the powers of the State, is that government tends to be bad, and that the more government is given to do, the worse it tends to become. On the other hand, if it can be shown that the present commercial system, which leaves the production of the necessaries of life to individual effort, and thereby sets the effort of one group to compete with that of other groups, is merciless and wasteful, the question arises whether in the first place competition can be eliminated from production or to any extent reduced ; and in the second place, whether this elimination can best be midertaken politically by the State, as in Europe, or commercially by trusts, as in the United States. These two questions are believed to be the most burning questions of the day, because upon the solution of them will be seen to depend the issue whether we are to continue subject to political corruption ; whether we are to continue to tolerate pauperism, prostitution, and crime ; whether we are to continue to preach the gospel and practise hypocrisy ; whether, in fine, we are to move towards a high standard of morality and justice, under the deliberate guidance of wisdom and conscience, with INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER 3 the greatest speed consistent with safety and with least cost of human despair, or whether we are to stagger towards it under the blind and conflicting impulse of selfishness and fear and at the price of agony levied during interminable centuries by the process of natural evolution which some of our teachers devoutly present to us as the only path of human salvation. The importance of this issue has led to the examina- tion of the foundations of individualist philosophy in a previous volume which closed with a definition of jus- tice. The present volume attempts to apply the scien- tific conclusions and political definitions there arrived at to the practical problems of the day, and in so doing to weigh against one another the respective theories of government known under the name of Individualism and Collectivism, respectively. Before entering upon this study it may be well to state briefly what is understood by these two terms. In the first place, they are both essentially economic. Many of our social problems seem insoluble because they are regarded as social, when as a matter of fact they are economic. Prostitution may be cited as an example.^ Less conspicuously but none the less essen- tially is this true of pauperism and for the most part of crime. From economic conditions result political and social consequences of stupendous import to human happiness. But the effect must not be confounded with the cause. Individualism and collectivism will be contrasted in this volume primarily as rival economic theories ; that is to say, rival theories as to the best way of producing the necessaries and comforts of life, and in these words are included all those things necessary to a high standard of refinement and happiness. But although individualism and collectivism are in their ^ Book ii. chap. iv. § 2. 4 INDIVIDUALISM nature economic, they are essentially political also ; for tliey involve the question whether production and dis- tribution are to be left as they are to-day, for the most part in the hands of individual enterprise, or whether they are to be to any extent undertaken by the State. From this point of view individualism and collectivism become rival theories of government, and as such come within the scope of the inquiry entered upon in the preceding volume. In the second place, collectivism and individualism are not regarded as at present inconsistent with one another. On the contrary, it is believed that for many generations man will have alternately to adopt now one, now the other theory ; for in pushing forward the one he will fall into the evils that now beset some of the English municipalities above referred to, and will have to fall back upon the other until these evils are slowly festered out. These preliminaries having been laid down, we may now venture upon definitions. Individualism is the theory that the production, trans- portation, and distribution of the necessaries of life can best be left to individual enterprise stimulated by self-interest and competition, under the protection and subject to the control of the State. Collectivism is the theory that the production, trans- portation, and distribution of the necessaries of life can to a certain degree to-day, slowly to a larger degree, and perhaps eventually altogether, be best undertaken by the collective action of the city or State, through the substitution of co-operation for competition and social for self interest. The fact that paujoerisra, prostitution, and crime are the necessary attendants and products of individualism is a sufficient reason for questioning its claims ; and the INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER 5 arguments presented by collectivism for believing that it furnishes the only way for diminishing these horrors and ultimately perhaps in great part eliminating them, furnish a motive not only for studying collectivism, but also, if the study justifies it, for straining every nerve to see that the proper steps be taken in the direction to which it points, with audacity enough to face the diffi- culties that can be surmounted, and, above all, with patience enough to mark time at those crises when fur- ther progress is impossible, remembering that " they also serve who only stand and wait." § 1. The Definition of Justice The task of justice was defined at the close of the first volume as "the effort to eliminate from our social con- ditions the effects of the inequalities of nature upon the happiness and advancement of man, and particularly to create an artificial environment which shall serve the individual as well as the race, and tend to perpetuate noble types rather than those which are base." ^ The obvious objection to this definition is that it is not new. This criticism was anticipated in the intro- ductory chapter,^ but has nevertheless been much in- sisted upon by some of the reviewers of the first volume. It may be useful, therefore, to point out at once that, however trite and innocuous the definition may seem, it is equivalent to a repudiation of Spence- rian philosophy in so far as this philosophy seeks to apply the Spencerian notion of human evolution to problems of government. For whereas Herbert Spencer considers justice attained only on the condition that the man who deserves much shall get much, and the man who deserves little shall get little, the definition pro- 1 Vol. i. p. 360. 2 Vol. i. p. 11, INDIVIDUALISM '> posed disregards this so-called " inequality of benefits, but on the contrary insists on the elimination from our social conditions of the inequalities of nature to the utmost possible, and on the elimination of the effects of these inequalities upon the happiness and advancement of man. In a word, Herbert Spencer asks that the curse of inferiority put by nature upon the majority of men be increased by the administration of justice, so that the majority shall not only suffer by the inferiority imposed by nature, but that it shall also suffer by a further inferiority imposed by man ; ^ whereas the proposed definition asks that on the contrary justice should mitigate the consequences of natural inferiority wherever this is possible ; and the extent to which this is possible is set forth in the words which follow ; that is to say, the task of justice is to eliminate the effects of inequalities of nature upon the happiness and ad- vancement of man; not the happiness of some men, but the happiness and advancement of all men. Nor is the individual forgotten in the proposed definition. On the contrary, the task of justice is further described as the creation of an artificial environment which shall serve the individual as well as the race, and tend to perpetu> ate noble types rather than those which are base. This definition then proposes two notable departures from nature and one possible departure from existing conditions ; that is to say, instead of conforming to the scheme of nature which on the one hand favours the gifted and disfavours the ungifted, and on the other hand sacrifices the individual to the race, the proposed definition asks that the individual be no longer sacri- ficed to the race, and that the inequalities of nature be * It has beeu elsewhere explained that the naturally gifted man already enjoys the exercise of his pifts. Wealth adds to this enjoyment the additional luxuries that attend it. INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER 7 eliminated in so far as they can be eliminated consist- ently with the happiness and advancement of all. And it further asks that an effort should be made so to readjust social conditions that they may tend to per- petuate noble types rather than those which are base. It may here be added for the benefit of a few other re- viewers that nothing already written justifies the notion that this last desideratum is to be obtained by treat- ing men in the same way that men treat stallions and brood mares, but, as the definition carefully states, by creating an artificial environment the tendency of which upon the race will be to eliminate low and set up high moral standards, so that marriage may become a sacra- ment rather than a surrender, and from the cradle to the grave men and women may be actuated by relatively unselfish rather than by primarily selfish motives. All these things have been fully explained in the preceding volume, and the conclusion arrived at will be briefly summarized in a subsequent chapter.^ They will not, therefore, be further developed here. Having, therefore, shown the difference between the proposed definition of the task of justice with which the first volume closed, and that adopted by Herbert Spencer, let us now consider summarily the relation which this definition bears to government and to the conflicting theories regarding government known under the names Individualism and Collectivism respectively. § 2. Justice and Government The task of justice, under our proposed definition, aims at securing the happiness and advancement of man hy the creation of an artificial environment. Now government is the name given to the artificial environ- 1 Book ii. chap. vi. 8 INDIVIDUALISM merit created by man in so far as it concerns the task of justice. It may be objected that the word "gov- ernment " applies strictly to the political element in this environment and not to the social and economic ele- ments therein. But inasmuch as our social and eco- nomic conditions are in part the result of our laws, and are protected by them, and inasmuch as our laws are essentially within the province of government, it seems permissible to use the word "government" to cover the whole field of human interference with nature, so far as the task of justice is concerned. We must, however, carefully keep in mind that this human interference is exerted in three very different arenas : the political, the social, and the economic ; and that it is sometimes as much engaged in defeating legislation as in enacting it. For outside of the field of legislation there are constantly at work the force of reaction, the force of sympathy, and the force of discontent ; and these forces, when they find themselves united in opposition to exist- ing laws, nullify these laws, either by paralysing the enforcement of them or by dictating new laws even to unwilling legislatures. We must also keep in mind that government may not always be engaged in increas- ing human interference with nature ; it may, on the contrary, be usefully occupied in decreasing it, as, for example, Avhen Louis XVI. a])olished the higlily artificial conditions created by guilds in France and restored the liberty of contract which approached more nearly to the scheme of nature. It is important, then, more carefully to define the word "government" in two directions: government constitutes, it is true, the artificial environ- ment created by man in so far as it concerns the task of justice, but it does not include that part of the artificial environment which grows up by the side of our deliber- ate legislative enactments, nor does it necessarily in its INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER 9 development — as the definition might seem to suggest — become more and more artificial, but may — and certainly at times doubtless should — become less and less so. Government would seem, then, in view of the fore- going limitations, to constitute that part of the artificial environment created by man to promote justice, which is expressed in our laws or in social and economic insti- tutions protected by our laws. As such, it constitutes altogether the larger part of this artificial environment, and fails to include only that part which is in process of modification or actively engaged therein ; as, for example, the institution of Free Masonry, believed by many to be a powerful factor in determining to-day the political fortunes of France, or the civil service reform and ballot reform associations so instrumental in improving our own political conditions in America. The foregoing expresses approximately the physio- logical view of government.^ Morphologically, gov- ernment is the machinery through which the rules of the political, social, and economic life of a people are determined and made known. And here again govern- ment does not and cannot include all these rules ; for example, it does not include the rules of the Stock Exchange, notwithstanding the fact that these rules determine the conditions under which an enormous amount of wealth is daily transferred. In every com- munity possessing the vitality and intelligence necessary to constitute a civilized State there will always be grow- ing up, by the side of the rules enacted and enforced by the government, other rules acknowledged and enforced by public opinion, — sometimes through a self-constituted body like the Stock Exchange, sometimes through the slow growth of custom. When these rules become 1 See vol. i. p. 53. 10 INDIVIDUALISM adopted by the government, as, for example, the common law of England and of most of our United States, they become a part of the government. Until they become so adopted they remain outside of government, though as regards which of these rules are and which are not a part of government it may often be difficult to decide. It is of great importance to distinguish between the human interference that comes within the definition of government from that which does not come within the definition, because upon this distinction rests to a con- siderable extent the difference of opinion wliich divides individualism from collectivism, and it is the rival claims of these two theories of government that this volume proposes to study. At the close of the first volume it was stated that individualism proceeds upon the assumption that egotism is the only motive which can be depended upon to keep man in the way of ad- vancement. Now that we are to study individualism a little more closely, our first task must be to point out the grounds of this assumption, and when these grounds are explained it m;iy turn out that the assumption itself is not as immoral as it at first sight appears. To this end let us consider briefly what the theory of individ- ualism is and upon what arguments it is founded. § 3. Individualism Described Indiviihialism rests its foundations in natural science, and particularly that part of it known under the name of Evolution. The scheme of nature — the scheme through which the protozoon lias developed into man — permits the survival of only those individuals best fitted to survive. In the earliest forms of lifi' the pro- cess of improvement is in no way accelerated or re- tarded by the individual itself ; but as development INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER 11 advances, individuals seem to contribute more and more to their own survival, so that when we reach man we find in him a conscious effort to improve his own condi- tions, and as between men we observe great differences of capacity and disposition for such improvement. Some savage races seem to have little capacity or disposition for it; other races, such as the Chinese, seem to have capacity, but little disposition ; others, on the contrary, have both capacity and disposition developed to a re- markable degree ; and in these last it is notably the genius of a few individuals sustained by the capacity and dispo- sition of the rest that makes the largest strides toward improvement. Now it seems obvious that, ceteris paribus^ the best government will be that which furnishes to gifted individuals the fullest liberty of action through which to benefit the race. Every limitation imposed by government upon individual action will from this point of view be destructive of the common good ; and from this point of view, therefore, we find individualism — that is, the promotion of the public good by the greatest liberty of individual action — supported both by the law of evolution and by the highest principles of statesmanship. This point of view gives rise to several political doc- trines : for example, it dwells upon the organic character of human society; upon its slow natural development as opposed to the effort to hurry its development by human interference ; it points out that jurists have always recognised the superiority of the law of nature over the law of man, so that natural law became identical with moral or ideal law, and that as such it was contrasted with the bungling and unjust laws enacted by man ; hence has grown up the notion of so- called natural rights, which are defined to include the most precious of them all, as, for example, the right to 12 INDIVIDUALISM life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And in de- fence of these so-called natural rights it demands that government be the least possible ; that is to say, that it be confined to defence from the foe abroad and to pres- ervation of order at home. Individualism, too, is founded upon moral considera- tions of the highest importance. Morality has devel- oped through the natural evolution of sympathy, — from sexual love to parental love, from parental love to tribal affection, from tribal affection to love of country or patriotism, — and love of country or patriotism is destined ultimately to extend beyond national boun- daries until we are at last all united in a common brotherhood. Let nature then take its course, says the individualist ; keep to nature to the utmost possible ; though man can do but little, let him be content to do that little, and not by ill-judged interference with nature retard development rather than promote it. In the more special problems of government the individualist points out that laws enacted to improve human conditions have continually been found to have the opposite effect; that by the side of institutional government there is a public opinion more powerful than it, and that the unwritten law is often more ef- fectual than the written. So that whether we build up for ourselves a complicated fabric of government, or whether we leave government to organise itself upon simple and natural lines, we must always fall back upon the vitality and resource of individual initiative, which is more likely to be crushed by governmental interference than promoted by it. Individualism therefore marshals on her side science, evolution, nature, morality, and statesmanship, and presents a front that cannot easily be assailed. It is only by attacking the theory in its very foundations INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER 13 that its conclusions can be discredited, and this is the task which has been attempted in the first volume. The effort has been made to show that Nature is not what individualists represent her to be; that the law of nature is not a moral but a non-moral law ; that there are no natural rights ; that the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is purely an invention of man ; that human evolution is not only different from natural evolution, but in great part diametrically the reverse of it ; that society is a construction rather than an organ- ism, and human interference with nature has been bad only when it has been unwise or insufficient ; that civil- isation has advanced, not by yielding to the principle of survival of the fittest, but by resisting it, and, in a word, that justice is the highest expression of human protest against it. At this point the first volume came to a close. In the course of it the operation of human evolution as contrasted with natural evolution was described during the periods that cast most light upon evolution prior to the adoption of Christianity by Constantine. We shall now resume the story with a view to tracing in subse- quent history the tendency of individualism, for Christ was the great adversary of individualism, and when His teaching was eliminated from the Church by its unholy alliance with the Roman Empire, the rein put by Him upon selfishness was loosened, and individualism once more became the dominant law of human civilisation. Before, however, we embark upon this study, a word of warning and explanation must be said : individualism resembles natural evolution — of which it is the theo- retical offspring — in that it is not wholly bad ; indeed, it is so much the reverse of bad that during the domin- ion of individualism humanity has obviously advanced ; men and women are to-day believed and admitted to be 14 INDIVIDUALISM better in mind, body, and estate than in the days of the Roman Empire. The issue between individualism and collectivism is not which of the two is wholl}^ bad, but which of the two is the better ; nay, more, which of the two should at different periods of human development be resorted to. In other words, individualism and collectivism are not necessarily destructive of one another. On the contrary, they may be found to come in aid of one another. In the first volume ^ the chapter devoted to the element of time in human evolution pointed out that living organisms cannot be subjected to changes of environment except with extreme slow- ness and with occasional periods of rest and even re- action. Should it, therefore, be demonstrated in these pages that collectivism presents not only the higher ideal of government, but also to a limited degree an eventually practical one, this would by no means neces- sarily involve the conclusion that individualism must for that reason never be resorted to. On the contrary, a contingency will be shown to be likely to happen under which a return to individualism would furnish a salutary reaction.^ Again, the study of human history and human institu- tions upon which we are about to embark would become extended beyond legitimate proportions were it to be interrupted at every moment by an intimate exami- nation of all the forces at work in the field tlirough an over-scrupulous desire not to exaggerate the case. Suffice it to say now tliat the tendency of evolution, even under the individualist regime, seems on the whole, in spite of api)alling obstacles, to be generally in the direction of improvement; the method of natural evo- 1 Vol. i. \). 157. Tlie Element of Time in Natural and in Human Evolution. ' Vol. ii. book ii. cliaji. v. § 4 (o). INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER 15 lution is, however, a dangerous one ; it is extremely slow, and its crises are attended by anguish of body and of mind. If we look back at the history of humanity we see the dangere of evolution illustrated by the decay of the civilisations of Assyria, India, Egypt, Greece, and Rome, by the long period of arrested mental devel- opment known as the Dark Ages, and by the bloodshed which has attended and is still attending the conflict of opposite social ideas. The issue presented for study in this volume is whether individualism, following closely one of the schemes presented by nature and attended by the horrors of violence, disease, and want, is the best theory of human government, or whether there is not another social scheme also presented by nature which, improved by man under the name of collectivism, may not in its proper turn contribute to work out his emancipation at a smaller cost of agony and time. 16 INDIVIDUALISM CHAPTER II INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY It is customary to ascribe the fall of the Roman Empire to the incursions of the Gotlis ; and undoubtedly it was the Goths who at the death divided the Roman Estate ; but to attribute the death to them would be like argu- ing a man's children to be his murderers because they shared his inheritance. Rome perished because the forces both within and without which had contributed to her maintenance were no longer strong enough to resist the forces that were hostile to it. The main force which had lifted ancient Rome above all the other cities of Latium was a senti- ment, — the sentiment of patriotism ; and this sentiment in ultimate analysis was built upon a kind of self-sacri- fice. So long as there remained in the Empire a suffi- cient number of citizens animated by the willingness to sacrifice self to the State and possessed of the courage and strength to make this sentiment effectual, so loner there was a force which, unless it encountered the same order of sentiment more pure and better organised tlian itself, could be counted on to triumph over external foes. But when this sentiment was devoured by the self- indulgence that follows like a sliark in the wake of wealth, the fate of Rome depended no longer on her- self, but on the wheel of Fortune. And it must be admitted tliat for centuries Fortune was very kind to Ri;me ; it is impossible to read her INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 17 history during the years which followed the reign of Constantine without wondering that so rotten a carcass could so long hang together. Rome was never conquered. There was during the period of her decay no organised community capable of conquering at all. She was never conquered: she fell to pieces ; and a " concourse of most politic worms " nibbled away her once so shapely limbs. We must look at the barbarians who poured over the frontiers of the Roman Empire during the fifth and sixth centuries, not as the conquerors of Rome, but as the scavengers which rid the world of her corruption. Man had by his very refinements sunk so low that Nature with all her cruelty and barbarism was an improvement upon him ; she rendered a service to the race by using the savage tribes of the north as a broom to sweep the earth of a nation which could no longer do aught but corrupt it. And the instruments she used were strangely con- scious of their mission. Attila proclaimed himself the Scourge of God. He knew that he could but destroy, and that he was powerless to construct. We cannot derive much advantage from pursuing the devious course of the barbarians who at this time divided the inheritance of Rome, unless it be to arrive at a realising sense of what is in store for man when he abandons the conduct of life in order to surrender himself to his natural propensities. And it is perhaps a sad and instructive lesson to compare the teaching of the wisest and best of Rome with the consequences of that teaching: " Vivere secundum naturam," — Live according to nature, — said the Stoic Cato ; " Live according to nature," echoed the Epicurean Horace ; " Live according to nature," repeated the sage Marcus Aurelius ; and live according to nature with a ven- 2 18 INDIVIDUALISM geance did the pleasure-sated patrician and the pleasure- seeking populace. In very truth they have had their reward.^ Nature brings to the sybarite a long and miserable decrepitude ; to the barbarian a violent but often glori- ous death ; and whether we linger by the decaying remains of the one or are carried headlong over the battlefields of the other, we can but record the inevi- table lesson that Nature unsubdued is a cruel god- mother. The history of man living according to Nature seems a bewildering and pointless tragedy, with a great deal of blood and misery in it ; the hell of human pas- sions let loose ; whole armies destroyed at one time to serve the ambition of a Clovis, at another to wreak the hatred of a Fredegonde. But out of it all, to one who seeks, not the hand that wields the sword, but the spirit that in the end overcomes it, there loom out of this con- fusion two great centres of order, — one in the papal chair at Rome ; the other in a mosque at Mecca. For the battles in which Clovis overcame Syagrius at Sois- sons, the Suabians at Zulpich, and Alaric near Poictiers would have shared the obscurity of the countless other unrecorded battles of that period were it not for the alliance which Clovis made with the bishops in com- munion with the See of Rome. Christianity may have lost by her alliance with the Roman State, but even the corruption of that day could not take from the Church of Christ the saving seed tliat still germinated and bore fruit in the byways and hedges, far from the pomp and jealousies of the Papal Court. It is difficult to believe that in all tlie violence and horror of this period there was much room for the humility and 1 It ought not to be necessarj' to explain that it is not tlie doctrine of the Stoic which is here criticised, but the false formula in which the doc- trine was expressed. INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 19 non-resistance preached to the fishermen of Galilee ; and yet throughout it all, such is the overwhelming power of a moral force to hold its own against mere physical brutality, that when we look for a clue to guide us through the world-spread and tottering ruins of the Roman Empire, we find it in religion, — whether it be a true religion corrupted by the State at Rome, or a false religion creating a state by the Red Sea. During the centuries that follow we shall find two waves of civili- sation starting: from these two centuiies : the Christian with a high ideal of morality, but degenerating towards a low standard of intelligence, strangely at variance with the violence which, by compromise after compromise, it was at last destined to overcome ; the Mohammedan with a low ideal of moralit}', but sustained by a high standard of intelligence, presenting two definite objects for the attainment of men, — conquest in this world and a para- dise of houris in the next. If we compare the ignorant monk of mediaeval Europe with the wise men who thronged the court of Haroun al Raschid, it is of no small interest to note that the one was sowing the seed of our Western Empires, while the other was destined to degenerate into the unspeakable Turk. To those who, like Niebuhr, think it possible to write history without reference to religion, it may seem fanci- ful to reduce that of the Middle Ages to the varying fortunes of two religious ideas ; and yet it is impossible to scan the centuries wliich separate Constantine from Cromwell without recognising the preponderating r81e which Mohammedanism played in one continent and Christianity in the other. Indeed, until prosperity had emasculated the Mussulman, it may be said that there were very few, if any, events in the civilised world which were not intimately connected with one of these two religions or with the conflict between them. 20 INDIVIDUALISM § 1. The Religious Idea. — Christianity and Mohammedanism The contrary currents which traverse an estuary hopelessly perplex a mariner until he discovers what gives rise to them ; but the moment he recognises them all to result from the flow of the sea up tlie river-bed during one tide and the flow of the river to the sea dur- ing the other, they not only cease to perplex him, but he can count upon and utilise them. It is probable that similar currents can be traced in history, though they are numerous and subtle. We cannot, then, do better than point them out whenever we can recognise them, without dogmatising too much as to their con- stancy or as to their strength. But though it may be unwise to be over-positive as to the influence of religion in the world, it cannot be denied that there have been times and places in which the power of a religious idea has proved itself to be overwhelming. Nor is it necessary that the idea com- mend itself to us to-day for its wisdom or morality; it is not likely that any man educated in our western civilisation would approve the peculiar tenets of Mos- lem faith; and yet, as a force, this very Moslem faith has never been surpassed; and in its origin it can hardly be distinguished from Christianity. " Do unto another as thou wouldst he should do unto you," says the Koran; and again: "Deal not unjustly with others, and ye shall not be dealt with unjustly. If there be any debtor under a difliculty of paying his debt, let his creditor wait until it be easy for him to do it; but if he remit it in alms, it will be better for him;" and again : " Take not advantage of the necessities of another to buy things at a sacrifice ; rather relieve his indigence." " Look not scornfully upon thy fellow-man ; neither INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 21 walk the earth with insolence, for God loveth not the arrogant and vainglorious." The very name Islam means submission. All the essentials of Christianity are here, — love substituted for greed ; humility for arrogance. (a) The Mohammedan Idea Notwithstanding the similarity between the teaching of Christ and that of Mohammed, neither Saint Paul nor his successors succeeded in making an impression upon the wandering tribes of Arabia. ^ It would have been difficult to find any corner of the earth in which there was less promise of religious regeneration or social cohe- rence than among the Bedouins, to whom the first gos- pel of Mohammed was preached. Mohammed's city was Mecca; and here the Banii Kinana had formed a settlement around the Ka'ba, — the sanctuary of a num- ber of loosely confederated tribes (Ahabish) belonging to that district. What prosperity Mecca enjoyed was mostly due to the fact that here was held the yearly fair at which the Meccans sold to the Bedouins the goods they imported from Syria. It enjoyed no municipal government, no magistracy, but was composed of num- erous so-called "septs," occupying each its own quarter, worshipping each its own gods, and united only by a common interest in observing the sacred month, during which merchants were safe from the brigandage that prevailed during the rest of the year. Here, as in ancient Greece and Rome, religion was in one of its phases an anti-social rather than a social force; there was indeed behind the multiplicity of Arabian gods a shadowy notion of Allah; but because of the very 1 Saint Paul himself preached the gospel in Arabia. — Epistle to GalatianSf i. 17. 22 INDIVIDUALISM unity and universality of Allah, the Arab was out of touch with Him. For the Arab was a true son of Ishmael: "He will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man's hand against him." ^ In the language of modern philosophy he was an indi- vidualist: he wanted a camel of his own; a God of his own ; the desert to range in ; and an occasional caravan to plunder.^ This was the ground in which the seed of Christ's gospel had taken no root, but which responded with savage enthusiasm to the same doctrine when it was driven home by the personality of Mohammed. It would be unwise in such a work as this to enter at too great length into speculation regarding the secret of Mohammed's success; we are more concerned with the fact of his success than with the reason of it; never- theless it may not be out of place to suggest that men's hearts are very much like men's minds in the dense carapace of dulness that envelops them, and that the personality of the teacher has perhaps more to do with his success than the soundness of his doctrine ; the word of a good woman will often reach the heart of a criminal upon whom the eloquence of a Chrysostom would have been wasted. But upon one point we must not allow ourselves to be deceived ; it was not the virtues preached by Mohammed that secured him the allegiance of his Bedouin disciples; it can hardly be conceived that Mohammed was enjoining upon them the Christian doctrine of humility and love when Ali, in offering to become his vizier, exclaimed: "O prophet, I am the man; whoever rises against thee, I will dash out his J Genesis xvi. 12. 2 There seems in this respect to be considerable analogy between the Boer and the Bedouin ideal of government. The Boer does not set out to plunder, but his system of government ends in something very like it. INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 23 teeth, tear out his eyes, break his legs, rip up his belly. O prophet, I will be thy vizier over them! "^ And yet too much importance must not be attached to the mere personality of Mohammed ; just as in carpentry every effort at penetration needs a sharp tool forward and a blunt one behind, and it is by the application of the hammer to the tack that penetration is effected ; so in the moral and intellectual world there are needed two instruments to penetrate the crust of habit within which the instinctive life of man is lived ; and these two in- struments are, first, an idea, and, secondly, the personal force of the Prophet to drive the idea home. Now the fundamental idea of Mohammedanism was probably not the practice of virtue; it was an idea that lies at the foundation of the highest form of government, and for this reason demands our very particular attention. (5) The Power of the Idea in Bcligion Selfishness, unenlightened by civilisation or corrupted by it, tends to distract the energies of an individual rather than to concentrate them. In some cases it may animate a temperament peculiarly gifted with the power of concentration so as to make of such a temperament a social scourge ; it accomplishes this work in such a life as that of Bonaparte, Jay Gould, or William Tweed; but this is comparatively rare ; in most men it distracts and dissipates their force, so as to make them incapable of very great accomplishment. This dissipating ten- dency of selfishness is illustrated in the man who, though vindictive enough to wish revenge, is too cowardly to attempt it; or in the man who is greedy enough for wealth to commit crime for the purpose of attaining it, and yet not rash enough to take the risks which 1 Gibbon, ix. p. 284. 24 INDIVIDUALISM crime involves; or in the man who would be glad enough to surrender to the allurements of another man's wife, and is yet restrained by the discomforts which await him from the jealousy of his own. Now it is upon this distracting tendency of human selfishness that our political and social institutions in great part rest. Selfish men stand like the fabled ass, irresolute and inactive because equally distant from equally attractive bunches of hay, and, through the paralysing effect of opposing selfishnesses, abstain from sin, except within limits that can be deemed safe. This is the kind of morality which practically keeps our civilisation to- gether. It is, of course, very different from the morality we profess; but this last has now become so obsolete that Mr. Fitz- James Stephen,^ in a book written for the purpose of demonstrating the necessity of maintaining Christianity as the bulwark of government, laughs at the idea of attempting to conform ourselves to the pre- cepts taught in the Sermon on the Mount. This incon- sistency will be treated at greater length when we come to study our existing institutions. For the present it is not necessary to insist on more than this : that men and women who are not animated by religious motives are for the most part kept from infractions of social and other law either by affection or by the fear of conse- quences. Now this distracting effect of selfishness, although extremely useful as a socialising force in creating a state, is a source of weakness once the socialising force has created it; for the more we have at stake in our lives, the less are we willing to expose them. Again the habits of self-indulgence wliich result from prosperity increase unwillingness to suffer pain and hardship, and this unwillingness unfits men to face the dangers of war; 1 Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity. INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 25 they therefore give up fighting themselves and pay others to fight for them, and this is the beginning of the end. The operation of selfishness tends, then, inevitably to the decay of every civilisation that is built upon it alone. The distraction produced by selfishness is particularly dangerous in the soldier ; a man who is concerned about his safety or unwilling to suffer pain is thereby unfitted to lead a charge, or to stand a charge, or to endure any of the hardships inseparable from a campaign ; whereas the soldier whose every fibre is animated by a single purpose unweakened by any conflicting consideration will hurl himself upon the enemy with irresistible momentum or stand to receive him with irresistible obstinacy. This distraction occasioned by selfishness ^ is inconsis- tent with good government so long as our political insti- ^ It ought to be obvious that the word "selfishness " is used here in its popular sense, and that no attempt is made to adopt or take into consid- eration the philosophical doctrine that all human motive must in its last analysis be selfish, and that therefore a careful and correct vocabulary will distinguish one kind of selfishness from another and not contrast selfish- ness with motives which are not philosophically distinguishable from them. It must be admitted that patriotism is a form of selfishness ; but it is a form in which it is so diluted by unselfishness that more confusion is likely to arise in non-philosophical minds by the attempt to be accurate than by adopting popular though slightly incorrect verbiage. The essen- tial difference between the selfishness which is concerned with one's self only and that in which considerations of self yield to considerations for one's country is that in the one case the selfishness is of a distracting character, and in the other case it is not. This is the distinction which it is here sought to establish ; and it can be established for the unsophisti- cated reader better by using the word in its popular sense than by preced- ing the argument with philosophical disquisition, which in a treatise on politics it is wise as much as possible to avoid. I permit myself therefore to use the word selfishness to mean selfishness which disregards the interest of others ; and unselfishness to mean that which regards them. So many people have an unreasonable objection to the word "altruism" that it hag been deemed prudent to use it as sparingly as possible. 26 INDIVIDUALISM tutions reward those willing to take risks of political brigandage by surrounding them, where successful, with the protection of the law. The citizens who are called law-abiding because they are timid become the natural prey of those who because they are not timid seize the law-making power in order to turn it against the law- abiders. The attempt to move forward civilisation by relying on selfishness is like the attempt to move for- ward on a treadmill; the wheel sinks under us every time we lean upon it; we remain at a standstill, losing strength at every effort, until at last exhaustion comes upon us ; we fall in our tracks, only to leave the eternal mill to grind the lives of those that come after us in recurring despair. And yet this is not a true picture of what has hap- pened in the history of man ; because man has not at all times depended upon selfishness as a sufficient motive for action. That selfishness is a sufficient motive is a modern doctrine of political economy which is already yielding to less inhuman argument. So far from de- pending upon selfishness, it may be said that no nation ever became very great that did depend upon it. When- ever we see one tribe sweeping other tribes before it, we almost always find behind it a force which, because it is not distracted by selfishness, is overwhelming. This force is generally an idea which removes from the mind the considerations which distract it, concen- trating energy instead of dissipating it. Such, for ex- ample, is the force of patriotism. Patriotism obliterates self; it is not an effectual patriotism unless it does obliterate self; and by o])literating self it obliterates the distractions which result from self -consideration. An- other such force is love; that is to say, the love that obliterates self and not that which is servile to it. An- other such force is religion ; that is to say, the religion INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 27 which succeeds in lifting the hearts of men above things worldly and substitutes for them things spiritual. Religion, however, operates upon men in different methods ; and its faculty for rousing enthusiasm depends much upon the particular method it adopts. It op- erates, for example, by cold appeal to reason, as in the religion of Confucius ; by passionate devotion to a cause, as in the case of the Crusades ; by substituting the love of the neighbour for the love of one's self, as in the case of the early Christians ; but above all, and perhaps be- hind all, by the conception of an omnipotent force of which each and every one of us is the manifestation and eveiy one of us the invincible instrument, as in the creed of Islam. It would be an interesting inquiry to examine every movement that has succeeded, and trace it to its psy- chological source; for it seems possible that success in almost every case could be traced to self-efface- ment. For example, the secret of successful leadership seems to be in the ability of a leader so to command the loyalty of his adherents that they will make any sacri- fice for him ; self in such case is forgotten in devotion to the leader. Again, although religion is behind the training which goes to make the Sister of Charity, there is in the training itself a carefully devised system for destroying self-consideration. No one is permanently admitted to the sisterhood who has not during a period of probation shown an ability to efface self, and during this period no effort is spared to effect this purpose; pride is shattered by the habit of servile obedience ; re- finement is discouraged; even personal cleanliness is tabooed in order that no bodily consideration should stand between the soul and God. ■ It is perhaps the absence of this somewhat brutal treatment of the body that explains why Episcopal sisterhoods keep so far 28 INDIVIDUALISM behind those of the Roman Church. Rome crushes self-consideration; Protestantism tends rather to keep it alive. This discussion must not be understood to favour one system or the other ; nor need it be regarded as written in the interest of religion: "Je n'oppose rien, je ne propose rien; j'expose." The great historical fact looms out of the confusion of the Middle Ages, that so long as men were urged only by selfish motives they destroyed much but constructed nothing ; but as soon as the energies which were distracted by selfishness became concentrated by the controlling force of a single idea they destroyed less and constructed more. In other words, the great constructive force in humanity is not selfishness, but unselfishness. Unselfishness, however, is a negative word and serves only to strike a contrast ; the real force which creates unselfishness is the force of a concentrating idea. This was the force which Mohammed had the srenius to com- municate to the sons of Ishmael. Whether we regard it as a religious idea, as, for example, the omnipotence of Allah, or an irreligious idea, as that of fatalism, or whether we attribute it to personal loyalty, there was accomplished among the Bedouins during the life of Mohammed a change of heart which drew together the wandering tribes of Arabia as a magnet does a field of iron filings, and converted them for the first time in their history into one invincible host. It hardly seems necessary to follow closely the course of the army which, starting from Medina and effecting the conquest of Mecca, set forth upon the conversion of the world. Almost without a check it spread over the whole Arabian peninsula, crossed into Egypt, mastered the whole northern coast of Africa, and established the Moorish Empire in Spain. Eastward and northward INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 29 its progress was less rapid but no less certain; as it came into contact with higher civilisations it borrowed and enhanced the splendour of every conquered race. Constantinople, the capital of the world, became neces- sarily the object of its effort; and in the direction of Constantinople therefore moved the capital of the Mos- lem Empire. Damascus, Bagdad, Broussa, were all steps towards the conquest of the city which was to make it master of the world. Nowhere did it encounter an effectual resistance until it came against a popula- tion animated by a similar force and organised by a still higher religion. The history of the Middle Ages is the history of the growth and conflict of two religious ideas, — the one represented by the Cross, the other by the Crescent. Out of this conflict the Cross came victorious not only in the field of war, but also in that of politics; and just as in ancient history that of monogamous and patriarchal tribes, because they laid down the basis of our existing civilisation, interests us more than that of the metro- nymic hordes which left behind them no useful political institutions, so the development of Christian States, upon which are laid the foundations of our existing un-Chris- tian governments, interests us more than that of the Mohammedan hosts which still, owing to the so-called European Concert, oppresses and massacres our Christian people in the East. (c) The Power of the Idea in Disease There is a rejuvenescence of the Mohammedan idea now taking place amongst us which it is possible that many of us have failed to recognise. It is known and for the most part despised under the names Mental Science, Christian Science, Menticulture, etc. ; it is the modern 30 INDIVIDUALISM form of miracle, and differs from the old only in the professions made by the healer. The miracles alleged to have been performed in ancient times are professedly witnesses to the divine mission of the miracle-worker; tliose alleged to be performed to-day have no special relation to the healer whatever; on the contrary, he is kept in the background. He claims no special qualifi- cations, assumes no divine mission; he even disclaims miraculous power, but on the contrary attributes the power he exercises to the influence of the mind, which he regards as the highest power in nature, and in fact as the manifestation of divine omnipotence in the world. He is the legitimate successor of the Stoic who denied the existence of evil, and of the Christian who proclaimed the omnipotence of God, — one being the negative, the other the affirmative form of the same idea ; but he is particularly the exponent of the Mohammedan doctrine that every man is the expression of divine omnipo- tence, if he will not himself stand in the way of that expression. Now there are certain diseases, such as those that arise from mental and nervous disorders, which derive their strength in great part from the domination of a fixed idea. There is perhaps no essential difference between the hysterical patient who believes himself to be par- alysed, and tlie balking horse which refuses to advance because he thinks he sees an insurmountable obstacle in his path; both are the slaves of an idea, and the duty of the healer in such case is not to treat the body, but to re- move the idea. It is practically useless to beat a balking horse, but if he is turned round once or twice, so as to dissipate the obstructing idea, he will often i)ass the balking spot witliout the necessity of a single blow; so if a liysterical patient who believes himself incapable of speech is etherised and suddenly questioned before INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 31 he is quite awake, so as to appeal to his instincts before the fixed idea can resume control, he will find tongue and answer, and in answering discover the error under which he has been labouring; he will be temporarily cured by the removal of the controlling idea.^ Now the idea which can paralyse one man can develop every conceivable disease in others; for example, in some cases it produces hemorrhage in lungs that are perfectly sound. To treat for consumption a hysterical patient who has hemorrhage is to confirm the idea and thereby increase the disorder; he must be treated like a balking horse ; he must be rescued from the domination of the false idea. But false ideas occasion not only acute symptoms such as those described, but also conditions of body which, because they are not attended by acute symptoms, are for that reason all the more baffling ; such, for example, is the condition that prevails so extensively to-day under the name nervous prostration. It originates doubtless in a real physical breakdown, due to overwork or some other physical or mental strain ; but this break- down creates in the patient an idea of weakness which maintains and enhances it. He learns to believe himself incapable of sleep, of work, of effort; he loses courage; and after his body has recovered its vigour the domina- tion of a false idea maintains in him a sense of weakness which is itself as false as the paralysis and hemorrhage in the hysterical patients above described. It is upon this class of patients that Mental Science performs its most astonishing results, for it substitutes for this false idea of discouragement a healing idea of strength ; and this healing idea is for the most part a sense of oneness with God that dissipates the distracting considerations of human weakness. There is nothing 1 See the " Medical Journal " for August, 1898. 32 INDIVIDUALISM metaphysical about this ; it is practical to the highest degree. If a man's body is capable of doing a certain amount of work, but he is possessed by the idea that he is not able to do it, the idea will paralyse him ; if, on the contrar}% he is possessed with the idea that he is able to do it, this enabling idea will remove the paralysis and restore his efficiency. This is the acknowledged conclusion of the medical profession in cases which do not admit of question ; it is the explanation of the heal- ing miracles of Lourdes, Schlatter, and mental scientists ; it is the secret of Mohammedan success, and it is part of the gospel of Christ: "For verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place ; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you." (tf) The Power of the Idea in Politics The force of habit has been insisted upon as explain- ing by far the largest part of human action, and as constituting a part of the strength and a part of the weakness of government. The force of an idea must now be insisted upon as similarly constituting a large and sometimes a determining role in the character of human institutions; and just as unconscious habit was con- trasted with conscious effort in the framing of govern- ment, so must the force of an idea be contrasted with it; for a man possessed by an idea is just as irresponsible as a runaway horse ; in the latter the idea of flight re- places the idea of submission, and, his habits of move- ment taking up the idea of flight, he is hurled on his way as uncontrollably as a driverless engine thundering along a railroad track. It is of extreme importance to keep in mind the true character of the idea in framing political institutions INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 33 when the idea is uncontrolled by judgment. It does not seem unreasonable to imagine that political move- ments that are determined by ideas ought to be classed among the conscious forces of society, and yet this would surely be a profound mistake. The balking horse is not a voluntary agent, nor was the conquering Mohamme- dan or the inspired Crusader. In ultimate analysis all are found to be slaves of an idea. The difference be- tween the savage who roams the forest in search of food and the savage who, associated with others like him, marched to the conquest of Constantinople, is that in the one case he is controlled by an individualistic idea, in the other case the individualistic idea is re- placed by a socialising one; in the one his energy is distracted by opposing selfishness, in the other it is con- centrated by a monopolising thought; in the one he is as feeble and helpless as a flake of snow, in the other he is as overwhelming as the avalanche. But in both cases, so long as he is an automaton worked by a force which is not under his control, he is equally undeliberate, equally unpurposive, equally in- voluntary; the difference is one of effect, not one of method. The solitary savage accomplishes nothing; the inspired horde accomplishes a great deal; but neither advance civilisation very much ; they differ in the uncon- scious socialising force which distinguishes the bumble- bee from the hive-bee; but this in its nature is not very different from the two phases through which the myxomycetes passes, — the individual cell and the com- pound Plasmodium. It is surely not to the unconscious socialising force that unites the cells of a sponge that we are to look for characteristic human progress ; human progress differs essentially from that of the lower ani- mals in the exercise of judgment and self-restraint, or in that combination of the two which is called wisdom. 3 34 INDIVIDUALISM Now the wisdom which started and guided the Moslem Empire must be sought in Mohammed rather than in the Mohammedans; in Omar rather than in the con- quering ranks of Amron. Let us then be careful to distinguish the three forces which were at work in this amazing history. Habit, which contributes the mechanism of all animal action. Idea, which, when religious, by concentration con- tributes the strongest motive for human action. Intelligence, which deliberately guides the human machine thus constituted and set at work. Habit, animated by selfishness alone and distracted by it, has produced the ape, the tiger, the savage, and the Ishmaelite. Idea, eliminating the distraction of many selfish- nesses, produced the Mussulman. Intelligence, in the persons of Mohammed and Omar, used the Mussulman to conquer all the neighbouring nations less highly socialised, and to create the Moslem Empire. The history of this empire has still an important lesson for us. Prosperity brought to the Moslem Empire its accustomed fruits: wealth, literature, art, science, music, rendered the Khalifs of Bagdad illustri- ous beyond all other rulers in the world; and these, the best results of civilisation unenlightened by wisdom, emasculated not only the court, but the people. No longer willing or able to face the dangers and hardships of battle themselves, they enlisted in their service the uncivilised Tartars of Turkestan. This new and neces- sary force did for the Khalifate what the Proetorian guard had done for Rome ; succession to it was determined no longer by inheritance, but by assassination; those who liad been called in to defend the empire stayed to divide INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 35 it ; its weakness and its wealth tempted a less peaceable invasion by the same race, and the Turks, snatching the Mohammedan idea from the expiring Mohammedans, once more undertook the original scheme of conquest. The successive conversion of the Tartars of Turkestan first; the Moguls of Genghis Khan afterwards; and those of Timur last of all, insured a continuous re- newal of the stock which the jDrosperity of conquest was continuously corrupting, and by the time that the Ottomans, who may be regarded as the final result of all these forces, appeared under the walls of Constanti- nople, the Christian idea which had theretofore resisted the Mohammedan had itself become divided ; so that the last of the Ctesars, no longer propped by western civili- sation, fell at last before the second Mohammed almost without a blow. The individualistic Bedouin, socialised by the genius of ^Mohammed, corrupted by the wealth of Bagdad, but, before expiring, handing on the central Mohammedan idea to his despoiler, — the Tartar first and the Mogul afterwards, — furnishes a pathetic story of high purposes prostituted to ignoble ends. It is one already rendered familiar to us in ancient history, but in a somewhat less startling degree ; for it cannot be said that the religion of Athens, Sparta, and the other Grecian States, in its relation to politics, did more than build up a heroic sort of patriotism ; and the patriotism was narrow ; it hardly transcended the city walls, and never conceived of a wider horizon than the City-State. That of Rome was of much the same order, but larger in its scope, and, as it set Rome upon the conquest of city after city, developed into the Nation and eventually into a world- embracing Empire. The Mohammedan idea, on the con- trary, was lofty beyond all that went before it, and boundless in its reach. Allah, the omnipotent, confined 36 INDIVIDUALISM to no city, as with the Greeks, to no race, as with the Hebrews; Himself eternal and manifesting Himself in no one man, but in all men, who became united in Him, and if obedient to His will, invincible ; Allah, unlimited in space as in time, embracing all humanity in one concentrated and overwhelming force, constituted a socialising force such as the world had not in recorded history previously to that time known. It seems probable that this was the conception which fired the enthusiasm of Mohammed in the wilderness; it lifted him high above the considerations of this world, so that when Abu Talib urged him to abandon his at- tacks upon the idolatry of Mecca, he answered : " Though they gave me the sun in my right hand and the moon in my left, to bring me back from my undertaking, yet will I not pause till the Lord carry my cause to victory or till I die." But no mighty effort was ever made to socialise men without encountering the opposition of the individ- ualistic instincts we share with the tiger and the ape. Mohammed and his few disciples were obliged to escape from Mecca; and when Medina opened her gates to them, Mecca regarded this act of hospitality as a signal for hostilities. Thus immediately was a great religious idea thrown into the hazard of military tactics ; and thus Mohammed, who had started upon a purely religious mission, found himself involved in a religious war. There is doubtless an inconsistency of startling repug- nance between religion and war; but this inconsistency did not shake the faith of the Prophet or weaken the arm of his disciples. It is not the man of action who is checked by inconsistency ; it is the man of thought ; and the career of Mohammedan conquest knew no retiring ebb, but kept due on from the Propontic to the Hel- los])ont until the splendour of a Mohammedan ccmrt afforded the leisure to think. INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 37 And here we come upon another of the great forces which have been at work in making and unmaking gov- ernment. Reason, which so often palsies action, is the great enemy of religious enthusiasm, because it opens the door to the spirit that doubts ; and there is probably no religious idea so difficult to reconcile with reason as that of an all-good as well as an all-powerful God. Nor is reason helped to accept this dogma by the luxury of an imperial court. Self-indulgence very soon suggests to reason that the obvious mission of man is the pursuit of happiness; and happiness, to one who has all the facilities for self-indulgence, at once becomes synony- mous with surrender to animal propensity. Culture, which in its first stages lifts man above the vulgar needs of the body, learns at last to minister to those needs with a refinement that transfigures vice into an art ; and then the inconsistency between a religion that teaches self-restraint and institutions that make for self- indulgence works out its necessary result. The pause in Moslem conquest during the illustrious Khalifate of Bagdad ; the renewal of these conquests when the cor- rupted Mussulman was replaced by the uncorrupted Turk ; the spur given to Moslem arms every time they were reinforced by new barbaric blood, as by the hosts of Genghis Khan and the Mongols of Timur; and the slow decay of the Ottoman Empire ever since the day it ceased to receive these reinforcements, — ■ are convincing witnesses to the hopelessness of permanently building institutions of selfishness upon an unselfish religious idea. The moment the inconsistency of such an effort is given the opportunity to bear its legitimate results, these results are manifested in decay. War, luxury, and licentiousness are inconsistent with the highest re- ligion; religion must either destroy them, or they will destroy religion. Man has not yet seriously undertaken 38 INDIVIDUALISM to make his institutions consistent with his religion; until he does he is doomed to the vicious circle so clearly marked out by the course of Mohammedanism; the unselfish religious idea destroying selfish irreligious communities, only itself to perish at the very hands of those by whom its victories were accomplished. A fundamental problem of government is to frame institutions which will be consistent with morality. It may be immaterial whether we take our morality from Confucius or Buddha, Plato or Mohannned, provided only our institutions be consistent with it. Then, and then only, will practice conform to precept, and hypocrisy cease to worship at the altar of the Golden Calf. § 2. The Christian Idea If now we turn from the Crescent to the Cross, we shall be struck with the likeness of their respective his- tories notwithstanding the profound differences which distinguish them ; and as the differences may be summed up briefly, whereas the history will have to be told at greater length, it may be well to jjoint out the differ- ences first. In the first place stands the obvious contrast between the personality of Christ and that of Moliammed, — the one spotless and inspiring love, the other self-indulgent and suggesting criticism. Christianity is essentially the following of Christ; iMoluunmcdanism is essentially the pursuit of conquest. The Ufe of Christ is a pattern; that of Mohammed a warning. Could we all but live the life of Christ, the world would be a heaven ; were we all to live the life of Mohammed, the world would perhaps be still worse than it is. In the second place the teaching of Christ is submis- sion, — not to God only, but to the ungodly also; that INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 39 of Mohammed is, like that of Christ, submission to God, but to the ungodly, death. In the third place Christ bore witness to his doc- trine of non-resistance on the cross; Mohammed bore witness to his doctrine of resistance on the field of battle. In the fourth place Christianity was built upon the family: "Honour thy father and thy mother." Chris- tendom is but the extension of the family so as to em- brace all mankind; "men became brothers because they acknowledged a common Father"; and the unit of Christendom was not the individual but the family, in- dissolubly bound together by the sanctity of marriage. Mohammedanism ignored the family; discredited the indissolubility of the marriage vow; set up only one fountain of authority, — the Caliph, or representative of the Prophet. If that fountain were troubled, — as it sometimes must be, and ultimately always was, — there was no other source of salvation or of strength. The necessary consequence of these essential differ- ences is seen in the early history of these two religions. We have seen that the result of one was a conquering army ; let us now consider the result of the other in the language of one of its earliest apologists : — " We who formerly delighted in fornication, but now em- brace chastity alone; we who formerly used magical arts, dedicate ourselves to the good and unbegotten God ; we who valued, above all things, the acquisition of wealth and possessions, now bring what we have into a common stock, and communicate to every one in need ; we who hated and destroyed one another, and on account of their different manners would not live with men of a different tribe, now, since the coming of Christ, live familiarly with them, and pray for our enemies, and endeavour to persuade those who hate us unjustly to live conformably to the good precepts 40 INDIVIDUALISM of Christ, to the end that they may become partakers with us of the same joyful hope of a reward from God, the Ruler of all." 1 It must be regretfully admitted that the description given by Justin, while probably true as regards a con- siderable fraction of the Christian Church, was lament- ably untrue as regards the remainder. There can be no church without organisation, and there can be no organisation without rank. The hierarchy to which organisation necessarily gave rise set the deacon above the congregation, the priest above the deacon, and the bishop above the priest; and wherever in congregations of men one is set above another, there immediately is room given for the play of passion, jealousy, and vindic- tiveness. Every church that has ever existed must, so long as man has a vestige of human passion in him, suffer from this necessary feature of church organisation. Nor are the conflicts which arise in a church confined to desire for office and consideration; men will con- scientiously differ regarding matters of belief, and it is just these differences of belief that the ambitious will seize upon as an excuse for ousting those who stand in their way. In this way ambition for ecclesiastical pre- ferment exaggerates differences of faith, encourages heresy, and fans heresy into sedition. The distracted condition of the Christian Church upon matters of dogma, the shameful scramble for eccle- siastical office, and the baseness of some of those who occupied episcopal chairs even before the prosperous era of Constantino, demonstrate the fact tliat wealth is not the only cause for unliappiness to mankind, and dis- parages the arguments of those who think that the elim- ination of wealth will suffice to make men happy. 1 The First Apology of Justin Martyr, chap. xiv. INDIVIDUALISM TN HISTORY 41 Long before the adoption of Christianity by Constan- tine, Novatus (if we are to believe Eusebius), having aspired to the bishopric of Rome and been disappointed, secured a "shadowy and empty imposition of hands" from a collection of bishops whom he had recruited from the provinces, shut up, and "heated with wine and surfeiting; " and yet it is Novatus who was the founder of the sect which, on account of the boasted purity of their morals, assumed the name of Cathari. Before Constantine a hundred heresies had served the purpose of intrigue and ambition, and Arius had already begun his war upon the ofMoovaiov, which was for centuries to serve as a battle-cry for political as well as ecclesiastical faction. Nevertheless, although the Church was distracted by heresy and often disgraced by corruption, there were doubtless, prior to its adoption by Constantine, districts where the precepts of Christ Avere practised even to the extent of holding property in common; and wherever the grossest abuses are found, they can generally be traced to exceptional prosperity. As soon as the Church began to receive imperial favours, Christianity became a profession, and was made to serve the purposes of ambition and avarice. The wealthy firat and the poor afterwards joined the Church for no other ol)ject than to enjoy the patronage which she now had to distribute ; it is even stated that twelve thousand men were baptised at Rome, besides a propor- tional number of women and children, upon the promise to each convert of a white garment and twenty pieces of gold.^ Cities which voluntarily destroyed their heathen temples were rewarded with municipal privileges. The property of which Christians had been stripped by Diocletian was restored to them. The Edict of Milan 1 Gibbon, vol. iii, p. 24. 42 INDIVIDUALISM permitted churches to hold landed property, and sub- sequently Constantine specifically authorised bequests to the Catholic Church. The Emperor presented large sums of money for the relief of churches in Africa, Numidia, and Mauritania ; he ordered a regular allowance of corn for the support of monastic institutions ; he built temples and adorned them with gold and silver, silk and gems. Imperfect rent-rolls bear witness to the large property held by some of the churches during his reign ; and the Church very soon acquired a power the ultimate extent of which Constantine probably did not foresee. He did not appreciate that the right of parish- ioners to elect their own priests and bishops took the appointment of thousands of magistrates out of his hands; nor that the so-called ecclesiastical courts, the right of the bishop to act as censor of the morals of his people, and the opportunities afforded by freedom of public preaching were to create a power in the State destined eventually to supersede that of the Emperor himself. The Church, however, was still in tutelage to the State; for it was the ratification of the Nicene Creed by the Emperor that Ijanished Arius to lUyricum and gave a sanction to the orthodox faith by punishing with death all persons found in possession of heretical writ- ings. From this moment religious faith became irretriev- ably committed to the varying fortunes of politics, and to the intrigues of eunuchs in the Emperor's palace. Wlien the Pagan Julian assumed the purple, lie swept all Christians out of public office with as little mercy and as systematic method as Tammany emj^loys when she replaces a Republican administration. On the other hand, as soon as Julian was replaced b}- a Christian emperor the reverse process took place; and under Theodosius the Church had become so strong that a INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 43 bishop was able to humiliate the Emperor himself by stopping him on the porch of the church and refusing him entrance to the sanctuary. " You have imitated David in his crime," said the audacious Ambrose; "imi- tate him also in his repentance." Nor did the Church hesitate to avail herself of her influence; she secured the confiscation of the property of the ancient faith, appropriated the revenues of its priests and vestals, and was not content till she secured the destruction of heathen temples in the provinces and their consecra- tion to the worship of Christ in Rome. But the Church was doomed speedily to suffer the consequences of her own aggression. She borrowed from the religion she destroyed much of its luxurious ritual and many of its most foolish superstitions. The idolatry of the ancient city became revived in the Chris- tian Church under the guise of the worship of Christian martyrs ; miracles were performed upon their relics, and the bones of malefactors fraudulently represented to be those of deceased saints were used to replenish her always emptying coffers. It has already been pointed out that the victories of Clovis were rendered permanent by the support he re- ceived from the bishops in his conquered territory. The conversion of Clovis, however, was not an isolated fact during this troubled period ; on the contrary, when- ever the barbarians came into contact with the Christian Church the latter led captivity captive by subduing her conquerors. So long as the barbarians refused communion with the See of Rome, so long they failed to found a State or attain civilisation ; but when, adopting Christianity, they acquired the socialising force which at that period seemed to radiate from the Papal chair, then, and then only, did they acquire the permanent settlement by 44 INDIVIDUALISM which alone was a record secured in history. And it seems immaterial whether the gospel was imposed upon them by the sword, or whether by the sword they con- quered it. The victorious Normans under Rollo, and the Tartar hordes subjugated by Henry the Fowler, were equally ungoverned and ungovernable until, the one by adopting Christianity and the others by submitting to it, imprinted the names of Normandy and Hungary per- manently upon the map of Europe. When Pepin, res- tive under the feeble yoke of the Merovingian Dynasty, asked whether he who maintained the crown should not also wear it, it was to Rome that he applied for an answer, and it was from Rome that the answer came. When later Charlemagne looked for a symbol under which he could extend his empire and consolidate it, it was to Rome he looked, and it was from Rome once more that the symbol came. And when the German kings sought the succession to the Carlovingian Empire, it was in Rome that they seized and assumed the impe- rial crown. But the power of the Christian idea must not be exag- gerated or misunderstood; Success did not alwaj-s attend upon Christian arms. Far from it. Not one of all the Christian peoples successfully resisted the Pagan pirates of Scandinavia; on the contrary, they were the terror of all Christian kings ; and Charlemagne is said to have shed tears when he saw their galle3-s in the Mediterranean. And yet, when they wrested the fairest province of France from the simple Charles, Cliristianity converted a race of adventurers into the future founders of the British Empire. The claim of the miraculous for the Roman Church must be left to those who write history in licr interests ; to political students her strength must be confined to, and may be explained by, a Jess mystical origin. INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 45 And yet, if we compare the conception of the Church entertained by Christ with the place occupied by the Church under her most illustrious prelates, it will be found that one is a wonderful and almost miraculous realisation of the other. The prayer which Christ dictated to his disciples is perhaps the finest expression of the Christian creed: "Our Father which art in Heaven; hallowed be Thy name ; Tliy kingdom come ; Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven." A universal Father; a universal king- dom ; a universal worship ; a universal peace, — these are the aims of Christianity. Nor is the word " kingdom " altogether figurative ; it is a kingdom not of this world, but nevertheless a kingdom ; and a kingdom that was spiritually to bind all the kingdoms of the earth, — Gens Sancta, a holy nation according to Saint Peter, and according to Saint Augustine, Civitas Dei, the kingdom of God. Now, whatever opinions we may entertain regarding the inconsistencies which disfigured the Christian faith and the crimes by which this faith was imposed upon the world; whatever may have been the deficiencies of the men through whom the Civitas Dei was founded ; whatever may have been the varying fortunes of Papal arms in the struCTCTle of the Church against the German Empire, it can hardly be contested that in the period which not long ago it was usual to characterise as the Dark Ages, but which to-day we have learned to regard as in one respect the most human of all the periods through which humanity has passed, there was estab- lished in Europe a moral power to which the kings of the earth submitted, and before which they laid down their arms. And this moral power governed not only rulers and princes, but it governed the mass of the people also, and entered into the lives of the men as 46 INDIVIDUALISM well as of the women of that time. And this is the testimony of lay historians as well as of the clergy. In his Twelfth Lecture ^ Guizot says : — " I must call your attention to a fact which stands at the head of all others, and characterises the Christian Church in general, — a fact which, so to speak, has decided its destiny. This fact is the unity of the Church, the unity of the Christian society, irrespectively of all diversities of time, of place, of power, of language, of origin. Wonderful plienotnenon ! It is just at tlie moment when the Roman Empire is breaking up and dis- appearing that the Christian Church gathers itself up and takes its definite form. Political unity perishes, religious unity emerges. Populations endlessly different in origin, habits, speech, destiny, rush upon the scene; all becomes local and particular ; every enlarged idea, every general institution, every great social arrangement, is lost sight of; and in this moment the Christian Church proclaims most loudly the unity of its teaching, the universality of its law. And from the bosom of the most frightful disorder the world has ever seen has arisen the largest and purest idea, perhaps, which ever drew men together, — the idea of a spiritual society." Bryce, again, points out that men " do not, cannot, un- derstand the intense fascination whicli tlie idea of one all-pervading Church exercised upon their mediaeval forefathers. "2 There is not an institution of the period but is founded upon a religious idea. When the Italian cities under- took to organise their own defence, their standards bore the image of Christ, and a priest said daily Mass at an altar placed in front of the sacred car; when the grocers of England united to protect their trade, tlieir first care was to fix tlie stipend of a priest who was to conduct their religious services and pray for their deadj when ■•^ Holy IJoiiKin Empire, 8th cd. pp. 373, 374. INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 47 brigandage and blood revenge were devastating the land, it was the Church which secured the Truce of God, out of which began the effort to render war less constant and less inhumane. The guild was religious ; the municipality which grew out of the guild was reli- gious ; and it was from religion that the King derived his title. Often and for many years together the Pope dictated the policy of nations, and as late as the fourteenth century, when the Papacy had already lost much of its |)ower, we see Clement VI. imposing peace on Philip of France and the victorious Edward of England. This was the Age of Faith, — the age -which erected all over Europe cathedrals instinct with the same idea ; which filled their Gothic arches with stained glass; which preached the Crusades, and, before expiring, CTuided the brush of Botticelli. And such was the power of this faith and such the unquestioning servility to it of the human mind, that it remained the dominant factor in the lives of men, al- though its ministers were in great part corrupt, violent, and unchaste. It is not necessary in this century to dwell on the dark side of the picture; for the dark side is doubtless more familiar than the bright. Our task must be rather to seek the causes of the decay which in undermining the Church of Rome undermined also the faith which had so long upheld her. The forces at work in Europe during the Middle Ages were strikingly similar to those already pointed out as operating in the Moslem Empire. There was the force of habit which constituted the animal machine ; there was the force of the Christian Idea, which never- theless influenced the human machine ; and there was be- hind this idea the organisation of the Church, guided by such men as the first and seventh Gregories. The idea 48 INDIVIDUALISM practised as well as taught by Christ and His apostles was an infinitely higher one than that which was ever effectually practised by the Mohammedans ; but by the time it had been corrupted by compromise with the Pa- gan worship of Rome on the one hand, and with the barbaric superstitions of the Goths on the other, it would be difficult to say whether it was an improvement as a social force on the Moslem faith. Two essential characteristics, however, served to distinguish it: it remained monogamous in the first place, and in the second it was preserved in its purity and handed down from one generation to another through the lives of a few holy men and women in communities similar if not identical with that founded by Saint Vincent of Paul. We should go far astray, however, if we attributed to the mass of the people the holy lives and motives which as a matter of fact were confined to a very few in- dividuals and associations. The vast majority was gov- erned by religious ideas as unholy and as inconsistent as those which governed their Ottoman invaders. Igno- rant people, whose lives are determined by habit, are like well-broken steeds ; it is immaterial who the rider is so long as he can sit the saddle and handle the reins. The liorse, whose habit has become one of su])mission, will obey the rider, whether he be a son of Belial or an angel of light. So will ignorant people remain subser- vient to the idea which possesses them, differing, how- ever, from the lower animal in this vital point, — that whereas the latter is controlled only by physical force, the former is amenable also to a spiritual idea. To what extent he is amenable to it; how far the idea can become corrupt and still command his obedience; at what point he will grow restive under it and throw it off, — is written in clearest characters in the history of the Age of Faith. INDIVIDULAISM IN HISTORY 49 At war with this force of a religions idea were the selfish motives which set men upon the satisfaction of their animal proj)ensities in spite of it; and these selfish motives not only set men upon using the Church to serve their purposes, but set the Church upon using them to maintain her power. One of the most fatal of the leg- acies which the Roman Empire left the Roman Church was temporal power ; for temporal power could only be maintained by the use of the same methods as were adopted by the temporal powers about her. Another, equally fatal, of these legacies was the habit of using methods which were irreconcilably inconsistent with the teaching of Christ. Our whole understanding of the Middle Ages is apt to be warped by the mistake of supposing that Constan- tine was converted by Christianity. Constantine was not converted by Christianity, but Christianity was cor- rupted by Constantine. It is not necessary to go so far as the French poet, who put into the mouth of Constantine, — ■ " Mais tous mes soins pour sa grandeur supreme N'eurent jamais d'autre objet que moi-meme ; Les saints autels n'etaient k mes regards Qu'un marchepied du trone des Cesars. L'or des chretiens, leurs intrigues, leur sang, Ont cimente ma fortune et mon rang ; " nor is it necessary to point to the fact that after his alleged conversion he murdered his own son, and post- poned his baptism till the hour of his death. These facts go to prove that Constantine did not practise the pre- cepts he preached ; but this must also be said of some of the most distinguished prelates of the Church. And even to-day the man who stands for all the evils against which Christ preached is maintained upon his throne by the so-called Christian Powers of Europe. We are 4 50 INDIVIDUALISM every one of us in our own time so inconsistent in every hour of our lives that mere inconsistency or an occa- sional crime furnishes no argument against a man's sin- cerity as the word is in practice understood amongst us. But the political student is concerned with facts more than with motives; and however pure or impure may have been the motives of Constantine, the fact remains that Justin Martyr's account of a Christian community is conformable with the teaching of Christ, whereas the change which came over the Christian Church through its adoption by Constantine was one which made such a community from that time forth impossible. It is not so much the fact that such communities disappeared subsequently to Constantino's adoption of Christianity as the fact that they must necessarily have disappeared, which is of interest to the political student. The mere fact of disappearance might be attributed to some other cause; but the intrinsic inconsistency be- tween the conditions necessary for the existence of such communities and the conditions wliich prevailed under the patronage of Constantine cannot be explained awa}'. As soon as the Church became a political machine, in the same sense as Tammany Hall is a political machine, because only through the favour of such a machine could public office be attained, that moment the Christian in the Church became swamped by the horde of office- seekers which invaded lier; that moment she became one of the instrumentalities througli which greed and ambition could secure their aim ; and that moment human passions were let loose upon her which made short work of charity and poverty of spirit. Singularly enough, although Christian virtues have been and are still practised by individuals all over the civilised world, it is difficult to find them practised INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 51 consistently and persistently by permanent groups, ex- cept in associations of men and women who are com- mitted by the rules of their order to a community life, and are thereby separated from the outside world. It is in convents and monasteries, among Sisters of Char- ity, among Shakers and Little Sisters of the Poor, that we find practised the precepts taught in the Sermon on the Mount : within these communities it seems possible to practise them ; outside of them men smile at the idea of attempting it. It ought not to be necessary to add to the foregoing arguments the obvious one to be drawn from the life of Constantine himself. No one familiar with the events of his reign can for a moment believe that his so-called conversion exercised much, if any, influence upon his conduct so far as the practice of virtue is concerned. All that can be said is that had he remained Pagan he might have been worse ; but in that case he would have to be ranked amongst the most infamous of an infamous line. If, on the other hand, we compare the life of the Imperial Court with that of the community described by Justin ^Martyr, the contrast becomes so striking as to provoke inquiry. Constantine led a Christian life no more than any of his successors; and this for a very simple reason. The virtues preached by Christ are essentially inconsis- tent with those necessary under existing conditions to maintain a throne ; the art of ruling a Christian king- dom consists in professing Christianit}^ and practising Paganism; the one is needed to secure Christian sub- mission from Christian subjects, and the other indispen- sable to protect the kingdom from wolfish kings. And so it ma}^ be said that the art of government has by the profession of Christian faith become the art of hypoc- 52 INDIVIDUALISM risy. Indeed, it may be said that hypocrisy, in the splendid career which it has made for itself through- out our modern civilisation, is peculiarly a product of Christianity, or rather of that compromise between Christianity and Paganism which dates from the reign of Constantine. We have heard so much of soi-disant Christian virtues and grown so restive under them, that it is with a sense of relief that we open our eyes to what may be called a characteristically Christian vice. In Greece and Rome there was no profession of universal love, of humility, of poverty of spirit ; on the contrary, morality there consisted of courage, sacrifice of self to the city, patriotism, chastity, and in fact those virtues which are necessary to a fierce and aggressive worship and defence of the home. Now all these virtues they not only preached, but practised. There were doubt- less hypocrites in those days also, and religion was used and abused then as now to serve the ambition of a priest or tyrant. But the mass of the people were not daily, hourly, corrupted by pretending to virtues which they in secret despised. How much did the haughty Hilde- brand, in his triumph over the barefooted and prostrate Henry, practise humility? How much poverty of spirit can we discover in the fighting prelates who succeeded one another during the eleventh and twelfth centuries in the See of Rome ? How much universal love is to be traced in the aggressive Christian nations which are now quarrelling over the still living limbs of China; or in the prayer of our own congressional cha])lain, who asks the Almighty to make us, through our Saviour Christ, "quick to resent"? Witli what secret derision does the business man of our own city and every otlier city in the world trample on these so-called Christian virtues in his daily struggle to increase his own wealth at the ex- pense of his neighbour ! And yet with what unctuous- INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 53 ness does this same citizen perform his duties as a ves- tryman on the so-called Lord's Day! Now in Greece and Rome there was but little of this kind of hypocrisy because there was but little need of it; there was no pretence of loving one's enemies ; on the contrar}^, there was a bold profession of hating them. There was no pretence of turning the other cheek; on the contrary, there was a wholesome respect for the blow which re- turned a blow. Above all, there was no pretence of humility. And this virtue, which is in one sense the highest because the most non-natural, would have ex- cited in the Greek and Roman only aversion and con- tempt. If their ideal was low, it was at any rate one not inconsistent with their daily life and their delib- erately constructed institutions; and if it encouraged ferocity and war, it at any rate rendered unnecessary the most contemptible of all vices, — because the most cowardly and the most refined, — hypocrisy. Were we to disregard this patent and indisputable fact, we should lose sight of one of the most powerful factors that have been at work in framing our mental constitu- tion ; we are every one of us to-day the product of the practice of hypocrisy during countless generations ; it has become as much a part of our mental habit as the taking of regular meals is a part of our bodily habit ; and it has created in us a capacity for inconsistency of which we are ourselves for the most part unconscious. We have to break through this crust of mental obliquity if we are to judge of political institutions justly; and if we fail to judge of them justly we are apt to have our crust broken for us by titanic forces which we have not had the sight to see or the understanding properly to appreciate. If we can rid ourselves of the blindness which the long practice of egotism and hypocrisy have fastened upon us, we may see things as they are and not as we want 54 INDIVIDUALISM to see them ; and a good test of our ability to do this is presented by our willingness to recognise the incontro- vertible fact that Christianity has been used to bolster government and scouted in the administration of it. This fact is not stated here by way of reproach, — far from it ; nothing in the world is more inconceivably im- possible than a Roman emperor practising Christianity. It would be as mad to reproach the sea for her wrecks as Constantine for his perversion. All we are concerned with here is the fact ; and if it is insisted upon at wearisome length it is because the fact is one which we have for centuries been persist- ently refusing to admit ; we still talk of our governments as Christian governments, and we have actually got to think of them as Christian governments. So long as this mental obliquity persists in us, we might as well give up the attempt usefully to study politics. As well ask a blind man to use a microscope. If, on the other hand, we are able to recognise that from the day Con- stantine prostituted a holy idea to prop up an unholy empire, although the Pagan Empire remained Pagan, the Christian Church ceased to be Christian, then we see things as they really were, and not as they are presented to us by a misleading vocabulary. The history of the Middle Ages will from this point of view turn out to be a struggle of humanitv with in- consistencies of which it was but dimly conscious ; and the habits of thought and action which this strucrcfle created constitute an essential factor in the political problems of to-day. The difference between the civili- sation of to-day and that of the Middle Ages is mainly this : until the Reformation faith was the controlling force among the masses ; since tlie Reformation faith as a force has diminished more and more. The influence INDIVIDUALISM IX HISTORY 55 of faith upon political institutions before the Reforma- tion and the effect of its disappearance upon institutions since that time are matters of paramount importance to political students. The power of faith ^ — that is to say, of a controlling religious idea — has already been referred to in the brief account given of Mohammedanism. The foi'ce which built up the western civilisation of the Middle Ages out of the ruins of the Roman Empire was of the same nature. In both cases the power of the religious idea to secure submission from, and arouse enthusiasm in, the masses of the people, has been used and abused with remorseless disregard for the effect of such abuse upon both religion and the people ; it was used by kings at one time, and by the Church at others, to push the interests of the crown and tiara respectively. Thus we find Pepin appealing to the Bishop of Rome for moral sanction of the usurpation of the French crown ; and we find the Pope in turn demanding his price for the sanction by an appeal to Pepin for succour in his contest with the Lon- gobardi. Pepin rewarded the Pope by wresting from the Lombards the ex-archate of Ravenna and by bestowing this ex-archate on the Pope, thereby laying the first sul> stantial foundations of his temporal power. But the power which a religious idea exerted on the masses of the people was too essential to the crown for kings to leave it where it belonged, — in the Christian Church ; and the Christian Church was too ambitious to leave temporal power where it belonged, — to so-called Chris- tian kings. We find, therefore, political power moving from the secular crown to the ecclesiastical tiara, and back again from the ecclesiastical tiara to the secular crown, according to the genius of those who respectively 1 For an explanation of the word "faith" as here used, see post, book ii. chap. vi. § 3. 56 INDIVIDUALISM wore them. Thus Charlemagne, who consented to re- ceive from the Church the moral sanction conferred by his coronation at Rome, did not hesitate to maintain his authority over the Church which gave that sanction ; for most of his capitularies relate to the discipline of the Church, There is no attempt in his laws to distinguish between those which are of a secular and those which are of an ecclesiastical order ; nor were these capitula- ries and ecclesiastical laws submitted to the bishop or the Pope; Charlemagne took his authority on ecclesi- astical as well as secular matters for granted. Never- theless, no king or emperor was more lavish in the privileges he allowed to the Church than he. Secure in the strength of his sword, he was at all times willing to strengthen his own hold upon his people by sti'engthen- ing the Church, through whom that hold was in part secured. This policy, however admirable in such a monarch as Charlemagne, proved disastrous to his feebler successors. Louis the Debonair was deposed by eccle- siastical authority ; it was an assembly of bishops that divided the dominions of Lothair between Charles the Bald and Louis of Bavaria ; and it was another assembly of bishops that handed over to Louis of Bavaria the kingdom of Charles the Bald. The ninth century has been called the Age of the Bishops, as the twelfth was that of the Popes. In England, as on the Continent, the bishops assumed control of secular affairs. It was the bishop of Winchester presiding as Papal Legate, at an assembly of the clergy in 1141, who arrogated to himself the riglit to put Matilda on the throne ; and the sub- mission of King Edwy to Archbishop Otho and Saint Dunstan sufficiently testifies to the power of the bishop in his day. The rise of the Papal power has been too often and too well described to make it necessary to repeat it here. INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 57 The gift to the Holy See of the ex-archate of Ravenna, taken in connection with the so-called False Decretals of Isidore ; the removal of the seat of the Roman Em- pire to Constantinople ; the recognition of the Pope by Charlemagne as the power from which the imperial crown was derived; the frequent and successful inter- ference of the Bishop of Rome in the determination of succession to the crown; the exorbitant power of censorship. which ultimately grew into that of excommu- nication and interdict ; the successful use of these in such cases as that of Robert of France, — could not but lift the Bishop of Rome above the other bishops of the world. But such power as that exercised by him inevitably resulted in abuse ; the conditions which raised the Bishop of Rome above that of all the princes of the earth could not fail to produce their results throughout the whole ecclesiastical system. It would be indeed amazing if a condition of things which within a hundred and fifty years deposed six popes, murdered two and mutilated one, should fail to demoralise those who derived their authority and ex- ample from the See of Rome ; the papal authority must have been weakened by the fact that often there were at the same time two and sometimes three popes in the field ; and the example offered by popes who filled their coffers by the sale of episcopal confirmations and of exemptions to monasteries could not but encourage a similar traffic throughout the whole hierarchy. The crozier was no longer conferred by the votes of the laity, but became an occasion of perpetual conflict between temporal rulers and the Pope ; it fell to him who had most men-at-arms at his back or most money in his pocket; a child of five years old sat in the episcopal chair of Rheims ; that of Narbonne was purchased for 58 INDIVIDUALISM another ctiild of ten ; vows of celibacy were habitually broken, and unchastity became the rule rather than the exception. Indeed, the corruption during this period became so rank and universal that it seems difficult to understand how the Church retained its hold upon the faith of men. But in this respect the condition of the Church in the Middle Ages resembles that of politics in our own ; wherever we look to-day over our political field we seem to see vice triumphant, and yet, as has been said elsewhere, it is astonishing to have to recognise that the worst of legislatures often enact the best of laws, and that the best of laws are in turn handed over to the ad- ministration of the worst of public officers. The reason of this will be discussed in its proper place, but it may be pointed out here that in view of the inherent vice of man it is astonishing how virtuous he is ; that, in other words, although, since the beginning of things, he has been surrounded by conditions which tend to make him more and more evil, he has as a matter of fact been becoming more and more good. And just as in our own day govern- ment seems to be in the hands of purely self-seeking politi- cians, and just as in the Middle Ages the Church seems to have been in the hands of a purely self-seeking hie- rarchy, so now, as then, there has been a saving force in the community which lias preserved the wholesomeness of both Church and State throughout every corrupting environment ; this saving force is the salt which keeps the sea wholesome, though the sea is the reservoir into wliich is poured all that is corrupt in the world ; it is the vital spark which keeps our heart beating, though without us and within us teem everywhere the seeds of death. Now, this view of the plain facts which confront us everywhere seems clearly to indicate the direction our stutlies should take : is tlicrc salt enough to take care of the corruption that prevails in the world? Is INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 59 there vital force enough to save the soul which is still struggling for the mastery in the lives of our institu- tions and ourselves? These questions resolve themselves into two : what is the strength of the soul in us and what is the strength of the corru]3ting environment ? And if it is true that the environment is in great part the work of our own hands, then the inquiry whetlier this work is of a charac- ter to keep alive the soul in us or to lay it low becomes altogether the most important inquiry about which we can at all be engaged. But if we allow ourselves to be hypnotised by the power of mere words ; if, because we have been so long- accustomed to reg^ard the words " Christian Church " as involving the idea that the Church has remained Christian, we are unable to recog- nise the undoubted fact that the Church ceased to be Cliristian ^ as soon as it became converted into a political machine, we are unfitted to estimate the work of our own hands, and therefore incapable of correcting it. And the importance of keeping the unchristian char- acter of the Christian Church well in view is felt the moment we inquire into the reasons wh}^ a vigorous and in great part successful effort of the people towards self- government marked the eleventh and succeeding cen- turies throughout the whole of Europe. ^ It must not be imagined that this conception of the Church is incon- sistent with a devoted loyalty to it. "VVe cannot be held responsible for incidents which occurred fifteen hundred years ago ; but we can be held responsible for refusing to see things to-day as they are, because it is in- convenient to do so. If, as a matter of fact, the Church is to-day a party to a scheme of society and government which is inconsistent with the doc- trine of Christ, it becomes our duty, not to abandon the Church, but to use all the power of the Church to restore society and government to com- pliance with the doctrine we profess. There is no organised power in ex- istence to-day so potent for social and political reform as the Church, provided only those in control over it will open their eyes to the truth and courageously act in conformity to it. 60 INDIVIDUALISM § 3. Decay of the Religious Idea and Growth of THE Idea of Individualist Governrient Nothing could exceed the patience and submissiveness of the people prior to the eleventh century : the habit of submission made them equally responsive to the call to arms of their feudal lord, or to the call to church of their ecclesiastical superiors ; but the perplexity and injustice to which they were submitted by the soldier turned churchman at one moment and the churchman turned soldier at another, coupled with an awakening sense of injury at the hands of both alternately, found an oppor- tunity of expression in the eleventh century of which those who furnished the opportunity were destined to be the dupes. There is probably no fact in history more amazing in its nature or more powerful in its results than the sudden inoculation of Europe by a religious frenzy that snatched alike the baron from his castle and the peasant from his hut, and dashed them against the walls of Jerusalem. It is an illustration of tlie power of the religious idea to which suificient reference has already been made, and upon which it is unnecessary again to expatiate. But it is also a still more striking illustration of how the religious enthusiasm of one por- tion of the people can be made to serve the selfish inter- ests of another. The extent to which the Church profited materially from the Crusades has often been pointed out ; as, for example, through tlie strengtli she gained by the drawing away from Europe of the turbulent nobility that contested with her the control of manorial liefs ; throucrh tlie property she acquired from this very nobility, who in borrowing money upon their estates in order to obey the exhortations of the Church, permitted the Cliurch to buy in these estates during their absence in the Holy Land. But these are of small importance to the political INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 61 student by the side of the larger fact that by drafting away from Europe at the same time the religious enthu- siasts who made the people subservient to the Church and the rascally barons who kejDt the people in terrified sub- servience to their manorial lords, the Crusades left be- hind them a population that, because it was not easily excited, was for that reason more capable of deliberate purpose, and because it was no longer overawed by the force of arms was for that reason capable of successful efforts towards self-government. The Crusades furnish startling evidence of the power of the Church from one point of view, and from another mark the period of her decline ; for, in the first place, they killed off many of her devoutest followers, and in the second place they furnished an opportunity for society to organise upon purely individualist lines ; and this kind of organisation is not consistent with blind subservience to a relisfious idea. The development of the city republics in Italy, of the communes in France, of the German towns in the Hanseatic League, and of the borougks in England during the eleventh and succeeding centuries is worthy of a moment's thought. As soon as the strong arm of Charlemagne was re- moved by death from the control of the Empire, the people became a prey to the conflict between rival lords, — sometimes both of them lay lords, — sometimes one lay and the other ecclesiastical ; it would be difficult to say which was the more oppressive of the two ; for while the lay domination was generally the more violent, the ecclesiastical was the more persistent; and in England at any rate it is clear that the boroughs found it more difficult to emancipate themselves from the tyranny of church communities than from those of lay lords ; be- cause whereas the latter were apt at some time to weaken through the weakness of one of their line, the former, 62 INDIVIDUALISM like all clerical corporations, had behind them the never- dying traditions and organisation of the Church. Now it is a remarkable fact that as soon as the first Crusades had drafted off to Palestine a population of nearly a million, very few of which ever returned, we find efforts at self-government in France becoming successful ; the date of the first crusade is 1096 to 1099 ; and it is between 1100 and 1112 that the co7n'munes jurees were formed at Noyon, Beauvais, St. Quentin, and Laon. The struggle had indeed begun before: the burghers of Amiens, for example, had allied themselves with those of Corbie as early as 1025 with a view to putting an end to the perpetual private wars which by dividing them kept them under the yoke of their manorial lords ; but the very terms of this alliance show how subject to their lords spiritual as well as temporal they at the time were. The alliance was essentially a religious one ; it provided for an annual meeting of the inhabitants of both towns at one of the great feasts of the Church ; for a procession in which were to be carried the relics of their saints ; for solemn oaths taken under the sanction of the Church ; and for a licaring of all mattei's of dispute in front of the cathedral and "in the presence of the bishop and the count." The whole story of the struggle of Amiens for self-government is typical and interesting : the town is divided as to matters of jurisdiction between the bishop and the count, — the one having jurisdiction over tlie cathedral and its neighbourhood and the other having jurisdiction over iho rest; nor is the authority of the king unrepresented; the "castillon," a veritable citadel built out of the ruins of a Roman palace and succeeding to its traditions, is tlie domain of the king and tenanted by liis "chatelain," who enjoys the title of "Prince de la CAt6 ; " the people have lost their rights ; they no longer elect their bishops, as they did in the seventh INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 63 centur}^, or their judges (scabini), as in the eighth; on the contrary, the right to judge the people is the source of perpetual quarrels between the bishop and the count ; and the reason why this privilege is prized may be gath- ered from the first charter which an alliance between the people and the bishop wrung from the count, for this charter provides that a burgher accused of theft shall have the right to be confronted by his accuser and his witnesses, and shall not, after having been fined by one of the judges of the count, be rearrested and fined once more b}' another judge. It seemed to be taken for granted as a manorial right which it was impossible to abolish, that the burghers should, whenever the " vidame " was in need of money, be arrested upon a trumped-up charge of theft and fined without trial ; but the charter conceded that the same burgher should not be arrested and fined without at least being confronted by an accuser, and that he should not be tried for the same offence l^y as many vidames as the count chose to appoint in Amiens I Such were the abuses and such the pitiful measiu-e of relief which at the close of the eleventh cen- tury the people were able to secure. But as soon as the Crusades had drawn away much of the strength of the nobility and some of the weak- ness of the people, we see Laon engaged in a furious campaign against the bishop and the king, which ended after three years in the triumph of the people ; and Amiens, the scene of a no less bloody conflict, in which at one time the town, having by the payment of a large sum of money purchased a charter from Louis le Gros, is supported by both the king's chatelain and the bishop against the count ; and at another, deserted by the chatelain, is holding its own against both count and king. We see the town securing against the count the alliance of his own son, the famous or rather infamous 64 INDIVIDUALISM Thomas de Marie ; we see this same Thomas using his alliance with the town in order to secure terms with his father at one time, and at another deserting the town and joining the ranks of the count ; we see the king, fearing the strength of this alliance, joining once more the town and the bishop ; and after a struggle of four years deposing the count (1117) and putting in his place a rival claimant in the person of Raoul I. This last count granted to Amiens its first veritable charter. It was out of such struggles as these that the people gained their rights, — struggles in which it is difficult to trace any consistent action among the abusing powers ; for if in one town we find, as in Amiens, the bishop supporting the people, in another, as in Laon, it is the bishop who is fighting the people ; and if in one the king is on the side of the oppressed, as in Amiens, in another, as in Laon, he is on the side of the oppressor. There is no notion of justice or right ; it is a struggle of selfishness operating sometimes through intrigue, sometimes through treachery, and always with violence and the shedding of blood. It is not sur[)rising that under these conditions the influence of faith should at last cease to be paramount : we can see it dwindle away in the history of this very town; the religious character of the alliance between Amiens and Corl)ie slowly disappears; the relics and the clergy no longer play a part in the procession ; and prayer is replaced by dancing and kindred diversions. Faith could not long survive under a rdgime as de- structive to it as that which prevailed when tlie weak- ness of the successors of Charlemagne tempted the Church to join in the general scramble for political power and wealtli. The bishops can be heard saying, in the words of one of our own contemporaneous states- INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 65 men, " Why should not we too play for our legitimate share of the great stake ? " ^ — and share they did, not only in the " great stake," but also in the degrading, the bloody, and the anti-Christian scramble for it. The influence of the Crusades, however, in bringing this result must not be exaggerated ; for there was another factor at work more positive in its action and more powerful in its effect. Whenever a devastating force such as that of the barbarians, during the years which ushered in the Middle Ages, sweeps over history, we observe after a brief spell of discouragement a rejuvenescence of the constructive force which origin- ally created the civilisation just destroyed ; this re- juvenescence does not need explanation ; and if it did, no explanation could be given ; it is a fact, it is the fact of life, as to the cause of which we know nothing, and our ignorance regarding which we all often illogi- cally ignore. Just as the more — within certain limits — we cut a hedge, the more it grows ; the more we trim a tree, the more it blossoms ; the more we destroy life, the more life teems, — so within similar limits the more we destroy institutions, the more vigorously new institutions spring up to take their place. But this rejuvenescence can only occur within certain limits, and it is the art of the statesman as of the gardener to know what tliese limits are. Let us give to this question a moment's consideration. § 4. Forces at Woek in the Development of THE Idea of Individualist Government The crafty minority which is for ever seeking to plunder the uncrafty multitude has an interest in 1 N, Y. "Times," January 28, 1898. Plea of Charles Emory Smith for the annexation of Hawaii by the United States. 5 66 INDIVIDUALISM the prosperity of its prey ; and it is generally when the governing minority fails to understand this that it is overthrown. The Indian tribes were as careful to preserve the herds of buffalo upon which they respec- tively depended for food as we have been reckless in destroying them ; Tammany remains in power in New York city so long as in the shearing of us it does not cut to the bone; and the Church preserved her authority over her flock until her oppression and exactions made it less intolerable to resist than to submit to her. What are the forces at work in this singular relation between the robber and the robbed ? The food of the buffalo is grass ; the food of the Indian is not grass, but buffalo ; in this case the robber and the robbed do not compete for the same food ; on the contrary, the robber has an interest in securing the finest pasture for his pre}'. If the herd be left to its natural increase, it will tend to grow too large for its food supply ; and until the effect of the insufficient supply shall either have occasioned migration to other pastures or killed off the weakest members of the herd, the herd will suffer. The intelligent killing of the members of the herd with which it can most easily dispense, such as the conquered bulls and the barren cows, will feed the Indian and improve the herd ; the unintelligent massacre of the best-producing bulls and the fertile cows will not furnish better food to the Indian, but will end by impoverishing his supply. Here we have in its inception the application of in- telligence to the predatory system ; and this new prin- ciple is beneficent to both the predator and his prey; it secures the best food to both. The forces at work are threefold, — two tliat belong to nature and one that belongs to art ; the two that belong to nature are, first, the reproductive force of the INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 67 herd which, ceteris paribus^ can be counted upon within certain limits to replace those that are consumed by the carnivore ; and, secondly, the predatory instinct of the carnivore. The force that belongs to art is the intelli- jjence which understands the limits within which the reproductive force of nature can be counted on and the individuals in the herd upon which the j)redatory se- lection can most advantageously be exercised. In other words, we see three forces confronting one another : the reproductive force of nature unexplained and in- explicable ; the natural or unintelligent destruction exercised by the carnivore, which is wasteful and in- jurious ; the artistic or intelligent selection exercised by man and involving some self-restraint, which is economical and beneficent to both. Government, unenlightened by religion, tends to be an application to human society of the art which the Indian applies to the herd of buffaloes ; it is the alli- ance of selfish intelligence, or craft, with the natural predatory instincts of man in the intelligent minority, for the purpose of preying, to the greatest advantage to themselves, upon the majority, which does not possess this intelligence to the same degree. Another new element introduced by man into society is a certain conscious and more or less deliberate con- sent in the unintelligent majority to the beneficent gov- ernment of the minority. This brings into play and into contrast two elements in the unintelligent minority : the predominating one, which is natural, and is common to the buffalo herd, — namel}', the habit of submission ; and the other, which is non-natural, and only inchoate in the herd, — namely, deliberate consent. Let us now set down graphically the forces here in operation. 68 INDIVIDUALISM UNCOXSCIOUS CONSCIOUS FORCES THAT BELONG TO FORCES THAT RESULT IN NATURE. ART. In the Predator. Predatory iustiuct. Force of intelligent recog- nition of advantages that result from self-restraint in government. In the Prey. Force of reproduction and Force of intelligent recogni- life. tion of advantages that Force of instinct of submis- result from submission to sion. intelligent government. With the forces on the left of the page — that is to say, the unconscious forces that belong to nature — we have become familiar in our study of the predatory system as it prevails in the lower animals. On the other hand, the forces on the right of the page — that is to say, the conscious forces that result in art — char- acterise human society, and constitute a large part of the characteristics which differentiate societies of men from societies of lower animals. We cannot too much insist upon the fact that the forces on the right of the page — that is to say, the conscious forces that result in art — do not replace those on the left of the page, or the unconscious forces that belong to nature. On the contrary, the former are added to the latter, and in different periods of history they are found to be operat- ing in different proportions ; for example, in every period in which civilisation is advancing, the conscious forces that result in art prevail over the unconscious forces that belong to nature ; whereas during the periods in which civilisation is in decay the unconscious INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 69 forces that belong to nature prevail over the conscious forces that result in art. Thus, in the periods which we have already briefly studied/ during which Lycurgus was establishing a quasi-community in Sparta, or Solon was imposing a constitution on Athens, or Servius Tullius was creating a municipal religion in Rome, there were operating both of the conscious forces on the right of the page. There was on the part of those who governed a recognition that only by self-restraint could government be conducted for the benefit of the governing as well as the governed classes ; and there was amongst those who were governed an intelligent apprehension of the benefits which intelligent govern- ment could secure from their submission ; but the play of these forces in no way prevented the operation at the same time of the unconscious forces that belong to nature ; for although there was doubtless an intelligent apprehension of the advantages that result from sub- mission in the multitude, it is probable that the natural habit of submission was by far the greater force ; and although a few such men as the law-makers above referred to undoubtedly entertained an intelligent ap- prehension of the necessity of self-restraint in the gov- erning classes, there can hardly be a doubt but that a vast majority of the governing classes was animated by the same predatory instinct which in the otter destroys far more fish than it can consume. Now, the predominance of the conscious forces over the unconscious forces in society, or that of the uncon- scious forces over the conscious forces, is not a matter of mere accident, but, on the contrary, is the necessary result of conditions which succeed one another as cer- tainly as night succeeds the day, or day succeeds the night again ; and the operation of this law of succession 1 Vol. i. book ii. ch. iv. 70 INDIVIDUALISM is due to the fact just observed that the unconscious forces that belong to nature, and the conscious forces that result in art, are always operating at the same time in human society, though in different degrees, for as soon as the governing classes grow prosperous, through the operation of self-restraint on their part and submission on the part of the governed, they tend to be rendered by this prosperity unfit for self-restraint; then the predatory instinct seizes the reins of govern- ment, and the withdrawing from the governed of the advantages which result from intelligent government incites the governed majority to rebellion, and incapaci- tates the governing minority for the task of holding their own. If, in the struggle that ensues, the governed majority does not produce intelligence capable of understanding and applying the doctrine of self-re- straint, the result is anarchy. Now, anarchy means the absolute domination of the unconscious forces that belong to nature ; ^ and it lasts until, out of the anguish that results from it, there is restored to the community the willingness to exert self-restraint on the part of the intelligent minority, and the willingness to submit on the part of the unintelligent majority. Then the game of government begins again only to repeat the story of tyrann}^ and its punishment. This is a well-worn thenie, and is illustrated by in- numerable instances in the histories of all tlie towns of Ancient Greece, of Mediaeval Italy, and of our own cities in the United States ; it has been referred to here for the purpose of pointing out the essential character- istics which distinguish the career of human society from that of the lower animals. With these last the ^ It may be contended that the domination of conscious forces will also in a perfect state result in anarchy. This may be, but the possibility of such a consummation is too remote to require consideration here. INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 71 forces at work are all automatic and indeliberate ; whereas in human societies there is the added element of deliberate self-restraint on the part of the govern- ing classes and deliberate submission on the part of the governed. But we have here considered only the operation of deliberate purpose unenlightened or uninspired by a re- ligious idea. The political effect of a religious idea has already been discussed, and the effort has been made to show that by eliminating the distracting effect of selfish- ness it can concentrate the otherwise dissipated forces of individuals and create a socialising force of unexampled power. It has been intimated that if the religious idea be as enlightened as that taught by Christ and be not inconsistent with social institutions, it might serve to break up the vicious circle in which the mere play of self- ishness seems to keep us. We are not yet sufficiently advanced in our historical resume to proceed with this part of our inquiry, but we are sufficiently advanced in it to recognise just where religion is to be classed in the scheme of forces at work in society; clearly, to the extent to which it is unperverted by selfishness, it belongs to the right of our page — that is to say, to tlie conscious forces that result in art; and clearly it serves to enhance the tendency of the governing classes to govern for the benefit of tlie governed, and of the governed classes to submit to the powers that be. Unfortunately, however, the force of religion can be abused, and tends always to be abused by the crafty minority who are pushed by selfishness to the employ- ment of every weapon useful for the attainment of their end. And so religion tends to operate in the vicious circle very much as intelligence does ; that is to say, at one period they both induce the governing minority to govern for the benefit of the governed and induce the 72 INDIVIDUALISM governed majority to submit to a government from which they benefit ; while at a subsequent period, when the governing minority have been corrupted by the en- joyment of power, and rendered unfit thereby for the exercise of it, the spark of religion left burning in the hearts of the multitude arouses its latent intelligence and serves to kindle the torch of Reformation and Revolt. It might seem as though the conclusion to be drawn from this view would be that religion offers no escape from the dreary treadmill of democracy and despotism ; but upon this point it may be well to suspend judgment until we have brought our historical r^sum^ down to the present date. The analysis of the forces at work in human society has been introduced here, because it seems important to distinguish, by the aid of it, the development of local government in France from its development in the rest of the world. The length of time that it takes a kettle to boil depends upon two things: the amount of heat under the kettle and the weight of air above it. Just in the same way the length of time that it takes a community to organise out of a condition of anarchy depends upon two things : the vital force within it, and the hostile forces without. Organisation then can be encouraged in two ways : either by increase of the force within or diminution of tlie obstacles without. In France organ- isation was helped by the diminution of both kinds of obstacles, — the internal obstacle, arising from the super- stitious submission of the people ; and the external obstacle, arising from the strength of the oppressing manorial lords. Both of these obstacles were diminished by the Crusades ; but it must not be concliulcd that be- cause the Crusades, in diminishing these obstacles, per- INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 73 mitted the organisation of the communes, therefore the communes would not have come into existence but for the Crusades. This is neither philosophically probable nor historically true, for the burghers of Mans, profiting by the absence in England of William the Bastard, revolted before the close of the tenth century, and, although re- conquered by William, in 1073 secured from him their municipal franchises ; and those of Cambrai profited by the absence of their bishop at the imperial court as early as 957, and in spite of jaerpetual defeats, in one of which the Christian prelate cut off the hands and feet of his prisoners and branded them upon the forehead, they maintained the struggle until a charter was conceded to them in 1076. So also it is impossible to explain by the direct action of the Crusades the rise of city republics in Italy, the prosperity of the Hanseatic towns in the north, and the growth of local government in England. These seem all of them due to the division and struggle for political power of the Crown, the Noble, and the Church, during the course of which the burghers secured the lib- erties which otherwise would longer have been denied them. But the conditions of the struggle are by no means the same, and in their variety is much instruc- tion. In Italy the conflict of the German Emperor with the Pope was doubtless the occasion which per- mitted the burghers first to drive the nobles out of their cities, and later to compel their residing within them ; but the Italian cities would hardly have maintained their struggle with the nobility as long and as success- fully as they did, were it not for the re-entrance upon the scenes of the familiar but for some centuries eclipsed factor, — the factor of wealth. And here we come once more upon the influence of the Crusades, indirect in this instance, but none the less potent ; for it was the Cru- sades that opened up the trade with the East ; it was 74 INDIVIDUALISM the trade of the East that poured wealth into Italy and raised within its cities a class of rich merchants capable not only of successfully resisting but actually of con- quering their old manorial lords ; it was this wealth which, seeking new markets, crept along the valley of the Rhine, and, feeling the need of protection from the robber barons who occupied its banks and levied prohibitory tariffs on its traffic, grouped together the cities interested in this trade into a league that for some centuries was one of the most important political factors in Europe. The Hanseatic League maintained its power until the general use of the mariner's compass, by per- mitting trade to pass through and beyond the Straits of Gibraltar, transferred political power from the forces of the land to those of the sea; created great maritime nations, such as Holland, Spain, and Great Britain, and set the soldier below the merchant by making the one the servant of the other. From this moment the his- tory of Europe becomes the history of its trade ; violence yields more and more to diplomacy; and men fight less for honour and more for wealth. This is the period during which militarism yields to industrialism ; and in view of the eulogy of industrialism which has for the last hundred years served as the constant theme of poli- tical economists and political philosophers, it is a matter of no small moment for us to pause awhile and consider just what this conversion is and what it has effected. But in order to make the comparison a sufficient one it may be well to close our study of the age of militarism by describing one of its more characteric manifestations, — one which brought the profession of the soldier to its loftiest ideal, and degraded it at last to its basest pur- pose, — the so-called institution of chivalr}'-. INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 75 § 5. The Idea of Chivalry If there is any one quality which distinguishes the military spirit from the commercial it is — generosity. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that there is room for generosity in warfare, but there is little room for it in commerce. Assuredly, we have seen it but little exercised in the one, whereas we have often seen it aui- matinor and restraininsr the other. The successful Lanark manufacturer who endeavoured to introduce it into his business died poor and discouraged ; and those manu- facturers who have succeeded along the lines of benevo- lence have done so only because they knew the limits within which it paid. When it ceases to pay, it has to be abandoned ; and the essential feature of the competi- tive system is that in the end competition will at last reduce benevolence to a point where it will no longer pay. Then it has to go to the wall. Now, although warfare is the condition of brutes rather than of men, it has the advantage over industrialism that it encourages two virtues which are conspicuous by their absence from the latter, — generosity and courage ; and it is the enemy of one vice which we have already described as the peculiar fruit of perverted Christianity, — hypocrisy. Generosity particularly characterises the mythology of the north ; with Norman pirates it was a matter of honour not to fight with weapons that could destroy at a distance and not to attack an enemy inferior in numbers to themselves ; it was consistent with this barbaric sense of self-respect that they refrained for twenty-four hours from dressing their wounds, and never would lower a sail because of a storm. This is the spirit that underlies chivalry and finds expression in the maxim noblesse oblige ; and this is the spirit which developed the four cardinal 76 INDIVIDUALISM virtues of chivalry, — generosity and gentleness, loyalty and courage. One of the first historical characters in whom we find these qualities conspicuously united was William of the Iron Arm, the Norman count of Apulia, and succeeding him came Richard Coeur de Lion, the Black Prince, Guesclin, and Bayard. If we go to literature for an account of chivalry, we shall find its ideal personated in Arthur, Lancelot, Amadis of Gaul, and Palmerin of England; and whether in his- tory or in literature we shall be struck by conflicting inconsistencies which make it difficult to decide whether chivalry was a very good thing or a very bad. How divided our modern authors are upon this point may be gathered from the very opposite accounts of it which we owe to Edmund Burke and Professor Freeman. Burke says : — " Never, never more shall we behold the generous loyalty of rank and sex, that proud submission, that dignified obe- dience, that subordination of the heart which kept alive even in servitude itself the spirit of an exalted freedom ; " and, he adds, " that sensibility of principle, that chastity of hon- our which felt a stain like a wound, which inspired courage whilst it mitigated ferocity, which ennobled whatever it touched, and under which vice itself lost half its evil by losing all its grossness." Freeman says : — **The chivalrous spirit is above all things a class spirit. The good knight is bound to endless fantastic courtesies towards men, and still more towards women of a certain rank ; he may treat all below that rank with any degree of scorn and cruelty. The spirit of chivalry implies the arbi- trary choice of one or two virtues to be practised in such an exaggerated degree as to become vices, while the ordi- nary laws of right and wrong are forgotten. The false code of honour supplants the laws of the Commonwealth, the law INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 77 of God, and the eternal principles of right. Chivalry again in its military aspect not only encourages the love of war for its own sake without regard to the cause for which war is waged, it encourages also an extravagant regard for a fantastic show of personal daring which cannot in any way advance the objects of the siege or campaign which is going on. Chivalry, in short, is in morals very much what feu- dalism is in law : each substitutes purely personal obliga- tions — obligations devised in the interests of an exclusive class — for the more homely duties of an honest man and a good citizen." The divergence of opinion of two such authorities stimulates the inquiry which of these two men is right, and how, if at all, can they be reconciled ; and if we follow out the line of argument which has been already followed in tracing the relation of the Church to the State, we shall, I think, find the explanation of this divergence and perhaps its reconciliation in a similar relation between the Church and knighthood. Just as there was and is still an irreconcilable incon- sistency between the Church and the institutions of the ancient and modern State, so there was and must always be an irreconcilable inconsistency between the gospel of peace and the profession of violence; the Church may bolster the State for a time, but in the end the State will drag the Church down ; the Church may miti- gate the horrors of war, but in countenancing them she is to herself untrue ; and if she raises the ideal of the soldier she does so at the fatal price of her own sincer- ity. Let us look at the facts, and see how far they support this argument. If we are to believe Sybel, the period which immedi- ately preceded the Crusades was as wretched as any re- corded in history. It was in a desperate effort to put an end to this barbarism that there was instituted about 78 INDIVIDUALISM 1041 the Truce of God, by virtue of wliich private war was subjected to limitations of time and place, and every church was converted into a sanctuary, into which it was sacrilege for private war to penetrate. But it is doubt- ful whether even the solemn censure pronounced against the license of private war by the council of Clermont in 1095 would have proved effectual in arresting it had the turbulent element in which it flourished not been drawn off to Palestine by the Crusades and educated there in a new school animated by something of a Chris- tian spirit. In preaching the Crusades, although the Church undertook the impossible task of inspiring the soldier with the spirit of Christ, she accomplished the very practical result of reviving in the soldier of the eleventh century something of the generosity which characterised the pirate of the eighth. The conception of knighthood which resulted from this undertaking can best be understood by referring to the accounts given of it by contemporaneous poets and to the system of education by which it was inculcated. Chaucer describes a knight in this fashion : — " And ever more he had a sovereign prize,^ And thoup;h that he was worthy he was wise, And of his port as meek as is a maid, He never yet no villany ne said In all his life unto no manner wight. He was a very perfect gentle knight." And Sir Thomas Malory puts into the mouth of Sir Ector this eulogy of him who was betrayed by love into treachery to his friend and king : — " ' Ah, Launcelot,' he said, 'thou were head of all Christian knights ! And now, I dare say,' said Sir Ector, ' thou, Sir Launcelot, there thou liest, that thou were never matched of earthly knight's hands ; and thou were the courtliest ^ Praise. INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 79 knight that ever bare shield ; and thou were the truest friend to thy lover that ever bestrode horse ; and thou were the truest lover, of a sinful man, that ever loved woman ; and thou were the kindest man that ever strake with sword; and thou were the goodliest person ever came among press of knights ; and thou were the meekest man and the gentlest that ever ate in hall among ladies ; and thou were the sternest knight to thy mortal foe that ever put spear in the rest. ' " The generosity and the gentleness Chivalry borrowed from Christ ; but the loyalty has across it a bar sinister. And yet chastity was one of the virtues demanded of the true knight. " To love one maiden and to cleave to her " is the law of the Round Table ; and Milton, in writing of the lofty " fables and romances " of knighthood, says : " I learned what a noble virtue chastity sure must be, to the defence of which so many worthies, by such a dear adventure of themselves, had sworn." And assuredly the story of Amadis Nicolse and Nicoleth are in this respect jewels of the purest water, and justify the lines of Spenser, — " For unto knight there is no greater shame Than lightness and inconstancy in love." So also in the education of youth during those days, to borrow the words of Ben Jonson, — " Every house became an academy of honour." At the age of seven or eight years the boy or damoi- seau becomes the constant attendant of his master and his mistress. He accompanies the one to the chase, and serves the other in her chamber. From the one he learns the use of weapons in the hunt, from the other the rudiments of religion, of rectitude, and of love. At the age of fifteen or sixteen he becomes a squire, but 80 INDIVIDUALISM generally remains the personal attendant of the same master and the same mistress. He is gradually accus- tomed, however, to military exercises and sports involv- ing hardship. He is expected to choose his lady love, to worship her with reverence and in secret. Gradually his duties in his lady's chamber diminish and those in the field increase ; he becomes the armiger of his lord, and learns loyalty and courage in the defence of liim against the enemy. After six or seven years of such service in the field he becomes a candidate for knight- hood. This knighthood is conferred by accolade, after the performance of some knightly deed by virtue of which he becomes "chevalier au nom de Dieu et de mon seigneur St. George pour la foy et justice loyale- ment garder et I'^glise, femes, vesves, et orphelins de- fender ; " or he is knighted with the religious ceremonies that are beautifully pictured in the frescoes of the Boston Library. Placed under the care of two " esquires of honour, grave and well seen in courtship and nurture, and also in the feats of chivalry," he is, after due in- struction, placed in the bath, — a ceremony which re- minds us of the lustrations of Ancient Rome and of the baptism of the Christian Church. Before he withdraws from the bath the sign of the cross is imprinted upon his shoulder ; he is then clothed in a white shirt, and over it is placed a " robe of russet, like unto that of an hermit." He is escorted by two " ancient and grave knights " and preceded by the sporting and dancing of minstrels making melody. But he does not yet share in the festival. He has still before him the vigil of arms until sunrise. After a night of prayer he confesses to the priest, hears matins, takes the holy sacrament, and consecrates a taper " to the honour of God and to the person that makes him a knight." He is then dressed in the garments of a knight, and his future squire rides INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 81 in front of him bearing his sword by the point in its scabbard and his spurs hanging from its hilt. When he reaches the baronial hall the most noble and gentle knight present fastens the right spur to his right heel, signing the candidate's knee with the sign of the cross ; in like manner another noble and gentle knight fastens the left spur to his left heel ; then he who is to create the knight girds the sword about the youth, who, laying his right hand on the altar, promises to support and de- fend the Church, and, ungirding his sword, offers it to God. Then are pronounced the solemn words, " If you do anything contrary to the order of Chivalry (which God forbid), I shall hack the spurs from your heels." So much had this ceremony become one of the func- tions of the Church, that the form for the presenting or consecration of new knights is included in the Pontifi- cale Roman um and the Manual of Common Prayer in use in England before the Reformation. It has been already pointed out that this education attempted to wed the virtues of the man of peace to those of a man of war ; it has still to be pointed out that it substituted for the love of God the love of woman. Both of these attempts had their good and their evil consequences : they introduced humanity into warfare ; but by making warfare humane they made it meritorious ; they raised the ideal of womanhood; but in lifting woman upon the altar they withdrew from it the wor- ship of God. One thing, however, they did in some measure accomplish : they diminislied the practice of hypocrisy by eliminating the temptation to it. The knight could boldly and without insincerity practise what he preached ; not so the Church, however, which became the sanction for violence as well as poverty of G 82 INDIVIDUALISM spirit, and in preaching the virtue of one to the feudal lord it enjoined the necessity of the other on the unre- generate Turk. And the love of Christ, which had ceased any longer to animate the Christian heart, was replaced by that for a woman, whose chastity it became a privilege for the knight to warrant and defend. It was the comparative sincerity of this new religion which in great part made its strength ; and it is impossible to read ancient chronicles without glowing with sympathy for men who court danger rather than avoid it and with- out reverence for the women whose lofty standards in- spired such "dear adventure." § 6. Decay of the Idea of Chr^alry But it is the doom of man to suffer the necessary consequence of every inconsistency ; and this futile attempt to square religion with institutions instead of squaring institutions with religion resulted in two codes to which we cannot attach too much importance : the code of honour and the code of lov^e. (a ) TJie Code of Love This code is a digest of the decisions of the Cours d' Amour, or courts held by ladies of noble birth, before whom subtle questions of gallantry were argued from the twelfth to the fourteenth centuries. It is some- times stated that these courts were confined to Prov- ence ; but this is a mistake, for the royal chaplain, Andr^, who lived about 1170, cites amongst the cours d'amour that existed at his day that of the ladies of Gascony, that of Ermengarde, Vicomtesse de Narbonne, that of Queen Eleanor, of the Countess of Flanders, of the Countess of Champagne; and Jean de Nostradamus speaks also of those which sat at Signe, Pigne, Pierre- INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 83 fen, Romanin, and Avignon. The decisions of these courts are rendered in the form customary in courts of law, and amongst the most important of the prin- ciples laid down by them may be quoted the following : " He knows not how to love who knows not how to con- ceal it. " It is not lawful to yield to more than to one love. " What a lover takes from his love by force is worthless. " No lover bereaved of his love by death may love again during the period of two years. " None may love except there be hope of being loved. " Love divulged is brief. "Too easy conquest robs love of its charm; obstacles enhance it. "Love grows with suspicion and jealousy. " Excess of pleasure prevents the birth of love. " It is not lawful that one woman be loved by two men or one man by two women. " Love ccmnot exist between husband and wife.^^ This code needs no comment ; we are doubtless ac- customed to see the principles therein laid down prac- tised in the lives of those about us and preached in almost every page of our contemporaneous romantic literature ; but we are likely to regard this fact as the price we have to pay for perhaps the best of our insti- tutions, — marriage ; and we may find it difficult to believe that they could be to-day, or could ever have been, set down deliberately as rules of morality and action. Those who still think that there is any limit to the inconsistency of mankind may well compare this code with the virtues of loyalty and courage that were professed by those who drew it up, and may well seek to reconcile these virtues with the treachery, adultery, and intrigue which it encourages and even enjoins. The fact is that we tend to take out of our environ- 84 INDIVIDUALISM ment what our temperaments find therein suited to us, — the courageous its courage, the chaste its chastity, the loyal its truth; and at different periods in our lives we respond to virtue or to vice according as conditions have tuned us to one or the other. So long, therefore, as the environment suggests to us vice as well as virtue, hypocrisy as well as truth, unchastity as well as chastity, we shall be a great deal at the mercy of acci- dent in our choice between them. The great question for the political student is to consider how far, if at all, our social and political institutions may be made to suggest noble qualities rather than ignoble ones ; and how far, if at all, man may be still capable not only of framing institutions that will ennoble him, but of living up to them when framed. In chivalry we see an effort on the part of the Church to ennoble the soldier by bringing religion down to his level; and we find the soldier dragging religion down with him inevitably, though not without much grace and picturesqueness, to the abyss. No wonder, then, that by some this effort, in spite of its momentary success, is condemned rather than justified ; for it may be better to keep war savage and barbaric than, by mitigating its cruelty, contribute to the enthronement of wantonness and falsehood. Chivalry cannot be justified by the occasional examples of courage and mercy which it has produced ; undoubtedly the lofty ideals set up by chiv- alry did stimulate the development of a noble type of courage : when the Black Prince, hard pressed at Cr^cy, was told that his father the king refused him reinforce- ments, — " for if God be pleased, I vnW this day's work be his and the honour thereof," — the chronicle tells us he was " greatly encouraged " by these words, with what conseciuence we know; undoubtedly, too, the role of the woman was enhanced by chivalry ; Edward III. turned INDIVIDUALISM IN HISTORY 85 a deaf ear to the entreaties of his own officers for the burghers of Calais ; in vain did Sir Walter of Marmy protest, " For God's sake refrain your courage ; ye have the name of sovereign noblesse ; therefore now do not a thing that should blemish your renown, nor give cause to some to speak villainy ; every man will say it is a great cruelty to put to death such honest persons, who by their own wills put themselves at your grace to save their company." In answer to Sir Walter the king sent for the hangman ; but when his Queen Philippa pleaded, he spared them, saying : " Ah, dame, I would you had been as now in some other place ; ye make such request to me that I cannot deny you." But these shining exceptions cannot counterbalance the sreneral demoralisation which deserved the strictures of Professor Freeman ; and a state of society for which marriage was but a screen for adultery must, under the application of a law already laid down, either perish or yield to one in which marriage became once more the consummation of love, and not its tomb. This was the stride taken by civilisation in moving from Malory to Shakespeare. (b) The Code of Honour The Code of Honour — that other fruit of chivalry — is as pregnant with inconsistency as the Code of Love which we have just been considering. Without enter- ing into the phases through which it passed, it is sufficient for our purposes to point out two of its most characteristic features. In the first place, it introduced the notion of class into morality, so that conduct which was permissible on the part of a member of one class to a member of another became a crime between members of the same class. For example, a gentleman who failed to pay a debt 86 INDIVIDUALISM to another gentleman would be declasse; whereas a gentleman who failed to pay his tailor's bill was regarded as rather a dashing fellow. The Code of Honour was binding only upon gentlemen ; and in the age of chiv- alry gentlemen included only those entitled to armorial bearings. In the second place, it referred questions of morality to the sword ; so that while, on the one hand, the slight- est error of politeness, if committed by an unskilful swordsman, was punishable by death, no crime was too base for condonation provided it was defended by a skilful foil. Such are a few of the amazing contradictions into which man has been led by the surrender of his institu- tions to haphazard and the law of nature. Through- out them all we see Religion, like an "ineffectual angel, beating in the void his luminous wings in vain." The omnipotence of Allah, the love of Christ, the enthusiasm of the Crusades, the lofty ideal of Chivalry, — all become at last harnessed to the service of private ambition and private greed. Nor can it be otherwise so long as these last preside at the framing of human institutions ; for whatever be the environment, to that environment type must either perish or conform. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 87 CHAPTER III THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM.— PRIVATE PROPERTY We have seen the Christian Church, bred and beau- tiful in poverty, suddenly lifted into wealth by a sort of morganatic marriage with the Roman Emperor; we have seen her, perverted by her riches, dispose of her imperial consort and usurp his throne; we have seen her draw the sword and join the general scramble and carnage in the struggle for political power, and rule the rich by superstition, as she once did the poor by faith. But in spite of her betrayal of Christ, we have seen His spirit kept alive in communities and individuals who were either removed from competition by their calling or too holy to be perverted by it. Amongst the former we have distinguished such communities as those of Saint Vincent of Paul, which, pledged to the ancient vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, devoted the lives of its votaries to doing good; and we have pointed out that womankind was to a great measure protected from the degrading tendency of the competitive system. It is not astonishing, then, that chivalry should set her up on the altar from which the true Christ had been driven; nor is it astonishing that this new cult should have resulted in licentiousness. When, however, we see the yearning for virtue driven from the Church, seeking its expression in such an institution as that of chivalry, only to result there in immorality and crime, we should 88 INDIVIDUALISM have reason to be discouraged were it not for one patent and altogether comforting fact. Ever since the perversion of the Church by Constantino man has been endeavouring to reconcile Christianity with his institu- tions instead of endeavouring to reconcile his institutions with Christianity. This fundamental inconsistency is at the bottom of all our failures in the years that are past; and so long as it remains unrecognised it must continue to involve us in failure in the years to come. But if it be recognised, and if our institutions are capa- ble of being slowly transformed so as to make them con- sistent with the doctrine of Christ, then the necessary evils which result from the artificial environment that we have created for ourselves may be eliminated, and we shall be called upon to endure only those which nature will continue to impose upon us. For we cannot bear too constantly before us the fact that there are evils in nature with which no wisdom that we have as yet attained can cope. We cannot, for example, hope by any study of political institutions to find a way for making all men and women equally beau- tiful as well as equally good; but we can study them with a view to finding a way of reducing the injustice of nature to a minimum ; and, above all, we can hope to eliminate those evils which Man in his struggle with nature has by defect of wisdom created for himself. Now, one of the principal products of human ingenuity is private property ; and while private property is un- doubtedly from one point of view a blessing, it is no less surely from another a curse. The study of this questionable gift is one of paramount importance, not only in its effect upon our institutions, but in its effect upon our character; for upon character does the consequence of our institutions for the most part depend. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 89 It is so much the fashion for socialists to rail against private property, and particularly that form of it which is called capital, that it may be as well to clear our skirts of all confusion on this subject by recognising at once the extent to which civilisation depends on private prop- erty for its existence in the first place, and for its sur- vival in the second. § 1. The Civilising Force of Private Prop- erty BY Promoting Self-Control The struggle for life is for the most part a struggle for food. If the supply of food were sufficient, attainable, and constant, there would be no struggle ; but inasmuch as it tends to be insufficient, unattainable, and inconstant, the struggle for it is perpetual. The inconstancy of the supply of food is the principal element in the struggle which gives rise to the instinct of accumulation. Instinctive accumulation is more developed in social than in unsocial animals. The unsocial carnivora do bury their prey and return to it ; they have a fierce sense of individual property in it, as is evident by the savage- ness with which they will fight for it. But their provi- dence never goes to the point of laying in during the summer a supply of food for the winter, for the reason that the character of their food is such that it cannot be preserved by any device at their disposal during the necessary period; but even though their food were capable of preservation, solitary life does not furnish the possibility of co-operation necessary to large accu- mulation. Social animals, on the contrary, — that is to say, those which live in communities, — have the in- stinct of accumulation very strongly developed; and it is a matter of no small interest to notice that the pro- cess of accumulation seems to involve two qualities, 90 INDIVIDUALISM both of which are cons23icuoiis by their high develop- ment in man. These qualities are prudence and self- control. It will doubtless be claimed by those who regard ani- mals as mere automata, that prudence and self-control as such are not to be found in them ; that their move- ments are purely the result of reflex action, and that those communities survive in which the reflex action engaged in gathering food supply is in excess of that needed for immediate purposes. How far ants and bees are pure automata need not be discussed. It is only necessary here to contrast the habits of social with unsocial animals, — habits which, when we find them associated with consciousness and the moral sense in man, become recognised as virtues and their respective opposites. In this connection it may be usefully noted that if there is in ants any volitional power which could interfere with their apparently altruistic devotion to the community, it is embryonic ; for as a matter of fact we see these insects uninterruptedly doing the work of the corrimunity without apparently the possibility of doing otherwise; they seem for the most part to be undistracted by selfishness. We may set it down, then, as certain that the habits of carnivora tend to pro- mote a fierce sense of private propert}^ in the products of the chase; whereas the habits formed in communities seem to be such as to obliterate all sense of private prop- erty and to substitute therefor a sense of ownership in common. The fierce sense of property in the female, or sexual jealousy, which characterises the carnivora, has already been pointed out; and this has been contrasted with the singular and savage system by means of which the sexual jealousy arising therefrom has been eliminated in such communities as those of ants or bees. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 91 The contrast, therefore, between the social and the unsocial animal can be briefly stated as follows: the so- cial animal, by the destruction of one sex, destroys the pos- sibility of sexual jealousy and kills in embryo the sense of property in the female; and the sense of private property in the results of labour seems to be entirely re- placed by a sense of ownership in common. The un- social animals, on the other hand, are characterised by a fierce sense of property in the female, and of indi- vidual property in the products of the chase. When we now turn our attention from lower animals to man, we cannot but be struck by the fact that they have solved both the problem of property in the female and the problem of property in the product of toil in very much the same way ; that is to say, by the exercise of self-control. Nor must we fail to take account also of the fact that the exercise of self-control permits of their retaining the individualistic sense of private prop- erty with the social sense of State property also. The sense of property, which has been already pointed out as the very foundation of human institutions, in- volves a sense of obligation ; for example, it involves the obligation to respect the property of others, the ob- ligation to contribute something in the shape of prop- erty to the State, and the obligation to contribute a great deal in the shape of personal service and personal labour to the State. Now, if the power to exercise the self-control involved in these respective obligations, and if the willingness to exercise this self-control were equal in all men, there would be little necessity for government; and this is the point where men seem to differ most from ants and bees. In these last every individual and every class seem equally willing to do the work for which each is particularly fitted, and in the absence of any power to 92 INDIVIDUALISM choose an alternative course there is apparently no- where in the community a necessity for the exercise of self-control. The result of this is that we have in every community of ants and bees what seems to be an automatic machine; every part of which, though pos- sessed of apparent individuality, can be counted upon to do the work which by survival it has been fitted to do. Communities of ants and bees, therefore, are char- acterised by uniformity of individuals in each class. Now, the uniformity which characterises communities of the lower animals is conspicuous by its absence in those of man; and very little consideration will show how far-reaching this absence of uniformity is. Men are unequal not only in their power of self- control, but in the productiveness of their efforts, and in their ability to command the submission of others. They also differ in willingness to exercise self-control, in willingness to labour, and in willingness to submit to others. The consequence of these inequalities must be that those who have great power of self-control, great power of productive toil, and great power of commanding the submission of others will become the masters of those who are willing to labour and willing to submit. This is the process by which the individualistic tem- perament developed by the possession of these powers is set upon subjugating the socialistic temperament and appropriating the benefits of society to its own use. But this ])rocess, on the other hand, tends to correct itself. The unresisted exercise of power takes away the neces- sity for self-control; and abuse of power destroys the willingness to submit to it. As self-control tends to disappear under such conditions, society is left to the struggle between opposing selfishnesses. But the disap- pearance of self-control makes the governing class cruel THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 93 and weak, while abuse of power tends to make the gov- erned class fierce and rebellious ; so that the condition at last becomes one of unstable equilibrium. The gov- erned class becomes strong enough to revolt; the gov- erning class too weak to govern ; the result is a culhute generale and a tendency to return to anarchy. Now, a condition of anarchy is just the one which is likely to require once more the exercise of self-control ; for under such conditions the tyrants and the slaves tend mutually to destroy one another, and thereby to permit those who are neither tyrants nor slaves (wher- ever these may be found) to re-establish social conditions in which some measure of self-control will be found not only in those who are willing to serve, but also in those who are able to govern. By these elements in the population centres of indus- try are formed ; and round them political institutions are likely to be restored, government is likely to be wisely administered, and wealth is likely to accumulate; for political power and wealth serve only to strengthen those who exercise self-control in the use of them, and emasculate only those incapable of exercising self- control in such use. Unfortunately, however, the mere possession of power and wealth, by eliminating the necessity of self-control, tends again to destroy it ; and the abuse of power and wealth tends again to restore pre-existing conditions. Hence, the same process tends to be repeated over and over again. We have already seen this process in operation at Athens, Sparta, and Rome. The civilisation of Greece and Rome differs from that of Assyria and Egypt in the character of its religion, for that of the former gave a peculiar sacredness to private property. Greek and Roman religion was essentially domestic; it con- secrated the property of a man in the fidelity of his 94 INDIVIDUALISM wife by the institution of marriage, and the property of a family in its home by converting every hearth into a temple. Out of this religious sense of private prop- erty arose the individualism which characterises Greek republics, and the fierce jealousy between these repub- lics which prevented their ever becoming federated into a nation. If Rome, though built up on similar institu- tions, became a nation, it was by conquest, 2iot by fed- eration. Individualism continued to characterise Roman civilisation, as it did that of Greece ; and individualism is at once the cause of private property and its result. For while the individualistic temperament tends to create the sense of private property, the last reacts upon the individualistic temperament and reinforces it. It is not surprising, then, that the more powerful grew the Roman Empire, the more powerful grew its individualis- tic and property instincts, so that Rome presented in her latter days the tyranny of wealth in its most revolting aspect. This necessary result, however, of the unbridled de- velopment of individualism and wealth must not blind us to the indispensable role which both have played in the development of the race; for in this development two inherited instincts had to be eliminated, — the ferocity of the solitary carnivora and the automatic servility of the ant. Out of these two instincts, each of them in a measure indispensable and both of them together inconsistent, there had to be developed an intelligent exercise of self-control; and this could be accomplished in only one way. The tiger in man had to curb his selfishness, and the ant in him had to acquire it. Now, the ferocity of the one was due to the failure of rivals to recognise rights of private property ; while the servility of the other was due to instinctive respect for the property of the State. The one is in a perpetual THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 95 rage lest his individual property be attacked; the other in a dull ignorance that individual property can ever be enjoyed. Now, it is possible to educate these opposite instincts so as to develop an intelligent recognition of the use and abuse of the good things of this world, and to make this recognition serviceable in developing the higher nature of man ; and the instrumentality through which these invaluable results were attained was the institution of private property. For when ferocity dis- covered that its rights in the product of labour were re- spected, it tended by disuse to disappear ; and when the servile automaton recognised that the more it laboured, the more it enjoyed, there grew up in it a nascent selfish- ness which was to substitute for the unconscious altruism of the ant the latter-day individualism of the working- man. The struggle for life went on very much as be- fore ; but instead of tending towards opposite results in different races, — towards ferocity in the carnivore and towards servility in the ant, — it operated in the same species to diminish ferocity on the one hand and servility on the other; and to develop the social mind which con- ceives of society not as an end in itself to which the individual should be sacrificed, but as a means towards the development of the individual into a "man and master of his fate." To denounce property under these circumstances is to denounce the scaffolding which conceals and perhaps disgraces an uncompleted temple. When the temple is completed, the scaffolding may be torn down ; until it is completed, the scaffolding must remain. The ques- tion for socialists, who rail against capital, to decide is whether our human temple is sufficiently completed to dispense with the scaffolding through which it has been thus far built. We should totally fail to appreciate the role of wealth or private property if we studied it only 96 INDlVroUALISM from the point of view of its effect upon the rich. It has had quite as important an effect upon the poor; for while it has permitted the rich to acquire knowledge, it has also permitted the poor to break through the husk of servility from which the servile element in humanity had to be emancipated ; and so, while the rich were acquiring the arts of civilisation, the poor were learning how to extend those arts to themselves, so that to-day the ques- tion is no longer how to accumulate wealth, but rather how to distribute it. The rule of the institution of pri- vate property in accomplishing this result is often for- gotten in view of the more striking role it has played in creating the injustice of distribution of which socialists to-day so bitterly complain. Let us endeavour briefly to trace the part property has played in history without partiality either to the rich or to the poor. § 2. The Democratic Force of Private Prop- erty BY Overthrowing Aristocracy OF Birth It has already been pointed out that religion created in Ancient Greece and Rome a patriarchal cast which was separated from those who had no domestic gods by an impassable abyss. In both countries, therefore, the families which held their own in the struggle for wealth and political influence became an oppressing aristocracy; and those families which failed to hold their own in the struggle lost not only their property, but with it their religion and their caste. The ranks of these last were swelled by strangers and the offs])ring of strangers ; by natural children; by emancipated slaves; and by all who could not claim direct descent from the ruling aris- tocracy. This rabble, which had its use in case of war, was for this reason not discouraged, but allowed, on THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 97 the contrary, to increase ; and thus a class was formed that stood midway between the patrician and the slave. The tendency of patrician selfishness was necessarily to diminish the number of the patrician class ; for by dimin- ishing its numbers the larger was the share of wealth and power enjoyed by each. But this tendency defeated its own aim ; for the patrician, in spite of his religious ascendency, became at last unable to resist the growing power of the plebs ; and we find, therefore, the conflict resulting in a breaking down of the religious barrier in Rome as well as in Greece, and rank by kinship giving way in both countries to rank by wealth. The classifi- cation introduced by Solon at Athens, and by Servius Tullius in Rome, was in both instances a classification of wealth; and this classification differs from that of kinship in the essentially democratic fact that whereas rank determined by kinship makes it impossible for a man not to the manner born ever to lift himself into a higher social scale, rank determined by wealth opens this possibility to every man fitted by intelligence to do so. Wealth, therefore, was the great democratising factor in both Greece and Rome: it furnished the ladder up the rungs of which men of ability could improve their social and political as well as their financial positions; it lifted into the highest offices of the State such "new" men as Cato, Marius, and Cicero, and in Athens it created a democracy so complete that every citizen became in turn an office-holder and a judge. Nor was it in ancient times alone that wealth proved the ally of democracy; on the contrary, all through the Middle Ages wealth was the lever through which the people gradually ac- quired their political rights. For it was when the royal exchequer was empty that the Dauphin called together the l^tats G^ndraux in 1355, and Louis XVI. in 1789, 7 98 INDIVIDUALISM that Charles I. endeavoured to levy ship money, and George III. the tax on tea. It was owing to the insti- tution of private property that the people held the strings of the money bags and were able to wrest from the throne a share in the government ; and it is to the exercise of this power that England, though in name still an empire, is in fact a republic. While, however, we are bound to recognise that wealth did open the door to ability, we must at the same time admit that it was not ability alone that could profit by its opportunities. The ability had to be of a particular character: it had generally to be selfish, un- scrupulous, even sometimes inhuman ; it succeeded best if it profited ungenerously by the generosity of others, and ruthlessly refused generosity to those who had already bestowed it. The ladder offered by wealth is too often made, as it were, of human hearts; all of them, whether willingly animated by love or unwill- ingly coerced by superior ability, are trampled upon alike by those who would soonest attain their ends. The advantage to the race, therefore, of this democ- ratisation by wealth, is questionable. But private property must not for that reason be regarded as an in- stitution which human sagacity could have dispensed with, but rather as a phase through which humanity liad to pass; it was one of the shells of the human chrys- alis, and humanity has had to pay the price of the strug- gle to break through it. The essential fact for us to recognise is that it may be only a phase, and that by wisely directed effort man may eventually escape from it. It should not be necessary to repeat the story of this struggle at any length, nor to emphasize how little pro- gress lias been made ; for it has been already pointed out that if men are actuated in the main by selfishness, THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 99 progress is subject to so frequent check as to be dis- couragingly slow. Selfishness, by putting government at Athens into the hands of the many, proved the ina- bilit}' of the many, if actuated only by selfish motives, to govern ; and, by putting government at Rome into the hands of the few, demonstrated the inability of the few, if actuated only by selfish motives, to govern. But after the demonstrated failure of both aristocracy and democracy in these two countries had prepared the way for the anarchy which characterised the Middle Ages, a new power came upon the stage in the shape of a new religion. We have shown how Greek and Roman re- ligion degenerated into superstition, and how Christianity and Mohammedanism both followed the same disheart- ening example under the daily reiterated conflict between religion and selfishness due to the competitive system. But Christianity had in it the miraculous vitality of truth, and we find it, therefore, re-expressing itself over and over again in the varying fortunes of man. The crusader was one of its most vigorous expressions ; and the demoralisation of the crusade by wealth startlingly illustrates the operation of this pernicious influence. The great orders organised by religious enthusiasm to rescue the sepulchre from the Turk ended in the same way. Thus the Order of Templars, vowed to chastity, obedience, and ijovertij^ acquired property with the pros- perity of their cause; became the owners of the most formidable fortresses in Palestine which the world has ever seen ; occupied whole quarters in the city of Paris ; and became at last engaged in banking, — then, as now, the most profitable branch of trade. Their enormous wealth, their enclosure of sixty thousand square metres in the heart of Paris, their incomparable donjon, at last aroused the cupidity of the king; and the Templars expiated their degeneracy at the stake. This was the 100 INDIVIDUALISM first signal victory of the commercialism of the soldier over that of the Church. The triumph of Philip of France over Boniface found its echo in England, and ended in the confiscation of monastic property by Henry VIII. If these acts of spoliation arouse indignation to-day, it must not be for- gotten that they were committed in a conflict with an institution which, while it professed to be purely reli- gious, had under Boniface acquired title to about one- third of European soil, — all of which claimed exemption from taxation by the State. While, however, the Church was corrupting itself by the pursuit of wealth and being crushed by its acquisi- tion, and while the battles between feudal lords, eccle- siastical and lay, were devastating the land, in a few protected places the indomitable industry of the people was engaged in building up little centres of order and of industry. Otho was the first of mediaeval monarchs to understand the utility to the Crown of favouring muni- cipal prosperity as a counterpoise to a factious nobility ; and so, under his protection, the towns of Italy, picking up the threads of corporate activity which still bound them to the collegia oinfimm of ancient Rome, laid the foundation of a new democracy through combination of workingmen, known under the name of the JNIajor and the Minor nrts.^ The Crusades at this propitious crisis opened to Italy the commerce of the East, and the pros- perity which attended this commerce soon built up the city republics of Florence and Milan, Genoa and Venice. Nor did it stop at the borders of Italy; it found a pas- sage over the Alps and swept through Germany along the valley of the Rhine. With the need for protection against the robber barons who levied tribute upon the ' There seems to be no brrak between the Ttiediaeval guilds of liavenna and the ancient corporations of that town. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 101 traffic of the stream, there grew not only cities to pro- tect this traffic, but a confederation of these cities in the Hanseatic League. And so the wealth of Asia, pour- ing over the wilderness of Europe, dotted its course with prosperous towns, every one of which was a school of practical politics for the peaceful burgher and the industrious artisan. For if France owes its municipal franchises to what the Crusades took away from her, Italy and Germany owe them to what the Crusades brought back. And when the use of the mariner's compass permitted trade to pass through the Straits of Gibraltar, it bestowed the same gifts upon England and the Netherlands as it had already lavished on the valley of the Rhine. Moreover, corrupt as was the Church, it must not be imagined for that reason that religion was dead in the land. The religious spirit which animated the burghers of Italy has already been referred to; how religious was the spirit which engaged in commerce in those days may be gathered from the laws which governed the Esterlings in London, "who lived in a strongly built enclosure, called the Steel Yard, the site of which is now occupied by the City station of the Southeastern Railway Com- pany, and were much the same as those under which the English traders lived in Bruges and other cities. The foreign merchant had, in Caxton's time, to brave a large amount of popular dislike, and to put up with great restraint on his liberty. Not only did he trade under harassing restrictions, but he resigned all hopes of domestic ties and family life. As in a monastery, each member had his own dormitory, whilst at meal-times there was a common table. Marriage was out of the question, and concubinage was followed by expulsion. Every member was bound to sleep in the house and to be indoors by a fixed time in the evening, and for the 102 INDIVIDUALISM sake of good order no woman of any description was allowed within the walls." ^ But the religious light thus cast upon the growth of municipal life in the Middle Ages would be grossly misleading were we for a moment to lose sight of the desperate struggle and bloodshed through which muni- cipal privileges were secured. The short sketch already given of the conflict between Amiens and her feudal lords represents practically what took place in almost every town in Europe. Nor must we imagine that the triumph of the people meant an era of peace; on the contrary, it was a new signal for war; not war against a feudal lord, but war of one fraction of the people with another. The history of this war is the history of mediaeval guilds, to which it may be well now to turn our atten- tion. So much has been written on the subject of medi- aeval guilds that it should not be necessary to do more than sketch with the utmost brevity the story of their rise and fall, in order to point out that the history of these guilds illustrates the inevitable and devastating consequence of selfishness. § 3. The Socialising Force of Private Property. — By Association in Guilds Nothing could be more admirable than the original purpose of these guilds; nothing more wise than the system adopted for carrying out their respective pur- poses. The guild was originally a combination of all persons engaged in the same trade, for the purpose of protecting the interests of that trade, not only from the point of view of those employed in it, but also from the 1 Thfi Rio.t,Taphy and Topo^^rapliy of William Caxton, England's First Printer, by William Blades. 8vo, 1877, p. 22. THE INSTEUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 103 point of view of the public welfare. It has been already pointed out how large a part religion played in the organisation and functions of the guild; none but Cath- olics were admitted ; the performance of religious duties was strictly enjoined ; every guild was under the pro- tection of a saint whose feast-day was celebrated with pomp ; every guild had its own chapel or its own altar in the parish church; and every religious cere- mony the guilds, grouped each around its own banner, attended. Brotherly charity was the virtue practised as well as preached by the guild ; a small contribution insured re- lief to any member of the guild who stood in need thereof; and at every great crisis in the lives of its members the guild stood ready to comfort and to cheer. Strictly democratic in their form of government, they were subject to the manorial lord or king only through the payment of a yearly tribute and a formal supervision of their rules ; but the moment the rights of the guilds, or of that larger guild to which they all belonged, — the town, — were attacked, that moment these guilds as- sumed not only a political but a military role. As has been already pointed out, it was these guilds that secured the independence of the free towns of Germany, and it was the burghers gathered round their guild banners that saved France from John of England at the Battle of Bovine ; it was the burghers of hihge that hewed in pieces the noblesse of Brabazon, and it was the Flemish pietraille which, in the Battle of the Golden Spurs, crushed the chivalry of France. Nor must we neglect to mention the dignity which guild life gave to the labour of the artisan. The imple- ments which figured on their banners were the tools of their trade ; and it is the tools of their trade which we 104 INDIVIDUALISM see in the stained glass windows that still adorn the Gothic cathedrals of the Middle Age.^ This was the spirit which converted every artisan into an artist, and which can find to-day no better form for conveying the irreproachable character of a piece of workmanship than to say of it that it is de main d^ouvrier. The system adopted by the guilds for securing the highest class of work could be summed up in the words education and surveillance. No man was allowed to be- come a master in any trade unless he had served his apprenticeship first, and had passed the examination which justified his graduation into the class known under the name "journeyman," and had, after a second examination, justified both in theory and practice his right to be admitted to the highest rank of all. Nor was he at any time free from the surveillance of a com- mittee of his guild, especially elected to exercise it ; and the rules laid down by the guilds for the purpose of securing the highest class of work singularly anticipate the rules laid do\vn to-day by the factory laws on the one hand and by the trade unions on the other. For the workingman was not then, as now, in opposition to his employer; on the contrary, both formed part of the same guild, and the interests of one were thereby made the interests of the other.^ Thus it was not necessary to curb the greed of the employer by hostile legislation ; nor was it necessary to limit, by the organisation of trade unions, the competition of workingmen with one another. Competition was eliminated by the fact that 1 The most beautiful of the famous windows in the apse of the Cathe- dral of Bourges are the gifts of guilds. 2 There were in Germany so-called " Gesellenvereine," or journeymen guilds in which emidoyers had no share ; but these were social rather than industrial in their character, and constituted an exception rather than the rule. These journeymen guilds were also found in England. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 105 no man could engage in a trade unless he belonged to the guild organised to defend and protect the trade; and as the guild itself was master of the question who was to be admitted thereto, undue competition was impossible. Moreover, another aim of the guild was to protect the public in the purchase of its wares, and to prevent the fabrication of articles of poor quality ; the guilds, therefore, themselves put limitations on the con- ditions of manufacture which competition uncontrolled by the guild system would not permit. It would seem as though the early years of guild life were the halcyon days of the workingman ; but it is the painful duty of the historian to record that, notwith- standing the high stiindards raised in its inception by the guild, human selfishness did for the guild what it had already done for the knight-errant; the privilege possessed by the guild of limiting the number of its own members it ruthlessly exercised, so as to make the num- ber of persons at liberty to engage in a given trade in- adequate. For example, the whole business of killing and selling meat was at one time in Paris confined to twenty persons. Needless to say, these persons did not themselves engage in the business; they sublet their respective monopolies to other corporations and guilds organised for the purpose of taking the contracts, and they became, therefore, a commercial but idle aristocracy. Again, in order to prevent competition within the guild, it became necessary to determine prices, and in the effort to determine prices it became necessary to deter- mine quality; and this double necessity gave rise to rules so stringent as to become intolerable and unjust. So great became the tyranny of the guilds that we find the king himself, in 1776, proclaiming the "in- alienable right to work," which has to-day become the shibboleth of a certain school of socialists. In the year 106 INDIVIDUALISM in which we in America were setting forth our political rights in the Declaration of Independence, Louis XVI. took the workingman under his protection in these remarkable words : — "Nous devons k nos sujets de leur assurer la jouissance pleine et entiere de leurs droits, nous devons surtout iiotre protection a cette classe d'hommes qui n'out de propriete que leur travail et leur industrie." "Dieu, en donnant a rhomme des besoins, en rendaut necessaire la ressource du travail, a fait chi droit de travadller la propriete de tout homme, et cette propriete est la premiere, la plus sacree, et la jjIus imprescriptible de toutes. "Nous regardons comme un des premiers devoirs de notre justice, et comme un des actes les plus dignes de notre bienfaisance, d'affranchir nos sujets de toutes les atteintes portees a ce droit inalienable de Vhumanite," It is true that the hand is the hand of Louis, but the voice was the voice of Turgot; and that voice was destined not to be hushed until it had received the weighty support of Adam Smith and the consecration of the Manchester School. But neither Turgot nor Louis himself were able to crush the power of the guilds; these last had behind them the traditions of five centuries, and the Parliament of Paris refused to register the edict. The king, how- ever, disregarded the refusal of the Paris Parliament, and the edict was executed in the city of Paris, althougli it was found impossible of execution in the provinces. Meanwliile, attempts to execute it gave rise to such disorder that in the same year the edict was abrogated ; and it Avas not until the French Revolution that the guilds received their final blow.^ 1 The Corporation was by no means supreme in the eighteenth century. In Franco, as in En;,'lan(l, the (Icvclopnii'nt of now industrios in such towns as Jiordeaux, Marseilles, Liverpool, and iManchcster menaced the power of THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 107 The history of the guild is so familiar to political students that it would not have been recapitulated here were it not that such recapitulation was necessary in order to draw from this history its necessary conclusion. Just as chivalry sought to introduce high ideals into the life of the soldier, so the guild sought to bring high ideals into the life of the artisan. Both failed for the same reason ; they both ended in a direct appeal to his self-interest, and in so doing they strengthened the very motive which is destructive to his higher nature. It would be sheer waste of time to trace the operation of self-interest in the abuse of power by the guild ; for it ought by this time to be obvious not only that power stimulated by selfishness was abused by the guilds, but that it must have been so abused. The evil did not rest with the guilds ; it rested with the competition to which the guilds were exposed. On the one side was the growth of population, which, in spite of apprenticeships, tended always to increase the ranks of the artisans ; on the other side was the struggle of competing guilds for purchasers in the market. The former tended to keep wages down; the latter tended to keep prices down. Nothing but regulation of price, regulation of wages, and regulation of admission of members to the guild could prevent wages from going down to the starvation level. But regulation meant putting into the hands of a few men to whom the task of regulation was intrusted the power to determine who were to be members of the guild, and the conditions under which these members were to be admitted and to work. Now, the exercise of this power involved the exclusion of men from ad- mission to the guild, or, in other words, from permission the guilds ; and [doubtless the guild would have perished in France, as it did in England, without legislative interference, had the matter been left to the automatic ebb and tide of action and reaction. 108 INDIVIDUALISM to work, who by such exclusion were doomed to pau- perism and to crime. It does not seem conceivable that such a deliberate condemnation of the innocent to misery could be continuously practised without blunting sym- pathy for those condemned ; nor does it seem conceiv- able that this sympathy could long be blunted without opening the door to private greed; for it is sympathy which for the most part keeps the door closed to greed. The guild, then, could not but eventually become the instrument of the very evil it was instituted to suppress ; in rescuing the artisan from the tyranny of the baron it became itself a tyrant. With this important difference, however, that whereas the tyranny of the baron cor- rupted only the baron, that of the guild corrupted all the members of the guild. So that whereas the baronial rule demoralised only a small minority, that of the guild demoralised almost the entire population; for it pam- pered one portion of it into a perversion of the sense of justice, and it relegated a large part of the remainder to vagabondage. How far the moral sense of those who profited by the guild system was demoralised by it may be judged by the laws passed in the early part of the sixteenth cen- tury to deal with the wretches for whose misery the exclusiveness of the guild was in large part responsible. Able-bodied men found begging were upon a first con- viction whipped and sent home ; upon a second convic- tion their ears were cropped ; and upon a third they were put to death. ^ But not even the death penalty could put an end to a vagabondage which was a necessary consequence of 1 Statute of 1536, 27 Henry YIII. c. 25. The weakness of the State and the absence of a proiierly organised police system is doubtless responsi- ble in part for the harshness of these laws ; but the existence of tlie unem- ployed is doubtless responsible for it also. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 109 existing^ industrial conditions. These conditions had to break up, and in breaking up they gave rise to new conditions more demoralising, perhaps, than those which preceded them; for although the poor-laws of Queen Elizabeth did diminish the violence theretofore practised upon vagabonds, they created a condition of pauperism which in many parishes reduced the majority to de- pendence upon the poor-rates, pat an end to industr}', and condemned the land to idleness. In the parish of Cholesbury, in 1833, out of a total population of 139, only 35 supported themselves; the remaining 104 re- ceived relief from the parish. The cultivation of all lands except sixteen acres was abandoned, the rates havingr more than swallowed the rent.^ The only encouraging fact in this pitiful story is that such evils as these tend to their own destruction. Tyranny, so long as there is a saving grace anywhere in the population, tends to destroy the tyrant; and so the towns in which labour was regulated decayed, and there arose in their place "villages " in which no such regulation existed. The villages of that century are the cities of our own; they are Manchester, Bimiing- ham, and Sheffield. But whether social conditions in these great munici- palities are more or less demoralising than those which prevailed in the sixteenth century remains to be seen. Reference has already been made ^ to the tyranny of the corporation and the reaction towards individualism, to wliich these tyrannies gave rise. And with the char- acter of this tyranny fresh in mind it is not difficult to understand why the political philosophers of the eighteenth century attributed the economic evils of that time to over-regulation; and as the over-regulation 1 Maltbie, " English Local Government of To-day," p. 58. 2 See vol. i. book i. chap. i. pp. 26, 27. 110 INDIVIDUALISM complained of was essentially artificial or non-natural in its character, it was likely that the evil should appear to them as an infringement of natural conditions or so- called natural law. This is doubtless the reason why we read so much about Nature and Natural Law in the writings of Rousseau and Quesnay, and why these men should have prepared the way for the political economy of Adam Smith. The doctrine of Laissez faire having been much criticised already in the first volume, the impression has doubtless been conveyed that it is deemed essentially unsound and bad. But this im- pression would be a mistake; it may be bad to-day, and yet have been inevitable at that time ; for the more familiar we become with the political conditions that prevailed at different periods of history, the more we have to recognise that the political theories of these periods bear a necessary relation to these conditions. The natural way of dealing with an evil is to direct against it a frontal attack; but if the evil attacked turns out to be a Quaker gun, such a system only exposes the attacking party to demolition from the mouth of the real though concealed battery on the flank, which he has not had the wit to discover. The misery which existed between the sixteenth and the eighteenth centuries was obviously due in part, at any rate, to the tyranny and exclusiveness of the guilds or corporations; and these again exercised their tyranny through the process of regulation. The most obvious remedy, then, was to suppress the guild, suppress regulation, and open the way to freedom. Sentiment took up the theme, and freedom became the topic of philosophy and literature as well as legislation. It intoxicated France, and cannily laid the foundation of the British Empire; for to-day it is uiidi-r the banner of free trade that England is justifying her conquest THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 111 of the East ; and it is behind the mask of free contract that we can distinguish the ominous countenance of the Sweater and the Absentee. For there is no more free- dom of contract between unorganised labour and a capi- talist than between unorganised labour and a guild; in both cases the labourer is at the mercy of the employer, for the one is not free to refuse work, and the other is comparatively free to withhold it. This, of course, is an old story, and is only recalled here to connect the tyranny of capital with that of the corporation, for the purpose of showing, not that capital is oppressive, but that it must be so. And here, at the risk of wearying with repetition, it may be well to point out that the demonstration of the evils attending capital is not an attack upon the capital- ist. He is in one sense as great a victim of the com- petitive system as the unemployed; he is no more responsible for the misery he occasions than he is for the pauperism to which he unconsciously and unwillingly contributes. There are doubtless employers who are little, if at all, affected by the unhappiness of the workingman; but again there are employers who are keenly sensitive to it and eagerly looking for a remedy. We shall never find the remedy or even an enduring palliative until we understand the disease; and we can- not understand the disease so long as we are bent upon putting the responsibility on the employers. Let us look for the disease with the impartiality of a physician, and we shall then escape the delusions of the partisan. § 4. The Tyranny op Private Property. — The Market It is not necessary — nor would it be wise — to repeat here the argument against capital which, since the day of Karl Marx, has been kindling the rage of the work- 112 INDIVIDUALISM ingman ; for we are not so much concerned with the in- justice which cajDital has caused, or does cause, as we are with the question how capital can be reconciled with justice, if at ail. In other words, is capital good or bad ? If bad, is it necessary ? If necessary to-day, will it be necessary always ? I cannot but think that Karl Marx made his first mis- take in the selection of his title; for, as has been already suggested, capital per se is a blessing ; it is the product of labour and self-restraint; it is the result of applying intelligence and effort to the solution of those problems which the destructive forces in nature are for ever pre- senting to us. It is not from the accumulation of wealth — called capital — that the evil results, but in its distri- bution; and the problem we have to solve is, how the distribution of capital or income can be modified so as to occasion less injustice in the world ; and in the course of the discussion how such a modification can result in im- proving the human type instead of — -as has already been indicated — degrading it. When, in the eighteenth century, it became clear that pauperism in France was in great part due to the tyranny of the corporation, it was not a difficult matter to lay the corporation low ; it was accomplished l)y a stroke of the pen. But when we endeavour to-day to run the evil to earth under the existing capitalistic system we are confronted with a totally diiferent state of things. It is easy enough to point to the employer and put the blame on him ; but the blame will not rest there, for the em- ployer will pass it on to the INIarket — and it is to the Market that it legitimately belongs. Now, the Market cannot be disposed of as easily as the corporation, for the Market represents in one sense the whole community. We all want to buy cloth and corn cheap; and so long as these are cheap, the labour that contributes to produce THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 113 them must be cheap. ^ It is not, then, the employer who keeps wages low; it is you, and I, and every one of us. If low wages are a crime, we are all participes ci'iminis ; and if we adopt the language of sentiment and apply it to ourselves, we shall have to admit that every time we avail ourselves of the low prices of a department store we are helping a "giant monopoly " to "crush out" the self-respecting retailer, and every time we undertake what should seem to be the legitimate task of buying our garments as cheaply as we can, we are engaged in "grinding the faces of the poor." This must not be understood as an attempt to shield those employers who consciously and deliberately extort large profits out of the necessities of the workingman ; such employers have existed and doubtless still exist. But the question before us is not what is, but what must be; in other words, assuming that all employers were angels of light, would it be possible for them, under our existing industrial system, very much to improve the conditions of the workingman? And if the fault be not in the employer but in ourselves, who constitute the 1 Although competition, by tending to lower prices, tends to lower wages, wages can nevertheless be raised without necessarily compelling a rise in prices. This important fact is fully recognised later on. It is not dwelt on here because it does not affect the argument here. Within limits increase of wages, by rendering service more effectual, does not neces- sitate a rise in prices ; indeed, under certain favourable conditions it permits of lower prices. This does not prevent, however, the application of the general law that, by and large, competition in lowering prices tends to lower wages ; that this tendency is, under certain conditions, the cause of sweating ; and that, if the tendency has been partially coun- teracted by labour organisation, there is a limit to the beneficial action of such organisation. Indeed, it is probable that in some industries this limit has already been reached. It is because the limit has been reached in them that workingmen are endeavouring to prevent foreign competition by international organisation. But even if such an international organi- sation can be rendered effectual, how will it remain so when we shall have taught the Mongol to compete with us ? 8 114 INDIVIDUALISM Market or the Demand, let us assume that we, too, are angels of light, and let us see whether under the exist- ing conditions we could very much improve the condi- tions of the workingman. And of these two social criminals let us begin with ourselves. Are we wrong in trying to buy cheaply? Let us suppose, for example, that you, reader, are a public-school teacher; you and your parents have made great sacrifices in order to secure the certificate which will qualify you to enter into the honourable career of educating your fellow-creatures ; no career can be more pregnant of good or bad results than this. If you are a fit person by your knowledge, your character, and your example, to make good citizens of the children put under your care, you will be accomplishing as great a work as any man or woman in the world. Let us as- sume that you are perfectly conscious of the magnitude of your task and are bent on performing your duty in conformity with its highest ideals. For years you have striven hourly to attain those qualifications which will entitle you to your teacher's certificate ; nothing in the world has seemed to you of as much importance as this ; the desire for it has made every sacrifice easy; and the fear of missing it has cost you hours of slee})less anxiety. At last your toils have been rewarded ; you have passed the ordeal, and the certificate is yours. Many of those who have worked by your side have fallen by the way; you have seen them drop off one by one. Illness has stood in the way of some ; the necessity of earning bread in that of others; and the same liigh hopes that have animated you, you have seen in others sink into discouragement. You have been sorry for your less successful competitors, but the necessities of your own case have forced you on tlie road too strenu- ously to permit of your devoting much time to consol- THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 115 ing those less prosperous than yourself. And now the goal of your long race has been attained ; you have your certificate, and you may at last get at your work. But here you meet with your first check. Of those who started in the race with you, some hundreds, it is true, have already fallen by the way; but there still remain thousands in the field. You are not the only one who has secured a certificate, and for the first time you are confronted with a fact of which up to this you have been only dimly conscious, — namely, that although there is a very strict limit to the number of teachers' places to fill, there is practically no limit to the num- ber of teachers able and eager to fill them. You now pass through a long and weary period of waiting. Sin- gular phenomenon ! Here you are, fully equipped, you and some thousands of others, to perform the highest task that it can be given to a man or woman to do ; con- fronted with still more countless thousands of children who are growing up into bad citizens for lack of the very teaching you are so peculiarly and laboriously fitted to give them; and neither may you teach nor they be taught ! With a sense of the injustice of these conditions rank- ling in you, slowly the high hopes you once entertained dwindle, peak, and pine; the expectations you once entertained of a permanent position somewhere near your family, a fixed income, and an eager class, give way to a willingness to accept any place, however temporary, however underpaid, by which you can relieve your par- ents of the now intolerable burden of your support. At last your patience is rewarded ; you are offered a posi- tion in a summer school during the summer months at five dollars a week. This remuneration will hardly pay your board, but it will be a beginning and will relieve your parents for a time. There is still, however, a 116 INDIVIDUALISM difficulty to overcome; now that you have secured a place, you must be respectably garmented; you must present an object-lesson of neatness and refinement; in other words, you must buy clothes. Once more you must make an inroad into your parents' ever-diminish- ing hoard ; you make your list of the things you need ; anxiously you price the articles on your list; anxiously you figure up the total ; it is more than you can afford. Then begins the task of cutting down the list and of comparing prices. In a few days' shopping you learn just where you can make most saving on every item ; and between the limits imposed upon you by a crushing necessity, between the total hoard which your parents can scrape together on the one side and your duty to your class on the other, there is but one solution, — the low prices of the department store. Are you free ? And what is true of you is true of every man, woman, and child who is striving to emerge or keep out of the ranks of pauperism and of crime ? Are they free ? But now let us suppose that good fortune comes to you. A rich uncle has died and left you a hundred thousand dollars ; you have suddenly become a capital- ist; you have a hundred thousand dollars to invest. What are you going to do with it? Your experience has taught you that the supply of teachers is far in excess of the demand ; if you continue to teach, you are taking the bread out of the mouth of some one in the desperate position out of which you have just emerged. This you will not consent any longer to do ; you abandon teaching for the time, and you con- ceive the idea of investing your money in such a way as to produce more income than you need, so that you can have some surplus to devote to the comfort of your parents and to the well-being of those about you. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 117 Just as you have come to this conclusion a favour- able opportunity for investing occurs. You are intro- duced to a firm engaged in the manufacture of Key West cigars ; and you are told that they need the sum of one hundred thousand dollars in order to avail them- selves of a singularly advantageous opportunity. Their cigars are now made at a factory which they lease in Key West, the rent of which forms a considerable item in the cost of their goods. The lease is about to expire, and they have received a proposition from cer- tain owners of real estate at Tampa, which, if accepted, will greatly diminish the cost of manufacture and in- deed add to profits in no small degree. The proposition is as follows : — A group of property-owners in Tampa, being anxious to bring industries to that town in order thereby to enhance the value of their real estate, offer to build a factory for A. B. & Co. as big as the one they now occupy at Key West, and to deed this factory to A. B. & Co., together with fifty acres of land, provided A. B. & Co. will move their industry from Key West to Tampa. It is expected that A. B. & Co. will build on the fifty acres deeded to them for this purpose cottages for their workmen ; and it is calculated that they could at once rent three hundred cottages to their workmen at $12 a month each, or $360 a year. The cottages will cost $300 each; a sum of $90,000, therefore, is needed for this purpose, and a margin of $10,000 is recom- mended. A. B. & Co. cannot take such a sum out of their business without crippling it. But if you will invest this sum of $100,000 in their business, they will take you into partnership with them, and thereby avail themselves of the offer made by the Tampa citizens. The advantages of this proposition are obvious; they would be relieved of the necessity of paying a high rent 118 INDIVIDUALISM for their factory, and they will receive, on the contrary, high rent from their employees, upon whom propinquity to the factory and the difficulty of securing accommoda- tions elsewhere in Tampa will practically impose the necessity of occupying the cottages built for them. After carefully examining the situation you are con- vinced that A. B. & Co. are doing a thriving business, that they stand high in commercial circles, and that you cannot better invest your funds. You consult your lawyers, and are advised (for reasons which seem sound, but which you are not alto- gether able to understand) that it is wise to convert the firm into a stock company, under the laws of West Virginia; and after the necessary formalities have been complied with you become a stockholder to the extent of one hundred thousand dollars in the A. B. Company. The offer of the Tampa citizens has been accepted, and the construction of the buildings is at once entered upon. It has also been explained to you that the move to Tampa will be attended by another incidental, but no less for that reason important, advantage. There is considerable discussion as to the appraisal of Havana tobacco. You are told that certain tobacco known as "fillers" pays a duty of only thirty-five cents a pound, whereas another grade of tobacco known as " wrappers " pays one dollar and eighty-five cents a pound ; and there is great discussion as to just what tobacco shall be entered as "fillers" and what as "wrappers." On this subject you are informed that the appnuser at Tampa is much more liberal to importers than the appraiser at Key West, and it is obviously an economy to pay one dollar and eighty-five cents a pound upon as little to- bacco as possible. It is estimated that constructing the buildings at THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 119 Tampa will take about six months ; but before a month has elapsed you are confronted by the wages problem in the shape of a strike at the Key West factory. Upon inquiry you find that the employees are for the most part Cubans who live in a state of degradation and filth. The wages they receive are not sufficient to permit of any better conditions; but when you calculate how much you can afford to raise wages, you will be surprised to find that any rise which could materially benefit or sensibly improve the condition of the cigar-makers would not only eat up the margin of profit, but even impair capital. A close examination of the prices obtainable on the one side, and the necessary expenses on the other, presents the following condition of things. The price that can be obtained for cigars is screwed down by competition to one which barely leaves a profit upon the goods manufactured on average years; and it is only on the condition of making and selling an enor- mous quantity of goods that a remunerative profit can be assured. For example, the average profit made on a single cigar is less than one cent, or about .975 of a cent; that on a hundred cigars is 97-^ cents ; that on a thou- sand, $9.75; that on a million is $9,750. Obviously, then, no manufacturer can earn a living who only sells hundreds; in order to get rich he must sell millions. This may seem a big profit; but unfortunately it is sub- ject to the accident of crops. When the tobacco crop is productive, these figures, and even better, are ob- tained; but when the crop is poor, not only is this profit diminished, but it even sometimes disappears. In 1879 the crop was so bad that many manufacturers were ruined. Indeed, this has happened often; and the element of risk involved is one against which manufac- turers must provide by securing an extra profit on pros- perous years. 120 INDIVIDUALISM In any case a large manufacturer has every advantage ; because he buys large quantities of tobacco, he com- mands a better quality of tobacco at a lower price ; be- cause he deals with large sums of money his credit is well known and proportionally high ; he can thus secure good terms, or, in other words, by the value of his credit his capital is increased tenfold. On the other hand, in the sale of his goods he has a corresponding advantage. He deals with the largest firms, who give the largest orders; and, having a large amount at his disposal, he can spend large sums in advertising and salesmen's commissions. When, however, appalled by the enormous sums spent in advertising and salesmen's commissions, you propose to diminish this expenditure and apply the amount thereby saved in increasing the wages of the work- ingmen, you are met by the positive assurance that experience has demonstrated the necessity of large ex- penditures of this kind. It is only by covering immense wall spaces wdth the names of your brands, and by im- pressing these names upon the imagination and memory of the public through every conceivable device, however costly, that you can secure and maintain the demand for your goods which permits you to sell on the large scale necessary to pay the expense of manufacture. Once more, then, you are confronted with the fact that it is not the capitalists that are masters of the subject of wages; but, on the contrary, you stand between the necessar}' cost of manufacture on the one hand, and the prices determined by competition on the other. If you are concerned with the fate of the Cuban work- ingman, you will be told that he is accustomed to the life he leads and would be no happier with a higher wage; that the strike cannot last longer than a few weeks, as there is an unlimited supply of other cigar- THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 121 makers to draw from ; and you learn that the question of wage is not a matter of humanity, but one of compulsion. A few weeks, during which you try to harden your heart to the suffering which the strike is occasioning in Key West, suffice to contirm the opinion of your part- ners that the strike cannot last long. The importation of a few hands eventually brings back such of the other employees as you are willing to receive, and the manu- facture proceeds upon the old wage ; but it has left dis- satisfaction, and the next news from Key West is that the factory has burned down. This, of course, should not involve any loss, for your partners have taken the precaution to insure ; but there are losses which insur- ance cannot cover; such, for example, as the loss arising from the inability to fill orders, and from the fact that the proceeds from the sale of goods ordered are no longer available to meet the notes which have been issued for raw material, etc. Moreover, the insurance company is persuaded that the fire comes at a specially opportune moment for your firm; it is impossible, they say, to move goods from Key West to Tampa and to interrupt the business for the time necessary for this process without considerable loss of time, of interest, and of actual money. It would be a much easier plan to burn down the factory and collect immediately insurance on the whole amount of material stored therein, especially if a little careful book-keeping can make the amount of stock burned appear more than it really was ; and so the insurance companies decline to pay insurance until they investigate. The very temper on the part of the striking workingmen which set fire to the factory is at the disposal of the insurance company to fabricate evi- dence to your disadvantage. The outcome, therefore, is that instead of receiving the amount of your loss you 122 INDIVIDUALISM are left with a heavy indebtedness, no prospect of sales to meet the same, and an expensive and exasperating litigation. It becomes necessary, notwithstanding, to purchase new tobacco ; and the resources and credit of the firm are strained to the utmost in order to enable this neces- sary purchase. The new tobacco is to be delivered no longer at Key West, but at Tampa, and you will at any rate profit now from the more favourable conditions which prevail at Tampa, owing to the liberality of the appraiser. On this subject, however, you find your partners unwilling to speak wdtli much freedom, and you are for the first time made acquainted with a doubt as to whether the appraiser will continue to entertain the liberal views once entertained on the subject. Upon further investigation, you learn that the appraiser in Tampa owes his position to the influence of the real- estate men to whom you owe the land upon which you are building your new factory. If the suspicion crosses your mind that the appraiser is in the pay of these real- estate owners, you put it aside as one unworthy of yourself and them ; until one day 3-our partners find it necessary to convey to you the fact that, the appraiser having struck for a higher rate of remuneration, the real-estate men have called upon your firm to pay a con- tribution thereto. This demand you of course refuse to comply Avith, and you then become acquainted with the fact that such a refusal is regarded by your part- ners as quixotic and unbusinesslike. The question is dropped, and it is not until you examine the accounts at the end of the year that you find you have been un- willingly made a party to the corruption of a United States official. Meanwhile a Spanish governor-general in Cuba has issued an edict forbidding the exportation of tobacco, THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 123 and the very material which you need for the conduct of your business is thereby refused you. On the other hand, owing to the fact that the resources of your firm have been crippled by the refusal of the insurance com- panies to pay the loss on the burning of the factory, you have only in stock just enough to supply your existing needs ; whereas your competitors, who have been antici- pating some such move on the part of the Spanish governor-general in Cuba, have supplied themselves with tobacco in sufficient quantity to run their factory for another year. In this critical condition of things there is only one compensating hope ; namely, that this prohibition of the exportation of tobacco in Havana will raise the price of cigars in which this tobacco enters. But again this hope is disappointed ; the few firms who have sufficient tobacco in stock, being able to continue manufacturing notwithstanding this order, discern in this advantage an opportunity for crushing out your- selves and all other less wealthy or less favoured com- petitors. They keep their prices where they stood before ; you can therefore get no higher prices for your goods, and the moment soon arrives when you can no longer fill the orders which you at so great an expense of advertising and salesmen's commissions secured. Then ruin stares you in the face ; the hundred thousand dol- lars subscribed by you for the purpose of building the factory and workingmen's houses has been in part employed in purchasing tobacco. The workmen's houses, therefore, are not built, no income is derived therefrom, and the closing of the factory is imminent, owing to your inability to obtain tobacco. Your atten- tion is thus called to the iniquity of Spanish misgovern- ment in Cuba ; to the ignoring of the rights of American commerce by the edict against the exportation of to- bacco; to the fact that all nations have proceeded upon 124 INDIVIDUALISM the plan of protecting their commerce, if necessary, by war; to the facility with which the United States might at any time put an end to Spanish misrule, and to the conditions which are now threatening you with ruin. It is not unlikely that under these circumstances you will be driven by the necessities of your position to become an advocate of war. Within the space of a few months, therefore, the mere possession of capital has forced you to refuse to improve the admittedly degraded condition of your employees, to become a silent partner in the corruption of a United States official, and to advocate the shedding of human blood for the purpose of protecting the interests of trade. § 5. The Industrial Results of Private Prop- erty. — Irregularity of Employment, Coloni- sation, AND War It may seem as though the conditions which brought about the failure of the A. B. Co., are exceptional ; but it must be borne in mind that out of every hundred men who start a new business an average of ninety are known by experience to fail ; ^ and there is not one of this ninety who fail, who is not prepared to prove that his failure was due to conditions that were exceptional. The fact is that commercial competition is very much like that of nature, in that we have before us only the ten per cent of those business ventures that succeed, and are therefore likely to lose sight of the ninety per cent that fail. In otlier respects, too, commercial com- petition resembles the scheme of nature. The compe- 1 United States commercial agencies, such as Bradstreet and Dun & Co., which publisli records of insolvencies, seem to prove that out of one hundred new business ventures about ninety per cent result either in bankruptcy or unprofitable liquidation. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 125 tition of nature is indifferent, cruel, and unjust; and it cannot be said that commerce is in any way less indif- ferent, less cruel, or less unjust. Nor could it be other- wise ; for it is the very element of competition in nature which man started out in his struggle with nature by political and social institutions to coiTect; and when we observe that in so far as man has failed by his social and political institutions to eliminate competi- tion, so far he lias maintained the injustice and cruelty of nature ; whereas in so far as he has by his institutions succeeded in replacing competition by co-operation, he has effected an improvement in general conditions, — the question naturally suggests itself whether a great part of the unhappiness which attends our social system may not be due to the fact that man has not completed the work that he began. But if, reader, there remains any lingering notion in your mind that the case I have imagined is an excep- tional one, let me ask you how you can invest your hun- dred thousand dollars without becoming a partner in the industrial system and to that extent responsible for the injustice which it unconsciously involves. If your money is invested in real estate, you become a partner in the fortunes of your tenants ; so long as they prosper your rent is paid ; but the moment one of them, however innocent, ceases to prosper, you, by evicting him, will be giving him the push down hill which tends eventually to land him in the poorhouse. If your money is in- vested in railroad securities, you become a partner in the fortunes of the road in the securities of which you in- vest ; when it has to crush competition by cutting rates, your money helps to pay the cost of the process, and your money therefore contributes to the ruin of the bondholders of the competing road ; when it has to secure a franchise and to corrupt a legislature to this 126 INDIVIDUALISM end, your money goes to pay the bribe ; you are yourself, therefore, unconsciously guilty of the very degradation against which you daily protest. If your money is in- vested in industry of any kind you are made thereby the instrument through which the Market — the irresponsi- ble but none the less merciless Market — keeps down the wages of the workingman ; you cannot escape this necessary law so long as competition remains the motive- power of the industrial machine. If you are to keep your capital, you must sell your goods at a profit ; you must lose your capital if you sell at a loss ; competition between capitalists, egged on by the perpetual effort of the purchaser to buy cheap, keeps prices down to a minimum, and thus the needs of the purchasing poor keep down the wages of the working poor, one part of the community being, under this system, engaged in crushing other parts of it. There is another feature of the competitive system to which attention cannot be too closely directed ; namely, the tendency to partial ^ over-production and the evils which follow in its wake, — irregularity of employment, colonisation, imperialism, and war. When, for any reason, an industry' becomes highly profitable, capital tends to flow to this industry and, by competition, to lower profits. If the profits were unduly high before this flow of capital set in, the lowering of profits would be a good thing ; but the flow of capital ^ The word "partial" is used in connection with over-production in order to avoid the appearance of approving the theory of recurring periods of general over-production, which Kdward Bellamy has popularised in " Equality," and has lately received the more weighty supjwrt of J. A. Hobson. This theory does not seem to be proven, and must be carefully distinguished from the partial over-production here explained. The extent to which competition is attended by over-production is illustrated in the liistory of our principal Trusts. See Appendix. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 127 to this industry generally means that it has abandoned some other industry, and this means that those who worked at the abandoned industry have lost their em- ployment. It is true that the capital which has swelled the profitable business will employ more labour in the business, but the labour employed will in most cases be different from that thrown out of employment, and a con- siderable period is likely to elapse before those thrown out of one employment can fit themselves for another. But the flow of capital to the profitable business will by competition lower profits ; every manufacturer, there- fore, in the business will have an interest to increase the scope of his business so as to make up by an increased number of transactions for diminished profits upon each transaction ; and as he increases his business he will become alive to the economies which attend large as compared with small business, economy in purchase of raw material, economy through utilisation of waste pro- ducts, facility for employment of improved machinery, economy of distribution, rebates allowed to large ship- pers, low interest charged on large transactions, etc. ; and so every dollar of profit not required for expendi- ture remains to swell the business ; capital is increased by transformation into joint-stock companies ; money is borrowed by issues of bonds ; and so production tends to increase until the demand ceases to keep pace with it, and prices go down. Now, if we want to be accurate we must say, not demand, but effectual demand. Demand in political economy does not mean mere desire to possess a thing, but desire to possess it coupled with ability to pay for it a price at least equal to the cost of manufacture. Let us suppose, for example, that there has been over-pro- duction of stockings ; more stockings have been made than there is effectual demand for. There may be thou- 128 INDIVIDUALISM sands who are prevented by poverty from wearing stock- ings ; but these thousands in political economy do not count for anything. Unless they have money enough to spare for the purchase of stockings at cost price, their desire to wear stockings is not effectual ; it cannot take the stockings off the hands of the manufacturer ; and in spite of a real need for stockings in the community, be- cause this need is not coupled with ability to pui'chase, the manufacturer of stockings has to shut down his fac- tory. There is no effectual demand ; there is a real demand, but because it is not effectual — that is to say, because it is not coupled with ability to purchase — thousands may be condemned to dispense with an article of clothing important in our climate to comfort and to health. One of the treacherous features of this tendency of production to outstrip effectual demand is that it is ex- pressed only in diminution of profits, and one of the methods for fighting diminished profits is, as just shown, still larger production. Manufacturers tend, therefore, to continue a suicidal extension of their industries at the very time when, if wisely informed, they would on the contrary restrict them. At last prices fall below cost. At such periods the most prosperous mills are driven to cHscharge a part of their employees ; those which are less prosperous shut down temporarily ; and others shut down never to open again. Thus there are cast upon the community deserv- ing workingmen anxious to work and unable to do so. Recurring periods of depression in each industry give way in time to new periods of prosperity through the operation of several causes. In the hrst jilace, tlie clos- ing of factories which they necessitate reduces the pro- duction until the stock of goods is brought into proper relation with effectual demand. Tn the second place, THE INSTRUMENT OP INDIVIDUALISM 129 gluts sometimes give rise to legislation in the shape of protecting tariffs and export bounties, which by shut- ting out the competition of the foreigner increases the demand for home-made goods; and, in the third place, they stimulate the search for foreign markets ; for, there being no demand at home, manufacturers who are carry- ing unsalable stock are willing to sell at a loss abroad, and are therefore able to undersell competitors in foreign markets.^ The tendency of gluts to stimulate foreign trade must not be overlooked ; for over-production drives nations to extend their market by forcing goods into foreign lands. The morality of forcing trade upon a foreign people at the cannon's mouth is justified by necessity ; for either English mills must shut down and English workingmen starve, or China must consent to buy England's goods. The necessity, however, under which industry stands to create new markets for its goods, owing to the law that production perpetually tends to outstrip effectual demand, has a result which has not yet been acutely felt ; but it must eventually produce serious conse- quences. For it is this necessity which is hastening the work of colonisation all over the world, at a fever- ish rate of speed. The manufacturer must sell his goods ; as fast as his production outstrips the capacity of his fellow-citizens to buy his goods he seeks to create new markets, and so he sends out the missionary first, the trader next, and the soldier eventually after him.^ The prosperity of the colony thus planted by ruse, or violence, or both, becomes a matter of vital importance 1 Some excellent illustrations of this tendency are to be found in the testimony taken in 1899 by the Industrial Commission. They have been collected in a footnote to the Appendix on Trusts at the end of this volume. 2 This point is somewhat more fully treated under section 7 of this chapter, sub (b) Militarism. 9 130 INDIVIDUALISM to English trade ; it stimulates the increase of popula- tion not only there, but in England, for no parent need hesitate to bring a large family into the world so long as there is a livelihood for children in the colonies ; and so the interests of manufacturers are continually urging the Anglo-Saxon race to breed and multiply in every corner of the habitable world. Instead of the self-restraint which Malthus piously urged upon his fellow-country- men, the industrial system stimulates an incontinence which, were it not for the vast unoccupied spaces still in the world, would be reckless in the extreme. And yet this process cannot go on much longer with- out fatal consequences. Most of the fertile land in our own continent of America is occupied ; it is by no means sure that there is very much land in Africa which can be occupied by white men until they have slowly become acclimated thereto ; and at the rate at which 2^opulation is now increasing under the perpetual stimulus of the competitive system it cannot be long before all the habitable vacant spaces in the world will be taken up. When that time comes, where will the competitive system, which upon the profit plan tends to produce more than the community can pay for, find new markets ? For there will then be neither foreign markets to conquer nor colonies to plant; nor indeed will there be any outlet by emigration for tlie un- employed. Indeed, when, in our eagerness to secure Chinese trade, we shall have taught the Chinaman liow to compete with us, China, instead of furnishing us with a new market, will constitute the most dangerous and relentless of our competitors ; for the Chinaman can work effectually on food which will not support life in the Anglo-Saxon ; and of Chinamen there are believed to be over three hundred millions. The disaster which will then bring the starving workman face to face with THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 131 a glutted market can lead to but one result. For some years to come there will doubtless remain room for emigration in Australia, America, and Africa ; and the most dangerous, because the most active, can be drafted away from the swelling and threatening masses of the unemployed. But when this resource is no longer open, and the unemployed, eager to work and hungry, find themselves confronted with a market overflowing with the food and clothing they need but cannot buy, can there be any result but one ? These, then, are the inevitable consequences of the present competitive system : First. The competitive system tends to produce par- tial over-production. Second. Over-production produces irregularity of em- ployment. Third. Over-production stimulates colonisation. Fourth. Colonisation stimulates population. Fifth. Over-production stimulates conquest of foreign markets, and, — Sixths consequently promotes war. Seventh. When there are neither lands to colonise nor markets to conquer, over-production is likely to result in violence and revolt. We have been asking ourselves of late whether we shall take the Philippines or not, unconscious of the relentless goads that are compelling us to take the Philippines whether we will or Jiot.^ The demand for expansion is for the most part the need for new markets, which is being felt for the first time in the United States by the large number of voters who are engaged in industry. It clothes itself in patriotism, but it is probably for the most part self-interest, or, rather, self- preservation. 1 Written in 1898. 132 INDIVIDUALISM It has been pointed out that over-production, when not relieved by extending foreign trade, is mainly checked by the tendency of capital to withdraw from unprofitable manufactures. Now, every time such with- drawal takes place a corresponding number of workmen are thrown out of employment, — that is to say, are sub- jected to want and the anguish of anxiety. The evil of this system cannot be explained away by pointing out that the capital withth-awn from one manufacture will soon be reinvested in another. A cotton-spinner can- not in a week or a month become a boiler-maker. The commercial system which makes it easy for a capitalist to maintain income at the cost of agony to the working- man does not recommend itself to the political student who is seeking for the establishment of Justice in economic conditions. Those who approve of the existing competitive system point with admiration to the natural adjustment which takes place eveiy time economic conditions are thrown out of prosperous equilibrium. If too much capital flows into one industry, they say the fact is promptly revealed by (hminished profits; capital then promptly flows away from that industry into industries which by the high profits realised indicate their need of more capital ; and so capital is always tending by its fluidity to maintain a " natural," " static," or normal rate of profit. Rate of profit, then, is the barometric signal for move- ment of capital to and from the industries respectively ; the system moves with meteorologic accuracy. Even the disturbances produced by invention of machinery are more apparent tlian real. Capital flows from the old industry into the manufacture of machinery, and, so invested, employs labour ; machinery dhninishes cost of production, conferring thereby a benefit on the consumer. This increases purchasing power ; every increase of THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 133 purchasing power means increase of demand ; every in- crease of demand means encouragement to greater pro- duction ; capital, therefore, is rendered more productive by every new machine, and ultimately is enabled, by increased production and increased demand, to employ more labour. All this is perfectly true. The fluidity of capital makes it possible for the capitalist for the most part to keep his money invested at remunerative rates of interest and concomitantly to remain engaged in the employment of labour. The working of the system is that of a beautifully devised machine, and as such is worthy of the admiration bestowed upon it, provided we only look at it from the capitalist's point of view. Unfortunately labour is not as " fluid " or insensible as capital. The workingman is a human being with the capacity for pain and for anxiety that characterises our race ; and every time that capital profits by its fluidity to flow from one industry to another, the lives of men, women, and children are threatened by want and their hearts wrung by fear. If the competitive system were the only possible economic system, then we should have to resign ourselves to these pitiable conditions ; but if it is not the only possible economic system, — if another system can be proposed which is free from these condi- tions, — is it not well that we should study this last with the utmost care ? The present industrial system has in one sense the disadvantage of being highly artificial, — for it is the creation of man, not of nature ; and in another, the ad- ditional disadvantage of resembling a natural method observable in the human body which is peculiarly open to criticism for the systematic pain which it involves : if a cinder falls into the eye, the sensory nerves are stimulated by the pain occasioned to such a point as to produce tears of anguish, through which the cinder 134 mDIVIDUALISM is washed out of the eye. The process is as automatic as the flow of capital from one industry to another ; but it is not one that we would, if we had the choice, deliberately adopt. We have tolerated the competitive plan in great part because the pain involved in tem- porary loss of profit is to a capitalist comparatively small, and capitalists have had up to the present time the making of our laws and economic institutions. But a change has of late come over our political con- ditions. The workingman, upon whom the torment of the process really falls, is learning to use his political power. It is not reasonable to suppose that he will long consent to endure conditions which necessarily impose the burden of every economic strain upon him- self. Is it? We must not leave the subject of industrialism with- out pointing out a few other attending circumstances. As production tends to outstrip consumption, every manufacturer is driven to the necessity of pushing the sale of his goods and endeavouring to secure as large a share of the diminishing market as possible for him- self at the expense of his competitors. The effort to sell goods necessitates the employment of commercial travellers, whose business it is to bring home to the public the superiority of the goods they have to sell over similar goods in the same market. The com- mercial traveller is remunerated by a commission on the sales he effects, and is given thereby a direct interest in appreciating the goods he is selling and depreciating the goods of competing manufacturers ; the lies wliich he is by this system induced to tell are sanctioned by a maxim of our law, — the admittedly immoral maxim, " caveat emptor ; " and the lies which tlie commercial traveller tells are spread in still more glaring charac- THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 135 ters over wall spaces and the advertising columns of our daily papers. It is true that the practice of lying has become so universal in trade that the deception is in extent much discounted ; but there is another character of falsehood that does deceive, — that is to say, the falsehood of fact implied in adulteration and scamped work. Thus in 1864 the inspectors of factories reported that export shirtings weighing eight pounds consisted only of five and a quarter pounds of cotton, whereas they contained two and three quarter pounds of size ; another weigh- ing five and a quarter pounds contained two pounds of size ; cloths of other descriptions contained as much as fifty per cent of size.^ The third effect of competition to which attention has already been directed is to reduce wages. At every period of depression not only are workingmen thrown out of employment in vast numbers, but the employees that remain are obliged to submit to reduced wages ; and the effect of the reduction of wages upon women is sufiiciently set forth in a similar report for 1865 in the following words : " Unfortunate females, in consequence of the cotton famine, were at its com- mencement thrown out of employment, and have there- by become outcasts of society, and now, though trade has revived and work is plentiful, continue members of that unfortunate class and are likely to continue so. There are also in the borough more youthful prostitutes than I have known for the last twenty-five years." ^ And so it turns out that the great maxim 1 Keport of Inspectors of Factories of 1864, p. 27. 2 From a letter of Mr. Harris, Chief Constable of Bolton, in Rep. of Insp. of Fact., Oct. 31, 1865, pp. 61, 62. It is true that, notwith- standing this tendency, prostitution seems to be actually on the decline ; but this is doubtless due to the fact that opportunities to women for earning money are largely on the increase. Prostitution is essentially a question of economics. Vide book ii. chap. iv. § 2. 136 INDIVIDUALISM of trade, " Buy in the cheapest market and sell in the dearest," means in a word this, — that the necessity of buying cheap brings all the markets in the world into competition with one another, giving the greatest advantage to those markets in which the lowest wages rule ; ^ and that it is upon the workman, therefore, that the burden of competition for the most part falls. Ob- viously the labourer alone is unable to hold up the rate of wages, in view of the unlimited store of work- ingmen upon which the capitalist can draw ; and workingmen would to-day be living on starvation wages were it not for the intelligence with which they have combined for the purpose of holding their own against the capitalist. These combinations of workingmen, however, which are familiar to us under the name of Trade Unions, stand between two fires : in the first place, their efforts to raise wages are limited by foreign competition ; that is to say, if the English manufac- turer, yielding to the demands of the trade unions, raises wages beyond a certain limit, he will be unable to hold liis foreign trade against foreign competitors 1 It may be objected that the recent success of American goods manu- factured at a high rate of wages disproves the truth of this assertion. The objection, however, is not well founded : American experience, shows that within certain limits labour can be made more effectual by raising wages. This, however, depends upon the personal e(]uation of every race. It is none the less true that the day the Chinaman is taught American methods, his undoubted superiority on the score of cheapness of living will enable him to manufacture more clicaply than the American. The day tliis happens — and it is not far distant — shall we allow the American work- man to be starved out of existence ? Or shall we seek by the adoption of a less wasteful method of production to preserve the American work- man from the Yellow Peril ? Exclusion of tlio ( 'Jiinese will not save the American workman ; nor will protection ; for Chinese goods will shut out American goods from foreign markets, and it is on foreign markets that the American workman is already beginning to depend. We need a less wastefid system of jiroduction. See book ii. chap, i., ou Collec- tivism. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 137 who do not pay equivalent rates for equivalent service ; and the inability of the English manufacturer to com- pete with his foreign competitors in foreign markets means not only his ruin, but the ruin of his working- men. In the second place, the trade union can only operate effectually on the condition of absolute obedi- ence on the part of its members ; and to the necessity of this obedience and the results of it, it may be well next to direct our attention. § 6. The Proletarian CoMsmATioisr against Pri- vate Property. — Trade Unions Trade unions have undoubtedly rendered great ser- vice : they have proved the error which underlies the wages fund theory ; they have stripped the Malthusian menace of most of its terrors ; they have demonstrated that wao;es can be raised and the condition of the work- man vastly improved without diminishing the cost of his work, so much do these improvements increase his efficiency ; and, last of all, they have furnished to the workman a school of political experience and self-con- trol which is destined eventually to be of inestimable value to the community. Nevertheless it must be recognised that at every step they have encountered problems that they have failed to solve, and the effect of this failure is of no small importance in demonstrating the radical evils of the competitive system. Let us consider some of these unsolved problems one by one. 138 INDIVIDUALISM UNSOLVED PKOBLEMS OF TRADE UNIONS (a) Restriction on Trade First in order comes restriction on trade ; such, for example, as apprenticeship and the attempted exclusion of boys and women. Apprenticeship in the guilds of old not only educated youths for the trade, but also restricted admission to it. This prevented competition amongst workmen by only allowing the number of workmen to be engaged in every craft which the craft could support, and rigidly excluding all the rest. Trade unions, the main object of which is to maintain a standard rate of wages, were confronted by the same problem, and originally adopted the same method. They soon found, however, that in most trades the limitation of entrance to the trade by apprenticeship was impossible ; this was mainly due to the fact that membership in trade unions was not com- pulsory for all persons engaged in the craft, as was membership in the guild. Trade unions have for the most part to depend upon the consent of the workman to belong thereto, and have no power to prevent groups of men encasred in the same trade outside of one trade union from organising separate trade unions of their own. Moreover the intimate relation of markets in different parts of the country which exist under modern conditions makes it indispensable that a trade union, in order to maintain rates of wages, should at least cover the entire district in which competition between workmen can effectually take place ; instead, therefore, of being in a position to exclude all but those they choose to admit, they are, on the contrary, driven to every kind of persuasion, and sometimes even com- pulsion, in order to induce all the workmen in the THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 139 trade to belong to the same trade union. When, there- fore, the compositors found that men were able to enter the trade in districts outside of their organisation, such as small towns where no organisation could be main- tained, they found it necessary to waive their principle of apprenticeship and admit " illegal men " in order to prevent their competition. Engineers, too, found that, owing to the simplicity resulting from improvements in machinery, men could enter the trade without ap- prenticeship, and they were driven to relax their rules in consequence. Nevertheless, of the 1,400,000 organised workingmen in England, 500,000 belong to trade unions which still insist upon apprenticeship. It might seem at first sight that the remaining 900,000, because they did not insist upon apprenticeship, could properly be called " open trades ; " that is to say, trades in which there was no restriction of membership. But this would be a great mistake : it would be mistaking form for fact ; for those who do not limit entries into a trade by a system of apprenticeship restrict it in an equally effective manner by maintaining a high stand- ard of wages ; for no employer can afford to pay this high rate of wages to any but the best workmen ; and the trade is therefore always recruited from the flower of those who apply for entrance to it. This principle is perfectly in accordance with the principles of the competitive system ; but it is injurious to general wel- fare, for it throws all but the best workmen upon the community and swells the ranks of sweated industries to which reference will be made later. In effect, there- fore, the numbers in every trade are almost as severely restricted as those of the ancient guild, with the ad- vantage, however, that while admission to the guild was a matter of favour, admission to a trade union is a matter 140 INDIVIDUALISM of ability. It may seem at first sight that this distinc- tion is an unadulterated improvement ; but if we look at the question from the point of view of general wel- fare, it will be seen to contain an element of serious danger; for whereas under the guild's system some of those excluded were capable of earning their live- lihood elsewhere if opportunity to do so presented itself, under the trade-union system the weakest are excluded, and therefore those least able to earn their livelihood elsewhere. Obviously, therefore, this system not only furnishes the material which supplies the sweated trades with cheap labour, but also helps to fill our roads with tramps and our institutions with paupers and criminals. The repeated attempts made to exclude boys from work which, before the institution of machinery, was performed by men, present another problem that still remains unsolved, nor does it seem capable of solution under the competitive system; for example, in the numerous efforts made by the boot and shoe trade in England to exclude boys, the workmen have been obliged to consent to their being used in "nursery goods ; " for the reason that if they endeavoured to pre- vent it, capitalists engaged in the business would sepa- rate into two classes, — those who could profitably employ men, and those who could more profitably, because they only manufactured nursery goods, use boys only ; these last would then entirely escape all pressure from the trade unions. The attempt to exclude women, though for a long time persisted in, has practically failed ; in some trades work naturally divides itself into such as can best be done by men, and such as can best be done by women, THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 141 as, for example, the cotton trade ; in this trade the work requiring most strength is more highly paid and is dis- tributed to men, and the work requiring less strength is paid at a lower rate and distributed to women. But whenever this cannot take place, as in the making of garments, the fact that women are often partially sup- ported from sources other than their own work, and that they do not demand the same standard of living, makes their competition destructive to all collective bargain- ing, and is largely responsible, therefore, for the so-called sweated industries. If now we pass to the so-called right to a trade, — that is to say, the claims which shipwrights, for example, have to a certain class of work in the building of ships, and the claims of joiners to some of the same work as that claimed by shipwrights, — we shall see that trade unions are involved in altercations which, as the authors of "Industrial Democracy" say, present an "apparently incomprehensible problem ; " and the conflicts which rise from these sources are of no small dimensions. In the industries of the Tyneside from 1890 to 1898, they put one or other of the four most important sections of workmen in the district out of work for thirty-five weeks in the space of thirty-five months. How subtle are the distinctions which these conflicting claims raise may be judged from the fact that, although shipwrights admit that joiners may line with wood all telegraphic connections throughout the upper part of the ship, they deny them the right to do this through cargo spaces, coal bunkers, and the hold ; so that " in a job of only a few hours, if a joiner passes this magic line, the whole of the shipwrights will drop their tools." Nor does it seem possible to find any basis upon which the claims of these rival trades can be settled. They cannot be 142 INDIVIDUALISM settled upon the basis of custom, because each party interprets custom in a different way ; they cannot be based upon the tools used, for whereas fifty years ago shipwrights were distinguished by the fact that they used the adze and the mallet, and joiners the hammer and the plane, to-day all four tools are used, together with others borrowed from the glazier and cabinet-maker, on the deck of a ship ; they cannot be based upon the material used, because shipwrights, joiners, and cabinet- makers all work in wood, shipwrights, boiler-makers, engineers, and plumbers all work in iron. As a matter of fact, they generally resort to distinctions of thickness and size ; engineers being allowed to use iron pipes of two and a half inches, and j)lumbers iron pipe of three inches ; joiners being allowed to work in wood of one and a half inches thick, and work in greater thickness of wood being reserved for shipwrights, and so on. These distinctions may seem trivial ; but upon them de- pend the bread of the various trades engaged therein; and unfortunately the arrangements to which these con- flicting trades come can never be permanent. The con- flicts which have given rise to them all result from the continual change produced by modern improvements; these changes are bound to go on, and every time a change occurs it affects these trades, and the same con- flict is likely to recur. Again, the main object of trade unions is to secure what is called a common rule ; that is to say, a univer- sally applied rate of wages for every variety of work in each trade. Their success in obtaining this common rule is in some trades remarkable, as may be seen by glancing over tlie piecework lists of the cotton industry; but the establis1inu;nt of tlie common rule involves the necessity of limiting tlie work ; in other words, in the THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 143 place of the freedom with which, under the freedom of contract plan, every workman was entitled to compete with other workmen not only in the amount of wages he was to receive, but in the amount of work he fur- nished for that wage, it has been found necessary by the trade-union plan, in order to maintain the rate of wages, to limit the amount of work which is to be done for these wages. I think the authors of "Industrial Democracy" have a little undervalued the extent to which this has been found indispensable, although they have been very frank in their admission of it. Some of the rules attributed by them to the folly and perversity of trade unions are worth quoting (pages 304, 305). The fifth by-law of the Bradford Lodge of the Labour- ers' Union of 1867 runs as follows : " You are strictly cautioned not to outstep good rules by doing double the work you are required, and causing others to do the same, in order to gain a smile from the master." And the following rule of the Leeds Lodge of the Bricklay- ers Labourers' Union provides : " Any brother in the Union professing to carry any more than the common number, which is eight bricks, shall be fined one shil- ling, to be paid within one month, or remain out of the benefit until such fine be paid." Nor were such rules entirely confined to unskilled labourers. The Manchester Bricklayers' Association was stated in 1869 to have a rule providing that " any man found running or working beyond a regular speed shall be fined 2s. 6d. for the first offence, 5s. for the second, 10s. for the third, and, if still persisting, shall be dealt with as the Committee think proper." The Friendly Society of Operative Stone-masons adopted in 1865 the following rule : "In localities where that most obnoxious and destructive system generally known as * chasing ' is persisted in, lodges should use every 144 INDIVIDUALISM effort to put it down. Not to take less time than that taken by an average mason in the execution of the first portion of each description of work is tlie practice that should be adopted among us as much as possible ; and where it is plainly visible that any member or other in- dividual is striving to overwork or ' chase ' his fellow- workmen, thereby acting in a manner calculated to lead to the discharge of members or a reduction of their wages, the party so acting shall be summoned before the lodge, and, if the charge be satisfactorily proved, a fine shall be inflicted." Our authors admit that one workman can underbid another by offering more work for the same wage as well as by offering a normal amount of work for a lower wage ; and if this be the case it is clearly as necessary, they say, to limit the maximum of the work to be fui-- nished as the minimum of the wage to be received. This is done in every trade, for even the piecework trades have found it necessary to limit the hours and to prohibit overtime. The success of trade unions has not prevented strikes. The published list shows that these continue to a number of from 700 to 800 a year ; the Royal Commis- sion of Labour describes the change which has taken place in the character of the strikes in the following words (page 221) : — " When both sides in a trade are strongly organised and in possession of considerable financial resources, a trade conflict, when it does occur, may be on a very large scale, veiy protracted, and very costly. But just as a modern war between two great European States, costly tliough it is, seems to represent a liigher state of civilisation than the incessant local fights and ])order raids which occur in tinjes or places where governments THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 145 are less strong and centralised, so, on the whole, an occasional great trade conflict, breaking in upon years of peace, seems to be preferable to continual local bickerings, stoppages of work, and petty conflicts." It may be a comfort to the Royal Commission to think that the " very protracted and very costly " strikes should have been substituted for " local bicker- ings," but they are none the less the disastrous, waste- ful, and plainly necessary result of the competitive system. (&) Sweating Bad as they are, however, they represent nothing in the shape of continuous human misery which can com- pare with the so-called sweated parasitic trades. It has been already pointed out that the system which recruits workmen in well-organised trades only from the very best who present themselves for admission to them, throws upon less organised trades a less qualified class ; and it has been pointed out that women, by the fact that they have a lower standard of living than men, and are often partially supported by other sources, are more willing to work at low wages than men, present an element of weakness, wherever they are, to the mainte- nance of a high standard of wages. Now, it is a nec- essary result of the competitive system that wherever cheap labour can be obtained, a trade will be found to profit by that labour ; in other words, because this cheap labour is available for certain trades, competition com- pels these trades to use this cheapest labour. Mr. Charles Booth bears witness to this in the following passage : — The facility of obtaining " large supplies of low- paid labour," says Mr. Booth, "may be regarded as the proximate cause of the expansion of some of the 10 146 INDIVIDUALISM most distinctive manufacturing industries of East and South London, — furniture, boots and shoes, caps, cloth- ing, paper bags, and cardboard boxes, matches, jam, etc. They are found in the neighbourhood of districts largely occupied by unskilled or semi-skilled workmen, or by those whose employment is most discontinuous, since it is chiefly the daughters, wives, and widows of these men who turn to labour of this kind." ^ The select committee of the House of Lords describes the condition of sweated workmen as follows (I. D. p. 771) : — " Earnings barely sufficient to sustain existence ; hours of labour such as to make the lives of the workers periods of almost ceaseless toil, hard and unlovely to the last degree ; sanitary conditions injurious to the health of the persons employed and dangerous to the public." 2 In these two quotations we see the cause of the sweat- ing system and its effect. On the one side, a population reduced to such a condition that it cannot exact high wages, attracting to itself on the other side trades that can only live on the condition of low wages, both re- sulting in misery, sickness, and destitution. There is a feature about this condition of things to which attention has not been sufficiently called. It has been so much the custom to use sentimental lancfuafje in order to arouse sympathy for the victims of this system, that we have ceased to give to this language of senti- ment the value it deserves ; for example, we take it for granted when we read a popular book on the sweating system that there will be a great deal in it about " white ^ "Life and Labour of the People." (London) vol. ix. p. 193. Quoted "Industrial Democracy," p. 757. 2 Final report of the Select Committee of the House of Lords on the sweating system, 1890. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 147 slaves " and " grinding the faces of the poor." We dis- count this language in advance ; it has been used so often that it ceases any longer to reach us. This is a pity, because, as a matter of fact, the condition of sweated workers is not only as bad as that of slaves, but in one respect much worse. A slave-owner has an interest in maintaining the health and vigour of his slaves, and will not, therefore, overwork them. Just as cab-owners in Paris have discovered that it is more profitable to feed up their horses than to overwork them, slave-owners, except in rare cases, have found it profitable to see to the health and even the comfort of their slaves. This motive does not exist with employers of sweated workmen ; on the contrary, they are per- petually driven by competition to reduce wages to the lowest figure possible, and are therefore prevented by the necessities of the situation from having any concern for the well-being of their employees, even if they would. It is not a matter of financial importance to them how soon the sweated workers are worn out : there are always plenty of others to take an empty place ; they are thus cU'iven to employ no workers but those who are on the verge of starvation and therefore most willing to work at any price ; and they are also driven to work these wretches to death because, at the rate of wages that they can afford to pay, the workers can earn only enough to keep alive on the condition of working more hours of the day than any human frame can stand. This condition of things, upon which I shall not trust myself to enlarge, is not a matter as regards which any individual is responsible. It is the inevitable, necessary, and fatal result of the competitive system ; and the well- being secured by a favoured class of workmen through highly organised trade unions tends to increase the sweated population rather than to diminish it. 148 INDIVIDUALISM (c) The Unemployed Closely connected with the problem of the sweating system, and indeed a necessary part of it, is that of the unemployed, — the final dregs of the population which not even the sweater can usefully employ. As the authors of " Industrial Democracy " admit (page 591), " the doctrine of a living wage does not profess to solve the problem of the unemployed or the unemployable." To pretend that a community which professes to frame its institutions with a view to justice can sincerely put up with a system that must necessarily result in such miseiy as this, looks a great deal like hypocrisy. But there is a more serious indictment against the whole trade-union system than this. The authors of " Industrial Democracy " admit that a point is reached in every trade at wliich the standard of wages can no longer be raised. " To put it concretely," they say (page 739), " when- ever the percentage of the unemployed in a particular industry begins to rise from the three to five per cent characteristic of 'good trade,' to the ten, fifteen, or even twenty-five per cent experienced in 'bad trade,' there must be a pause in the operatives' advance move- ment." And again (page 450), "The trade unionists, in short, like the majority of English employers, have hitherto stood helpless before the inscrutable ebb and flow of demand, and have accepted as inevitable the corresponding fluctuations of work." (jV) The Limitations of Trade Unions The ebb and flow of demand is not " inscrutable." It obeys a law as certain as the ebb and flow of the tide. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 149 England is engaged in competing with the whole civil- ised world as to the cost at which she can produce the goods she manufactures ; and as she produces a great deal more goods than her own people have money to buy, she is di'iven to fight the rest of the world in order to force her goods upon new markets. " What you Avant," says a London comic paper, rep- resenting John Bull holding up before a Chinaman a garment made by sweated workers, "• is something with pockets." Up to the present time and during the last three hundred years the expansion of England has been continuous. To many it has seemed as though her trade merely kept up with her conquests. To a more careful observer it becomes obvious that she is driven to conquest by her trade. I think it cannot be denied that it is only upon the condition of continuous expan- sion and continuous conquest that trade unions have succeeded in securing the terms they now enjoy. Let that expansion stop, and the trade unions will immedi- ately fuid themselves confronted by the " inscrutable ebb and flow of demand " which has already bid them pause ; but instead of being an ebb and flow as hereto- fore, the movement will all be in the same direction. Already American factories compete successfully witli those of England in many of her most lucrative branches of trade ; and in those of which England still keeps control the difference in cost is almost inappreciable. Under these circumstances English trade seems threat- ened in both directions through diminished markets on the one hand and underbidding on the other. When that time comes, what will become of this vast organisa- tion of trade unions ? But American competition is by no means all that Great Britain has to fear : she is already beaten out of many markets by the Germans and the Japanese; and 150 INDIVIDUALISM it is certain that when the Chinese are driven to learn our arts, as at the cannon's mouth we are now compel- ling them to do, they will not only manufacture at a lower cost for themselves, but will underbid both Eng- land and the United States ; for of all the races in the world there is none that can do more work upon less food than the Chinaman. The trade-union system, therefore, is a successful device for improving the con- dition of the workingman during periods of expanding trade, but the moment contraction sets in, the whole system seems doomed to fall to the ground. One more point must be briefly referred to here before we leave the unsolved problems of trade unions. It is dealt with more at length in the chap- ter on Liberty.^ The guilds were broken up because they constituted exclusive and tyrannical industrial rings. They differed from our present industrial system mainly in the fact that the guild included the whole industrial class, — managers as well as managed, employers as well as employees. This combination maintained prices for both ; it kept up liigli wages for a few workmen at the cost of misery to the mass ; and it kept up high prices at the cost of the consumer. This double-headed result was deemed so evil for the com- munity that guilds came to an end, by legislation in France, by wholesome competition in England. Since tlieir disappearance the industrial world has slowly gone round the same weary cycle that marks the movement of man in other fields. The destruction of the guilds opened the era of freedom of contract, or in otlier words it gave free rein to the competitive system. Labour was driven in self-protection to organise trade unions, for the purpose of raising wages ; capital was driven by 1 See book i. cbaj). v. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 151 these labour organisations to protect itself in similar asso- ciations to keep wages down. But to-day we find these two hostile ranks coming together again in Birmingham in so-called " alliances " which reproduce the essential feature of the guild. Employer and employee are re- united to maintain wages for the few at the expense of the many, and to keep up prices for the benefit of a handful of emjjloyers at the expense of the consumer ; that is to say, of all the rest. Are we to move round this dreary treadmill for ever? And so we remain the dupes of selfishness. Christ sought to rescue us from it, but the Church He instituted to do this was submerged in the cesspool of the decay- ing Roman Empire. Mohammed began a new effort against it, but was himself and all his followers betrayed into a career of conquest ; the lofty ideals of chivalry were dragged down by it into the cours (T amour ; the Crusades lapsed into commercialism, and while commer- cialism rescued us from the avarice of the crown, it de- livered us over to the tyranny of the guild ; and in our effort to escape from the guild we have swept around the circle of every form of tyranny till we have got back to the guild again in the guise of a Birmingham alliance. We are like a log in a whirlpool : a fortunate accident may at any time throw it out of the whirl ; but, on the other hand, it may remain there until it is ground to powder. And yet over and over again, as it rises to the surface and sweeps slowly around the outer curve, the lightest touch would throw it out of the whirl into the placid stream beyond. But there is no one to give it this slight touch at the right time. Now, the effort necessary at these moments to escape from the centripetal force — this effort of which the log is incapable, — is exactly the effort of which man is capable. 152 INDIVIDUALISM and a liigh capacity for which distinguishes him from all the lower animals. We have seen with what dreary monotony man has swept round and romid the vicious circle, — a monotony that is relieved only when, drawn towards the centre, he has been sucked down among the rocks below ; we have seen that we are still sweeping slowly around the outer curve. The question for us is whether we shall make the effort necessary, by resisting selfishness, to emerge upon the placid stream towards improvement; or, because our movement is still slow and to appearances innocent, we fail to make this effort, closing our eyes to the sucking vortex which remains close to us, and towards which we are by selfishness being drawn. We are moving slowly now; we may move faster by and by. § 7. The Social Results of Private Property From the foregoing statement of the working of in- dustrialism it seems to be difficult to decide that it is in any sense of the word less immoral than war; indeed, it is in many respects far more immoral ; for in war there is little pretence at virtue, Avhereas com- merce glows with hypocrisy. Such, indeed, is the inconsistency of man that war is generally opened with prayer and the language of Israel borrowed by each warring power to put the Almiglity on liis side. But few reasoning creatures are deceived by this device, and the better part of the public mind is gradually revolting more and more at the obvious cruelty of bloodshed. Unfortunately the cruelty of industrialism, ])cing less obvious, has not yet reached the moral sense of the community; not because it is in itself less revolting, but because the criminality THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 153 of it has not been made clear. Political economists have dwelt so fondly on the laws which automatically govern the relation of supply to demand that people have not yet become alive to the fact that the operation of these automatic laws is in its effect identical with the predatory law of nature. In both the law of com- petition is allowed to operate regardless of cost in life and happiness ; in both the majority suffer for the bene- fit of a few. The scheme of Nature, however, differs from that of man in the important fact that, whereas the one results in benefit for the race, the latter tends towards its degeneration ; and whereas the one conceals its victims in a common grave, the other rescues them, as it were, from the brink of the grave in order to prolong their wretched existence, perpetuate the type, and flood the almshouses, the lunatic asylum, and the State prison. The contrast between Nature's plan and ours has been abeady sufiiciently drawn ; there is, however, one point in connection with the result of industrialism to which too careful attention cannot be given, for there is, I think, a widespread error regarding it. It is commonly believed, and indeed it is constantly preached, that if every man did his duty according to the gospel of Christ, there would be neither pauperism nor crime ; and in connection with the doctrine it is frequently maintained that increase of human happi- ness does not depend on reform of political or social institutions, but rather on the universal practice of charity and sacrifice. Now, I think there are bound together in this view a great truth and a great error: doubtless if all men were perfect there would be no poor; but in that case neither would there be a competitive system ; so that although perfection of character would doubtless residt in the disappearance^ of pauperism, a necessary phase through 154 INDIVIDUALISM which the process of perfection would take place must be the slow but entire demolition of the competitive system. Now, the question whether perfection of char- acter can precede the destruction of the competitive sys- tem, or whether, on the contrary, the destruction of the competitive system must precede perfection of character, must be kept for a subsequent chapter ; suffice it here to point out, that so long as the competitive system exists, pauperism must exist, and so long as pauperism exists, crime must exist; for pauperism is the hot-bed of crime. Quite apart, then, from all religious discussion of tliis question, it is above all important that we should note and remember that industrialism not only does result in pauperism, but that it must do so. And if we want to be sure whether this statement be true or not, we must be careful to satisfy ourselves that we know just what pauperism is. To the considera- tion of this question it may be well next to direct our attention. (rt) Poverty Human life is supported by the consumption of other lives, — animal and vegetable. The living tilings fitted for our food are for ever streaming to our markets, there to be distributed, devoured, and digested. In this process there is a twofold production of waste which re- sults from those parts of animal and vegetable life that are either unfit for food or have become so durincr tlie process of distribution ; the part which is not eaten is called garbage ; the other part results from the jirocess of digestion ; that is to say, that which after digestion is excreted ; this part is called sewage. The problem of how to dispose of these two waste products has not yet been satisfactorily solved ; for although we are rapidly adopting sanitary measures for disposing of them in THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 155 such a way as not to breed disease, there is one element in the problem which can hardly be said to have been seriously attacked ; for all animal and vegetable life draws from the soil certain mineral products, such as phosphorus, potash, and nitrates, which are not restored to it under our system. Under natural conditions they are restored to it, owing to the fact that lower animals, not being congregated by millions as human beings are, deposit their excreta at large, thereby retiu'ning to the soil the mineral products which animals assimilate only in microscopic proportions, and the decay attending which, if in sufficiently small quantities, the soil is sufficiently antiseptic to take care of. When, however, this waste is accumulated in such vast quantities as in our larger cities,^ it not only tends to breed disease, but, if not returned to the land, represents a perpetual drain of its most valuable ingredients. In New York State, for example, may be witnessed the extraordinary spectacle of a soil daily robbed of its essential elements ; these essential elements hurried by human industry to the sea, and restored in part to the land through the importation of guano from South America, where the excreta of birds are quarried and transported over thousands of miles by water and by land under a system which combines incomparable cost with lamentable prodigality. This treatment of the waste that results from food products seems to betray a singular lack of intelligence, but it does not compare in this respect with the folly and cruelty with which we treat the waste of population. For just as the animal and vegetable life which is fit for human consumption moves from the country to the town, so the human lives that are fit for industrial con- 1 The garbage of New York City is nearly three thousand tons a day ; the sewage escaping through the sewers it is impossible to measure. 156 INDIVIDUALISM sumption move from the countiy to the town, under the impulse of laws as certain as the law of gravitation. Every farmer in New York State who, toiling with his hands, has to pay high rent for a few acres, is brought by steam into competition with industrial institutions in the prairies of the West, where steam replaces hand labour and where far lower prices are proportionally paid for rent and transportation. Thus New York land becomes less and less able to yield profit and at last will not even yield a living to an increasing population ; the increase then must seek a living elsewhere ; it hesitates to travel West where steam has replaced human labour ; and so the hope of a living wage draws them inevitably to the town. Moreover, the town needs them and silently beckons to them ; for experience shows that it is not the countryman who swells the ranks of the city poor ; it takes several generations to convert a healthy comitry- man into a pauper; and as this process of conversion goes on, the pauper's place has to be filled up from the healthy population out of town. Again, experience shows that one-fifth of the entire population ends its existence in the poorhouse or the penitentiary. So here we have the picture complete : the flow of the healthy country population to the urban mill ; and from the urban mill the flow of a pauper population to a pauper grave. The fact is, that the urban mill devours and digests the country product just as the human stomach does ; and just as sewage and garbage are the waste of food, so the pauper and the criminal arc the waste of population. To expect the industrial mill to grind and not pro- duce paupers would be as inconsistent as to expect a threshing-machine to thresh and not produce chaff. The admitted purpose of the industrial mill is by the application of the principle of competition to use the THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 157 material that comes to it, sifting out tliat which it cannot or can no longer use. But the evil of the system is that it does not merely use the material : it uses the mate- rial up; in the human mill there is little or no chaff in what comes to the mill ; the chaff is created in the milling. Competition brings good material to the mill ; and the mill turns out bad material; it is competition that makes the good material bad. And as the mill must work, it for ever asks for more population, and is for ever converting that population into waste. This is the process which is going on before our eyes ; it is the process with which we have become familiar in the realm of nature, and which under human conditions is expressed in the words, " every man for himself and the devil take the hindmost." If only the devil did take the hindmost ! but the devil does not take him ; the devil leaves him for us to wring our hands over. It has been already intimated that our treatment of the waste of population is even more unintelligent than our treatment of the waste of food ; and indeed, al- though we allow the latter to carry off to sea the most precious ingredients of our soil, we do at any rate get rid of its corruption for the most part ; but the former — this waste of population which consists of men and women like ourselves — we collect in vast reservoirs which we call institutions, and which, because they never can be large enough permanently to hold the ever-in- creasing accumulations of urban waste, are for ever over- flowing and pouring back upon our already teeming cities the poison that for the most part leaves its prison more poisonous than before. (b) Militarism It is difficult to say in what the industrial type is an improvement upon the military : militarism at any rate 158 INDIVIDUALISM does promote courage and sincerity ; or, to put it more carefully, tliere is nothing in a soldier's life essentially inconsistent with courage and with truth ; whereas trade tends to conduct its wars by declarations of peace and do its iniquities under the sanction of law. It manu- factures paupers with protestations of hypocrisy, and, while withholding sufficient wages with one hand, offers insufficient charity with the other. And all of us, good and bad, are victims of this sys- tem, — not only those who themselves suffer in hunger and in want, but those who suffer for the hunger and want of others. We are as helpless as they: if we strive to help them, they vindictively refuse oiu- offer, or if they accept it, do so without gratitude or thanks ; and they are not altogether wrong, for we are all partners in the system that drags them down. Nor is it possible to contend that war is more cruel than industrialism : the bodies of the dead that strew a battlefield are out of pain ; but what shall be said of the bodies of those who struggle in daily misery against the crushing tyranny of the Market ; or of those that are reduced to the silence and discipline of the almshouse ; or of those who with no hope of better things expiate their offences in the penitentiary? But the industrial system has its battlefields as well as war; witness the report of tlie British Governor- General, " The bones of the cotton-weavers are bleach- ing the plains of India." Nor can it be any longer disputed that not only is industrialism a war under cover, but it inevitiibly leads to war in the open. If we have not been driven by it to war in the United States, it is because we have here- tofore enjoyed a sufficient market for our manufactures iji the Western States; in England, however, where the industrial system lias reached its most perfect develop- THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 159 ment, production outstrips purchasing power so rapidly that it is only by conquest that she can keep her fac- tories open, and we therefore find Great Britain driven by an irresistible force to the conquest and colonisation of all those parts of the world where she can force her goods on the people or edge the people out. But although we have not as yet been driven by over- production to war, the day has at last come when the same conditions which have diiven England to aggres- sion are nraino- us also. Mr. John R. Proctor writes : " Mulhall estimates that the United States possess al- most as much energy in foot tons as Great Britain, France, and Germany combined. Already our capacity for production^ hath in agricultural and manufactured products, far exceeds our capacity for consumption^ so that we must seek foreign markets for the disposition of our increasing supplies.'"'^ And in a subsequent article he argues in favoui- of retaining the Philippines and unit- ing with England to resist Russia in order to protect our trade. Indeed, it is this question of trade that is at the bottom of the present demand for imperialism, the money-maker dangling the rag of glory to set the soldier in movement and inflaming the hearts of the people with an interested cry of patriotism. This must not be understood as a denunciation of expansion, of the reten- tion of the Philippines, or of a defensive and if need be offensive alliance with England. So long as we are part of the competitive system, we may have to fight or go under. What is criticised is not the policy of ex- pansion, but the competitive system, which makes this expansion necessary. Nor is it intended as a reproach ; in many respects, as 1 " Forum," September, 1897, — Hawaii and the Changing Front of the World. See also another article in the "Forum" for September, 1898, entitled, "Isolation or Imperialism." 160 INDIVIDUALISM has been already intimated, Anglo-Saxon aggression brings blessings of prosperity to a heretofore oppressed people. Nor, again, is the disparagement of the industrial system intended as a disparagement of those engaged in it; on the contrary, the most careful effort has been made to point out that all of us, good and bad, are vic- tims of the system. We can no more resist it than we can resist the force of gravitation ; for like gravitation it does not suggest resistance, but docility. All gravita- tion asks is that we should refrain from ignoring it; but, alas ! while gravitation hurts no one save those who refuse to comply with her laws, industrialism holds a few harmless only on the condition of keeping the majority in a torment of anxiety and consigning a fifth to a disgraceful death. (c) Corruption In no respect does the competitive system work more detriment to the community than in its influence on politics ; for a very little consideration will suffice to show that under existing conditions political corruption must result from it. It has been sufficiently demonstrated that what with the competition between employera on the one hand, and what with the high rate of wages maintained by trade unions on the other, profits derivable from normal in- dustries are reduced to such a degree as to make these industries unattractive. Even when they are run on a sufficiently large scale to make small profits result in a large income for the employer, they are exposed to un- avoidable risks ; witness the effect of the competition of Soutliern mills upon the New England cotton industr3% owing to the more profitable conditions under whicli the former can manufacture, — conditions which have only developed within the last few years. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 161 For this reason astute men avoid ordinary channels of industry where competition is allowed free scope. They seek the larger profits which can be secured only from some form of monopoly ; they resort to different expe- dients to this end. Patents constitute a monopoly in which some fortunes are made ; manufacturers create what are called proprietary articles by extensive adver- tisements, whereby they induce the public to believe that the article manufactured by them under a name made familiar b}^ being posted on all our wall spaces and our most picturesque views is superior to all other articles of the same character. The latest device to which money-makers have resorted in order to escape from competition is the combination of all factories engaged in the same industry in so-called trusts, thereby creating a capital so large that they can crush out any person venturing to enter into the trade and can thus remain in a condition to maintain prices. These trusts and the Birmingham alliance already explained are each in their respective lines a demonstration of the folly of the so-called free-contract theory ; for they show how the necessary tendency of freedom of con- tract is to lead to combination for the purpose of making this very freedom impossible. But the principal agency through which men contrive to escape the pressure of competition is the agency of government. This agency is appealed to by manufac- turers for protection in order to cut down competition from abroad ; for bounties in order to " foster infant in- dustries " at home and for government concessions of all sorts, — concessions for railroads, gas companies, water companies, tramways, and the like. Not that protection and bounties are in themselves bad; there has been considerable reaction of late amongst our authorities on political economy against 11 162 INDIVIDUALISM the ultra free-trade doctrine of Cobden and of Bright. It seems to be admitted to-day that if our government were in the hands of an all-wise and all-powerful Deity, interested only in the public weal, such a Deity would find it wise to fight the tariff and bounty legislations of other countries by tariff and bounty legislations of our own. But whatever differences of opinion may exist as to the degree to which the protection and bounty system may be economically wise, there is no difference of opinion as to the fact that they are both deplorable in their effects, not only upon the govern- ment that grants them, but upon those who seek their aid. In other words, the measures through which bounty and protection are obtained, and through which they are granted, necessarily tend to become measures of corruption. The same is true of all franchises and concessions granted by the government to private enterprise. And the still more deplorable fact connected with this al- liance between business and politics is that it not only corrupts legislators, manufacturers, and all persons en- gagecl in securing franchises, but it also spreads cor- ruption throughout the people. Never was a more profound mistake uttered than in the woixls that the people is incorruptible. It was when the Roman people became corrupt that the Roman Empire fell. The evils of political corruption from which we suffer in the United States to-day would not last a week if they did not include the people or what is equivalent in practice, that part of the people that controls the po- litical machine. The story of how this liappens lias lately been picturesquely told by Mr. John Jay Chapman in the " Atlantic Monthly." I shall therefore refer to it here only with the utmost brevity. It is a matter of common knowledge that the politics THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 163 of New York State are practically run by the New York Central Railroad, with the assistance of all the other corporations which have interest in controlling the sources of their supplies and the machinery of their taxation. Chicago has long been in the hands of those who own its tramways ; a similar ring, which owns the tramways and the waterworks of Philadelphia, has long controlled its city politics, and Greater New York has lately passed under a similar control through the alli- ance of the Metropolitan Traction Company with Tam- many Hall. With these facts we have long been familiar, but there is an element connected with these facts and underlying them of which we are not all of us aware ; and this fact is that the reason why reform movements so often fail, and even when they succeed do not re- sult in permanent improvement, is that they always run up at last against some private interest. In the campaign of 1897 in New York the Citizens' Union which represented the reform element adopted a plat- form which included the ownership by the city of its own franchises. While this campaign was in progress it was discovered that opportunity had arisen which permitted the city to repurchase one of the franchises which had been granted many years ago for an in- sufficient consideration. Proceeding's in court were instituted to this end ; and the Citizens' Union was amazed there to find the most distinguished reformers in New York City appear as counsel for the defendant company, thereby opposing the movement fathered by the very reform organisation of which these distin- guished comisel were supposed to be the principal props. When asked how they reconciled their attitude as counsel, they answered that litigation was business, not politics. 164 INDIVIDUALISM In another case, a young man, fired with indignation at the villainy which was daily practised in the field of municipal politics, secured large subscriptions from his personal friends with a view to conducting a vigor- ous campaign against it. After the fund was raised, he discovered that the ring he had to fight drew all its resources from a gas company ; he found a flaw in the franchise of the gas company, and instituted an attack upon it. The shares of the gas company went down three points. This fall of three points deluged him Avith letters from those who had subscribed to his political fund, protesting that while they were with him in his fight against bad politics, he must not ruin them by attacking the gas company in which they had shares. " Some distinction," said they, " must be made between business and politics." Unfortunately there is no difference between them. It is business interests which make bad politics; and so long as under the competitive system business con- tinues to make bad politics, so long our politics will be bad, and nothing can permanently make them other- wise. This fact received an interesting illustration in the fate of the City Club. Organised in New York in 1892, it was composed for the most part of the richest and most distinguished men in the city. Its purpose was to secure good municipal government. It was started by a group of men comparatively young, as to whose sincerity of ])urpose no one has ever enter- tained a doubt. This little group, with pathetic uncon- sciousness of the conditions which were destined to make all tlieir efforts fruitless, formulated plan after plan for beginning the attack on the enemy, F'or some inscrutable reason none of these plans was ever ap- proved by the Board of Trustees ; none of them ever came before the Chib ; and when at last a Republican THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 165 legislature sent down the Lexow Committee to investi- gate the city departments, the City Club, though pos- sessed of convincing testimony of the corruption of the police department, collected by some of its members for its use, refused to bring this evidence before the Committee of Investigation. Fortunately, outside the Club, Dr. Parkhurst had used his pulpit as a politi- cal rostrum from which to hurl attack after attack against Tammany Hall ; meeting after meeting was organised in order to extend the scope of his work beyond the limits of his congregation ; and when the time came for action, — that is to say, when the Lexow Committee of Investigation appeared in New York, — the work which the City Club was constituted to do, and was specially prepared to do, was abandoned by the Club, and taken up by Dr. Parkhurst, who, single- handed, accomplished what the City Club had not dared to undertake. Unfortunately the kind of popular enthusiasm which can be roused by such preaching as that of Dr. Park- hurst turns out not to be one upon which a politi- cal organisation can easily be built or a political pro- gramme systematically worked out; for the moment that anything like a permanent organisation is at- tempted, the distinguished men who naturally present themselves to the minds of the people as best fitted to lead the movement, and who are willing enough to undertake the leadership, turn out to be the very men who are counted upon for protection by those most respon- sible for the evil. Let every man who doubts this take pencil in hand and undertake to draw up a list of the names of men who in his opinion are best calculated to create confidence in the minds of the community to which he belongs, and therefore best fitted to be put upon a reform committee ; if he is familiar with the 166 INDIVIDUALISM business conditions of his city he will know as soon as his list is made up that nine men out of every ten on that list are committed by some connection or some business interest, whether as counsel or shareholder, to an extent which makes sincere co-operation in the re- form movement diiificult if not impossible. The reformer is thus left between two alternatives ; if he makes up his committee of men sufficiently well known to attract the confidence of the community, they will be men upon whose sincerity he cannot count ; if, on the other hand, he endeavours to secure men upon whose sincerity he can count, it will be because they are not rich enough or distinguished enough to have any weight with the community. It is between these two alternatives that the reformer who dreams of perma- nent^ reform organisation under existing industrial con- ditions stands paralysed. But it must not be imagined that the corruption caused by business interests is confined to the wealthy and the distinguished : it extends throughout the entire community, from the retail trader to the owner of a 1 Importance is attached to the word " [)crnianent." The splendid work done by many municipalities in Enj^Iand and Europe may be cited to show that the argument in these pages is not well founded. An attempt to enter into the reasons why the better element obtains control of govern- ment at sundry times and places would involve considerable digression from the main issue. It has been already explained that when engaged in showing the evil action of our economico-social system, it is not neces- sary at every step to show that, notwithstanding this evil action, there are good impulses also at work. In the United States the evil prevails ; this argument is an effort to show why it prevails. If we had in the United States an aristocracy, pledged by the principle noblesse oblige, to counter- act this evil, we might have less municipal corruption ; but we should then be exposed to the aristocratic evil ; and government run hypocritically in the interests of an aristocracy of culture may be as bad as government run openly in the interests of Tammany Hall. The attempt made in these pages is to show that there is a tendency towards corruption inher- ent in the competitive system. It does not attempt to show that it can never be counteracted. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 167 peanut stand ; for every law which is enacted, whether good or bad, with a view of maintaining order, health, and safety in the community, can be turned by an unscrupu- lous political organisation into an instrument for exact- ing blackmail or compelling political support ; and the opportunities for accomplishing this are so numerous that it would be impossible to exhaust them. A few illustrations must suffice to show the extent to which they reach. New York City has been defectively constructed in the absence of back alleys, so that there is no way of delivering goods from the wagon to the store except over the sidewalk ; it is difficult, therefore, to deliver goods of any size without occasionally obstructing the sidewalk. Now, the city ordinances prohibit this. There are only two ways, therefore, in which a store- keeper can, notwithstanding this ordinance, conduct his business : one is by corruption, and the other is by join- ing the political organisation which is in control of the city. One of the minor political organisations which has figured constantly during the last few years in New York was organised by the abuse of this city ordinance ; the leader of the organisation was appointed corpora- tion attorney, the corporation attorney being the officer whose specific duty it was to see to the execution of this ordinance. The system he adopted was as follows : The citizen who obstructed the sidewalk was sued ; wlien he came to court to answer the summons the case was adjourned. Every time he came to court the case was adjourned ; the first time he failed to appear, he was heavily fined. He was then summoned once more for a new offence ; again the case was adjourned every time he appeared, and resulted in a fine when he failed to do so. This process was continued until the storekeeper either subscribed to the corruption fund or 168 INDIVIDUALISM joined the "organisation." In this manner nearly all city ordinances can be used for the purpose of securing political support ; the ordinance, for example, prohibit- ing push-carts from remaining standing in the street, is regularly employed by district leaders to secure the political support of all the men who use push-carts ; the same system is adopted as has been described ; the push- cart man is arrested and brought to court, where he finds himself between the prosecuting officer and the district leader. If he joins the organisation, the case is dis- missed ; if he does not, he is fined, whether guilty or not guilty, the whole court being sometimes party to the conspiracy. The building laws formed for the purpose of secur- ing the safety and sanitation of our buildings are con- tinually used in the same way. Under this law every builder has to submit plans of buildings and alterations of buildings to the building department ; if he belongs to the organisation, his plans are passed promptly ; if he does not belong to the organisation, his plans are de- layed in a manner to make the conduct of business difficult if not impossible. Owners of buildings are subjected to the same kind of persecution ; health in- spectors are instructed to compel alterations whether they are exacted by the law or not; with the conse- quence that the property-owner generally finds it cheaper to contribute to the corruption fund or join the organisation than to enter into litigation with the health department on the question raised. It should be pointed out that it is not the men who violate the law alone who are subjected to this political pressure; on the contrary, builders and property-owners who comply with the law are the very ones most marked for per- secution. It does not cost a political organisation wliicli is in control of the city anything to litigate ; litigation THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 169 is paid for by the city ; but it costs a citizen more than he can spare, in time as well as money, to fight an organisation which is better equipped at every point for such a fight than he. The control of the liquor department has, however, probably been the most potent of all the devices by which political organisations have controlled votes. The liquor saloon has been called the poor man's club, and is such in effect. The influence of the liquor saloon, there- fore, in politics is incalculable. Sunday is the most profitable day in the week for the transaction of liquor business, and upon the permission clandestinely to keep open on Sunday depends the prosperity of every liquor- dealer. Not only does this permission secure to the organisation the support of the liquor-dealer, but his saloon becomes a centre of political propaganda. It is without doubt the old affiliation between Tammany Hall and the liquor-dealers which constitutes its par- ticular political strength. Perhaps one of the worst features of this system is that it involves the corruption of the police, — that is to say, of the very men upon whom the order of the com- munity practically depends ; and the corruption of the police is not confined to misdemeanours, but sometimes extends to crime. It is well known that every house of prostitution in New York remains open only under the protection of the police ; and on numerous occasions it has become clear that the police have an understand- ing with receivers of stolen goods. Whether, under these circumstances, person or property can long be deemed safe is a question which every citizen has to think out seriously for himself. 170 INDIVIDUALISM § 8. Private Property and the Church There occasionally arises in England an opposition to the relation which exists there between the government and the established Church. Doubtless the evils which attend a state-endowed church are great ; but it is sub- mitted that those which attend a chiu-ch subjected to the pressure of the competitive system are just as great, if not greater. And here we have an illustration of the fact that the competitive system keeps us for ever between two equally unfortunate alternatives ; it is the source of practically all our unsolved and unsolvable political problems. Indeed, it is for this reason that the time seems to have come for us to decide whether or not it is worth while attempting to solve problems that are insoluble, if it is true that the competitive system keeps them so ; or whether the only alternative left to us is not at once to study how, if at all, this root of all our political evils can be attacked. We have seen the system of unendowed churches at work in the United States now sufficiently long to permit of our coming to some conclusions about it ; let us consider for a moment what these conclusions are. A church cannot imder existing conditions live without money ; if unendowed, the main source upon which it has to depend for this money is its parish- ioners ; but every church has much to gain or lose from its relations witli the efovernment. It can secure grants of land from the government, as the Roman Catholic Church did the land upon which was built its cathedral in New York and the adjacent asylums ; it can secure freedom from taxation ; it can secure per capita contri- butions for its institutions, and chapels in the institu- tions of the State. Every church, therefore, has, in order to succeed, to THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 171 propitiate three personalities, — that of the congregation, that of the municipality, and that of the State. It can live only on the condition of propitiating the first of them, and it can hardly prosper without winning over all three. The Church, therefore, instead of directing, is itself directed ; instead of denouncing evil, it has to propitiate it, and, although its mission is to preach virtue, it is sometimes sorely tempted to practise iniquity. An illustration will serve to show the working of this system. The government from wliich the Roman Catholic Church secured the land above mentioned was the most avowedly corrupt government the country had ever seen: it was the government of which its chief, Tweed, said, " We have our hands deep in the pockets of the people, and we mean to take them out full ; " and when asked what the people would say to this, an- swered, " What are you going to do about it ? " Was the Church for this reason to refuse to accept a gift of land from Mr. Tweed? Many would answer: Clearly not. It was the robber barons who built most of the cathedrals of Europe. It is a part of the scheme of Nature — and the most beneficent part of it — that out of evil often comes good. Pious people profit by this principle when they can ; build temples out of the spoils of war, and cathedrals out of the plunder of Tammany Hall. Unfortunately, however, if good some- times springs from evil, evil has a way of returning the compliment; for the dignitaries of the Church have doubtless experienced some embarrassment when they found themselves under the duty to preach the gospel to a congregation the most prominent members of which were the very men who, after having endowed the Church, were engaged in reimbursing their endow- ments from the pockets of the people. 172 INDIVIDUALISM And it is not easy to say what course the Church could in such a case successfully adopt. She has sel- dom since the fifteenth century interfered in politics without discomfiture. Even in the most bigoted of all the nations of the world, when the Pope put an inter- dict on Segovia, Avila, and the other cities which were defending their privileges against Charles V., the inter- dict was contemptuously disregarded, and Charles V. himself entreated the Pope to remove it; and only a few years ago in Ireland, the last refuge of Romanism amongst English-speaking countries, the voice of the Pope exhorting submission was disregarded with scorn. If tlie Church, even when endowed and independent, has to follow rather than lead the political intrigues of her devotees, what shall be said of the Church which is neither endowed nor independent ? Nor are these insurmountable difficulties peculiar to the Roman Church: they present themselves not only to all the churches, but to all our charitable societies, and have dictated the clause in their statutes that forbids their interfering in matters political. This clause of tol- erance, while necessary to their existence, represents the attitude of the best citizen towards his government ; it is an attitude of tolerance ; and the tolerance is unfortu- nately a tolerance of evil : not a tolerance of good. It is the kind of tolerance which makes the President of the Society for the Protection of Children openly vote for Tammany Hall because it subscribes $30,000 a year to his charity ; it is the kind of tolerance that regards it as wiser to co-operate with bad government tlian resist it ; it is a kind of tolerance, in a word, wliich is responsible for the misgovernment under which we groan. THE INSTRUMENT OF INDIVIDUALISM 173 § 9. Conclusion Whether, therefore, we look at the effect of industrial- ism upon our social conditions, upon our foreign rela- tions, or upon our internal administration, we find it everywhere necessarily resulting in evil. Its natural and necessary fruits are pauperism, misgovernment, and war. Such is the machinery which man has invented for the administration of justice in the world; for securing, as Herbert Spencer puts it, that the "superior shall have the good of his superiority and the inferior the evil of his inferiority," ^ regardless of the fact that this is the very scheme through which Nature has brought the injustice into the world which man has undertaken, in so far as in him lies, to resist and overcome. Any scheme which secures " to the superior the good of his superiority, and to the inferior the evil of his in- feriority," is built upon selfishness ; and this book has been written in vain if it has not demonstrated that sel- fishness can bring happiness neither to those who are themselves selfish nor to those who are the victims of selfishness, but that selfishness must bring misery on man and lead to his defeneration. The conclusion which it has been sought to draw from this aspect of human history and particularly from that part of it which pertains to industry and commerce, is not only that our existing institutions do work injus- tice, but that they must do so ; and that whether we be angels of light or instruments of the devil, we are all alike consciously or unconsciously partners in the human misery which inevitably results from them. Commercialism is a Moloch which has almost with- out resistance obtained ascendancy over us. To this un- 1 Principles of Sociology, p. 567. 174 INDIVIDUALISM clean god, with equal indifference, we hourly sacrifice guilty men and innocent children; and of the cruelty this cult involves we are essential factors ; for it is a part of the competitive scheme that all of us — even those who have the tenderest hearts — should, inno- cently and unconsciously, in silent submission to its laws, be strangling one another. THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM 175 CHAPTER IV THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM. — THE SO-CALLED SOCIAL MIND In the first volume the attempt has been made to con- trast the selection which takes place in nature with the selection that takes place under the artificial conditions created by man. Herbert Spencer and his school assume that the selection that takes place in nature is still taking place, and must continue to take place in the evolution of man. The result of our inquiry has been to show that not only is the process of human de- velopment very different from the process that pre- ceded man, but that it is in many respects diametrically opposed to it. In the course of the inquiry it became necessary to dwell at some length upon the cruelty of Nature's plan, under which millions perished in order that the few most favoured by the environment survive ; and to point out that the more or less unconscious object of human institutions is to put an end, in so far as we can, to the cruelty of Nature. And from this point of view it was concluded that justice, regarded objectively, consisted in the effort of humanity to repair the inequality of Nature, and particularly in the effort of man to create conditions which will make the community prosper for the benefit of the individual rather than at his expense. In this connection it was shown that the artificial plan created by man for the benefit of the individual is dia- metrically opposed to the natural plan which, on the 176 INDIVIDUALISM contrary, sacrificed the individual to the community, in such communities as those of ants and bees. After having endeavoured to lay down as nearly as pos- sible in what respects man was at liberty to improve his condition in his conflict with Nature, and, on the other hand, to what extent man was powerless to improve his condition in his conflict with Nature, we next directed our attention to a short study of the history of human effort; with the view of determining, if possible, how far the efforts of man in his conflict with Nature had affected the human machine ; with the view of coming to some conclusion as to which of his efforts had been well directed, and which, on the contrary, had tended towards evil. Throughout the history of man we are struck by the fact that he has been, at different periods, actuated by different motives. Most of the time the predominating motive has been the natural motive of selfishness; but occasionally the dominating motive has been a non- natural motive, which, for the lack of a better name, we must call " religion ; " and although we find that the institutions which have been brought into existence by the religious spirit have been for the most part captured by craft in the interests of selfishness, we have neverthe- less recognised that at all times and in all places there has remained some sj^jark of the non-natural or religious motive, ready upon any favourable change of conditions to burst into a flame. No attempt has been made to explain this non- natural motive ; on the contrary, it has been treated sim})ly as one of the facts which no political student can affoi-d to disregard in liis study of social forces. Nor have we been seduced by religious bias into believing that this non-natural religious force has alwaj's acted in a direction favourable to social progress; on the con- THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM 177 trary, we have had to admit that it often added another motive to the natural selfish motive for war, and that in many times and in many places it served to prevent the development of the family into the tribe, and the tribe into the State. Nevertheless, we had to recognise that it was the force best capable of concentrating human effort so as to rescue it from the distracting consequences of selfishness ; and that when so acting it was a power of irresistible strength. On the other hand, we have had also to admit that so far the fate of every religion has been at last to become the instrument of the very selfishness it started to destroy. Having, then, on the one side endeavoured to make clear what was the natural environment, the favourable elements of which man has undertaken to use in order to overcome those elements in it which are not favourable to him, and, on the other hand, endeavoured to show some of the actual phases through which man has passed in the struggle, it now becomes our business to en- deavour to come to some conclusion as to what is the constitution of man himself, and how far this constitu- tion is fitted to carry on the struggle in the future ; all these inquiries being preliminary to the last and great- est inquiry of all, — namely, what are the conditions which, taking into consideration, on the one hand, the forces of nature that are friendly to man, and the forces of nature that are hostile to man, and taking into consideration the constitution of man on the other, will tend most to help man to use the friendly forces in order to subdue those that are hostile. The human constitution in its relation to society may be given the specific term of the social mind. I under- stand the words "social mind " to include all that part of the human constitution which, when developed, fits man for social life, and, when imperfectly developed, unfits 12 178 INDIVIDUALISM man for it.^ Thus in such tribes as those of the Arabs — prior to the Hegira — • the social mind was intensely individualistic, and therefore unfitted for social life; whereas that of our great Western nations, on the con- trary, has become less individualistic, and therefore more fitted to social life. It will be found, on making a study of the social mind, that it is an extremely complicated thing; for the words "social mind " must be deemed to include not only mind, but temperament also, and char- acter. In other words, the social mind is not confined to the intelligence of man, but also to his emotions ; not only to his reason, but to his instincts, his passions, and his capacity of self-control. In order thoroughly to understand the constitution of the social mind, we have to study it from three differ- ent points of view : — In the first place, we have to study its develojDment in lower animals, under the influence of a purely natural environment. In the second place, we have to study its development in man under the influence of an artificial human environment. And in the third place, we have to study its structure through physiology, psychology, and pathology ; that is to say, through the actual structure of the brain, through its operation under normal conditions, and through its operation under abnormal conditions. The evolution of the mind in a purely natural envi- ronment, and the development of the mind under the influence of an artificial or human environment, has already been studied in some detail. For the purpose of this chapter, therefore, we shall only have to recapit- 1 Some sociologists use the words "social miml " to mean the mind of the social organism taken as a whole. This is 7iot the sense in which the *o words are used in this book. THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM 179 ulate the conclusions to which we have already come under these two heads, filling in, however, a few im- portant details. The study of the social mind by actual analysis — that is to say, by the help of physiology, psy- chology, and pathology — has been only slightly at- tempted in previous pages ; nor will it be attempted in any great detail here. We should lose the thread of the argument were we to attempt to deal with these ques- tions at length; we shall, however, adopt on this sub- ject, as on previous subjects, the policy of avoiding matters of controversy and proceeding to the utmost possible along lines of admitted fact. We shall, then, in its natural order, begin by recapit- ulating the conclusions to which we have already come, regarding the social mind in the lower animals. § 1. Social Mind in the Lower Animals Natural selection primarily creates two types, — the hunter, which is fierce, and the more fierce he is the more he tends to be solitary ; and the hunted, which is timid and tends to herd. The two extremes of these two types are to be found in the purely pursuing and butchering machine, with which we are familiar in the lion and tiger, and tlie purely fleeing machine, with which we are familiar in the hare. Midway between these two extreme types, however, is to be found the large majority of the animal kingdom, which tends by co-operation to make up for lack of fit- ness, whether fitness to hunt or fitness to escape. For example, we find wolves driven by cold to hunt in packs, in order by co-operation to pull down quarry which in- dividually they would be unable to subdue ; and we find horses congregate in herds for the purpose of jointly defending their young against carnivora, to which other- 180 INDIVIDUALISM wise the young must fall a prey. The principle of co-operation is found in nature in almost every conceiv- able degree, from the purely temporary combination of wolves in packs to the permanent community of ants already described. What is the character of the force which brings together animals for the purpose of co-operation and mutual defence, it does not seem necessary to discuss. In the sponge, the young are freely moving animals, and unite only at a period approaching maturity. Here is a force acting upon individual animals, which at a certain stage in their growth brings them together with an irresistible power and unites them in a mass so homo- geneous that the individuals of which it is composed lose all distinctiveness and become merged into a new individuality. Indeed, if the myxomycetes is properly classed under the Fungi, we should have to recognise the existence of this force in the vegetable kingdom. This power seems to be no other than what Professor Giddings calls a consciousness of kind, which he regards as the beginning of socialisation. He does not, how- ever, trace it as far back as the vegetable kingdom ; and it is probable that if he had done so he would not have given it the name of consciousness. Attention is directed to this strange force which brings together the individual larvae of the sponge and welds them into a unit, because the character of it has so far entirely baffled scientific explanation, and tends to prove that. the socialising force that brings together animals for a common purpose can hardly be attributed to any conscious sense of advantage therefrom, in the individuals thus brought together. In otlier words, the inexplicable force which ])rings together the freely mov- ing larvse of the sponge into a single immovable mass may be the same force which brings together horses into THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM 181 herds, bees into hives, and ants into their still more per- fect communities, respectively. Purely temporary associations, such as those of wolves in packs, involve little in the way of tacit agreement to tacit government. They are all united in the common purpose of securing food ; the food is devoured as soon as killed, and the combination is maintained so long as the cold, by keeping the smaller game out of sight, puts them under the necessity of killing large game or dying of starvation. As soon as the cold disappears, the necessity for this association disappears and the pack disbands. A totally different state of things, however, is to be found when the relation is a more permanent one. For example, when horses and deer unite in herds for the permanent purpose of defence against carnivora, there arises, as has been explained, the necessity of solving the first problem of property; that is to say, property in the female, which gives rise to sexual jeal- ousy. It has been already explained that Nature's scheme for solving this problem is the usual scheme of battle ; and this scheme has the incidental advantage of allowing only the strongest bucks and stallions to per- petuate the race. When, however, we j)roceed to the next step in com- munity life, — that is to say, the step involved in the accumulating of food, — there arises a second problem, — -that is to say, the problem of property in things. Now, the problem of property in things not only presents a new problem of its own, but it enhances the difiiculty of the problem of projjerty in the female; because accumulation of food, such as honey, creates a perma- nent bond which is inconsistent with the splitting up of the herd that takes place in the herbivora during the breeding season. In other words, the community has to live together all the year round. This makes the prob- 182 INDIVIDUALISM lem of sexual jealousy so acute that, as has been already pointed out, Nature solves it by the arbitrary and cruel measure of destroying one entire sex, and leaving the work of the community to be done and the benefits of it to be enjoyed practically by the other sex alone. More- over, not only is sexual jealousy eliminated by the disap- pearance of the male sex, but the competition which characterises the struggle for existence of animals who do not live in communities is eliminated by the apparent disappearance of selfishness altogether. The habit or instinct of sacrifice that results from the disappearance of selfishness is evidenced by the fact that all ants work for the community with apparently the same industry; all seem prepared at any time to defend and die for it. There is apparently no one that has more greed than another, so that no internal quarrel seems to disturb the harmony of the ant-hill. In other words, there seems to be absolute uniformity of temperament, auto- matic willingness to work, and a total absence of all those qualities which characterise the solitary carnivora; and when found in man, are grouped in the word "vice." It is a matter of no small importance to bear clearly in mind the fact that Nature, proceeding tlirough the principle of the survival of the fittest, has produced types so opposite as that represented by the selfish au- tomaton in the tiger and the unselfish automaton in the ant; the process employed by Nature in the one case being competition, and the process in the other case being co-operation. At this point, however, a careful distinction has to be made ; for Nature nowhere works by co-operation alone. Co-operation in the ant-hill is confined to the ant-liill ; outside the ant-liill there is the same competition as cliaracterises the general scheme of Nature. lu other words, every ant-hill is brought into THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM 18 o competition with every other ant-hill, and although occasionally many ant-hills are found grouped so as to form one large community, there is found between com- munities a savage war. It is the competition between different communities of ants which has caused those communities to sur- vive in which co-operation is most advantageous and most complete. Every individual that was unfitted for community life by unwillingness to work or desire to appropriate to his own advantage the property of the community or the work of another, or individuals, in a word, who were lazy or selfish, have been mercilessly destroyed, whether by the process of survival of the fittest or by the direct action of the other ants in the community.^ Communities of ants, therefore, are characterised by competition without and co-operation within ; the result of this competition being to produce an automaton free from selfishness. If, now, the result of co-operation within, acting subject to the principle of competition without, be compared with the result of competition alone, we cannot but be struck by the fact that, while competition alone produces the most bloodthirsty of all living creatures, co-operation produces a living automaton which within the commun- ity seems to be free from all those vices which charac- 1 It is undesirable to introduce here speculation as to the method by which such individuals were disposed of. It is interesting to observe however, that in communities of bees (which are far less perfect from the collectivist point of view than those of ants) some bees are found to rob one another of the honey they have collected ; these robber bees are punished by the other bees in the hive. In the same way it has been observed that when flocks of birds return to their old nesting-place, the birds return each to her own nest, and any attempt of one bird to appro- priate the nest of another immediately brings upon her the resentment of the whole flock. Individual sparrows, too, who attempt to rob one nest of straw to make their own are immediately set upou by the other spar- rows in the flock. 184 INDIVIDUALISM terise communities of men. This, however, does not prevent the same unselfish automaton waging vigorous warfare upon all individuals belonging to other com- munities ; and thus we have the same automaton under two different conditions acting with the self-sacrilice of a saint in the one case, and the ferocity of a soldier in the other. Such are the results of Nature acting through natural laws without interference at the hands of men. Let us now turn to the study of how this process has been modified by the conscious effort of man. § 2. The Sociai. Mind of Maij^" Under this heading it will not be necessary to do more than recapitulate what has been already pointed out in the previous volume. The striking and essential differ- ence which characterises man and differentiates him from the lower animals is his large capacity for self- control. The points, therefore, which will interest us most in studying the development of human society, are the two questions how self-control solved, or attempted to solve, the problem arising out of property in the female, or sexual jealousy, and how self-control at- tempted to solve the problem of property in things. We have already seen that the races which solved the question of sexual relations in the manner which ex- acted most self-control — that is to saj'', by permanent monogamy — were the nations which in the struggle for existence have survived; and we have also seen that self-control rests at the foundation of the notion of pri- vate property; that the idea of property involves not only the right of every individual to the product of his own labour, but also involves the obligation to respect a similar right in others. As the family grew into the THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM 185 State, the notion of private property gave rise to the obligation to support the State, and also the obligation to contribute some fraction of personal liberty to the State; even to the extent, under certain conditions, of laying down one's life for the State. But men differ from ants not only in the possession of the faculty of self-control, but also in the fact that the higher up in the animal scale we go, the greater is the diversity of function we find, and the greater the difference between one individual and another. So far as we can judge, there is less difference be- tween individuals in as simply organised an insect as an ant than in as highly a differentiated animal as man; and not only do we observe great differences be- tween men in those qualities which men possess more or less in common with other animals, but perhaps there is no quality in which men differ from one another more than in the quality of self-control, which men alone to any degree possess. Again, not only do men differ in power of self-control, but they differ in willingness to use this power for the benefit of the community or for the benefit of themselves. Not only do they differ in power of productive toil, but they differ in willingness to give the benefit of this power of production to the community; and, last but not least, not only do they differ greatly in the power of commanding the sul)mis- sion of one another, but they differ also in willingness to use this power for the benefit of all, or only for the benefit of themselves. ' Again, the development of human intelligence could not but make it clear to men who possess any one of these three powers — that is to say, the power of self- control, the power of productiveness, and the power of commanding submission — to any remarkable degree that such a man could exercise these powers with infi- 186 INDIVIDUALISM nitely more advantage to himself if, instead of putting them at the disposal of the community, he used them to improve his own position at the expense of those about him. And not only did some men possess these three powers to a very great extent, but others were wanting in these powers in a corresponding degree. We have, therefore, by the side of the few who possess these powers in a large degree, many who, on the contrary, were influenced by corresponding willingness to submit, willingness to toil, and willingness to exercise self- control for the benefit of the community rather than for that of themselves. It became inevitable, therefore, that those who had most power became the masters of those who had most willingness ; and as the faculty of power coupled with selfishness inevitably goes to make up the lowest type of individualist, so the faculty of power coupled with unselfishness goes to make up the highest type of social- ist. We have thus within the same community two kinds of social mind, one of which is by nature equipped to enslave the other. The effect of this inequality in man has been, there- fore, to create a society presenting a marked contrast to that of the ants ; for whereas the latter have eliminated all individuals possessing selfish or anti-social qualities, human society has delivered over all that j)art of hu- manity which possesses social qualities into the hands of the few who possess the anti-social. The docility and unselfishness of the many have delivered them over to the imperiousness and egotism of the few.^ Another process has been at work, singularly enough, to produce the same result. The law of nature tends 1 Obviously there are exceptions. The contention is not that unselfish men never conio to the front, but that the main tendency is to put govern- ment in the hands of the selfish. THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM 187 to make the muscularly strong prevail over the muscu- larly weak; but the mental development of man has set up intelligence to fight muscular strength. Now, religion is the natural ally of intelligence in its warfare with physical strength; but the same tendency which makes intelligence the instrument of selfishness tends to make religion also the instrument of both. The result of this is that selfishness has used religion as well as intelligence to make the muscularly strong but intellec- tually weak the servants of the muscularly weak but intellectually strong. The result of the operation of these forces has been that, whereas under the law of nature the individual is sacrificed to the interests of the community, under the law of man the community is made to serve the interests of the individual ; and inasmuch as the alliance between selfishness, intelligence, and religion has con- tributed to subject the many to the few, the final result has been to make the community serve the interests of the few rather than that of the many. And so it has happened that the intelligence of a few men using and abusing the docility and strength of the many has created an artificial environment, the conse- quences of which have been already pointed out.^ They may be recapitulated as follows : whereas under the system of nature the struggle is a struggle for life, under that of man it is a struggle for wealth, power, and consideration; whereas under the system of nature the struggle favours bulk and muscle, under that of man it favours brain and nerve ; whereas under the system of nature the struggle favours the strong, under that of man the struggle favours the rich; and perhaps the most serious consequence of this artificial environment is that whereas under the system of nature the types 1 Vol. I. pp. 330 et seq. 188 INDIVIDUALISM most favoured by the environment are the most fertile, and the types least favoured by the environment least fertile, under the system of man the types most favoured by the environment are least fertile, and the types least favoured by the environment are the most fertile. So that whereas man has set up for himself intelligence and morality as the types to which he admittedly would tend, it is not the intelligent and moral type which tends to perpetuate itself, but that which is least intelli- gent and often for that reason the least moral also ; be- cause the human environment, by showering its blessings upon the few rich, has reduced the multitude to a con- dition of poverty which tends to promote neither a high standard of intelligence nor a high standard of morality. But the tendency of the rich to die childless, while the poor breed more children than they can provide for, is by no means the worst feature of the artificial conditions created by men. For although it has been shown that man's conscious efforts towards the improvement of the race have always been directed towards diminishing the inequality and injustice of Nature, a study of its history demonstrates that these conscious efforts have been allowed to operate at only rare and fitful intervals; whereas selfishness has operated all the time, and the study of its history shows that so powerful has been the selfishness of the few in subjugating the docility of the many, that even the noblest impulses of men have in the end invariably been appropriated by human sel- fishness to its own ends. Thus we have seen the religion of Mohammed serve only to corrupt the court at Bagdad, and that of Christ to bolster the thrones of kings in F.urope and the splen- dour of a papal court at llonie. We have seen the re- ligious enthusiasm which inspired the Crusades used by Venice to conquer Constantinople, and by the Church THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM 189 to acquire one-third of the whole property of Europe. We have seen municipalities created for the purpose of protecting the interests of honest toil become pawns in the game between the Emperor and the Pope. We have seen them used by the nobles to defeat the king and used by the king to defeat the nobles. We have seen industry, organised in the shape of guilds to defend the artisan against both the king and noble, create a new tyranny equal to that of either. We have seen the cry of liberty raised against the tyranny of the guild, only to hand over the workingman to the merciless tyranny of the Market ; and in his efforts to free himself from that of the Market, we have seen him once more subjected to that of the Trade Union. So that whether we look a 'priori at the conditions under which man is placed by the environment which he himself has created, or a posteriori to the history of his actual struggle with this environment, we find ourselves inevitably con- fronted by the fact that this human environment has for its necessary effect to subject the many to the selfish- ness of the few, and to perpetuate the lowest types in the race rather than the best. The degenerating consequences of such a system could not but have resulted fatally for the race, were it not for the fact that under it degeneration tends to take place chiefly at the top and bottom, — that is to say, amongst the most successful and the least successful, leaving the moderately successful to maintain the race. So that in spite of the misery of the very poor and the enervation of the very rich, the race has not only main- tained itself, but even obviously improved ; and out of the conflicts, or rather revolutions, in consequence of which the selfish minority has over and over again been deposed, only to find its place taken by another minority equally selfish, the human mind is gradually awakening 190 INDIVIDUALISM to a more intelligent and more moral apprehension of its social duties. This development is taking place in a manner which ought to command our careful attention ; for if we return to the extreme types presented by nature, — that is to say, to the unselfish automaton observed in the ant and the selfish automaton observed in the tiger, — we shall find that while the governing class in mankind finds it necessary to give up some of the selfishness which characterises the tiger, the un- selfish automaton in the governed, whose docility has rendered easy the control of the governing class, is gradually becoming less docile, less unselfish, and more clear in the understanding of what the governed call their rights. And so throughout the history of man the develop- ment has been always from the extreme type towards a medium type, in which there is retained some of the docility of the ant with some of the selfishness of the carnivora. We may now pass to the consideration of what light is thrown upon this medium type by the study of the actual constitution of the human mind, and the method in which it works under normal and abnormal conditions. § 3. Physiology of the Mind Psychologists have long been familiar with the fact that the human mind is more complex than it appears to be ; that consciousness cannot be depended upon to give us a complete account of its own workings, but that, on the contrary, the mind seems to work as much outside of consciousness as within it. They had, for example, to account for the capacity of the mind to keep track of time during sleep, as is shown by the fact that THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM 191 many men can wake at whatever hour they decide to awake. Again, the mind can be set working at the effort to recall a name, and, though consciously occupied with other things, the search is continued until suddenly the name appears in consciousness and the recognition of it actually interrupts consciousness engaged in other things. Psychologists have called this unconscious operation of the mind sub-consciousness. Psychologists have also been long familiar with the fact that there was within the conscious mind, as it were, and generally subject to it, an automaton that seemed capable of transacting most of the business of life without the assistance of conscious volition; such an automaton is startlingly revealed to us in the well- known case of the retired soldier, who, carrying his dinner across the street, dropped it in automatic response to a sudden and authoritative order to present arms. Somnambulism also furnishes an illustration of the fact that the human automaton can operate with singular skill in the absence of all consciousness. But it is to hypnotism and certain cases of mental shock and hysteria that we chiefly owe our knowledge of this sub-conscious automaton. The experiments of many physicians in different fields have now substantiated the fact beyond the possibility of doubt that the mind is like a tele- phone system, consisting of numerous simple and com- plex circuits, — as, for example, a simple circuit of telephones in a single building, with a central system of its own; these circuits, connected with those of other buildings, — as, for example, all the buildings in the Borough of Manhattan and centralised in the borough ; these — that is to say, the various systems of the va- rious boroughs, — again connected and centralised at a central office of Greater New York, and that of Greater New York connected with those of other cities and cen- 192 INDIVIDUALISM tralised at Washington, every city being thus put into communication with all the other great systems of the country. This vast and complicated telephone system can be disassociated so that a part of it will operate by itself; New York can be cut off from Washington, and Washington thereby prevented from exercising any control over it. This analogy, however, is deficient in not accounting for one of the most essential and interesting character- istics of the human mind, — that is to say, its faculty for self-consciousness. It is probable that animals possess very nearly as complete an automatic system for the conveyance of nerve messages as man; with the single exception of the fact that the whole nervous system which man has in common with the lower animals is subjected in man to a higher centralisation or control, and that this control is at the same time the seat of man's self-consciousness and of his self-restraint. If we examine the structure of the brain, we find a large part of the nerves of the body centre there ; the nerves affecting the movements of the tongue centre in the inferior extremity of the so-called Broca's convolu- tion, injury to which produces aphasia, or disorder of the faculty of speech. The nerves of the eye are also centred in the brain, and there are centred also the nerves of the nose, the mouth, and the ears. Again, all these various nerves are connected in another portion of the brain, so that a healthy and useful relation can be established between the various functions in the body. For example, the flight of a pigeon involves not only the use of the wings and the use of the eyes to direct the flight, but also the faculty of correlating the messages which a pigeon receives through the eye and directs to the wing, thus enabling it to direct its flight in a manner to avoid the obstacles thereto. Now, it is THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM 193 possible, by removing a part of the brain of a pigeon, to deprive it of this correlating faculty; so that, al- though the pigeon can see and can fly, it is unable to direct its movements in correlation with the objects which it sees. It is possible to trace the development of the nervous system from the simplest form, in which it simply con- veys a message from the surface of the body to the muscle, to that in which it conveys a message from the surface of the body to a centre in the brain, which con- nects it with different muscles of the body ; this system being connected again with another system of nerves, which come from the eyes, ears, nose, and mouth, all of them being centralised so that the whole animal moves in obedience to all the messages it receives from all these organs, whether they come in consciousness or not. This is the machinery which men have in common with the lower animals. But in addition to this machinery, man has the faculty of controlling this machinery to a certain extent through doubtless an additional central nervous system. ^ And this additional central nervous system seems at once to be the seat, not only of his self-control, but of his self -consciousness. The evidence of this additional central nervous system is to be found in the fact that it can be disassociated from the purely automatic system that man has in com- mon with the lower animals, either by accident, disease, or hypnotism ; so that a man can be divested of all self- control and all self-consciousness by, as it were, cutting off the new central nervous system from the rest. When this faculty of self-control and self-consciousness is, as it were, shunted off the nervous system by hypnotism, 1 It cannot be stated positively that no animals possess this developed nervous system, though it can be said that if they do possess it, it is de- veloped only to a limited degi-ee. 13 194 INDIVIDUALISM disease, or accidental shock, the subject remains per- fectly capable of all the automatic actions of the human body; nay, more, the automatic machinery will comply with any suggestion made to it, the faculty of self- control or self-direction being no longer in operation. No one who has witnessed experiments on hypnotic subjects can fail to admit the duality of the mind, or recognise that there is in man an automaton which, though in a normal state under his control, can by hypnotism be withdrawn from his control as completely as though one were connected with the other by an elec- tric switch. Physiology, too, confirms the application of this analogy. The threads which unite the nerve centres are not continuous; on the contrary, every nerve centre appears to have threads of its own, which remain under normal conditions in contact with those of the other nerve centres with which they are connected. It seems probable that when one set of nerve centres is put out of relation with the others, by hypnotism or otherwise, contact is broken between the centres at the point where the threads of each centre meet in much the same way as in an electric circuit. All experiments made upon hysterical subjects by suggestion, or upon hypnotic subjects by hypnotism, seem to be the result of breaking the connection between one set of nerve centres and another; and the most familiar dislocation that takes place is that l)etween the automaton which man shares with lower animals, and the self-conscious, self-controlling force which is peculiar to himself. Wlicn this dislocation has been effected, the subject in whom it has taken place will act with all the docility and something of the brutality of a lower animal, in conformity witli tlie slightest suggestion made; and, however gentle may be the disposition of tlie subject THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM 195 in a normal state, nothing can exceed the ferocity with which the subject will act if the suggestion be one to elicit it. Suggest to the subject to be gay, and the sub- ject will laugh; suggest sorrow, and the subject will weep; suggest dignity, and the subject will draw him- self up to his full height; and yet there is no act so contemptible or foolish of which, in obedience to sug- gestion, he will not be guilty; if, however, connection be restored, the subject returns again to the normal state, once more self-conscious and once more capable of habitual self-control.^ When, therefore, we bring together the conclusions which result from an examination of the human mind from the point of view of natural evolution, human environment, and a study of the actual constitution of the brain, the result may be summed up briefly as follows : — First, as the result of purely natural evolution, man possesses both the anti-social solitary ferocity of the carnivora and the social, gentle docility of the ant. Second, the mind is composed of two different parts, — the automaton, which man shares with the lower ani- mals, and the power of self-consciousness and self- control, which is peculiar to himself. Third, while the institutions — that is to say, the artificial environment which man has made for himself — have, in a measure, tended to promote the exercise of self-control, that one of his institutions which is known as commercialism has been perpetually appealing to his selfishness, so that the automaton in him has contracted habits of pursuing selfish ends which have become in 1 This is so familiar to those who have made any study of hypnotism that no time will be wasted in repeating its various phenomena. A recent useful book on the subject is that of Dr. Boris Sidis, — "The Psychology of Suggestion," — to which the reader is referred. 196 INDIVIDUALISM great measure uncontrollable; and his intelligence has become so far an instrument of selfishness that the better impulses in his nature are in continual clanger of being suppressed thereby. It will be remembered that we have studied, in the first place, the environment furnished by nature ; in the second place the environment created by man ; and in the third place we started upon the study of man him- self in order to come to some conclusion as to the extent to which man is still capable of modification by these two environments. Now, it is obvious that if the mind of man, instead of being as homogeneous as we might without knowledge of its structure be induced to believe, is, on the con- trary, composed of two totally different elements, one of which is practically indistinguishable from that of the lower animals, and the other of which is, on the contrarj', peculiar to man, we have to distinguish be- tween the effects of environment, whether natural or human, upon these two factors. Indeed, the inconsis- tencies of our system of education and the hybrid results of it are both probably due to the fact that we have failed to take into account the dual character of the social mind. Thus, while religion has been addressing itself to the conscious factor, and urging it to the attain- ment of high ideals, industrialism has been training the automaton so that it has acquired uncontrollable habits altogether inconsistent with these ideals. Every man who has made efforts to control his temper will recog- nise the operation of these opposite forces, — in the first place the strong desire to control the temper, and in the second place the uncontrollable force of habit in giving expression to it. To this fact is doubtless due much of the inconsis- tency with which we are familiar in the human mind. THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM 197 We have already observed this inconsistency in the ant, which, though instinctively gentle to its fellows, shows equally instinctive fierceness to its enemies. Just in the same way a man who is a pattern father and hus- band is often a merciless business man; and we are familiar with the fact that the most ferocious soldiers are often the gentlest husbands. But there is, perhaps, no arena in which inconsistencies of character are more developed than in politics ; and this is doubtless because in our relations to one another the effects of our conduct are immediately seen, whereas, in our relations to the State, the effects of our conduct are for the most part not seen. Thus, a man who will not consciously cheat his neighbour will have no hesitation in cheating the State ; a man who will not surrender his political prin- ciples for a gift of money from an individual will not hesitate to sacrifice his political principles for a public office from the State. And so the mere fact that the State is an impersonal thing, does not suffer pain, or, if it does, abstains from crying out, blunts our moral sense to injuries affecting it. The result of this is that a code of morals obtains, as regards our duty to the State, quite different from that which controls us in our relations to one another. Now, the State is part of the environment which man has created for himself, and is indeed the largest part of it; and if our moral sense is blunted in our service to the State, it is blunted in our relations to one of the most important factors in our environment. Again, in the relation of an individual to the State, there is exactly the same inconsistency of action in the automatic and the conscious parts of man as has been already described in relation of the individual to religion and commercialism ; for at one moment all that is con- temptible in us is engaged in shirking the smallest duties to the State, and at another we are laying down 198 INDIVIDUALISM our lives in obedience to the highest conceivable ideal of patriotism. The history of New York furnishes illus- trations of this inconsistency of action: our ancestors seemed, in the early days of the colonies, to be animated by a high sense of self-respect in demanding self- government from those who were sent out to govern them by both Dutch and British governments alike ; and 3'et, when the commercial spirit was aroused by the wars in which England was involved with France and the In- dians, the good burghers of New York could not resist the temptation of driving the hardest of bargains with the armies which England sent out for their defence, of making the needs of their neighbouring colonies an occasion for extortion, and even of furnishing weapons at a high price to the Indians, for the purpose of using them against these very neighbours. Nevertheless, within a few years, we find them rallying to the popular cause in revolt against the greatest military power in the world, and refusing to lay down their arms until that revolt was crowned with success. Once, however, the victory won, they became engaged in a shameful and continuous scramble for political office, until the cr}^ of freedom for the negro and of honour for the national flag aroused them anew to deeds of patriotism, only at last to relapse again into the same vulgar struggle for office and for wealth. Nor is the history of New York peculiar in this re- spect; whatever be the people, we cannot but recognise that so long as there is a spark of vitality in the people it inevitably responds to the call which is made on them. If the State bids its citizens grow rich, every man sets himself to the work with merciless disregard for the consequences to his neighbour; if the State, on the con- trary, asks them to sacrifice the dearest thing they have, they make the sacrifice with a willingness inconceiv- THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM 199 ably inconsistent with the greed they had only a moment before exhibited. It does not seem, therefore, unreasonable to believe that the character of the State, and particularly the character of the call which the State makes upon its citizens, is of consummate importance in forming na- tional character; and before we leave the subject it may be well to consider a little more closely to what extent and in what manner the social mind responds to the influences about it. Under the dual theory of the social mind above de- scribed, it is found to consist of very opposite factors : one is automatic, unconscious, and animal ; the other is voluntary, conscious, and human. Now, it seems reason- able to suppose that the unconscious automaton is as necessary a product of the environment as the ant is, or the ape ; it will become exactly what the environment makes it. And if the environment perpetually appeals to its selfishness, it will be as selfish as the ape ; whereas if it appeal, on the contrary, always to its unselfishness, it will become as unselfish as the ant. It is hardly necessary to observe that, if this be true, the competitive system tends to result in an automaton uncontrollably and mercilessly selfish. As soon as the Christian Church allied itself with the Roman State, the effect of the competitive system of the Roman State became so obviously hostile to the religious life that all who were bent on leading religious lives felt driven to protect themselves from it by living in communities especially created for that purpose ; and the monastic system created by this imperative necessity became at last so extensive that it threatened to become more powerful than the State. But just as selfishness corrupted the Church, so it corrupted the monastery 200 INDIVIDUALISM also ; and the monastic system fell as much because of the greed within its walls, as because of the greed with- out them. The fact of monasticism, however, serves to corroborate the theory that the religious life and the competitive life are inconsistent with one another ; and the vitality and permanence of such communities as that of Sisters of Charity indicates the importance of keeping those engaged in unselfish lives from the inevi- table tendencies of the environment which the gospel has characterised in the words, "the world, the flesh, and the devil." Fortunately, however, the unconscious automaton is more or less under the control of a conscious will. But when we come to consider how far the lives of those about us are determined by habit, and how far by con- scious will, we cannot but be struck by the fact that the vast majority of our fellow-citizens are probably con- trolled by habit altogether; that only a few are ever controlled by conscious will, and even these few are controlled by conscious will only for an insignificant portion of their whole lives. Nor is this all ; for, as has been already observed, when the conscious will does undertake to resist the force of habit, the force of habit is generally found so overwhelming that the conscious will can make but little, if any, headway against it. It would seem, under these circumstances, as though the struggle of the conscious will to control the uncon- scious automaton in man is not likely to be crowned with success. Fortunately, however, the automaton in us is not left entirely between its own selfish instincts and the feeble efforts of a conscious will. There have also been developed in family life affections, and habits of mercy, which are doubtless responsible for by far the largest i)art of human benevolence ; and so we come to the conclusion that while our good instincts spring from THE RESULT OF INDIVIDUALISM 201 the family, our bad instincts are to great extent culti- vated by the State, except at those rare times when great issues arouse in us the for the most part latent sentiments of patriotism. The artificial environment, then, which man has created for himself is found to include forces so oppo- site that, while the necessities of life are training within us an automaton to act in obedience to selfishness and furnishing our reason with motives of selfishness, an opposite non-natural force which we call religion is urging us to lives of unselfishness, but so inadequately that up to the present day this religion has done the work of the devil almost as often as that of God. Moreover, the conscious deliberate factor in us is so confounded by the opposite doctrines taught by the com- petitive and political system on the one hand, and by affection and godliness on the other, that it is able to adopt neither the one nor the other, but, like the infu- soria which we see shooting aimlessly in every direction under our microscopes, we are driven alternately by both, and are moving, therefore, persistently in the direction of neither. Herbert Spencer has pointed out that development in animal life is characterised by the growing certainty and definiteness of animal movements, the erratic movements of the infusoria being replaced by the definite persistent pursuit of the higher carnivora. Now, if a similar progress is to take place in the moral development of man ; if the incoherency, uncertainty, and indefiniteness of his movements in the search for happiness are to be replaced by coherency, certainty, and definiteness, — it must be by a removal of those causes which to-day occa- sion the one and a substitution therefor of an environ- ment that will permit the other. In other words, the conflict between the necessities of his physical being and 202 INDIVIDUALISM those of his moral being must be eliminated ; and this can only be accomplished by substituting for tlie com- petitive system which creates this conflict a co-operative system that will bring it to an end. Is such a co-operative system possible ? Among the habits which have been formed in man by the competitive system is one which looks with iierce jealousy upon any infringement of what is generally termed individual liberty. The isolated savagery of the great carnivora and that of the least civilised races of men has been already commented on. They have slowly yielded to the process of socialisation, but only with great reluctance, and often under a hope, not always grounded, that socialisation would result in an enhance- ment of liberty. And we are to-day confronted with two notions of liberty so inconsistent that they are deluding: the whole of South Africa with blood. Until some of the confusion attending the Boer and British notions of liberty is removed, it will be difficult, if not impossible, usefully to study the question of how far a more perfect system of co-operation can be realised ; for co-operation involves the sacrifice of some freedom, and the essential question arises how much freedom will men consent to sacrifice. A careful study of this sacri- fice will show that the freedom sacrificed under an intel- ligent system of co-operation will result in a new order of freedom as much more precious than that sacrificed as the substance of iEsop's bone is more precious than its shadow. LIBERTY 203 CHAPTER V LIBERTY The most formidable subjective obstacle to the adop- tion of a co-operative scheme of society is probably to be found in the false notions which prevail on the subject of liberty. Notions of liberty have arisen in the same way as notions of justice by the fitful action of the environment on our conscious will and by its constant action upon our unconscious automata, so that the few whose conscious wills are awake during a material part of the day are likely to have approximately correct notions about liberty, whereas those whose lives are practically delivered over to the unconscious au- tomata within them are likely to have very incorrect notions about it. To tliese last, liberty generally means the right to do what they want ; and as the environment created by commercialism is one of perpetual competi- tion which sets every man on the task of getting the best of his neighbour, the right to do what one wants becomes reducible to the right to benefit oneself, even though it be at the expense of one's neighbour. Now, no society could exist if every individual in it were allowed the unbridled right to benefit himself at the expense of others. The needs of society, therefore, have curtailed this right so that as a matter of fact our liberties are everywhere circumscribed by law ; and, although most of us are for ever clamouring for liberty, 204 INDIVIDUALISM we are, nevertheless, conscious of the necessity of law, and the conflict between liberty and law, both of which we respectively approve, makes it no easy task to determine where liberty should end and law begin, or, indeed, what, in view of the necessity of law, liberty in fact is. One of the standard objections to collectivism is that it will interfere with liberty. But as to the meaning of this word " liberty," there is probably no subject on which men are so little agreed. Those who object to collectivism on the ground that it will interfere with the liberty of individuals regard liberty as the opposite of too much law and of too much government ; so that according to them the more absolute government is, the less liberty there is. This view, however, is assuredly a mistaken one. The government of the Tartars in Russia dui'ing the fourteenth century was ruthless, brutal, and absolute ; and yet it interfered so seldom and so little with the individual that the Russian people were hardly aware of its existence. It generally con- tented itself with receiving the tribute of the Russian princes ; and as long as the tribute was paid, the Russian people had little to fear from the great Khan. Sir J. R. Seeley points out that there was during this period of Tartar despotism at tlie same time the greatest degree of cruelty and the greatest degree of liberty. He also points out that the same state of facts can be noticed to a less degree in the present Turkish Empire. On the oth(jr liand, the government may be mild in the extreme, and yet liberty be violated at every hour of the day, as in the Jesuit government of Paraguay, of wliich it is said that " all tlie most private acts that man can do, the acts with which among us no one would allow the least interference, were performed in Paraguay accord- ing to a fixed rule and at the ringing of a bell." He LIBERTY 205 also points out that, according to Shelley, " a man who is starving is not free." " Nay, in countries that are free, Such starvation cannot be As in England now we see." So, adds Sir J. R. Seeley, " liberty is actually discovered to be something to eat." But in describing the status of a slave he regards it as one " under an unlimited government." Surely in this respect he is mistaken. A slave may be such through the fact that neither he nor his master are sub- ject to any government at all ; in other words, in a perfectly savage state, the stronger man enslaves the weaker man, and the question of liberty therefore is a mere question of physical strength. In the so-called state of natiu'e there is no such thing as the particular kind of freedom that we enjoy under a civilised form of government. In the state of nature the individual is free only so long as he is strong enough to remain free ; and he has as many slaves as he is strong enough to enslave. v^ Here is, I think, one of the fundamental errors that underlies our general notions of liberty. We conceive that liberty is greatest in the savage state and least in the civilised state ; whereas as a matter of fact liberty is generally least in a savage state and most in one of civilisation, for the foundation of liberty is law. Legum omnes servi sumus, ut liberi esse possumus.^ It must be admitted that there is a kind of civilisa- tion that does seriously diminish the liberty of the in- dividual, as, for example, that of Paraguay ; but the important thing to keep in mind is that the extent of liberty which the individuals of a community enjoy is 1 Cicero pro Cluentio, 53. 206 INDIVIDUALISM due mainly to tlie wisdom of its institutions ; that is to say, to the extent to which intelligence and morality prevail therein. For example, history shows that man has until very lately helplessly staggered from one kind of tyranny to another; the tyranny exercised by the soldier under the Roman Empire yielded to the tyranny of the Church in the Middle Ages ; and while the Church was contesting the right to misgovern with the king and the nobles, the tyranny of these three became in part replaced by the tyranny of the corporation or guild ; and in the reaction from the tyranny of the corporation and the guild the workingraan found himself exposed to the tyranny of the Market; and in endeavouring to liberate himself from the tyranny of the Market he is now subjecting himself to the tyranny of the trade union. A very little consideration of these facts will lead to the conclusion that government has been modified mainly through the efforts of different groups of a com- munity to get into a position where they could tyrannise respectively over the rest ; with a general tendency, however, in the direction of substituting for a compul- sory tyranny one which is more or less willingly con- sented to. So, while there is little or no element of consent in the subjection of the weak man to the strong in the state of nature or under a military form of despotism, there is an element of consent and approval on tlie part of the governed to the governing class in the religious form of despotism. This element of con- sent and approval is still more developed in the corpora- tion or guild, and again still more in the trade union. The direction, therefore, towards which men have tended lias been to substitute for a tyranny to which they do not willingly consent, and over which they have no con- trol, one to which they do more or less willingly consent, and one over which they have some control. LIBERTY 207 The amount of liberty which an individual enjoys does not always depend upon the form of government; under no orovernment was the libertv of the individual less a matter of public concern than under that of the Venetian Republic ; and the Kaffir servant in the South African Republic to-day can hardly be said to be altogether free. Again, social and industrial conditions may create a kind of slavery under the most popular form of govern- ment. Thus the social institution of marriage condemns every woman who has once become declassee to a life of disgrace, and excludes her from all so-called respectable means of living ; and the trade union in some districts imposes rules upon the workingman which he is power- less to resist. We must not then allow ourselves to be misled by mere form. True liberty is the most precious of the rights claimed by man ; and in discussing what it is we must not allow ourselves to be misled by a form of government which keeps the word of promise to the ear and breaks it to the heart. A shirt-maker who can- not earn more than forty-eight cents a dozen in the city of New York, or a coal-miner who cannot work for more or less than the wage determined by a trade union to which he does not belong in Wales, may have less real liberty than a eunuch in the palace of the Shah. A man who in England or the United States is will- ing to work and cannot get employment, or a woman who has been betrayed and is refused work in conse- quence, is outraged because civilisation seems to offer them less rights than a state of nature. They are sur- rounded by an inexhaustible supply of food, and yet they may not take and eat; there is plenty of work to be done, and yet they may not do it. This condition of things they regard as wrong, and they describe their 208 INDIVIDUALISM wrongs by saying that civilisation produces not free- dom but slavery. An American who in France is arrested and confined at the discretion of a juge d' instruction without the privilege of having the reason of his confinement tested in court by Habeas Corpus considers his right to liberty improperly abridged. A Turk, already the husband of many wives, who de- sires in England to add an English girl to his seraglio, complains when told that the laws of England do not allow it. His liberty, too, he regards as abridged. And the Shah, it is said, was indignant because in the ab- sence of a man condemned to death, the laws of England forbade a subject being produced upon whom to exhibit to him the modus operandi of the gallows. The divergent views entertained in different parts of the world upon liberty, justice, and morality at large have given rise to the theory that they are questions of geography. This theory, however, is believed to be a profoundly mistaken one. Subjective notions about liberty may be matters of geography; but the thing liberty, of which every man has a more or less diver- gent idea, none the less exists outside of the notions entertained regarding it. When an English gentleman says there is more free- dom in England than in any country in the world, he means not necessarily that men are more free in Eng- land than elsewhere, but that it is in England that he himself finds least restraint on his actions. He is not free to murder in England, or steal there, but this does not interfere with his freedom, because he has no desire to murder or steal. As to all the details of life which he regards as important, — trivial though they some- times are, — he is free, and he is secure. He is not obliged to announce his arrival in a town to the police, LIBERTY 209 or to show his passport on the frontier. He is not exposed to arbitrary arrest, as in France, or to police interference, as in Germany. He is not even obliged to take a check for his luggage when he travels, as in America. If he is in the enjoyment of a sufficient income, he is practically free to do what he wants to do, and this is what he calls being free. The imemployed British workingman, however, does not enjoy the same freedom ; with perhaps more faculty for work he is obliged to accept the slavery of a work- house or starve. A similar servitude is forced upon the South Wales coal-miner; for he must either work subject to the conditions imposed by a trade union to which perhaps he does not belong, or not work at all. Under these conditions the attitude of the British gen- tleman towards the liberty enjoyed in England is likely to be different from that of the unemployed. Surely, however, there is some measure of liberty less uncertain than the conflicting views regarding it enter- tained in the same country by these two men. Perhaps nothing will help us better to get a clear view of just what liberty is and what it is not, and particularly just what relation it bears to the govern- ment on the one hand and to social conditions on the other, than by reviewing briefly during the last hun- dred years the history of one of the most precious of our liberties, — liberty of contract. § 1. Liberty of Contract In the disorders which attended the breaking up of the Roman Empire, government, in so far as it pro- tected property, may almost be said to have ceased to exist. Those who commanded the armed forces of Europe were robbers on a large or small scale accord- 14 210 INDIVIDUALISM ing to the scope of their power and the success which attended their depredations. In this respect there was little to choose between a Chilperic and a Robin Hood. As a defence against this predatory system, industri- ous citizens organised themselves all over Eui'ope into voluntary societies which took the name of guilds or corporations ; the purposes for which these were or- ganised varied; they began by organising for the pur- pose of mutual protection against pillage, and they ended by organising for mutual protection against the tendency of competition to reduce prices and wages. But the inevitable tendency of government to be- come oppressive made itself felt in these voluntary associations, as it had before made itself felt under established forms. And the Corporation became as tyrannical as ever had been the King, the Noble, or the Church. The French Revolution was aimed as much at the Corporation as at the Crown. The economic expression of this Revolution is to be found in the doctrine of laissez /aire. At the close of the eighteenth century both England and France were dominated by it : one of its most seductive formulae was Liberty of Contract ; everybody was to be left perfectly free to make such contracts as he could ; liberty was the order of the day, — liberty for the employer ; liberty for the employee ; liberty for the landlord ; liberty for the tenant. What has become of that liberty to-day? Liberty for the employer meant the destruction of the guild, and, with the guild, of all the safeguards which guilds liad put round the isolated workingman so that he should not be at the mercy of the employer. And how did the emj)loyer use his liberty ? He forthwith, by the operation of the law of Nature which furnishes more beings than she can nourish, in order out of the supertluity to select those most lit, profited by free LIBERTY 211 competition between workingmen to reduce them to starvation wages. The workingmen were driven, by the ruthlessness with which the employer pushed his advantage, to combine in order to secure by combina- tion terms which when isolated they were unable to secure. It would seem as though liberty of contract between employer and employee included liberty for the employee as well as for the employer ; and that if employers had the right to combine with employers to keep down wages, employees had the right to combine with employees to keep them up. But a Parliament composed of employers thought otherwise, and enacted a law in 1799 forbidding combinations between work- ingmen, though it left the employers' right to combine intact. By this Act of 1799 they cut away the logical ground for their own doctrine of laissez /aire. After a struggle of over twenty years, during which the trade unions learned their first lesson in Parliamentary tac- tics, they secured the repeal of the Act of 1799. They did more, without being incorporated themselves, they secured the right to sue in certain cases ; so that though they could use the courts for the purpose of attacking others, they could not themselves be attacked there ; they share with the State the sovereignty that can use the courts to discipline others, but are beyond the reach of the court itself. A trade union can fine a member, deprive him of his share in the benefit fund to which he has for years subscribed, expel him, outlaw him so that he cannot get occupation in the trade again, and yet the trade union is, so far as the law courts are concerned, absolutely beyond the reach of the outraged member. But not only is a trade union an irresponsible mas- ter over its own members ; it is often, as a matter of fact, an equally irresponsible master over all workmen 212 INDIVIDUALISM engaged in the trade, whether they are members of the trade union or not. In the first place, in many trades, every person en- gaged in the trade has to be a member of the trade union, however unwillingly ; as Mr. and Mrs. Webb say, — themselves apostles of trades unions, and there- fore anxious to avoid exaggerating defects, — " The plater and riveter who, because he is outside the United Society of Boiler-Makers, is politely refused work by every shipbuilder on the northeast coast, is just as much compelled to join the Union as if membership were by a new Factory Act made a legal condition of employment." Tliis is brought about by the policy of refusing to work in establishments where non-unionists are employed, and is as effectual in compelling membership in the liighly organised trade unions of the Northumberland coal- miners and the Lancashire cotton-spinners as in that of the boiler-makers just referred to. But not only do the trade unions in many districts practically compel even the unwilling to become mem- bers, but in certain other districts they control the ac- tions even of those who refuse to join ; for example, although not one-third of the 120,000 men engaged in coal-mining in South Wales are members of any trade union, or in any way represented in trade-union nego- tiations, and although of the recognised workers a large portion forming three separate unions expressly refused to agree to the sliding scale of 1893, and withdrew their representatives from the committee engaged in negotiat- ing the same, the whole of the 120,000 men with infini- tesimal exceptions are compelled to accept the sliding scale notwithstanding their protests against it, and not only are they compelled to accept the rate of wages de- termined by the trade unions, but a sum of sixpence per annum is deducted from the earnings of about 40,000 LIBERTY 213 men to meet the expenses connected with the agreement. In the Rhonclda Valley and in a few other districts the compulsion goes still further: the employers deduct a few pence per month from their workmen's earnings as contributions to the trade union, whether the workmen are members of the trade union or not; and some trade unions are thus supported by deductions made from the wages of workmen who are not members of them ; indeed, the largest and most important in South Wales has no other means of support than this compul- sory deduction made in the employer's pay office, and is without any lodges, branch officials, or other organised machinery. As a necessary result of this system practically two- thirds of the miners in the South Wales coal field — that is to say, 80,000 out of 120,000 — are taxed for the support of the trade union which imposes conditions of employment upon them without giving them any op- portunity of expressing their desires or of taking any part in the negotiation ; in other words, here we have a case of taxation without representation aggravated by the fact that 80,000 men are dictated to by a minority of 40,000 as to what is generally supposed to be the most intimate right of man; that is to say, the wages for which he will work. A similar case may be cited in Dublin where the coopers are so admirably organised that they allow no one to work at their trade except when brisk business occasions more work than they can do ; and they then draw workmen from other towns, but do not admit them to membership. Nevertheless, they compel the strangers to contribute weekly, so long as they work in Dublin, to the Dublin union, and when work gets slack issue orders that they leave the town; and leave the town they must, or starve. 214 INDIVIDUALISM As is said in the " Federalist," " Power over a man's subsistence amounts to power over his will." There can be no more complete destruction of freedom of contract or so-called liberty than in the cases just described. The more closely we study the operation of so-called freedom of contract, the more inevitably we are driven to the conclusion that it must lead, under the competitive system, to industrial slavery. We have seen in the above cases that it does lead to industrial slavery ; indeed, we are driven to the conclusion tliat it must always do so. The more complete the freedom, the more inevitable is this result ; because, the more free an employer is in the contracts he makes with his workmen, the greater the necessity he is put by the pressure of competition to lower the workmen's wages, and the more inevitably are workmen driven by combination to resist the deduction of wages. This can only be done effectually on a scale commensurate with the trade, because the workman is not fighting his particular employer so much as he is all the employers who are in the field of competition, and are compelling by their competition a reduction of wages in one district to a corresponding level to that which rules in another. In other words, the competitive system, when allowed full liberty of action under the principle of freedom of contract, not only leads to industrial slavery, but must do so. There is no alternative ; if in certain trades and in certain favoured districts this in- dustrial slavery is not at present operating, it is because special circumstances favour that particular district ; but competition will eventually reach the district and apply thereto the fatal law. And this law does not apply to workmen alone : it applies equally to employers ; for combination among workmen inevitably leads to combination among em- ployers ; and employers therefore find themselves soon LIBERTY 215 brought to the same condition of subservience as the workmen. Far from running their own business in their own way, as was boldly asserted to be the right of every employer under the system of laissez /aire, em- ployers find themselves driven to accept the rate of wages fixed by arrangements between trade unions and employers, whether they have formed part of the employ- ers' combination or not ; and the inevitable effect of this system is to crush the small employers, leaving only the large. In 1891, for instance, the small boot-manufac- turers protested against " the capitalist manufacturers' conspiracy " by fixing uniform standards of wages, to crush out their smaller competitors. It is interesting to read the comments of the labour press on this outcry of the small manufacturers. It is characterised as a "ridiculous superstition, too obviously absurd to admit a moment's thought ; " "if smaller manufacturers can- not continue to exist except by paying less than a proper standard of wages for work done, this is the clearest proof that they have no right to exist as such." ^ It is very much like what we are accustomed to hear the employers say regarding the workingmen. The fact is, both are perpetually crying out for liberty of contract, and both perpetually combining to make liberty of contract impossible. But this is not all. Not only does workman combine with workman to keep wages up, and employer with employer to keep wages down, but at last the two com- binations effect what are called in the trade " alliances " for the purpose of putting a stop to freedom of contract altogether ; that is to say, the combination of workmen and the combination of employers together form a third combination, both agreeing that the employers shall 1 Editorial in "Shoe and Leather Eecord," vol. x. page 254, April 10, 1891. 216 INDIVIDUALISM employ no workman, and the workman shall work for no employer, who does not comply with the alliance agreement. So at last we arrive at the consummate paradox that not only does freedom of contract put an end to freedom of contract, but competition puts an end to competition. The final result of trade alliances is that no person is allowed to engage in the trade, whether as employer or as workman, unless he complies with the rule determined by the alliance ; in other words, we find in full-fledged operation at the present time the same conditions that prevailed in the mediaeval guild ; and it was in great part to break down this tyranny of the guild that the doctrine of laissez faire was invented.^ It will be seen, therefore, that the competitive system admits of little progress. Competition created the mediaeval guild ; when the tyranny of the guild be- came intolerable, it was broken up by the principle of freedom of contract; and the operation of freedom of contract under the competitive system has only brought us back, after a century of so-called progress, to the point from which we started, — the tyranny of the guild again. There is but one conclusion to be drawn from this story : competition is inconsistent with complete liberty of contract ; and complete liberty of contract is probably not attainable in this world at all. CoUectivists offer as a solution for this discouraging conclusion a system of government under which com- 1 A good illustration of this so-called alliance is to be found in those concluded since 1890 between the Employers' Association and the Trade Union of Birmingham. (See the New Trades Combination Movement, Its Purposes and Methods, by E. J. Smith, Birmingham, 1898, and an article in the Birmingham "District Journal" for April, 1896, by W. J. Davis, Secretary of the National Society of Amalgamated Brassworkers. See also Birmingham "Daily Post," 1895 and 1896.) LIBERTY 217 petition could be to the greatest degree possible elimi- nated through the abolition of private property in those things the ownership of which enable one set of men to control the lives of others. The feasibility of such a scheme will be discussed in another chapter. If col- lectivism is ever possible, it is assuredly to-day still a long- way off. And what we are in this chapter studying is not an ultimate solution of the problem of liberty, but an answer to the question what, under existing condi- tions, is this thing which we call liberty, and for which Redskins have fought and it is alleged Boer and Filipino are still fighting. It seems to follow from the foregoing history of human efforts to secure liberty of contract that under existing conditions absolute liberty of contract is un- attainable. With this conclusion fresh in our minds let us next study what elements enter into this so-called liberty, in the hope that when we have reduced it to the elements of which it is composed we may be in a better position to decide just what it is, how far it may be at- tained, and to what extent Boers, Filipinos, and Red- skins are respectively attaining it. § 2. Analysis of Liberty The state of nature gives the individual the maxi- mum opportunity of liberty, but exposes him to the greatest risk of losing it. The lowest savages of all, such as the Wood Veddahs of Ceylon, live in the woods much after the fashion of the anthropoid apes: they have no social institutions, and they know no law. Every male mates with the female he can capture, and lives with her so long as the caprice lasts, or as he is not deprived of her by a stronger male than he. Being deprived of the co-operation of his fellow-creatures ex- 218 INDIVIDUALISM cept that of the female he lives with, he has to dispense with all the comforts and securities that result from co-operation. His liberty is not limited by law : it is, however, much limited by Nature's predatory scheme ; any animal stronger than he can deprive liim of it, and he has only his own individual resources with which to defend him- self against such stronger animals. But Nature includes not only the predatory or com- petitive scheme, but also that of co-operation ; and while it presents us with the tiger as the consummate result of the one, it points to the ant as the product of the other. Now what Nature has done for the ant in substi- tuting co-operation for competition within the commu- nity, man has to a less degree done for himself through his social institutions and his political schemes of gov- ernment. The history of the progress of man is the history of the slow steps through which he has abandoned the license he enjoys in a state of nature in order to secure the advantages conferred by law. The process through which man has slowly abandoned the license of nature for the security of law is twofold : compulsion and consent ; that is to say, during some pe- riods of his development man has been civilised through compulsion by a more or less benevolent despot ; at other periods man has contributed to his own develop- ment by himself organising institutions to that end. The institutions which man has devised for the pur- pose of securing himself from the risks which attend the savage state are manifold ; sometimes they partake of the nature of government, — that is to say, they are in- stitutions which can compel consent by the authority of some established power in the State ; at other times they are not governmental but voluntary, as, for example, the LIBERTY 219 Church, the Guild, and the Trade Union. But what- ever be the process, it is characterised in every case by the abandonment, whether voluntary or involuntary, of a part of the license enjoyed in a state of nature for the purpose of obtaining the security possible only under the safeguards of law. One of the first steps taken by humanity was to emerge from the isolated family condition of the an- thropoid ape and the Wood Veddah into what is generally described by sociologists as the horde system. The horde was probably made up of individuals, not of families. Marriage under the horde system was proba- bly not recognised as an institution. Under conditions which made " maternity a matter of fact and paternity a matter of opinion," children derived their names from their mothers, not from their fathers. The sacrifice of liberty made by the individual under the horde system was practically confined to a recognition of the author- ity of the chief. This is probably the kind of civilisa- tion that prevailed in Assyria and Egypt. Another step is to be found in the institution of marriage ; under this institution the individual sacri- ficed the license he enjoyed under a natural state as regards sexual relations, and under it was founded the patriarchal system which affords a striking contrast to that of the horde. The horde system tends to produce a nation of slaves abjectly following the lead of a mili- tary chief ; the patriarchal system created, on the contrary, a fierce and jealous individualism. Every patriarch tends to become a chief over his own family first, and over his weaker neiglibours afterwards. It was only with the greatest reluctance that the patriarch consented to surrender any part of his absolute author- ity in order to combine with neighbouring patriarchs in common defence against a common invader. But the 220 INDIVIDUALISM nations built upon a patriarchal plan which survived were those in which the patriarchs had sufficient in- telligence and sufficient self-control to make the neces- sary sacrifice. The slow steps through which these successive sacrifices were made can be followed in the early history of Greece ; we see there the great patriar- chal families gradually uniting in common defence against a common invader to form the City States of Athens, Sparta, and Thebes. We see next the City States combining with one another, sometimes against a Greek, sometimes against a foreign foe. But in Greece the fierce individualism of every city made it impossible for them to grasp the idea of a great State ; the cities were unable to make the necessary sacrifice, and they fell, therefore, one by one, before the genius of Philip and Alexander. Rome achieved by compulsion what Greece had failed to accomplish by consent. Roman arms com- pelled the surrender of conquered cities ; and a high degree of political sagacity succeeded in welding the conquered cities into an empire. But it is during the eighteenth century that the last great step has been made. What Grecian cities could not accomplish by consent, and what Rome was unable permanently to accomplish by compulsion has been accomplished by the Cantons of Switzerland and the Colonies of the United States. The sacrifices which every Colony had to make in order by combination to secure the advan- tages of a great nation are the sacrifices which the Federalists secured from the United States, which the Southerners threw into the hazard during our civil war, and the wisdom of which has been justified by the prosperity and comparatively high degree of civilisation which now prevails from the Atlantic to the Pacific slope. LIBERTY 221 At every step we see man by intelligence and self- control surrendering a part of the license he enjoyed in a state of nature in order to secure the advantages which through co-operation can only be enjoyed under a government constituted by consent and administered for the benefit of all ; and these steps have been con- secutively as follows. From a state of isolation to that of the horde through recognition of the authority of a chief ; from that of the horde to the city through the patriarchal system involving surrender of license in sexual relations ; from the city to the State through surrender of some political freedom in recognition of State sovereignty ; and from the State to the United States through the surrender of State sovereignty. Every one of these sacrifices is represented in the political status of every citizen of the United States : he has surrendered the absolute freedom of the state of nature through the recognition of government at large ; he has surrendered freedom as regards sexual relations by his recognition of the institution of marriage ; and our existing government represents to him three distinct concessions, — a concession of political liberty through recognition of the government of the city or town in which he lives ; a concession of political liberty through the recognition of the government of the State in which he lives ; and a concession of political liberty through the recognition of the government of the United States. Now, what are the advantages he has gained in ex- change for these concessions respectively? It has been pointed out that in the savage state he was exposed to many risks ; these risks may be divided into the follow- ing groups, — risks to life, or death ; risks to personal freedom, or slavery and imprisonment ; risks to limb, or bodily injury ; risks to property, or pauperism. It is obvious that of these our present system of gov- 222 INDIVIDUALISM eminent practically secures us from the first three except in the abnormal case of war ; that is to say, that risks of life, liberty, and limb are by our governmental institutions reduced to a minimum. Government, how- ever, has very incompletely secured us from risk to property ; that is to say, we are most of us exposed to the danger of becoming paupers. The great political struggles which we have before us are the struggles between different fractions in our community upon the question of property. As regards security or risk to property, those who are in favour of maintaining existing conditions are generally termed conservatives ; those, on the other hand, who think existing conditions can be improved are generally termed liberals ; and those who demand a radical change in the system are termed radicals, socialists, or anar- chists, according to the extent to which they desire to see existing conditions subverted. We do not propose to enter profoundly into the ques- tions which divide these three groups in this chapter. It suffices the purpose of our discussion here to point out that the conservatives proceed upon the theory that the TToWol are not fit for self-government, and that their happiness can best be promoted through the generosity of the governing and wealthy class ; the liberals are willing to recognize in the ttoWoI a larger faculty for self-government, but cling to maintaining the effectual ascendancy of the wealtliy class ; whereas the ratlicals, socialists, and anarchists repudiate the alleged gener- osity of the governing, or wealthy class, with scorn, and pronounce the iroWol better fitted to govern than they. But apart from the question which fraction of the people is best fitted to govern, there is one of a more fundamental character which demands our very careful LIBERTY 223 consideration. We have already referred to risks to property. We have now to consider what property is. § 3. Pkoperty, Right, and Duty Property is practically unknown in the purely preda- tory scheme of nature. We see it arising in nature when animals abandon the isolation created by the preda- tory plan and adopt some form of socialisation. We see it, for example, in flocks of birds when they return to a nesting-place. Every bird retui-ns to her own nest, and any attempt of one bird to appropriate the nest of another immediately brings upon her the resent- ment of the whole flock. Individual sparrows who attempt to rob one nest of straw to make their own are immediately set upon by the other sparrows in the flock. But notions of individual property in nature are com- paratively rare. It is in such highly organised com- munities as those of ants that we find the notion of property most developed, but in these communities the idea of property is collective, not individual. The most amazing quality of the ant is its notion of collective property. If ants are observed in the process of tearing to pieces a dead caterpillar, it will be found that they do not themselves devour the morsels they separate, as would a pack of wolves in a similar case. On the con- trary, every ant carries off its morsel to the nest. Every ant's nest is a storehouse of collective property, and teaches a humiliating lesson of social life to man. If we turn to human institutions, we shall find that they have been organised more with a view to protecting private property than public, and Herbert Spencer has propounded the doctrine that the less a government owns in the way of property, the better. It will be useful in studying this question to push 224 INDIVIDUALISM our analysis of liberty a step farther; let us begin by agreeing upon terms. It is clear that we need three words, in discussing this subject, to convey essentially different things: one generic word to convey the general notion of ability to do what one wants ; one specific word to convey the notion of ability to do what one wants irrespective of consequence to others and uncontrolled by social conditions ; another specific word to convey the notion of ability to do what one wants, due regard being had to the consequence to others, and controlled by social con- ditions. Although the words "freedom " and " liberty" are used interchangeably, the latter is more specifically used to convey the idea of political liberty, or liberty under the law. Let us agree for the purpose of this discussion, without attempting further to justify it, to use the word " freedom" in the first sense required ; that is to say, to convey the general notion of ability to do what one wants. The word " license " conveys the idea of freedom irrespective of consequence to others and un- controlled by social conditions. And the word " liberty" will then conveniently be reduced to mean freedom limited by regard for others and controlled by social conditions or law. Every advance of civilisation is marked by a surren- der of license, because the progress of civilisation is away from the condition of isolation which character- ises the savage and predatory plan towards the system of co-operation that characterises communities of citi- zens. Co-operation involves a sacrifice. Now, every sacrifice of license gives rise to two things : a right and a duty. It has been already pointed out that every step from license to liberty is made for the purpose of securing some advantage. Now, the thing surrendered represents the duty, and the advantage secured repre- LIBERTY 225 sents the right. A moment's consideration will serve to illustrate this. A savage kills whom he chooses and can ; a citizen surrenders this license to murder. Now, this surrender of a part of liis old license, converted into the language of morality, corresponds to the duty to respect life, and the advantage secured by the surrender corresponds to security or rigid to life. Again, a savage satisfies every sexual caprice. The citizen surrenders this license, and this surrender, trans- lated into the language of morality, corresponds to the duty to respect chastity, and the advantage obtained by this surrender consists in security from assault and recognition of connubial rights. Again, the savage takes what he chooses and keeps it as long as he chooses or can. A citizen takes and keeps only what the law allows. The surrender made by the citizen, translated into the language of morality, corresponds to the duty to respect property. The ad- vantage he secures consists in security to and right in property. It is by a series, then, of surrenders that we secure rights and assume duties. No one any longer doubts the wisdom and advantage to a community of the rights secured by the abandon- ment of the license enjoyed in a savage state to kill, maim, and rob ; but the right to property differs from the right to life and limb in a peculiar and important respect. For while the right to life and limb is a right which confers an unmixed good upon a community, the right to property has conferred upon those who have the faculty of accumulating it, or who by the law of in- heritance are protected in the enjoyment of property they have not accumulated, opportunities for oppression. Now, when property is used by one set of men to oppress another it gives rise to conflict, and it may be said with- 15 226 INDIVIDUALISM out much exaggeration that most of the political prob- lems of the present day arise out of this conflict. To the student the problem presents itself in this form : how can the advantages of property be preserved and the facilities for oppression be obviated? The recognition of right to property has played an essential role in the progress of civilisation. Civilisa- tion cannot advance save on the condition of securing a sufficient supply of the necessaries of life or wealth ; and wealth cannot be accumulated unless right to property be recognised. Indeed, the social state is differentiated from the state of isolated savagery by the notion of propert}^ ; the notion of a man's property in his wife is at the basis of the domestic state ; the notion of a man's property in his flock is at the basis of the pastoral state ; the notion of a man's property in the land occupied by him is at the basis of the agricultural State. And although property has built up an aristocracy which up to this centiuy has always been found in control of the agricultural State, property in its commercial and indus- trial development has broken up the power of the landed aristocracy, as, for example, that of the patrician in Rome and that of the feudal baron in the Middle Ages. The French Revolution was a revolt of the wealthy bourgeoisie against the noble and the throne ; and French collectivists are to-day prophesying a new revolution of the workingman against the bourgeoisie. How far this heralded revolt can be made consistent with a high degree of socialisation is not yet clear. It does seem clear, however, that in so far as private prop- erty can be used by a few to pauperise the many, the problem of property has not yet been solved consistently with a high standard of justice. Let us, then, agree to define property as the right of the individual to the exclusive possession, enjoyment, LIBERTY 227 and disposition of things, subject to limitations deter- mined in every nation by its own laws, — no system of laws regarding property having yet been devised that is consistent with a high standard of justice. Bearing this definition in mind, liberty may roughly be divided into three kinds, — personal liberty, which is better understood to mean liberty from personal re- straint or imprisonment ; political liberty, which can be defined as the right by such peaceful methods as the ballot to determine the character of our political institu- tions, the power to direct legislation, and to determine to whom the administration of our laws shall be con- fided ; and (the third and last great division of liberty) economic liberty. It is around and about economic liberty that most of the battles of the present day are wasred. "^o^ § 4. EcoNoivnc Liberty The great problem of economic liberty arises out of the conflict between the individualistic idea of civilisa- tion and the socialistic idea of it. Extreme individualism is marked by ferocity and selfishness, and is illustrated by the lion, the tiger, and man in the savage state. Extreme socialism is marked by habits of altruism and affection, as illustrated by the bee, the ant, and man in the ideal Christian State ; and here it must be observed that man has practically never reached the high condition of socialism observed in bees and ants ; on the contrary, he stands midway between the extremes of individualism on the one hand and the extremes of socialism on the other. It should be further observed that extreme individ- ualism knows no law, no right, no duty; whereas socialism is the embodiment of law, of right, and of duty. 228 INDIVIDUALISM There are some standard objections to socialism which are singularly unsound. One is that individualism creates character. If by character is understood fero- city and selfishness, the proposition will not for a moment be disputed. But if by character is meant capacity for self-sacrifice and self-control, it ought not to be difficult to demonstrate that these qualities are hardly elicited by the individualistic condition at all, whereas they are necessary to a high degree of socialism and are promoted by it. There is another argument of the individualist which seems equally unsound. It is the argument built upon a false use of the word "liberty ; " for if we test individ- ualistic ideals of liberty by their fruits, we shall find that they generally mean full play to selfishness for one- self, but full security from the selfishness of others. This is the ideal of liberty expressed by an oppressing employer when he demands the right to manage his own business as he chooses, or the right to do what he wishes with his own. It is against this false notion of liberty that we have particularly to guard. There is, however, another argument of the individ- ualist which puts him upon stronger ground. Tliis argument is built upon the unfitness of humanity to-day for the socialistic State. Undoubtedly socialism in the full sense of the word — that is to say, the entire abolition of private property in the sources of production and the sole property of the sources of production in the State — involves a degree of altruism, self-sacrifice, and self- control which cannot be said to exist in our community to-day. The result of attempting to impose such a government upon any of our existing communities would j>robably be to create such dissatisfaction that government would become impossible. Solon, in pro- posing his Constitution for Athens, professed the desire LIBERTY 229 to give Athens, not the best government possible, but the best government that Athenians could endure. It is the application of this wise principle which makes un- wise the idea of suddenly imposing socialistic forms of government upon a community little fitted for it. While, therefore, the individualist is clamouring for an ideal of liberty which, giving full play to the selfishness of the few, allows the few to oppress the many, the socialist is demanding institutions which, because they are compatible only with self-sacrifice and self-control, would, in a community in which neither is developed to a sufficient degree, probably lead through a period of factious discontent to anarchy. The practical states- man has to determine, not the degree of liberty a man ought in the end to enjoy or ought in the end to sacri- fice, but rather the degree of liberty which present con- ditions can afford to allow in recognition of individual- ism on the one hand, or to curtail in the interests of socialism on the other. The political problem that every community is to-day more or less unconsciously solving for itself is how to move towards a higher degree of socialisation fast enough to prevent revolution, and yet not so fast as to impose institutions more highly socialised than the individualistic instincts of the community can tolerate. It is impossible to define these limits at large, for they vary in every community. It is, however, of interest to point out that the higher the degree of socialisation, the more rights of private property tend to be curtailed, and it may be laid down as a general rule that when- ever rights of property become sufficiently oppressive upon a sufficient number they will certainly, under a popular government, be curtailed. For example, the right of property of one man in another has during this century been denied and abrogated. The right of 230 INDIVIDUALISM a landlord to ask what he likes for his land has been cur- tailed in Ireland. The right of a capitalist to manage his business as he chooses has been curtailed by factory legislation ; and the growing tendency of municipalities to own and operate their own franchises is daily dimin- ishing the scope of private capital and correspondingly increasing that of collectivism. Every step through which the tendency of capital to oppress labour has been diminished serves to illustrate a fact of no small importance in connection with the prob- lem of economic liberty. When the workingman first attempted to emancipate himself from what he regarded as the oppression of the capitalist, he regarded the capi- talist as his enemy; all he could see was that the capitalist determined his rate of wages. He was not sufficiently well informed to see behind the capitalist the remorseless tyranny of the Market. To-day, when he has, by the organisation of trade imions and by the daily struggle with the capitalist, as an organised body, become enlightened as to the economic conditions under which both are suffering, he has become aware of the fact that he cannot in his own interests demand too high a rate of wages from his employer, because the moment the rate of wages becomes sufficiently high to consume the margin of profit, the employee ruins the employer. No one knows better than the orsfanised trade union how merciless is the oppression of the Market upon the employer as well as upon the employee. It has been pointed out that the system of private property has led to oppression, and that workingmen in the early part of the century were persuaded that this oppression was entirely due to the greed of their em- ployers. Now, in so far as employers are lacking in gen- erosity and in a souse of justi(;e to their employees, they ought undoubtedly to be held responsible. But the or- LIBERTY 231 ganisatiou of trade unions has had for effect to demon- strate to the workingmen that their employers are very little less subject to the tyranny of the Market than themselves. For example, when workingmen were suf- ficiently organised to make a collective demand for higher wages, they often found themselves confronted by an employer who, with his books in his hands, showed that the prices he obtained for the product of their work barely left himself a margin for existence, and that any rise in wages would bring the cost of manufacture to such a point that he would be beaten in his own mar- ket by foreign competitors. Now the officers of trade unions in England have attained such knowledge and skill in computing the profit of their employer that they often know more exactly what the employer is earning than the employer himself ; and they use this information to determine the occasions when they can demand a rise in wages and when, on the contrary, such demand could not be granted. In this manner the workingman to-day is beginning to understand that the employer is as much under the domination of market price as the employee himself. But the Market which rules mercilessly employer and employee alike exerts a perhaps still more disastrous influence beyond national limits. Demand is by no means constant. It varies with the wealth and prosper- ity of the community. During prosperous periods de- mand is great ; but the very extent of demand one day is a sure forerunner of a decreased demand the next, and when the home demand diminishes, what is to become of the factories which have been mounted on a scale to meet a demand which no longer exists ? Must the fires of the factory be extinguished ? Must the workmen be dismissed to starve ? Must the employer lose the capi- tal he has invested in the industry ? It is not well that 232 INDIVIDUALISM any of these things should occur, and to prevent this occurrence there is no other way than for the manufac- turer to seek abroad the demand which no longer exists at home. This perpetually recurring state of things, this ten- dency of production to outstrip effectual demand, is the goad that has driven England to colonise, and colonisa- tion is only another word for conquest. England has no choice ; either she must shut down her factories and see her self-respecting workmen driven to almshouses, or she must compel existing communities to trade with her against their will or create a new demand by creat- ing new communities. Both of these systems mean war, for colonisation nearly always means either the conquest of natives or the conquest of a Power which can no longer keep natives in control. The African continent is a great field for the former of these two processes ; Turkey and Spain the Powers which are at this time best illustrating the second. The Market, or, as Adam Smith in his eulogy of the competitive system describes it, " the higgling of the Market," has become master of us all. With systematic persistence, the automatic regularity of which political economists until very lately were never weary of admiring, the Market reduces us to de- ceit amongst ourselves, — caveat emptor, — and, as re- gards our neighbours, to conquest. Again, great wealth creates great needs, so tliat what is a luxury to a workingman becomes a necessity to a millionaire. And the millionaire who is for ever haunted by a fear of losing the wealth that makes these necessa- ries possible is driven by his needs to the task of accu- mulation ; so that, as all things the millionaire most values in the world can be obtained only tlirough the instrumentality of wealth, wherever wealth can be ac- LIBERTY 233 cumulated there is also the millionaire. This explains Johannesburg. But the object of this exposition is not to condemn wealth. On the contrary, wealth is essential to civilisa- tion ; to abolish wealth in a State would be to condemn it to the fate of Lacedaemon. It is not wealth which is the enemy ; it is the competitive system, which, under the peaceful guise of the Market, exerts over us all, cap- italist and labourer alike, a despotism as great as that of Genghis Khan. As great and more immoral ; for whereas that of the Khan produced in its victims only sub- serviency, that of the Market produces selfishness, ava- rice, and deceit ; it sets every man against his neighbour, by stealth within the community, and by open war out- side of it. The enemy of justice is not wealth ; it is competition. To abolish competition altogether may be impossible; but the problem of how far competition can be dimin- ished without, in the effort to diminish it, causing more misery than itself occasions, is one which contemporane- ous history shows is being solved only in those civilisa- tions that have substituted government by consent for government by compulsion. It is in England, the United States, Belgium, France, Switzerland, and Germany that the problem is being at- tacked ; not in Russia, Turkey, or Thibet. And it is in proportion as the government is indeed a government of the people, by the people, for the people that the solution is becoming more and more effectual. Here, then, is the value of what we have termed political liberty, because it is only through political liberty that we can ever hope to acquire all the rest. Now, the essential machinery through which political liberty works is the francliise. It may be imagined that because the foregoing pre- 234 INDIVIDUALISM sents an argument in favour of popular government it is assumed that the government which the people enjoy in the countries quoted is good or even tolerable. No such assumption, however, is intended. On the contrary, if any assertion on this subject were necessary, it would rather be to the effect that the government in all these countries is not only bad, but intolerably so. But why is it bad? Because the competitive system makes it bad. The Market rules our government in the field of politics just as despotically as it rules the citizen in the field of economics. What interferes with the making of good laws? The financial interests of our legisla- tors. What prevents good administration of the laws we have ? The financial interests of both administra- tor and administered. Who controls the United States Senate? The Trusts. Who controls the New York Legislature? The New York Central Railroad. Who controls Parliament? It is a tradition amongst English- men that no man controls Parliament, And yet we hear faintly sometimes in England of the Beer Interest, and some people think a certain Chartered Company had something to do with the Transvaal war. And who is to blame? Can a man, the day he enters Parliament, cease to live ? Must he not derive his in- come from some business ? And is there any business in the world which is not or cannot be affected by legislation ? We are caught within the meshes of the Market inex- tricably. And within these meshes few can be rich, and fewer still, honest. In considering what if any remedy there is to this wicked condition of things we are brought back to the question of liberty. We have seen just how much polit- ical liberty we enjoy, and we ought now to be clear as to LIBERTY 235 how little we can be said to enjoy economic liberty at all. These pages will have been written in vain if they have not also made clear that although wealth does be- stow a greater economic liberty on the wealthy than on the poor, the former are (with wider limits) as inevi- tably subject to the dominion of the Market as the rest. This condition of things is not a simple one ; it is ex- tremely complicated ; to understand it requires a careful study of political economy in all its numerous branches, — industry, trade, finance, currency. Few problems re- quire more knowledge and judgment for their solution than those of currency and finance ; a ratio of sixteen to one has been proposed as a general panacea for the woes of the unwealthy, and the injustice of the enhance- ment in value of one metal over the other is argued in favour of it. But admitting this injustice, admitting that every time legal tender enhances in value the debtor class is wronged in the interest of the creditor, it is by no means sure that the condition of the creditor may not be such as to render a sudden reversal more perni- cious to the debtor than to him. Moreover, if the sud- den enhancement of gold in its relation to silver was unjust to the farmer, the sudden depreciation of gold in its relation to silver will certainly be equally unjust to the workingman. Those in favour of Free Silver as- sume that the same class will suffer by a remonetisation of silver that gained by its demonetisation. But this may not be true. On the contrary, the man who will suffer first and perhaps most from such a remonetisation will be the wage-earner. Again, the intricacies of finance are such that the cap- italist can often gain more by making a sacrifice than by refusing it. The day Jay Gould decided to disgorge a part of his ill-gotten gains he gained more by the rise in the stock of the company to which he made restitution than he lost by what he restored. 236 INDIVIDUALISM The one thing necessary in order to solve the eco- nomic problem is knowledge. Our workingmen are in- telligent, and they have in most of their trade unions shown a remarkable capacity for self-control and collec- tive action. But they have not had the time to study ; their knowledge is generally limited to the particular economic conditions under which they work, and only a very few of them have ever had a chance to peer outside. Amongst the wealthy there is a growing sympathy with the working class and a growing indignation at the injustice which existing conditions occasion. But most of this class are so absorbed in the task of growing richer that they have little time to give to study, and those who do study generally wear blinders imposed by their individual interest that make the acquisition of knowledge difficult and that of wisdom almost impossible. Ignorance, then, is our chief enemy, and closely al- lied with Ignorance is Greed. For surely the desire for wealth — in whomsoever it may be — which pursues it at the cost of poverty for others is greed. And in the word " greed " is included not only the greed of the miser, which is obvious and contemptible, but the greed of re- finement, which, because we are accustomed to it, has ceased to be obvious ; the greed of the dainty lady, which blinds her to the injustice of the conditions sur- rounding her through her dependence on the delicate things which these conditions contribute to furnish ; the greed of the place-hunter, of the politician, nay, even the greed of the Church. The competitive system per- mits of wealth enough to furnish security for only very few ; the large majority are in daily fear of poverty, and one-fifth are a hopeless prey to it. And so one-fifth of our population are the victims of Despair ; and the rest are the slaves of Greed. LIBERTY 237 § 5. Conclusion In conclusion, the liberty or license of the savage state is attended by so many risks that as a matter of fact it is enjoyed by very few, sometimes only by one, at the cost of all the rest. This is a part of the preda- tory scheme which has become converted into the great scientific dogma couched in the words, " survival of the fittest." All the vices attend it and are promoted by it, — selfishness, ferocity, and lust. The finest results of its handiwork are to be found in the tiger and the ape, Man has sought, by the exercise of intelligence and self-control, to emancipate himself from the operation of this cruel law ; and every intelligent sacrifice he has made has been expressed in institutions which we to-day recognise as so many steps in the progress of civilisa- tion. The very principle of the survival of the fittest which condemns the individualist to solitude, sav- agery, and sin comes in aid of every wise effort towards socialisation ; for the higher the degree of socialisation of any given group, the stronger it is in the conflict with less highly socialised enemies. Thus the nations in which self-control was encouraged by the institution of monogamy have prevailed over those in which polyg- amy or polyandry contributed to diminish self-control rather than enhance it. And the nations in which patriarchs surrendered a part of their absolute power over their homes in order to combine against a common foe prevailed over those in which a fierce individualism made this sacrifice impossible. Tribes, the chiefs of which combined to constitute the Greek city, prevailed over those who refused to make the sacrifice neces- sitated by such a combination. But the Greek cities whose jealousies prevented permanent combination into 238 INDIVIDUALISM a great State were conquered by a nation free from such local impediments. And the States which in America have yielded their sovereignty to a powerful Federation have to-day become one of the great Powers of the earth. And out of this slowly increasing socialisation emerge all the virtues, because socialisation cannot take place without them. So ferocity tends to disappear and is replaced by courage ; lust is replaced by love ; selfish- ness by altruism ; license by liberty. And this process furnishes an answer to those who claim that virtue is a matter of opinion and geography. Men's minds may differ as to what virtue is; obviously there is a pro- found difference between the opinions on the subject of a Washington and of a Ute ; or of Aguinaldo and McKinley ; or of Kruger and Salisbury. But outside of these divergent opinions virtue remains as clearly and beautifully delineated as the Samothracean Nike ; headless, perhaps, and armless, but still standing in superb defiance against all the winds of controversy. For virtue in any given community is an embodiment of its socialisation. Wherever the socialisation is low, virtue is low, nay, sometimes buried, as the Nike was for countless years, deep down under the mould of ignorance. But when wisdom raises tiie level of so- cialisation and removes man from the condition of the savage towards that of the saint, she removes the mould of ignorance from above the prostrate limbs, she lifts the goddess on her feet, and sets her up once more upon the prow of the ship of State, — a symbol of matter made alive and eternal through the genius of art and hope. Virtue, then, includes all those qualities necessary to a high degree of socialisation. Vice includes all those qualities that make socialisation difficult or impossible. LIBERTY 239 Applying this definition to liberty, and without at- tempting at this time an exhaustive analysis of what liberty is, we may roughly divide it into — Personal liberty, which is the freedom or security from physical restraint consistent with a high de- gree of socialisation. Political liberty, which is the freedom or security from governmental oppression consistent with a high degree of socialisation. Economic liberty, which is the freedom or security from want consistent with a high degree of socialisation. In many countries constitutional government has provided the machinery through which political liberty can be enjoyed ; in a few, such provisions as those of habeas corpus have to a large degree secured perso- nal liberty ; but in none is economic liberty enjoyed save by a comparative minority; and a large major- ity are reduced by economic conditions to a state of subjection. Slowly the problem of economic liberty — the last of our great political problems — is being worked out. The solution of it proposed by collectivism is the one to which we shall next direct our attention ; and in the course of our study of collectivism we shall have to re- turn to and complete that of liberty. BOOK II. COLLECTIVISM INTRODUCTION When a French drayman harnesses his three Percherons to his cart, he sets them in a row tandem with their heads in the direction to which he desires to go, and by the use of the whip and certain conventional noises endeavours to co-ordinate the efforts of his team so that they all act as a unit to the utmost possible, every pound of work being employed usefully to move the cart with the least waste of energy in the desired direction. What should we say of a drayman who, instead of unit- ing the efforts of his horses by harnessing them all to the same end of his cart, should attach each one to a different end of it, and, applying the lash impartially to them all, set each one upon counteracting the efforts of the rest, so that the direction be determined by the acci- dent which horse was the strongest, and the speed by the difference between the strength of one horse and that of those pulling against him ? We should say that such a drayman was mad. And yet this is practically what the competitive system does in setting one man against another in the work of production. Obviously the illustration fails in many particulars. In such occupations as farming, every farmer produces the things which the community needs and asks for, and to this extent farmers co-operate ; but it is the interest of every farmer that his neighbour's crop should fail in 16 242 COLLECTIVISM order that his may secure a better price; it is the in- terest of the railroad to charge as high a price as it can wrest from the farmer for taking his crop to market ; and it is the interest of the middleman to buy the farmer's crop at the lowest and sell at the highest possible price. To this extent, therefore, farmer, middleman, and railroad are working against one another. These three represent three essential factors in the machinery of economics, — the producer, the transporter, and the salesman. It would be useful to the community that these three dray horses should pull together instead of pulling against one another, and in some communities, by the adoption of a simple expedient, the folly of our mad drayman's system is eliminated. In South Aus- tralia the railroads are owned by the State ; the State carries goods as well as letters and telegrams. It has receiving-depots and a produce-export depot, and through the agency of the State the farmer can convert his produce into money with the assistance of the trans- porter and salesman instead of in conflict with him. "Now in South Australia all the farmer has to do when he wishes to send a box of butter, honev, or some sheep abroad, is to write to the agricultural department, and if they are approved and forwarded, the consignor has nothing more to do but sit at home and await re- turns by check." 1 The principle of extending the sphere of government so as to substitute co-operation for competition, as illus- trated by this South Australian system, is tlie principle of collectivism; and those who believe in the possibility of ultimately extending this principle to its utmost limits look forward to a day when the State will own all so-called "sources of production," leaving to indi- ^ Bulletin of the Academy of Political and Social Science, New Series, No. 10, {). 9. INTRODUCTION 243 viduals property only in the things they for personal convenience and enjoyment use. There is, however, a widespread ignorance as to the effect of this system, and it may, therefore, be well at once to point out that it is by no means so revolutionary as is generally imagined. For example, were the State sole owner of the land, there need be but little difference between our tenure under the State and our tenure to- day. Every man who occupies land under the present system contributes to the extent of his occupation to the maintenance of the State. This contribution ^ is called a tax to-day; in a collectivist State it would be called rent. The principal change effected by collectivism would be as to the extent of any one man's holdings. In such a State no Winans could evict whole villages in order to secure a deer forest for his exclusive personal enjoyment ; nor could a French chocolate manufacturer depopulate a Canadian island larger than one of our United States for a game preserve. But every man could enjoy the exclusive use of such land as he could within reasonable limits require, under a tenure just as secure as — or, with this Anticosti experience fresh in our minds, shall we not say far more secure than — un- der the existing plan. Another widespread mistake regarding collectivism consists in the notion that it involves the division of property amongst the people. On the contrary, far from involving the principle of division or dissipation, collectivism is the embodiment of the principle of con- centration. Mark Twain wittily objects to the proverb, " Don't put all your eggs in one basket," by substituting for it, " On the contrary, put all your eggs in one basket, but watch that basket." Collectivism proposes to vest in the State both land and capital, the private ownership ^ In France taxes are called just what they are, "contributions." 244 COLLECTIVISM of which now sets man against man, and to vest it under conditions which will put men shoulder to shoulder in co-operative production, eliminating anxiety, diminish- ing toil, and permitting a leisure and a freedom for the promotion of knowledge, culture, and art which the world has not yet seen. Above all, the economy of time occasioned by such a system would permit every indi- vidual voter to exercise a watchfulness over the State which is impossible under existing conditions, and the impossibility of which is perhaps the principal cause of administrative mismanagement and political corruption. Collectivists do not necessarily demand or expect that collectivism be introduced suddenly or by violent means into the State. On the contrary, temperate collectivists — and we may disregard the views of the intemperate — ask for nothing more than the gradual introduction of a less unintelligent and of a less immoral economic system, by .just such reforms as are being introduced to-day in almost every civilised country. In England municipalities are annually increasing the scope of their activities, acquiring their own gas-plants, water-works, and tramway systems; the same thing is taking place in the United States. In Switzerland the State has just decided to purchase its railroads; in Belgium, Prussia, and Austria the State owns many of them. In New Zealand and Australia State ownership is still more largely recognised. The collectivist, therefore, preaches nothing new, but rather justifies a political movement that has already begun. It is possible and even probable that the movement may proceed too fast; that the State may not be able to accommodate itself to all the new functions which it is perhaps in some countries too rapidly assuming. In such case a reaction will undoubtedly set in, and such a reaction the prudent collectivist will not violently INTRODUCTION 245 resist. Such reactions furnish the periods of rest al- ready alluded to,^ which are found to be indispensable to organic development, and during such reactions, and indeed at all times, individualists will be for ever clam- ouring against collectivism and pointing out the hope- lessness of the ideal towards which collectivists are strivino-. It is important, then, that this coUectivist ideal be temperately set forth, in order to silence the contention that it is altogether ridiculous. In order to anticipate this clamour it is important also to point out, first, the difference between collectivism as a method from collectivism as an ideal, and, secondly, that, even as an ideal, collectivism is not the utterly insane thing people generally imagine it to be. As regards the first point, it is unnecessary to repeat here what has already been explained in the preface; and as regards the second, no more need be added than the consideration that the practicability of ideal collec- tivism forms no essential parts of coUectivist doctrine. This last is so important a point that it deserves careful emphasis. It would be perfectly proper to leave out of this work all reference to ideal collectivism, and, indeed, in the first plan laid down it was decided to treat ideal col- lectivism as a non-essential and leave it out of the discussion altogether. To this method of treatment, however, there is a serious objection. Individualists find their strongest ground of vantage in the supposed impracticability of collectivism, both as a method and as an ideal, and, in discussing its demerits, confound the two so as to throw upon the method some of the objections that apply only to the ideal, and upon the ideal some that apply only to the method. For example, it is an objection to ideal collectivism that men are not 1 Vol I., pp. 157-164. 246 COLLECTIVISM yet good and wise enough for it, but this objection does not apply to the method; for if New York is not too bad and foolish to own its own water-works, it is not too bad and foolish to own its gas-works also. Again, it may be an objection to the method that municipal ownership may lead to extravagance, but this objection has no application to ideal collectivism, the economy of which no one will put in question. Again, individ- ualists, in discussing the method, are never tired of pointing out the hopelessness of the ideal to which it tends; they denounce the suggestion that New York should own its gas-works as " the thin end of the wedge," and disparage the programme by derisive taunts at the ideal. Now, although men are not to-day fit for ideal collectivism, and it would probably be a great mistake to attempt suddenly to introduce it, the scheme itself, as applied to an improved generation, is not as foolish a thing as individualists maintain it to be. If indi- vidualists were right in contending that the extension of State functions would inevitably lead us to peril or ruin, then we should have to pause before entering upon it. But if, on the contrary, the extension of State func- tions may lead us to continually improved conditions, and if introduced gradually cannot have for consequence anything worse than a temporary stay in the progress towards such improvement, then this clamour of indi- vidualists about the " thin end of the wedge " may be disregarded ; and if, pushing our argument to its extreme limits, the big end of the wedge turns out to be nothing worse than the very best condition, economic, social, and political, that humanity is at all capable of, then this clamour can be turned against the individualists, and out of it a justification found for the very pro- gramme against which it is directed. For this reason it has been considered wise to look at INTRODUCTION 247 this dreaded Gorgon of collectivism in the face, take it at its very worst, scan it feature by feature, and challenge for ourselves with deliberation the conclusions that many are induced to assume from others through ridicule. Without admitting, therefore, that it is incumbent upon the practical collectivist — that is to say, the man who proposes collectivism as a programme — to prove the attainability of ideal collectivism or collec- tivism regarded as an end, the attempt will be made to present the scheme of government to which collectivism tends, in its least practicable extreme, so that we may deliberately study the very worst that can happen to us by persevering in the collectivist programme. And in- cidentally it may be pointed out that while individual- ists are for ever sneering at the hopelessly happy results of the collectivist programme, they carefully keep in the background the hopelessly unhappy condition to which their own condemns us. They mock at col- lectivists for having an ideal, but are silent as to the fact that they themselves have none. They warn us that collectivist schemes of improvement are too beauti- ful to be true, forgetting that the pathos of their own programme is too true to be beautiful. The enormity of believing that human misery can be lessened is the charge brought against collectivism, whether as a method or as an ideal. Let us, then, grapple with it at its worst, in its most undiluted shape, and judge for ourselves whether, even if to the utmost degree possible realised, it would be as bad as it has been painted. Before presenting, however, the collectivist ideal, one reservation cannot be too strongly emphasised: it has been explained that no reasonable collectivist proposes to introduce a complete collectivist system suddenly 248 COLLECTIVISM upon the State. Of the many reasons against such an attempt the principal one, perhaps, is that the existing generation is totally unfit for it. But a social condition which would be impossible to our generation would be not only possible but highly beneficial to a generation that had been educated to it. If in a community no child had ever seen one man working for another, but every child had from its infancy been accustomed to the thought that every human being without exception was expected to devote three or four hours out of the day to the work of the State, there would be neither desire to reduce fellow-creatures to servitude nor repugnance at the necessity of compulsory work. In other words, a condition that would be intolerable to such of us as seem to-day to be masters of our own time and of that of others, would not be intolerable to a future generation to which such an apparent mastery had never been known. All the instincts of the wealthy and of the educated have been formed under conditions so different from those of a collectivist State that it is difficult for us to conceive of such a State without repugnance. In order properly to understand ideal collectivism, we ought to divest ourselves of these instincts and consider it from the point of view, not of ourselves, but of the future generation, whose moral instincts will not have been blunted by the habit of lording it over their fellow- creatures. If we can rid our minds of the immoral prejudices which our economic conditions have imposed upon us, we may then be able to weigh the advantages and disad- vantages of collectivism, — not for ourselves, who are unfit for it, but for an as yet unborn generation less ill used than ourselves by prosperity and selfishness. The task is a difficult one, and yet it is indispensable to a fair estimate of collectivism. Those, therefore, INTRODUCTION 249 who are incapacitated by selfish instincts from accom- plishing it, are not likely to read the following pages understandingly. It is only for those who can escape from the bondage of instinct that the attempt will be made to give some account of a scheme of government that they only can understand. But, however difficult it may be for us to-day to appreciate the possibilities of a complete collectivism, it is by no means so difficult to understand the advantages to be derived from the slow application of collectivist principles in so far as the present generation is capable of it. It cannot be too often repeated that it is by no means necessary to col- lectivism, whether regarded as an economic theory or as a political programme, that it should be proved to be ever possible or practicable in its ideal or ultimate development. The principal aim of this book is to destroy the doctrine of Herbert Spencer that there are sound scientific, economic, or political grounds for re- ducing government to the least possible. The extent to which collectivism can be wisely resorted to depends upon the economic, political, and moral development of the people. Many intelligent Italians believe Milan to be capable of assuming the control of its own franchises, but would deplore any general attempt at the munici- palisation of franchises in all the cities of Italy. Keep- ing in view, then, the essentially local character of the political problem presented by collectivism, let us attack the question of collectivism by considering the definition of it given by Schaffie, who has written one book for the purpose of telling us what it is, and another for the pur- pose of explaining that it is impossible. 250 COLLECTIVISM CHAPTER I WHAT IS COLLECTIVISM? ScHAFFLE defines collectivism as follows : — " The economic quintessence of the socialistic programme, the real aim of the international movement, is as follows : " To replace the system of private capital (i. e. the specu- lative method of production, regulated on behalf of society only by the free competition of private enterprises) by a system of collective capital ; that is, by a method of pro- duction, which would introduce a unified (social or 'col- lective') organisation of national labour, on the basis of collective or common ownership of the means of production by all the members of the society. This collective method of production would remove the present competitive system by placing under official administration such departments of production as can be managed collectively (socially or co-operatively) as well as the distribution among all of the common produce of all, according to the amount of social utility of the productive labour of each. " This represents in the shortest possible formula the aim of the socialism of to-day, however variously expressed, and in some cases obscurely conceived, may be the proposed methods for attaining it." ^ To this account of ideal collectivism the following observations may be made : — In the first place, if I were undertaking to make a definition of ideal collectivism, I should avoid the use of the word " official " because the official under our 1 The Quintessence of Socialism, Dr. A. Schaffle, p. 3. WHAT IS COLLECTIVISM? 251 present system is and must be a totally different person from the official under the collectivist State, for reasons which will be explained later. To use the word "offi- cial," therefore, in connection with the administration of a collectivist State, is to associate with such a State the notion of an intolerable bureaucracy. As this is one of the standing objections to collectivism it will have to be considered separately later on. In the second place, and this is by far the most im- portant change that will be proposed to Schaffle's for- mula, the attempt to distribute " among all the common produce of all, according to the amount of social utility of the productive labour of each," is not a necessary feature of collectivism. On the contrary, in the form of collectivism that seems least impractical, there will be comparatively little attempt made to distribute the income of the community amongst its members in pro- portion to the amount or utility of the productive labour of each, but rather all will to the utmost possible share equally in the income of the community. Nevertheless, the inevitable natural inequalities amongst men will make it much easier for some to perform their allotted task than others, and therefore, although all will receive the same share of the community income, some will re- ceive it with less labour, and doubtless with less disa- greeable labour, than others ; and these, as they enjoy a larger leisure than the others, will be at liberty to apply this leisure either to their own pleasure and advantage or to the public good. Moreover, no rigid rules can be laid down on this point. The collectivism of one State is likely to differ from that of other States just as much as popular government in the United States differs from popular government in France. It may be found con- venient to confine the system of equal sharing to the barest necessaries of life, or, on the contrary, to apply it 252 COLLECTIVISM to all its comforts and superfluities; this will depend upon the character of the people and the extent of their development. Justice, according to many authors, demands that men should be rewarded according to their utility, — in other words, that human institutions should proceed exactly as Nature does ; for Nature begins by commit- ting the injustice of favouring one individual at birth more than another; and she adds to this injustice throughout the entire life of her favourite; for the favours granted at birth continue throughout his life so to operate as to sacrifice all others to him. Now, this consequence of natural injustice at birth is exactly what man has attempted to resist; he has already so far suc- ceeded that the man of excelling muscular strength no longer lords it over his fellows, but he has substituted for the tyranny of muscular strength the tyranny of that particular form of craft which is skilful in amassing wealth. One tyranny is as bad, and in some respects worse, than the other. The moral rule is not, " Do unto others according as they are able to do unto you; " it is, " Do unto others according as you would they should do unto you." Act with others according to their weak- ness and your own, rather than according to their strength and your own. In other words, diminish for every man the consequence of Nature's injustice. If he is sick, nurse him; if he is weak, strengthen him. This is the order of justice. But even if this moral rule be set aside as non- existing, if we look only to the question how we can so frame our institutions as to make the whole sum of hap- piness tlie greatest possible, it is conceivable that a differ- ent economic system might substitute for selfishness that form of it wliich seeks satisfaction mainly through the 1 See chap, v., Practical Working of Collectivism. WHAT IS COLLECTIVISM? 253 satisfaction of others. In communities of ants and bees nature has done it ; and man can do it for himself by suppressing the seliishness that characterises our present competitive system and is at the same time the direct consequence of it. One of the worst results of our competitive system is that it rewards men according to their deeds, giv- ing to the few more than they need, and to the many less ; stimulating them to effort for the purpose of bene- fiting self, instead of for the purpose of benefiting the community. The higher order of selfishness, called altruism, has already been realised in the family: a man works for his family because he loves it; altruism has also been realised, but to a less degree, in the city and the State. A man will work for his country — nay, will die for it — because he loves it. The next step in altruism is not so impossible as it seems, if once our institutions make it possible. Relieve a man from the necessity of always working for himself, and he will soon acquire and possibly delight in the taste for work- ing for others. The form of ideal collectivism then proposed here is one in which every man will receive to the utmost pos- sible the same share of the national income, and not one that gives to men according to their deeds ; for this last would stimulate selfishness, and selfishness is the great obstacle to human happiness. Those who propose to admit this stimulus into the ideal collectivist State lose the moral point of collectivism, the main purpose of which is to strike at the root of selfishness. To expose society to the changes involved in collectivism without removing the stimulus of selfishness would, from the moral point of view, be to attack the symptom and leave undiminished the disease. The Spencerian doctrine that justice involves the idea 254 COLLECTIVISM of "inequality of benefits" is consistent with the brutal predatory plan of Nature, but inconsistent with the human ideal which seeks to compensate the unfortu- nate for the unhappiness to which natural defects ex- pose them. For gifted men are those whom Nature favours; every gift is a source of happiness. Intelli- gence furnishes the resource of mental stimulation ; all creative faculty bestows moments of creative rapture; physical strength contributes to the joy of life ; all these things are in themselves sources of happiness. Our present social institutions add wealth to these gifted men, so that they not only enjoy the happiness that flows naturally from their natural gifts, but also the further happiness that springs from riches. A lawyer enjoys the exercise of his profession; he would not willingly abandon the triumphs of the court-room in order to break stones on the highway. A journalist enjoys the sparkle of his own editorial; the sculptor enjoys the plasticity his art gives to implastic stone. Their occu- pation is in itself a delight; it ought to be delight enough, and would be delight enough, were necessaries and ordinary comfort provided for them. But under our competitive system, success in the struggle for wealth brings to these men wealth also, whereas the ungifted have poverty added to the drudgery of their employment. These are the conditions condemned by Christ in the words : " Unto every one that hath shall be given, . . . but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath." Were this a necessary condition, it would have to be endured; but Christ has himself suggested a different ideal, — one under which the gifted man shall account to his fellow-creatures for his gifts, and not make of them an instrument of oppression ; one under which tlie un- gifted man shall at any rate be assured by the community WHAT IS COLLECTIVISM? 255 the same necessaries and ordinary comforts as the gifted ; and thus — if he may not enjoy the raptures of the crea- tive faculty — he may at any rate be saved from anxiety and want. So only can be realised the social condition proposed by Christ under which "Unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required ; and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more." The aim of collectivism is to substitute love of the neighbour for love of self by framing institutions that make this substitution possible. Nature furnishes us with such institutions in the beehive and the ant's nest. These, however, must be adapted to the care for the individual which characterises human justice and is conspicuous by its absence from animal communities. But the fact that Nature has furnished us a model of collectivism must not be forgotten in answer to those who contend that collectivism is impossible because it is contrary to Nature. The form of collectivism proposed by Schaffle is that in which the members of the community are to receive an income proportionate to deeds, whereas that proposed by the form of collectivism under discussion will distribute national income in proportion to needs ; the needs of every individual being recognised as practically the same. I say practically, because, in working out the scheme, considerable difference will be found to exist between individuals in this respect, and these differences of needs will give rise to differences of possession without unduly stimulating selfishness or causing discontent. A study of these details, however, must be postponed until the main lines of the collectivist scheme have been presented. Another reason why a collectivism which endeavours 256 COLLECTIVISM to distribute national income according to the utility of the labour of each is not recommended as a solution of our social problem is this : we have laid down the gen- eral proposition that if the environment is one which stimulates selfishness, the individual will tend, under the influence of this environment, to become more selfish. Now, if the collectivism proposed continually urges individuals to work for the State for no other motive than that their work result in direct advantage to themselves, they will not be working for the community, but for themselves. The moral purpose of collectivism, in so far as it attempts to solve the problem of environ- ment, is to substitute for this sort of selfish interest an interest in the community which will benefit self only on the condition of equally benefiting all the other members thereof. That those most gifted by nature, and therefore able to accomplish their work with the least pain to themselves, are to receive a larger share of the national income than their less gifted brothers, who are obliged, in order to perform their allotted task, to work longer hours at an occupation possibly less agree- able to themselves, is clearly neither just in principle nor beneficial in result ; for such a system would tend to stimulate the very same kind of selfishness as is stimu- lated by our present system, and as it is the moral pur- pose of collectivism to eradicate. If, therefore, the conclusions to which we have come in the preceding pages are at all sound, such a collectivism as this woukl fail to solve the moral problem which we have before us ; namely, the problem of how to modify our artificial environment so that instead of stimulating selfishness it will stimulate the reverse of selfishness, or altruism. The form of collectivism, therefore, that will best meet what seem to be the moral necessities of the situ- ation is one in which no individual can gain much save WHAT IS COLLECTIVISM? 257 through the gain of all his fellows, the motive of every man being as much as possible to benefit the whole com- munity, and only through the benefit of the whole com- munity benefit himself. In addition, however, to the theoretical argument against dividing income according to deeds derived from the advisableness of diminishing selfishness in the community, there is a practical argu- ment against it which is of no small importance : Those who oppose collectivism very properly point out that if the social income is to be divided according to deeds, the division must be intrusted to the govern- ment ; and that the power of determining how much of social income is to be enjoyed by the various members of a community is a power far greater in extent and far more liable to abuse than any power enjoyed by any civilised government to-day. If the scramble for ofiSce, which must always take place, whatever be the economic scheme of society, is to be intensified by the fact that the heads of the government are not only to enjoy the con- sideration and authority that pertain to office, but also are to have the power of distributing national income according to deeds, politics would, under such a system, tend to become a field for the basest intrigue and the most remorseless audacity. Such a collectivism would submit the fortune of every individual to the ipse dixit of those who had control of the government. A more arbitrary form of government, or one more likely to re- sult in injustice, cannot well be conceived. It is true that ingenious plans have been devised for determining division according to deeds ; but all of them must neces- sarily give rise to endless discussion and manifold inter- pretations, and would have ultimately to be left to the decision of some State official, administrative or judi- cial. Hence would arise the necessity for a large and expensive judicial organisation with an elaborate system 17 258 COLLECTIVISM of courts, juries, lawyers, attorney-generals, and district attorneys ; and, indeed, it is probable that the economy resulting from collective production would be more than compensated by the waste of time involved in the deter- mination of how collective income should be divided. The scheme of collectivism, therefore, proposed in these pages proceeds upon a simpler plan: it follows nature closely, for it follows the plan of the ant-hill. Every community undertakes to furnish for the individ- uals which constitute it a certain amount of food, of comforts, of luxuries, of security, and of pleasure. Justice demands that the race be not exhausted or degenerated by the process of obtaining these, and, above all, that the necessity of procuring food be not used by a skilful few as a means for exploiting the many. It is submitted that this demand of justice would be attained were the State to set all the citizens at work according to their best abilities, every citizen working for the benefit of the community during the comparatively few hours that would be required to secure necessaries and ordinary comforts ; that all should share in these necessaries and ordinary comforts equally; and that such a plan would afford a large amount of leisure which every individual could apply to the pur- suit of pleasure, whether in the shape of luxury, or art, or literature, or the satisfaction of individual aspirations. We shall later show that such a plan would secure the greatest economy of production and the greatest personal liberty ; that it would eliminate every economic occasion of injustice, and, by diminishing base motives of action to a minimum and relieving humanity from the exhaus- tion which attends competition, advance the race in body, mind, and spirit. This aspect of collectivism furnishes an opportunity WHAT IS COLLECTIVISM? 259 for disposing of one objection to it, which is more pop- ular than well founded. It is a favourite way of dis- posing of collectivism to say that it is a form of society fit only for angels and not fit for men; or, in other words, that so long as men are human they are not fitted for a collectivist society. This objection would be founded if, as a matter of fact, collectivism disre- garded the natural and social needs of man; but it is not true of the collectivism proposed. The principal natural needs of man are food, clothing, comfort, and the satisfaction of his natural affections. These needs belong to that natural part of man which political insti- tutions cannot eliminate. Any political scheme which undertook to ignore these would be false. Far from ignoring these, however, collectivism seeks only to fur- nish to these needs the highest form of satisfaction. It further recognises that man not only seeks the satisfac- tion of his physical needs, but also of his moral needs ; and that the attempt to satisfy physical without at the same time satisfying moral needs is bound to lead to as much unhappiness as the attempt to satisfy moral needs without regard to those that are physical. Now the system under which we live makes just this last mis- take. It stimulates men to satisfy their physical needs at the cost of cruelty to their neighbour, and in so doing it keeps men not only unjust, but unhappy; for the un- happiness which a man occasions in others tends to come back to him ultimately in some form or other. The collectivist plan, on the contrary, recognises that man has moral as well as physical needs, and it proposes to minister to both by making the interest of every marx in the satisfaction of his physical needs consistent with the satisfaction of those that are moral also. We shall remain all wrong about collectivism if we imagine that it ignores the natural needs of man. On 260 COLLECTIVISM the contrary, it begins by recognising that every man is, and must always be, engaged in the pursuit of hap- piness, and it proposes to make that pursuit more suc- cessful than under the present system. It proposes to eliminate from this pursuit to the utmost possible the bitterness that attends not only struggle and defeat, but, under the competitive system, success also. It proposes to add to the pursuit of happiness the satisfaction that results from benefiting others as well as ourselves. It proposes to dignify labour, so that the more menial it is, the more beautiful ; for it is rendered not unwillingly upon the compulsion of a sometime odious master, but willingly as a contribution to the general good. Collectivism takes all the cynicism out of a doctrine against which many rebel because they do not under- stand it. I mean the doctrine that selfishness is inerad- icable, and that, although one form of selfishness may be substituted for another, the substituted form will be selfish, however much it may be higher in character. For example, a man who obeys a generous impulse and gives alms to the poor is declared by this doctrine to be as selfish as the man who refuses alms, because the phi- lanthropist is gratifying himself in giving the alms as much as his opposite is gratifying himself in refusing them. In one sense there is no doubt about the truth of this statement, for we are all seeking our gratification and we are all to this extent selfish; but one man is driven by his selfishness and the industrial environment to the gratification of himself without regard to others, whereas other men are urged, in spite of the artificial environment which surrounds them, to gratify them- selves by contributing to the happiness of others. As the selfishness of the former causes pain to others, whereas that of the latter causes benefit and happiness to others, clearly that of the latter is preferable in the WHAT IS COLLECTIVISM? 261 social state to that of the former. But we are con- fronted under existing conditions with the appalling fact that the man who yields to the impulse of charity and gives alms to a suffering fellow-creature is often doing a greater injury to the whole community than the man who, obeying another kind of selfishness, refuses them. In the presence of such an anomalous condition as this we cannot but ask ourselves whether it is not possible to imagine conditions different from those which pre- vail, and under which the generous form of selfishness may be stimulated rather than the other. Now this is practically what collectivism seeks to do. It seeks to create conditions under which men will be benefited through the operation of generous impulses, rather than through those that are base. But all this discussion will seem vain to a man who is convinced that it is impossible to frame a form of government which will at the same time recognise the inequality between men, and also contrive so that those inequalities shall not result for men in very different degrees of happiness. Let me, then, at once remind such a reader that in the chapter on Justice the possibility of altogether elim- inating the consequences to men of the inequalities which characterise them has been fully admitted ; but it was at the same time laid down that human justice is a struggle with these inequalities, having for its purpose the reduction to the utmost possible of the unhappiness which results therefrom. It was there recognised that such inequalities as made one man more or less attrac- tive than another inevitably tended to make one man more or less happy than the other ; the same is true as regards health ; the same is true as regards intelligence ; the same is true as regards physical strength. No man 262 COLLECTIVISM who has enjoyed the exercise of physical strength can pretend that a weak man is not to that extent less happy than a strong man; no man who has exercised the faculty of intelligence can pretend that he is not to that extent a happier man than an unintelligent one. The problem before us is not to obliterate all the conse- quences of inequality, for this we have admitted we can never do ; but what it is possible to do in the way of diminishing the consequences of these inequalities, this is what man, in aiming at justice, has attempted to do ; this is what our duty binds us to do; this is what re- ligion orders us to do ; and this is what, by an intelligent study of political and economic science, man may to a great extent ultimately accomplish. Recognising, therefore, the limits which are imposed upon us by the inequalities of nature with which we are powerless to grapple, but recognising at the same time the inequalities which we by our unintelligent in- terference with nature have ourselves created, it may be possible for us to conceive of a system which will at any rate eliminate the inequalities we have ourselves added to those of nature. In proposing to abolish the principle of private prop- erty in the sources of production, we must be careful to distinguish what we mean by sources of jjroduction. It is not part of the collectivist plan to deprive men of property in the things which they themselves use for their personal comfort and pleasure; as, for example, in the things that contribute to making a man's home pleasant to him, — his furniture, his books, his works of art, his musical instruments, and other instruments of pleasure. It will be seen, when we get a completer idea of the collectivist scheme, that there is no injury to society in a man's owning these things and at his death passing them on to his children. WHAT IS COLLECTIVISM? 263 The essential feature of collectivism is, that it pre- vents any man from making himself master of the sources of production so as to use this mastery for the exploitation of other men. Everything which constitutes a natural monopoly is to belong to the State. Land is to belong to the State, or to be controlled by it, and no individual is by property in land to demand rent of a fellow-citizen ; and as the land belongs to the State, the product of land will also belong to the State ; and no man is, by accumulating this product and depriving others of it, to put himself in a position to exact service therefor from his fellow-citizens. As a natural conse- quence of this, the State being the owner of all the sources of production and of the product itself, the State alone will be in a position to command and control the labour of the citizens, so far as that labour is necessary to the support of the community. And here we come to the next obvious objection to socialism suggested by the word "State." Those born and bred under existing conditions will answer that the State thus constituted sole proprietor of land and the produce of land, sole distributer of this produce, and sole mistress of the labour of her citizens, will constitute as despotic a power as the world has ever seen ; that this despotic power will go into the hands of the mob, which will use it for its own advantage, and that no tyranny excels the tyranny of a mob. Undoubtedly this objection is one which goes to the very root of the question ; and undoubtedly, if the offi- cials of the coUectivist State are to any degree to resemble the officials of the State in which we live, and if they are to be remunerated as these officials are ; if they are to form part of a political machine at all similar to that which now appoints them ; and if, being such officials as those we now have, they are to enjoy 264 COLLECTIVISM the power which it is proposed to grant in the collec- tivist State, — nothing can be conceived more odious or abominable than such a power in such hands. And this is just where it becomes necessary that we should exercise all the power of imagination that we have in order to escape from the bondage of ideas under which we are committed to the view of officialism by the con- ditions under which we live, and under which for thou- sands of years our ancestors have lived before us. For we have to begin by eradicating from our minds the pic- ture which naturally suggests itself when we use the word "official." The official under our existing conditions is a man who, driven by the necessity of making his bread, has offered himself for service to the State. His employer is either the State to which he has to be subservient, as in Prussia, or is a political Boss, as in the United States. In the first case, the official becomes part of a system under which one class undertakes to govern the rest of the nation, seeking its own benefit first, and the benefit of the governed only in so far as that benefit is secondary to its own. In the second case, he is a part of a machine which is engaged in practically the same work, except that while in the former case the governing class is more or less consented to by the governed, in the case of a political machine the consent of the governed class has been obtained through a sort of unconscious fraud, and in consequence of a defect in the political machinery of the State. In both cases, however, the official is operated upon primarily by the motive of taking care of himself, and only secondarily, if at all, by the desire to take care of those for whose benefit his office has been constituted. Moreover, the necessity of maintain- ing himself or securing advancement in office creates a WHAT IS COLLECTIVISM? 265 subserviency to the power that put him there, and this power is a selfish power in both cases, and in one is generally corrupt. The point to which attention must chiefly be directed in considering the position of an official under our pres- ent system is that the official is always haunted by the fear, not only of losing advancement, but also of losing with it the increased facility advancement gives him of making bread. The official in a collectivist State would occupy a totally different position. He has nothing financially to gain or lose from the office he occupies ; his share in the national income is exactly the same whether he occupies the official place or not. There is therefore no haunt- ing fear lest he lose the place, nor is there any subser- vience to a governing class or to a political machine arising out of the necessity for making bread, which is the primary necessity of our present system. In fact, in a collectivist State every individual is an official, and thereby put on an absolute equality, so far as oifi- cialism is concerned, with every other member of it. The man who is growing corn is an official of the State ; the man who is killing cattle is an official of the State ; the man who is distributing dry-goods is an official of the State; the man who is administering justice is an official of the State. There may and will, of course, be in the collectivist State, as in ours, a great difference between the consid- eration which is attached to various functions in the State; and here we have to recognise the inevitable reflection in the State of the natural inequalities of men. If a man is fitted by his physique for physical labour and not fitted by intelligence for intellectual labour, the advantage of the State is that he should do the physical labour and leave the intellectual labour to the intelligent ; 266 COLLECTIVISM but under our system the man fitted by nature for phy- sical labour and correspondingly unfitted for intellectual is urged by the higher rewards given to the latter to seek the employment for which he is unfitted, or to destroy the system which excludes him from it ; whereas under the coUectivist State the physically strong man will have no mercenary motive for trying to do the work of the intelligent man, nor will the intelligent man have any mercenary motive for trying to do the work of his physical superiors. All receiving substantially the same income from the State, the mercenary motive disappears ; all being in the service of the State, many of the worst features of officialism disappear. To conceive, therefore, of the official under a coUec- tivist State as being in any sense like an official of our own State, is altogether to fail in understanding what is meant by collectivism. Nevertheless, there is no doubt but that collectivism must be postponed until selfishness is a less paramount factor in human char- acter than to-day, for selfishness has a dangerous influ- ence upon those occupying positions of authority. Under the existing system the tendency of selfishness is to con- vert government into an intolerable bureaucracy; for those who form part of the governing body, being alive to the fact that their maintenance in power depends considerably upon the docility of those governed, are unconsciously set upon promoting this docility. The official tends to put on more and more the language of authority and to exact from the public more and more that of subservience ; in such a country as Prussia this tendency is plainly visible on both classes. Prudence has made the people submissive, and powei' has made the official intolerable. In countries sucli as ours, where popular institutions liave long prevailed, this ten- dency is much less observable, and in proportion as the WHAT IS COLLECTIVISM? 267 people becomes more in fact the controlling influence, it is likely to give way altogether to a more enlightened view, which will put the official more in the position of an adviser to the public than in that of its master. In the closing chapters of this volume collectivism will be presented from the moral point of view. It may be that the importance of this view has been exagger- ated. To those, however, who have endeavoured and failed to reconcile a just life with the inevitable strug- gle for life that characterises the competitive system, collectivism offers the only solution. If, then, collec- tivism renders easy a religious life that is difficult or impossible under existing conditions, and if it offers a hope capable of inspiring earnest people with an abiding enthusiasm, then it may not be unreasonable to expect that the official may not only be liberated from the mer- cenary motive, but be inspired by a faith and courage that will banish the perfunctoriness characteristic of the present irreligious age. And if existing conditions nevertheless permit of so zealous and efficient a post- office official as Anthony Trollope,^ what may we not hope of conditions that will tend to bring to govern- ment service courage, hope, and conviction? It is doubtful whether our community is ready yet for a system which would give the officials that exercise power a much larger control over our daily lives than they now have. It is probable that the evils attending such a system, if thrust upon us by a revolution of the working classes, would be considerable; for they have not learned to govern with consideration, and surely the wealthy are not yet ready to submit without resistance. But we have seen that the various functions of the State will differ much in the character of the labour 1 See Anthony Trollope's Autobiography. 268 COLLECTIVISM they involve ; and this suggests a new problem on the one hand, and the solution of a problem on the other. The problem it suggests is this: if more labour is involved in some functions in the State than in others, how will these functions be distributed without arous- ing discontent? As has been already stated, collectivists have erred in claiming that all causes of discontent will be abolished by collectivism ; for it must be admitted that it is prob- ably impossible so to distribute the functions of a social system as to cause no discontent. These causes can, however, be diminished, and the method proposed by Rodbertus is, slightly modified, roughly as follows : Different employments differ in hardship and in agree- ableness. It is harder work to dig than to sew ; it is less agreeable to dig underground than above ground; to stoke at the mouth of a furnace than to hoist sail on deck. Under the present system the differences between these kinds of employment are expressed in wages. The navvy gets higher wages than the sewing-girl ; the miner gets higher wages than the navvy; and the stoker gets higher wages than all. Under the collectivist plan, this method of rewarding a more arduous or disagreeable employment is impossible; it is proposed, therefore, to reward it in time, — that is, the more arduous and the more disagreeable an employment, the less will be the time of employment; on the other hand, the less ardu- ous and the more agreeable the work, the longer will be the time of employment. If we assume six hours' work to be the time which the farmer will daily devote to working in the field, the miner will not be called upon to work longer than three hours ; and if six hours be deemed a day's work for a sailor, three hours will be regarded as suihcient work for a stoker; or, indeed, inasmuch as even three hours of stoking may well be WHAT IS COLLECTIVISM? 269 regarded as excessive, it could be arranged that sailors take their turn at stoking, thereby reducing the hours of stoking for every man to such an extent as to make what is now an occupation so odious that few except drunkards can be induced to engage in it, a matter of such short inconvenience as not to form an important feature in a sailor's life. It may be objected that one man's day's work is a very different thing from another man's, or in other words, while one man will show considerable results at the end of the day, his neighbour may show very little. This is undoubtedly true ; but it forms no objection to the plan, because the experience of trade unions has shown that in most trades piece-work is possible and actually employed; for example, factories engaged in the cotton industry are run on the piece-work plan; miners work on the piece-work plan. Out of a total trade-union membership in Great Britain of 1,003,000, more than half — that is, 573,000 — insist on piece- work; 140,000 use both piece-work and time-work in various departments; only 290,000 insist on time-work, and this not because it would be impossible to frame a scheme of piece-work for these protesting trade unions, but because the variety of the work involved in these trades makes collective bargaining for each variety difficult. Under these circumstances work would be done in a collective State almost entirely on the piece-work plan, so that those who got through their work with the great- est rapidity would enjoy the greatest amount of leisure. All those who showed a disposition to shirk work would be put to a piece-work trade, and only those who showed willingness to work would be put to a trade in which piece-work was impossible. Trade-unionism has rendered no small service in 270 COLLECTIVISM demonstrating the possibility of this piece-work system ; for if it is taken in connection with a recognition of the fact that, some employments being more onerous or dis- agreeable than others, a less amount of time ought to be exacted from those engaged in the one than from those engaged in the other, it is obvious that tasks could be so contrived as to permit of a distribution that would be approximately just. For it will be possible under the piece-work plan to permit those who are able to work more expeditiously than others to secure for themselves the advantage of their natural superiority without thereby causing the slightest prejudice to their inferiors. Again, — and upon this point too much emphasis can- not be placed, — a large use of piece-work removes the objection to collectivism that, being deprived of the spur of self-interest, work will be done perfunctorily, and the economy occasioned by collective action more than com- pensated by laziness and lack of zeal. This objection would be a formidable one were labour to be parcelled out according to time ; but the moment it is parcelled out on the piece-work plan every worker has an inter- est in getting through his work with the greatest pos- sible despatch. And here is illustrated one of the features of collectivism which most advantageously contrasts it with the competitive system. Under the competitive system the principal way in which we secure what we want is through the instrumentality of money. Do we want consideration? We purchase it with money. Do we want leisure? We purchase it with money. Do we want love? We even purchase love with money; and, when not purchasable, we can rarely without money enjoy it. Under collectivism the sordid element of money is eliminated. If we want the consid- eration of our fellow-creatures at large, we must earn it directly by the service we render them and by the WHAT IS COLLECTIVISM? 271 affection that prompts this service; if we want to marry, no want of money need stand in the way ; if we want leisure and the liberty that belongs to leisure, we must earn them directly by the rapidity and efficiency of our work. In other words, the competitive system in making money the channel through which all the good things of the world are procured creates an environ- ment that favours the qualities of the money-maker, or selfishness; collectivism, on the contrary, creates an en- vironment that favours the social qualities, or altruism. State education will obviously furnish a classification of youth according to ability, physical and mental, so that no individual, while at school or after leaving school, will be called upon to do work for which he is physically or mentally unfit. Within the limits imposed by this classification, there ought to be not only the fullest opportunity for choice of tasks on the part of individuals, but wherever choice cannot be exerted, owing to a large demand for the particular kind of occupation preferred, the fullest opportunity for rotation ought to and could exist, so that no one class of individual should be subjected to distasteful occupation for a longer period than another. It is obvious that in the drawing up of this scheme of occupation there is ample room for error and injustice. There is also ample room for error and injustice in the attribution of individuals to their respective tasks ; and in the struggle of factions to acquire control of the political offices to which is intrusted the duty to deter- mine these classes, and the attribution of various indi- viduals to the tasks so classified, there is room for much of the antagonism which exists to-day. If, however, any one will take the trouble to read over the schemes of piece-work which trade unions have adopted in the 272 COLLECTIVISM various factories of England, it will be seen that the equalisation of tasks is by no means an insoluble prob- lem ; and it will be also seen that if rotation in tasks is determined by lot within the limits laid down by physi- cal and mental capacity as determined by physical and mental classification, no great injustice ought to obtain. But this whole question of occupation and the attri- bution of tasks cannot be understood so long as we remain under the impression that the members of a col- lectivist community will have to labour as many hours in the day as under our present system. If this were to be the case, — that is to say, if we were to have to labour for the State as long as we now have to labour in order to support life, and if, in addition to this necessity, we were not to be masters of the occupation to which we were put, but were, on the contrary, to be in this respect subject to the dominant faction in the State, — such a condition of things would indeed be in one sense per- haps worse than the system which prevails to-day. If, however, we examine the working of a collectivist plan, we shall find that the hours of work which would be imposed upon every individual by the State would be so diminished that the pressure of the State would only be felt during veiy few of our waking hours ; the rest of them would be practically at our own disposal ; and as this part of the collectivist plan is an essential one, we shall do well to give it special attention. THE ECONOMY OF COLLECTIVISM 273 CHAPTER II THE ECONOMY OF COLLECTIVISM! Let us begin by considering how large a part of our population is now devoting its entire time to the work of competition, as distinguished from that part of the population which is devoting its time to the task of production. It is obvious that all those who are devoting their time to the work of competition would be without employ- ment in a collectivist State ; they would therefore be able to give their entire time to production ; and the time they gave to production would be so much taken away from the time which those now engaged in pro- duction have to give to it. For example, the United States to-day keeps alive, according to the last census, ^ about sixty-five millions (65,000,000) of men, women, and children ; of these about forty-five millions are either too young to work, or are unfit to work, or are dispensed by sex or wealth from the necessity of working. This eliminates children, women not engaged in remunerative work, old people, criminals, paupers, and the insane. Now if, of the remaining twenty millions who do the work of production, it is found that ten millions, or one- half, are engaged in work that results from the compet- itive character of our industrial system, it is clear that ^ See, upon the question of the waste that attends the competitive system, and the economy that would result from collectivism, Appendix on Trusts. 2 Written in 1898. 18 274 COLLECTIVISM in a collectivist State in which there is no competition, these ten millions would be applied to the work of pro- duction; and therefore every man would have to work only one-half the number of hours he now works in order to keep the community alive. Let us see if we can form any idea how many are engaged in the wasteful work of competition, and how many, therefore, would in a collectivist State be set free to relieve the labour of those engaged in production. It is estimated that out of every one hundred men who start a new business ninety become insolvent. This means that for every ten who are fit and able to conduct a new business ninety engage in new business who are unable to earn their bread at it; and this fur- nishes in one class of business men a measure of the wastefulness of the present plan. Under a system of collectivism the exact number of men necessary to con- duct business in any given place could be mathemati- cally determined ; and the ninety unsuccessful men who are now engaged in futile efforts to destroy the business of the ten successful men \vould be employed in pro- duction to their own advantage and to the relief of those already engaged therein. The wastefulness, however, of the present plan is not confined to the fact that many are engaged in attempting to do what can better be done by a few, but also by the fact that in the conflict between the successful as well as the unsuccessful a vast horde of men are employed by the mere fact of the com- petition, who would be thrown out of employment and, therefore, be serviceable for production in case the ele- ment of competition were avoided. Amongst the men so employed are commercial travellers ; these men occa- sion waste to the community not only through the fact that instead of producing themselves they are living on the production of others, but through the fact that they THE ECONOMY OF COLLECTIVISM 275 constitute a large part of the passenger traffic of the country, — that is to say, the railroads are put to the expense of carrying these travellers all over the United States in order that they may each have an opportunity in every corner of the United States of decrying the goods of one another. And this throws a side light on the evils of our present plan, for the railroads have an interest in encouraging this work; because if they did not have this horde of commercial travellers to carry about the country, many of them might not be able to pay interest on their bonds, whereas, if the railroads were owned by a collectivist State, the less passengers they had to carry, the richer would be the State. The testimony taken by the Industrial Commission furnishes admirable instances of the waste that attends competi- tive production and the corresponding economy that would attend a collectivist system, Mr. Edson Bradley, President of the American Spirits Manufacturing Com- pany, testifies that in the whiskey business, " somewhere between the distiller and the consumer in this country, $40,000,000 is lost. This goes primarily to the attempt to secure trade." He further testifies that the whiskey combination had been able to dispense with 300 sales- men. Mr. Gates, President of the American Steel and Wire Company, testified that combination in this in- dustry had led to the dismissal of 200 commercial trav- ellers. Mr. Dowe, President of the Commercial Travellers' National League, testified that "35,000 salesmen had been thrown out of employment by the organisation of trusts and 25,000 reduced to two-thirds of their previous salaries. . . . The baking powder trust has replaced men at $4,000 to $5,000 a year by others at $18 a week. . . . The displacement of travel- ling men represents also large loss to railways, amount- ing, on the estimate that each traveller spends $2.50 a 276 COLLECTIVISM day for 240 days, each year to $27,000,000, while the loss to hotels would be at least as much as to railways. " Adding up these losses, we reach the following result ; 35,000 salesmen at an average compensation (including commissions) of $3,000 each a year ^105,000,000 Loss in railroad travelling 27,000,000 Loss in hotel expenses 27,000,000 Together $159,000,000 In the few industries, therefore, in which competition has been diminished by the trust system, an economy of $159,000,000 is estimated to have been already effected. These figures enable us to appreciate the enormous economy that would result from an elimina- tion of competition from every industry. It is important to note that an economy that constitutes a loss to com- mercial travellers, railroads, and hotels under the competitive system would constitute a pure gain to a collectivist community ; for it would mean so much less work for railroads and hotels and so much more labour for production. Our present system, then, encourages useless expenditure ; whereas collectivism would secure an equivalent economy. Another important economy would be made, too, in the running of all public enterprises, through the absence of the necessity of collecting revenue therefrom. In municipal tramways, for example, no less than one-half the force could be dispensed with ; for the functions of the conductor are practically confined to collecting fares. A similar economy would be practised on railroads ; in telegrams; no stamps would be required for postage; no costly corps of clerks for book-keeping. Another source of bootless expense to the community arises from advertising. Mr. P. Magnuson, quoted by Professor Ely,i has estimated that five hundred million 1 Socialism and Social Reform, p. 122. THE ECONOMY OF COLLECTIVISM 277 dollars a year are spent in advertising ; whereas the cost of conveying the useful information given by advertis- ing would not amount to more than five million. The labour of all the men and all the wealth employed in this work of advertising, estimated together at four hundred and ninety-five millions a year, would be saved in a collectivist State. Under our system gas is furnished to our cities by gas companies, each one of which tears up the streets at great detriment to public convenience and public health, in order to lay its mains for the mere purpose of com- peting with existing companies, but only with the result of forcing a consolidation which tends to make gas dearer instead of cheaper to the consumer. Professor Ely estimates that the consolidation of gas companies in Baltimore has cost eighteen millions, of which ten millions represents pure loss. Very much the same thing is true of railroads. Pro- fessor Ely quotes a railroad manager who claims that if the railways of the United States were managed as a unit instead of by competing companies, such manage- ment would effect an economy of two hundred millions of dollars a year; he cites, as an instance of useless par- alleling of roads, the numerous railroads which connect New York with Chicago. He estimates that these lines cost two hundred millions of dollars, and that the maintenance of the useless lines involves perpetual loss. He is obliged, however, to admit that in this case there is a considerable accommodation, owing to the fact that the parallel lines pass through different places and occa- sion some advantage in the time-table. This, however, is not the case with many other lines in the United States. The Colorado Midland parallels the Denver and Rio Grande, passing through the same places, and, in- asmuch as both are subjected to the necessity of con- 278 COLLECTIVISM necting and forwarding passengers to lines at their extremities, both are obliged to run trains at the same hours. There is in this case no advantage either to the time-table or to new places. Nor does the paralleling and competition of parallel roads always furnish better accommodation to the public. Between Chicago and Denver there is one line able easily to run trains from place to place in twenty- four hours ; but for the purpose of avoiding freight war with the competing lines it has entered into an arrange- ment with the competing lines under which it agrees not to run passenger trains in less than thirty-six hours. The public, therefore, instead of gaining, loses an advan- tage of twelve hours by this arrangement, thereby learning at no small inconvenience that competition does not always compete. What is true of railroads and gas companies is also true of telegraph business. The Western Union is capitalised at one hundred million dollars. It is esti- mated that the cost of laying the lines actually used by the Western Union would be twenty millions; eighty million dollars, therefore, have been wasted by the ex- isting system which encourages private companies to construct lines for the purpose or with the result of compelling other companies to buy them up. Professor Ely adds that "it cost England nearly as much to make the telegraph a part of the post-office as it did all the other countries of Europe put together, because in these the telegraph had been from the beginning a part of the post-office, and the wastes of competition had been avoided." ^ Another of the most wasteful features attending our present system is the expense of distributing goods; 1 " Socialism and Social Keform," p. 120. THE ECONOMY OF COLLECTIVISM 279 take, for example, the articles which enter most into our daily life, — milk, bread, butter, eggs, meat, fish, and vegetables, — and compare the method of distribut- ing letters adopted by our government in the post-ofifice. The fact that the government is the only instrumen- tality through which letters are distributed permits the government to effect a great economy in time, labour, and expense by sorting the letters beforehand according to streets and confining the distribution in any one street to a single carrier, who distributes the letters with the greatest economy of time and labour door by door. This is the economical system for distributing all things in regular use that would be adopted by the collectivist plan. Compare this now with the plan adopted and necessitated by the competitive system. Every block is served with milk by a very large number of milk-dealers instead of by one ; every block is furnished with bread by a very large number of dealers instead of by one; every block is furnished with meat by a very large num- ber of dealers instead of by one; and so on through every article which enters into our daily use. Not only is there great waste of labour in the business of producing and distributing the necessaries of life under the competitive system, but the competitive sys- tem creates a large class of business that absorbs much of the wealth of the community and employs a very large number of its members. For example, under a collectivist system there would no longer be any necessity or advantage in insurance, whether against life or against fire, or against accident, or against hail, or against de- fective title, or against any other cause. The reason of this is obvious; we insure ourselves against pecuniary loss arising out of these accidents because otherwise the whole loss will fall upon ourselves. In a collectivist 280 COLLECTIVISM State some of these occasions for loss would not exist at all, and those that did exist would fall upon the entire State and would consequently be inappreciable by any one member of it. For example, a man insures his life so that his children should not be reduced to poverty by his death ; but in the collectivist State the widow and the child are provided for, being all of them members of the State and therefore all of them sharers in its in- come. Death in such a case would practically not con- stitute a loss at all ; it would rather constitute a gain to the State financially, because the number of deaths of the very old and the very young — and therefore of the unproductive members of the community — is known to be far greater than that of its productive members. We can to a certain extent measure the economy that would result to the State from an elimination of insur- ance by a reference to the insurance reports of the State of New York and to the amount of capital invested therein.^ The capital invested in life and casualty insurance companies alone doing business in the State of New York is $1,334,051,344,2 — q^qj. q^c thousand three hundred and thirty-four millions of dollars; it increased during the single year of 1897, $105,727,002; so that, assuming that an average workingman earns $2.00 a day, over fifty-two million working days were wasted in life and casualty insurance alone in a single year ; or, taking three hundred and thirty days to repre- sent the working days in a year, the whole labour of over 157,500 men was lost to the nation in 1897 through the wasteful necessity of life and casualty insur- ance alone. And to this must be added the time de- voted to life insurance during the year of all the oificers, ^ Capital is taken as the measure becavise it represents the accumu- Lation of premiums paid for tlie benefit of insurance. ' Report of State Superintendent of Insurance of the State of New York for 1897. THE ECONOMY OF COLLECTIVISM 281 actuaries, book-keepers, clerks, and the host of agents who have become proverbial for the extent to which they worry and annoy us. Another kind of business that would be eliminated in a collectivist State is the class of brokers ; not only Wall Street brokers, but real-estate brokers, mining brokers, and brokers of every description, in so far as they are engaged in competition. The abolition of Wall Street would carry with it the abolition of gambling in stocks which is a necessary feature thereof. No law has yet been devised, though the attempt has often been made, that would, so long as the competitive system endures, put a stop to gambling in stocks. A law which would successfully stop gambling in stocks would stop legiti- mate dealing in stocks also. But the immoral element involved in "puts " and "calls " is only an exaggeration of the immoral element involved in all industrial trans- actions built upon the principle of private profit; for although business can be conducted in such a way as only to furnish to those engaged in it a fair remunera- tion for time involved therein, it perpetually furnishes a temptation to those involved therein to contrive so that it shall furnish a large rather than a fair return. In fact, the whole struggle of business consists in endeav- ouring to secure tlie largest return of profit for the least expenditure of labour. The man who succeeds in get- ting the largest return for the least expenditure is the successful business man; and no man does this with more security than the next class to which attention may be called, whose occupation would come to an end in the collectivist State ; namely, the banker. It would take too long to enter here into an accurate and fair estimate of the service rendered by the banker and the reward he obtains for it. Most writers who favour socialism undervalue the functions of the banker. 282 COLLECTIVISM They are so impressed by the enormous incomes which bankers make that they do not appreciate the enormous services they render; and although in a collectivist State the banker qua banker would tend to disappear, the man who to-day does the work of a banker would, it is hoped, do the same work for the State. So that al- though the business of banking would disappear, the best form of government would be the one in which the individuals who have been discovered to be best fitted for the onerous and difficult duties of finance would be those to whom this duty would be intrusted. Whether, as matter of fact, the man best fitted to do this difficult work would be intrusted with it under the collectivist plan is an objection to collectivism which will be con- sidered later. But there is another large class of intelligent men who are now engaged in fighting the quarrels which re- sult from the competitive system who would be left with- out an occupation under the collectivist plan; namely, the lawyers. With them, the hatred and vindictiveness which arise from litigation would in a collectivist State in great part disappear also ; for lawyers constitute the class whose business it is to conduct these quarrels, and, alas! also to inflame them. When we take into consideration the fact that in the city of New York alone there are nearly ten thousand practising lawyers, and when we add to these the clerks, stenographers, book- keepers, and office-boys employed by each of these ten thousand lawyers, those employed in the courts, the sheriff's office, the county clerk's office, marshals, dejjuty sheriffs, and others; and when we take into account that most of these men are engaged in the busi- ness of fighting, we cannot but be struck by the enor- mous advantage to the community of a system which would practically eliminate this class altogether. THE ECONOMY OF COLLECTIVISM 283 It must not be understood to mean, however, that there would be no necessity for courts under the collec- tivist plan. Even though crimes against property were eliminated by collectivism, there would still be a temp- tation to commit crime, owing to sexual jealousy and in a certain degree to intemperance and idleness. It is believed that both intemperance and idleness would tend to diminish with the disappearance of the misery that reduces men to the physical condition that engenders them; but there would still, doubtless, be some intem- perance and some idleness ; there would certainly remain unhappy marriages ; and as every man is to remain pos- sessed of a small amount of property there would be minute questions of property sometimes involved. But it is hardly conceivable that such questions could involve any system of justice more elaborate than that of the justice of the peace and possibly a single court of appeal. The absence of competition would so simplify the law that no question would be likely to arise that the parties to the litigation could not themselves ex- plain. How little litigation would be likely under a collectivist regime may be judged by comparing the liti- gation to which the administration of the Post-Office gives rise with the interminable lawsuits which result from the administration of railroads. ^ Moreover, it is to be hoped that in a collectivist State the community would at last have leisure to study criminology and learn to understand that the criminal has to be treated as a sick man rather than as a wicked one. The whole system of criminal procedure would be changed, and the type now known as the criminal lawyer would in such case disappear. The existing system, under which every ^ This is undoubtedly more true of railroads in the United States than in England, probably because competing roads have not been tolerated in. England to the same extent as in our country. 284 COLLECTIVISM prosecuting officer considers his reputation involved in securing the punishment of every criminal brought before the court, necessarily gives rise to a corresponding class of lawyer who regards his reputation as well as his fee involved in opposing the efforts of the prosecuting officer by any means, however unjustifiable. If, now, we consider that the large number of men thus liberated by the substitution of collectivism for our present form of government would not only be employed to diminish the labour of those now engaged in production, but that it constitutes the very part of our population which is engaged in fanning the flame of hatred in the minds of men, the advantage to a com- munity of having this perpetual source of trouble re- moved will be obvious. But we are not concerned so much now with the reduction of hatred under the col- lectivist plan as we are with its economy. We shall therefore next pass to the consideration of the waste- fulness involved in the field of production itself, hav- ing heretofore considered rather the wastefulness which attends our present system of distribution. At the present time horses in the West have become so valueless that they are left unbranded by their owners, lest the branding of them involve the payment of taxes thereupon. Cattle, on the other hand, have of late risen in value ; the price of them fell so low some time ago as to involve the ruin of all those largely engaged in them ; but to-day every one is rushing back into this business. This state of things furnishes a very fair opportunity of judging how imperfectly informed the producer is as to the needs of the community. In other words, he is only informed that the community is overstocked with an article hy being ruined in the course of producing it. This plan is not only productive of misery to a large number of individuals in every community, but it is necessarily THE ECONOMY OF COLLECTIVISM 285 an extremely wasteful one. The object of every com- munity ought to be to produce the things it needs, not the things it does not need. The present system, on the contrary, obliges the community to be continually producing the things it does not need as the only means by which it can arrive at a knowledge of what it does need.^ For under the existing system, over-production occa- sions a surplusage of things in themselves valuable, but the exchange value of which has been diminished by their abundance. And the producer cannot afford to keep this surplusage, because he has fixed charges to pay. He has to sell his crop at a loss because he must have money to pay rent, or interest on mortgage, or salaries, or for his own support during the year. It is this pressure he is under to sell which impoverishes him. And its consequences are far-reaching; for as the price of raw cotton goes down, cotton manufacturers are encouraged to buy and to increase the output of 1 And yet Herbert Spencer does not hesitate to lavish encomiums on the present system ; for example, he says in " A Plea for Liberty," p. 17 : " Under our existing voluntary co-operation with its free contracts and its competition, production and distribution need no official oversight. Demand and supply and the desire of each man to gain a living by sup- plying the needs of his fellows spontaneously evolve that wonderful sys- tem whereby a great city has its food daily brought round to all doors or stored at adjacent shops ; has clothing for its citizens everywhere at hand in multitudinous varieties ; has its houses and furniture and fuel ready made or stocked in each locality ; and has mental pabulum from halfpenny papers, hourly hawked around, to weekly shoals of novels and less abundant books of instruction, furnished without stint for small payments. And throughout the kingdom, production as well as distri- bution is similarly carried on with the smallest amount of superintendence which proves efficient ; while the quantities of the numerous commodities required daily in each locality are adjusted without any other agency than the pursuit of proiit." To him and to all individualists the agony caused by the failure to make profit which attends ninety per cent of all new business ventures is a matter of no importance. 286 COLLECTIVISM their factories ; and so over-production of raw material tends to result in over-production of manufactured goods. In a collect! vist State the industry or good harvest of one year would have for effect a diminution of labour the next ; or greater comfort or luxury next year for the same labour; no man's labour would be lost, and the bountifulness of Nature would be a blessing and not, as now, a misfortune. The efforts to prevent the over-production of cotton in the South gave rise to a convention in 1892, regard- ing which Professor Ely quotes a telegram from Mem- phis, January 8, as follows : — " That the farmers of the South are in earnest in their endeavours to solve the serious problem of over-production of cotton is evinced by the enthusiastic meeting of dele- gates to the convention of the Mississippi Valley Cotton- Growers' Association, which was called to order in this city this morning." ^ And again the speech of the President of the Boston Chamber of Commerce : — ■ "In 1890 we harvested a cotton crop of over eight million bales, — several hundred thousand bales more than the world could consume. Had the crop of the present year been equally large, it would have been an appall- ing calamity to the section of our country that devotes so large a portion of its labour and capital to the raising of cotton." 2 Nothing could better illustrate the evil of our present system and the benefits of a system of collectivism than such a state of things as is described by the President of the Boston Chamber of Commerce. If, under a collec- 1 Ely's " Socialism and Social Reform," p. 134. 2 /j^ THE ECONOMY OF COLLECTIVISM 287 tivist State, more bales of cotton were produced m any given year than the community of the world could con- sume, the State would store away the unused cotton and would modify its agriculture in a manner to bring the cotton crop into proper relation to the needs of the com- munity. But such an event could not be an " appalling calamity;" it could not be anything but a benefit; so much more wealth for the community; so much less labour for its citizens; and what is true of the cotton crop is equally true of all other crops. Over-produc- tion is impossible in a collectivist community, for all the over-production of one year would mean less work in that particular kind of production the next. Every citizen in the community would profit by so-called over-production instead of, as now, suffering from it. This question of over-production is closely allied to that of invention, which, as is well known, has been a source of despair to workingmen; for improvements in machinery almost always throw large numbers of them out of employment. In India, as has already been de- scribed, the destruction of hand-loom weavers by ma- chinery brought about a misery hardly paralleled in the history of war: "the bones of the cotton-weavers are bleaching the plains of India." And yet invention, far from bringing distress to the workingmen, as under our system it must, would, under a collectivist State, prove an unqualified advantage; for every invention that increases the eiBciency of human labour diminishes the amount of time that must be spent in labour in order to obtain the same result. In other words, in a collec- tivist State the saving of labour is a benefit to every individual in the community, whereas under the com- petitive system the saving of labour is of immediate benefit to the owner of the patent alone, and means immediate distress to the labourers it particularly affects. 288 COLLECTIVISM One of the standard objections to collectivism in this connection is that a coUectivist form of government would remove all stimulus to invention. This is be- lieved to be a profound mistake. In the first place, inventors are not always urged to invention by the prospect of financial reward. The great discoveries of humanity which are at the basis of all our practical advances were made by men who neither sought nor obtained a reward therefor. It was not with the view of making money that Newton dis- covered and propounded the laws of gravity, or Ohm the laws of electrical resistance. Nor do inventors to-day, as a matter of fact, reap the reward of their in- ventions. Capitalists often have an interest in suppress- ing inventions; for inventions generally involve the expensive transformation of existing plants. For ex- ample, Mr. Babbage ^ describes how a patent for welding gun -barrels by machinery had long been unused because of the cheapness of hand labour ; but as soon as a strike forced up wages recourse was had to the patent, which until then had been neglected. Capitalists often prefer to dispense with an improve- ment rather than go to the expense which improvements generally occasion. This was the unwritten motive for the opposition of England to the construction of the Suez Canal, and was believed by Mr. De Lesseps to be the motive of their opposition to the Panama Canal. ^ Again, no one who has had personal acquaintance with inventors can believe that their discoveries are to any material extent the result of financial motive. It would be difficult to imagine the conditions under which Edi- 1 "Economy of Manufactures." Babbage (London, 1832), p. 246. 2 Mr. De Lesseps has stated that it cost EngLaiid £100,000,000 to cliange its .shipping so as to fit it for passage through the Suez Canal ; and this expense applies more or less to change of machinery due to in- vention in every factory. THE ECONOMY OF COLLECTIVISM 289 son and Maxim would not invent. They cannot help inventing ; they are as much under a necessity to invent as a hen to lay eggs. Undoubtedly there are certain environments which favour the production and utilisa- tion of inventing types, and others that disfavour the production and utilisation of such types. And undoubt- edly a motive for invention is a part of the environment which does contribute to invention ; but would such a motive be wanting in a collectivist State ? I think it can be shown that it would not only be present, but that it would be a stronger motive in the collectivist State than in our own ; for under our own the reward which an inventor receives for an invention is a patent, and a patent is, as all lawyers will testify, merely a subject for litigation. In other words, every man who invents a useful thing has to overcome first the objections of the patent office ; secondly, the objections of the capitalists ; and thirdly, the objections of infringers; all three of which mean obstacles of no small order. And not until they are all overcome, if indeed they any of them are, is the patent likely to be a source of income to the inven- tor. Under the collectivist State, however, every man is interested in increasing the productiveness of the State so as to diminish hours of labour; and nothing, more- over, would be easier than for a collectivist State excep- tionally to reward invention by diminishing the hours of labour due by the inventor to the State. From one point of view, therefore, it seems reason- able to suppose that invention would prove more benefi- cial to the collectivist State than to our own, that a more immediately advantageous motive could be given for invention in such a State, and that much fewer and lesser obstacles would be presented to the utilisation of such inventions. Moreover, as Professor Ely has pointed out, the ten- 19 290 COLLECTIVISM dency of invention in a collectivist State would be to replace work which now involves drudgery by a ma- chinery that would tend to lessen or eliminate it. His words on this subject are interesting enough to deserve quotation : — "An advertisement (of what is technically called the before-and-after kind) which attracted the author's at- tention some time since is significant. It was simply an advertisement of a mop ; but as a naturalist can construct from a single bone a likeness of an extinct animal, so a so- ciologist, sufficiently skilful, could tell us a good deal about the kind of society in which this advertisement appeared. The advertisement gave two pictures, — one of an ordinary mop, out of which the water was wrung by a bedrabbled, sorry-looking maid, and the other of a smiling, comely housewife, who was wringing the dirty water out of the mop by simply turning the handle. This method of ex- tracting the dirty water without soiling one's hands was the essential feature of the patented mop. Now, of course the author knows nothing about the merits of this mop, but he claims that the advertisement itself of the alleged improve- ment signifies a great deal. It is significant that the adver- tisement appeared in the United States, where women's wages are high and many women of respectability do their own housework, and not in Germany, where labour is cheap and servants abundant. It is significant that improvements of this kind should be more abundant in the North than in the South. Equally significant is the undoubted fact that the tools used by the slaves in the South were of an inferior kind. The Northern farmer, who hoed his own Indian corn, used a beautifully constructed hoe, weighing a few ounces, and despised the heavy and clumsy tool used by the South- ern slave in the field. Equally significant is the fact that when it was made illegal to send chimney-sweeps down chimneys in England, the chimneys were still swept, but THE ECONOMY OF COLLECTIVISM 291 by improved tools, and not by boys in the chimneys them- selves." ^ " The author spent some time among the Shakers at Mount Lebanon, New York, and was much pleased to see the im- provements which had been introduced in the kitchen, ren- dering kitchen work so agreeable that the sisters preferred it to any other occupation. One thing which he remembers is that the soiled clothes were washed by the aid of water- power. Now, what did all these unusual improvements in the kitchen signify, except that the community of interests resulted in the devotion of a larger proportion than usual of the inventive talent and energy of this social group to occupations ordinarily termed menial ? " If it were conceivable that a law could be made or enforced requiring that millionaires, and none but mil- lionaires, were to serve as stokers, there is no doubt that all the ingenuity in the land would at once be put to making the work of stoking less detestable than it now is; if necessary, naval architecture would be re- formed from top to bottom, so as to reduce the work of stoking to that pressure of a finger upon a button which is the only physical work that is imposed by modern conditions upon the millionaire to-day. The improvements due to invention would differ, per- haps, in character but not in quantity, for invention obeys the particular stimulus which gives rise to it. Thus Karl Marx points out^ that mechanical traction was not introduced into mines until a law forbade the use of women and children there, and the "half-time system stimulated the invention of the piecing-machine, " thereby replacing child labour in woollen-yarn manufac- ture. Again, immense improvements have been made 1 This last illustration is given by Mrs. Annie Besant in the Fabian Essays. 2 Capital, Part LV. chap. xv. 292 COLLECTIVISM in the charging and drawing of gas retorts, owing to labour troubles, and there is no doubt that all arduous work would soon be made less arduous if we all had to take a turn at it. The standard objection against the economy of col- lectivism is that government is to-day much less econom- ical in its administration than private enterprise, and the cost of ships built by the admiralty is compared in this connection with that of ships built in private yards. It may be admitted that the government does not to-day administer as cheaply as competitive enterprises without for that reason yielding the superior economy of govern- ment administration on a sufficiently large scale. In order to establish a proper comparison between collective and competitive administration, a contrast must not be made between government and private ship-building, for in this particular industry the special economies of collective administration do not enter. A more enlight- ening contrast would be that between the transportation and delivery of letters by the government, and their transportation and delivery by as many private individ- uals as chose to compete in the business. The advan- tage of the government system over the competitive system is too obvious to need comment. It is the ap- plication of the post-office plan to all transportation and to the delivery of all necessaries that constitutes the special feature and special economy of collectivism. Again, the present official cannot fairly be compared with the official in a collectivist form of government. Religion, religious sense of duty, above all, religious enthusiasm, cannot be said to prevail largely in govern- ment official life. They ought to and could be the priniuTn mobile of a collectivist administration. But this needs time. SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 293 CHAPTER III SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM It would seem, then, from the foregoing consideration, that from a collectivist form of government great econ- omy would result. Many socialists believe that it would reduce the necessary amount of labour to be performed by every individual to three hours a day. The probabil- ities are that although some occupations — such as farm- ing — which are attractive would involve the expenditure of more than three hours a day ; others, such as mining, might not require labour of as much as three hours a day. One thing, however, is certain; the number of hours which every man would have to work per day would be largely diminished. The amount of leisure, therefore, that he would enjoy would be largely increased. The importance of the diminution of hours of labour has been already pointed out in the discussion of the feasibility of collectivism; for if what individualists call the tyranny of the collectivist State is to operate on the individual only during a comparatively small part of each day, the so-called tyranny — if tyranny it be — may well be endured during these few hours in view of the benefits to the mass which such a system would confer. But a thorough examination of the collectivist plan will serve to diminish still more the number of hours' work which an intelligent collectivist State would be obliged to exact from every individual. In order to 294 COLLECTIVISM make this more thorough examination into the coUec- tivist State, it will be necessary for us to consider for a moment the groups of citizens which such a State would have to take account of, — that is to say, the groups into which mankind inevitably falls by nature. § 1. Paupekism and Crime The problem of pauperism will confront us under the collectivist State just as certainly as under the competi- tive system. There will always, under every condition, be a fraction of the population unable to contribute its share of effective service to the commonwealth. This will take the shape then, as now, of unwillingness to work ; unwillingness to work being then, as now, mainly due to incapacity to work. This part of the population will have to be treated with more intelligence than it is now treated, or it will prove a source of danger in the State. The very fact that we do not now treat this fraction of the population as we ought is an indication of the extent to which ignorance prevails, and of our present unfitness for a collectivist form of government. This ignorance is one of sentiment as well as of intelli- gence. Sentimental people will not recognise that a pauper is just as much in need of training as a criminal. The training is of a different character, but it is none the less training. A pauper is generally a person whose physical vitality is below par. He is instinctively lazy because his physical strength is deficient in the vitality which enables him to decide upon working. To this deficiency Professor Marshall, in his Economics, refers as constituting perhaps one of the most important differ- ences between men. One man is always ready to go to work ; another man gets to work with so much reluct- ance that whenever his work is interrupted it requires a SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 295 painful effort to return to it. This effort is an indica- tion of weakness of nerve rather than of weakness of muscle ; but whether it be of nerve or of muscle it is a weakness; and this weakness will confront us in the collectivist State to some extent, although doubtless to a much less extent than under the competitive system/ Now, there is only one cure, for unfitness or unwilling- ness to work, and this cure is coercion. Coercion may be brutal and it may be benevolent. No man is more unhappy than a man who is physically strong enough to work and nervously unable to do so. Nervous inability to work generally expresses itself in the unwillingness to which reference has just been made. Unwillingness is for the most part due to inability to make up one's mind to work. Under the competitive system a man has to make up his mind to work or has to starve. When he reaches the brink of the grave, society salves its conscience by putting him into a poor- house, where he is kept for an insufficient time, render- ing him all the more unfit for work, and plunging him at the end of that time once more into the competitive mill. The time that he remains in the poorhouse de- pends in part upon the decision of a magistrate who is generally ignorant of the problems of pauperism, and it depends also — in England, at any rate — upon the caprice of the pauper. Under certain conditions he thinks himself fit for the poorhouse and commits him- self thereto ; and under another condition he gets tired of the poorhouse and decides to leave it. The folly of this system is evidenced by the hopeless result that "once a pauper, always a pauper." The condition of the pauper is undoubtedly capable 1 To a much less extent because this weakness is generally the result of overwork, underfeeding, worry, and the alcoholism to which all these in- evitably tend. 296 COLLECTIVISM of being improved. Instead of immuring him within the four walls of an institution from which he emerges no better fitted for serviceable work than before he entered it, a method has prevailed in Holland since the beginning of the century, of returning the pauper to the land, and giving him there an opportunity of recover- ing the physical strength or the nerve strength, as the case may be, which regular life, open air, and healthy occupation contribute to restore. The benefit of this system to the pauper is twofold. The labour of the pauper is applied in a manner which is least expensive to the community. In the Dutch farm colonies every pauper is put to the work for which he turns out to be best fitted ; the strongest and less intelligent to that of digging, those that are less strong and more intelli- gent to work where less strength and more intelligence are required. So that a farm colony can be made, if not quite self-supporting, very nearly so. But the principal importance of the farm colony is that if the pauper is capable of reformation at all, the life of a farm colony is one that will tend to reform him and restore him to ser- viceable work under the same conditions as his other fellow-creatures. Now, the coercion necessary to reform the pauper we have not yet intelligence enough to exercise. The New York Legislature has three times thrown out a pauper colony bill for no other reason than that they refused to subject the pauper to confinement during a time long enough to effect improvement.-^ 1 The pauper colony bill three times presented to the Legislature and three times rejected by it proposes an indeterminate sentence ; that is to say, it proposes that a pauper shall be confined for a time not exceeding three years, but subject to reduction as soon as, in the opinion of the con- stituted authority, the pauper is deemed fit to earn his own living outside of the institution. It has proved heretofore impossible to make our Legis- SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 297 The widespread ignorance on the subject of pauper- ism seems to make a long period of education necessary for intelligent legislation on the subject ; but the ques- tion of pauperism has already been discussed elsewhere ^ and need not be referred to here further than to recall the argument therein made that until the pauper is recognised to be morally and nervously sick, and there- fore as much in need of humane treatment and, if neces- sary, humane coercion, as a patient in a hospital, it is impossible to expect that the pauper problem can be to any extent solved. In a collectivist State the pauper will have to be cared for by the State as now. The pauper and the ciimiual then, as now, will represent the lowest grade of human- ity with which the State will have to deal, for it is the only part of the community upon which coercion will have to be used. The Elmira Reformatory furnishes a model of the way the collectivist State will deal with the criminal. The Dutch pauper colonies furnish a model of how the collectivist State will deal with the pauper. The collec- tivist State, however, will have the advantage over our present competitive system, in the fact that there will be no longer any persons under the collectivist State to complain of convict labour, all the product of convict lature understand that under this system of indeterminate sentence no pauper who is fit for freedom would remain as long as three years under confinement; many, indeed, might be restored to the community within a month or even within three days, if at the expiration of the three days it were clear that the pauper were willing and able to provide for himself; for it need not take longer than three days for intelligent administrators to understand that a pauper has been committed to the institution by mistake. ^ "Evolution and Effort," chap, x., The Problem of Pauperism, p. 157 ; and ante, book i., chap, iii., § 7 (a) Poverty. 298 COLLECTIVISM labour going to the benefit of the whole community in- stead of to the disadvantage of the workingman. In proportion as the inmate of a pauper colony be- comes fitted for life outside the institution he will be given more and more liberty, until at last he graduates therefrom under conditions similar to those which now attend liberation from the Elmira Reformatory ; and he will be put to such employment as he has been specifi- cally fitted for in the institute. § 2. DlSTKIBUTION OF WORK With the single exception, therefore, of the pauper and criminal classes, there will be no separation of citizens into castes according to occupation. There will doubt- less be unskilled labourers in the collectivist State as in ours ; not because men will be forced into unskilled labour by a competitive system, or kept confined to un- skilled labour, notwithstanding the fact that they deserve a better order of employment ; but because out of every hundred men born into the world there is a certain pro- portion by nature fitted only for unskilled work, and against this classification of natm-e human institutions are powerless. Under the collectivist system ever}^ man born into the world will be born under equal conditions ; that is to say, equal opportunities. If he is fit for a high class of work, high-class work will be open to him ; if he is fit only for the lowest class of work, it is only the lowest class of work that he will be asked to per- form. But he is not for that reason to be deprived of his share of the total collectivist income. On the con- trary, it is perhaps because he is an unskilled work- man, and therefore called upon to do least pleasant work, that he deserves the full share of income more than those who, being favoured by nature, are able SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 299 to do a higher class of work, or by other natural gifts are able to perform their allotted work in a shorter time than others. There will therefore be in the collectivist State some classification of individuals, though to a less degree than in our own. The difference, however, between them will be less, for all will be furnished with the same necessaries and even comforts of life ; but those engaged in the higher work of the community will have the advantage which necessarily results from the gifts with which nature has endowed them ; that is to say, they will generally benefit in the first place by shorter hours of work and therefore longer hours of leisure ; in the second place the work will be less arduous be- cause more agreeable ; and in the third place they may possibly be better able to avail themselves of the opportunities for increasing the sum of positive plea- sure which will be offered to those willing to employ their leisure in rendering extra services to the State therefor. To this last point it will be necessary to give some special attention. There are some pleasures which nec- essarily involve more expense than others ; for example, the pleasure of sailing, riding, driving, bicycling, and everything that needs tools of an expensive character. There seems no reason why, within limits, those persons able and willing to render more service than that al- lotted to them might not be permitted to render such service and receive as compensation the opportunity for enjoying a larger share of these positive pleasures than those that are not willing or able to render these extra services. For the aim of collectivism is not to level all men, but to prevent some men from becoming subject to others, and to give to every man the opportunity of do- ing his best service for the State without involving the 300 COLLECTIVISM State in the loss of service whicli has been shown to re- sult from the competitive system. There is no reason why a man who is better fitted by nature to work for the State than another should not be allowed to render extra services to the State and to receive therefor some extra compensation in the shape of extra pleasure. The danger and injustice which have resulted from the granting of extra benefit to extra service under the competitive system is that it has made it possible for one man so to accumulate extra benefits that he was able to monopolise these benefits and to have more of them at his disposal than he could himself enjoy ; and the effect of such monopoly has been to deprive others of his fellow-creatures, not only of these benefits, but even of the necessaries of life. It is in the accumulation that evil resides, not in the extra benefit. So long as accumulation is avoided, the system of extra benefits would give to every man a stimulus for work which would benefit the whole community, injure no one, and increase the positive pleasure which every man could secure for himself out of the common stock. The foregoing will serve to explain the natural clas- sification into which the least gifted citizens of the com- munity will naturally fall ; the lowest of all will be the criminal class, which for reasons above explained will probably be smaller than at present ; next will come the pauper class, which for reasons also explained is likely to be smaller than at present. Upon these two classes coercion will have to be used, but it is hoped that the coercion will, under more enlightened conditions, be less unenlightened than now. The next class in order will be those whom education has demonstrated to be least fitted for intelligent work and will include the un- skilled workman ; and above him will be constituted SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 301 classifications of work which will not constitute classifi- cations of individuals. Nothing would be worse than a classification of per- sons that would tend to degenerate into a system of caste. The work, however, would be classified in such a manner as to be generally graded to various degrees of intelligence and education ; for example, the ability de- veloped by the child at school would determine the degree to which it was to the interest of the State to ex- tend his education and the extent to which his education was carried, and the character of the education he re- ceives would tend to determine the character of work which would in the first instance be assigned to him. If the effect of general education and equal distribu- tion of income upon the race was to put an end to unskilled workmen as a class altogether, so that there was no man in the community so unintelligent as not to be fitted for skilled work, as it seems possible, though not for a long time probable, unskilled work would have to be distributed among all members of the community by rotation, or by lot, or by a mixture of both. This plan may seem a fantastical one to those accus- tomed to our present system, but as a matter of fact it is not half so fantastical to us as would to Alexander the Great have seemed the idea that under any conceivable system a man could one day enjoy the executive power vested in the President of the United States and the next day be peacefully practising law or unostentatiously devoting himself to artificial incubation ; and yet such to-day is the life of ex-President Harrison, and such was but lately the occupation of ex-President Hayes. There is nothing degrading about manual work ; indeed, the daintiest of our millionaires pride themselves upon being sportsmen ; and no sportsman who has ever suc- ceeded in bringing down big game without the assistance 302 COLLECTIVISM of a guide (and surely none but such deserve the name of sportsman) would fail to admit that it involves work, no other than that of the butcher's boy. The greatest novelist of the day takes pleasure in the manual labour attending the cultivation of his field. Ruskin, the daintiest of our art critics, did not disdain to dig ; and we all remember the devotion of Gladstone to the hew- ing of timber. If the hard and unpleasant work of life, the burden of which is now thrown entirely upon the shoulders of a particular class, were divided between all those who to-day consume the product of their toil in such wasteful and unnecessary professions as com- mercial travelling, advertising, life insurance, litigation, stock-broking, etc., it is obvious that the amount of manual work that each man would have to do would be comparatively small. Nevertheless, it is useless to close our eyes to the fact that an attempt to compel the men who, under our pres- ent system, are dispensed by wealth from the necessity of doing manual work, to do such work would be likely to result in hopeless failure. Indeed, the mere thought of it cannot but raise a laugh. It is utterly absurd ; and the absurdity of it prevents men from imagining the practicability of such a plan even with a totally different population, animated by totally different motives under totally different conditions. But the bare idea of Wall Street brokers engaged in carrying a hod suggests the extreme inexpediency of allowing such an experiment as collectivism to be forced upon us to-day, and the advis- ableness, therefore, indeed, the imperativeness of a study of the conditions which might give rise to such a mis- fortune. Notwithstanding, then, the smile with which the collectivist system of government is likely to be greeted by those wliose imaginations do not permit of their grasping the extent to which conditions can change, SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 303 let us next turn to a consideration of the effect upon the community of the large amoimt of leisure which under a coUectivist system it would enjoy. § 3. Leisure secured by Collectivism No man who has closely followed politics in the United States will be disposed to deny that one of the chief reasons for the abuses which are tolerated in politics is the fact that very few citizens have time to take account of them. There is, of course, a certain number of people in this country who are by wealth endowed with more leisure than they can enjoy ; but this class has not yet in this country learned that politics can constitute as interesting an occupation as the pursuit of bags of anise- seed, nor become alive to the fact that their wealth im- poses upon them some duty to the State in consequence thereof. In England, where the existence of leisure is of old standing, this lesson has been learned, and a very considerable part of the leisure class devotes itself to public affairs ; not because it is compelled to do so, but partly because of the interest of the work itself and partly because of the personal consideration which re- sults therefrom. As, however, the holding of public office exposes a man as much to public abuse as to pub- lic consideration, it may not unreasonably be concluded that the interest of the work itself, enhanced by a certain sense of noblesse oblige, is perhaps the largest element in the motive which induces men of leisure in England to devote their time to public affairs. The fact is that man is not as bad as commercialism is always trying to make him. Even men who are obliged by in- dustrial conditions to devote all their time to making money are continually seen giving up their evenings to works of philantlnopy and to the general good. If we 304 COLLECTIVISM take due account of all the disinterested work done by busy men in the city of New York alone, we cannot but be impressed by the fact that the amount of time that New York citizens are willing to give to this class of work is determined not by themselves, but by the obli- gations which the necessity of supporting their families imposes upon them. And if this be true of the upper and middle class, it is still more true of the workingman. Under existing conditions the workingman returns to his home for the most part worn out by the labours of the day. Never- theless, he is often driven by the necessities of his con- dition to devote his evening to the interest of his trade union. What leisure he has, then, is taken up by the necessity of organising in order to maintain a successful conflict with capital. It is not surprising, therefore, that he has no time to give to politics, or that, absorbed as he now is by the necessity of organising labour against cap- ital in the struggle to maintain a high rate of wages, he has not yet become alive to, or indeed has leisure, for the duty which he owes to the State. If it is possible to conceive of a condition of things in which all this con- flict would be eliminated ; in which every man would be free from worry regarding the support of himself and his family ; in which every man would be called upon to work only five instead of ten hours a day, so that after the midday meal he would be free to devote himself either to pleasure or to public affairs, — if we can con- ceive of such a condition of things, then we may be able to understand how it would be possible for such a community to become enlightened as to its interests so that the great enemy of all human progress — ignorance — may be eliminated. SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 305 § 4. Ignorance the Enemy of Collectivism AND Eliminated by It I have ventured to say that ignorance was the great enemy to human progress. Let us next consider the rule which ignorance plays in this very question of collectiv- ism, and to what extent collectivism is rendered unattain- able by the ignorance of the wealthy minority first and by that of the unwealthy majority afterwards. Ignorance of the wealthy minority : it would be an interesting thing to find out how many bankers, stock- exchange brokers, insurance agents, and lawyers, had ever read a book on collectivism. They all denounce collectivism with vociferous unanimity, and yet, when asked on what ground, they generally answer with per- fect assurance that collectivism proposes to divide the whole wealth of the community between the members of it, and that, in view of the inequalities of men, such a division would impoverish the wealthy without enrich- ing the few, and could only give rise to a stage of general misery out of which would ultimately result the same conditions as prevail to-day. Those who know anything upon the subject at all are likely to quote the story of Rothschild, who, upon being confronted with a socialist, asked him how much, upon a general distribution of wealth, would be due to every member of the French Republic. Upon being answered that a careful calculation had determined that every in- dividual of the State would be entitled to tliree francs and sixty-five centimes, Mr. Rothschild handed him this amount on the condition that he would say nothing more about it. This is the convincing kind of argument with which the wealthy minority is for the most part content. 20 306 COLLECTIVISM Upon the difference between this kind of socialism and the form of collectivism proposed in these pages it is not necessary to enlarge ; but it is important to keep in mind the fact that so long as such ignorance as this prevails amongst our wealthy minority it is hopeless to expect that the improvement of social conditions along these lines can receive any help from them, although they, perhaps, are more profoundly interested in an intel- ligent understanding of this question than those rash members of the unwealthy majority who are being driven by legitimate discontent to push this question to a premature experiment. It would not be fair to re- proach the wealthy minority with ignorance on this sub- ject ; on the contrary, it would be most unfair to do so. A man who has spent his day in the tumult of a stock exchange is not disposed thereby for the serious study of abstract politics. The same is true of the banker who has to work his way through the legal intricacies of a railroad reorganisation, or the lawyer, who has to advise not one but many bankers in similar operations, and to fight their battles in crowded law courts. But all these men, and not these alone, but all men, women, and children who are consciously or uncon- sciously subjected to the perpetual stress and strain of competition, are not only deprived of the leisure neces- sary for an intelligent understanding of political affairs, but they are, on the contrary, unfitted for a proper under- standing of collectivism by the environment to which they are subjected. We cannot in this connection take sufficient account of the automatic mechanism in us which myriads of years have been engaged in constitut- ing. This automatic machine is set upon the satisfac- tion of its needs by a force which in the absence of moral sentiment is uncontrollable. Were the moral sentiment, which alone can control this machine, free SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 307 from the same influence of the competitive environment, the moral sentiment might be strong enough to control the machine ; but, as has already been pointed out, our moral sentiments are put into such conflict with our physical needs that we are deprived, by this conflict, of a consistent moral standard, and we are therefore like a mariner without a compass, steering sometimes, under obedience to our moral sentiment, in one direction, and steering at another time, under obedience to our physical needs, in a diametrically opposite one ; so that whether we consider the automaton in us which is the result of the competitive system, or the moral sentiment which is perpetually in conflict with the competitive system, we can find in neither one nor the other much hope for escape from the bondage to the competitive system under which man has from the beginning suffered. Let us consider for a moment the character of the ignorance to which the wealthy minority is subjected : 1st. Ignorance of facts: in the first place, he does not know how wasteful our present competitive system is ; on the contrary, he has been taught by political econ- omists to believe that it is one of great beauty and con- summate art; he does not know any better system to put in its place ; on the contrary, he has been by educa- tion teaching the beauties of the competitive system to the workingman and has thereby been putting a club in the hands of the workingman that he will in the end inevitably use to break it up. The rich man does not know the danger he is in ; he does not know how he can escape from it. He neither believes in the danger nor the possibility of escape if there be danger. 2d. Ignorance of mental habit: he is so accustomed to believe in the sacredness of private property that he regards every man who disputes the principle of private property as an enemy of society ; he is therefore incapa- 308 COLLECTIVISM citated by this mental habit from the possibility of seeing things as they are ; and, above all, of recognising that the abolition of private property would bring to himself in the end more happiness than its maintenance. 3d. Ignorance of imagination : it may not be strictly accurate to speak of ignorance of imagination, but our capacity for imagination depends largely upon our knowledge. The scientific men of to-day can imagine electrical possibilities which a few years ago would have been unimaginable. In the same manner, were the wealthy minority informed regarding facts, they would be capable of conceiving of a collectivist State which to-day is impossible to them through ignorance of these facts. Let us consider next the ignorance of the unwealthy majority. This is ignorance of a very different charac- ter from that of the wealthy minority ; for the unwealthy majority is driven by its poverty to look to a change in social conditions as the only chance for relief ; to the same extent, then, as the wealthy minority are unfitted by their peculiar ignorance to appreciate the possibility of collectivism, the conditions of the unwealthy majority make them disposed to exaggerate its benefits. Few things, probably, stand more in the way of a collectivist programme than the exaggerated notions of the un- wealthy majority regarding the benefits which would attend it, and the erroneous notions regarding the possi- bility of introducing a collectivist system at once and without the necessary intermediate steps. One of the dangerous notions regarding government wliich prevail amongst workingmen is that the work of government is easy, requires no education, no special experience, and can be trusted as well to the working- man as to the millionaire. Perhaps in one sense this might be true ; perhaps the millionaire might be as little SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 309 fitted to govern a collectivist State as a workingman ; but one thing is certain : the task of managing the col- lectivist State would be one of stupendous magnitude, requiring consummate skill, consummate judgment, and encyclopsedic information. The difficulties attending the management of a collectivist State will be referred to more at length later on. In this context attention will only be directed to the fact that so long as the unwealthy majority is possessed by the idea that the difficult task of government can be intrusted with in- difference to the ignorant as well as to the educated, all experiments at collectivism initiated by them are likely to end in failure. The workingmen are no more to be blamed for this widespread conviction than the rich are to be blamed for their equally widespread ignorance; not only have workingmen still less opportunity for acquiring knowl- edge on these subjects than the rich, but their expe- rience has not been of a character to justify the belief that better government is to be obtained from the wealthy than from the unwealthy. On the contrary, the administration of Tammany Hall in the city of New York, little though it in one sense contributes to the comfort of the poor, nevertheless gives advantages to workingmen which appear to them more conspicuous and of more importance. It was Tammany Hall that in 1820 secured the extension of the franchise to working- men ; it was Tammany Hall that in 1870 rescued the city from the control of the State Legislature at Albany and conferred upon its citizens the advantage so dear to the workingman, and so little understood by him, of so- called home rule. It is the district leaders of Tammany Hall who go into courts to rescue workingmen from the harsh application of sometimes good laws. It is in the liquor saloons of Tammany leaders that the workingman 310 COLLECTIVISM finds his club. It is to Tammany leaders that the work- ingman goes for a job for himself, and for jobs for his friends and relations. And, above all things, it is to Tammany Hall that the workingmen owe the rate of two dollars a day paid by the city to those who clean its streets. By the side of such favours as these the question whether the streets are clean, though perhaps of really more importance to them, is not felt to be of the same importance; and the workingman, like the rest of us, is influenced, not by what is his real good, but by what he believes to be his real good. The paramount idea in the mind of every workingman is to get his wages raised. Tammany has constantly helped him in the pros- ecution of this idea ; and for this reason Tammany — and if not Tammany, some other organisation equally corrupt — is pretty sure always, under the existing com- petitive system, to be maintained by the workingman. And the effect of this upon the workingman is twofold. It encourages him, consciously as well as unconsciously, to support corrupt government ; and it confirms him in his conviction that keepers of liquor saloons are just as well able to govern as statesmen of the highest education. It has been already suggested that one of the difficul- ties of a collectivist State, as indeed of all States, is to secure the services of the men most fitted for public office. The conspicuous merit of the competitive sys- tem is that it automatically does put fit men at the head of commercial enterprises, for the reason that none other than fit men can under the competitive system success- fully conduct them. The difficulty of all government is that public office tends to be filled by favour rather than by merit. Now, under the existing system, although public office is exposed to this evil tendency, industry SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 311 and commerce not being in the hands of government, but for the most part in private hands and therefore subject to the competitive system, are not exposed to it. But under a collectivist form of government, industry and commerce being largely under the control of the State and therefore not subject to the competitive sys- tem, would be as much subject to this evil as func- tions now under the control of government, and the collectivist State would be relieved of the constant pressure which under the competitive system now auto- matically forces the best men to the head of business affaii-s. A collectivist form of government, therefore, would be more exposed to the danger of unfit public officers than our own, because the industrial offices of the community as well as the rest would tend to be filled by favour rather than by merit. Indeed, this weakness of the collectivist form of government is by some deemed so great that they have condemned it for this reason altogether. And the danger arising through this source must not be underestimated, for it may well be asked if, under our own form of government, unfit men are foisted into public office, how much more will this be the case in a form of government still more democratic than ours, in which education will no longer have the advantage over ignorance that to-day the wealthy exercise over the poor ! And how rash it would be suddenly to adopt a collectivist regime so long as the notion prevails amongst the majority in the State that one man is just as fit to govern as another! The ignorance, therefore, of the unwealthy majority which disposes it to believe that the uneducated are as fit for public office as the educated is perhaps the most formidable obstacle to collectivism to-day, and seems assuredly a fair reason for straining every nerve to pre- vent a premature experiment of it. But this ignorance 312 COLLECTIVISM is being somewhat diminished in England by the efforts at co-operation which have for many years been mace there. Mrs. Sidney Webb ^ has pointed out that, how- ever unsuccessful many of these experiments have been, they have had the effect of demonstrating the import- ance of putting at the head of business affairs men who are by capacity and education fitted therefor. This, coo, is daily brought home to the workingman in the success and failure of strikes and of trade unions. There is, therefore, a slow education now going on which is of a character to teach the unwealthy majority the lesson of which they stand so much in need. But even after this lesson is learned the workingman will by no means be equipped with the knowledge neces- sary to govern a coUectivist State. And perhaps the most important point to be retained in this connection is that under our existing competitive system not only is the workingman deprived of the leisure necessary for acquiring knowledge, but it is difficult to conceive how under a competitive system he ever could enjoy it. It has already been pointed out that the tyranny of the Mar- ket puts an iron limit to wages and to leisure which under the existing industrial system is a form of wage. Up to a certain point the standard of living can be raised ; but it can be raised only up to the point where by so raising the standard the workingman becomes, by good living and sufficient hours of rest, better fitted for doing the work he is given to do. And if it is a workman's duty to punch eyes in needles, his standard of living can be raised to the point which will enable him to punch eyes into the largest number of needles in a day, but it can never be raised beyond this point. The moment the point is reached at which the maximum work is got out 1 The Co-operative Movement in England . SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 313 of a man during the best years of his life, that moment capital can no longer afford to improve his condition ; for beyond this point the investment will result in loss instead of in profit. And if the workman whose working power it is sought to raise by increasing his wages uses in mental labour the leisure which is allowed him for rest, the question arises whether he is not diminishing his capacity for work thereby. It is notorious that workingmen whose leisure is in- creased do not spend their leisure in study : they cannot be expected to do so ; they spend it in amusement or in their trade unions, or in reading the newspapers ; and how little real education there is for them in reading the newspapers may be judged by the admitted fact that, in the United States at any rate, commercial exigencies — the tyranny of the Market again — tend to lower the standard of newspapers so that they serve to paralyze the intelligence of men rather than to improve it. Upon this theme alone a book might be written ; but it is not necessary ; the forces that contribute to keep the workingman in ignorance of the facts it is most es- sential for a voting citizen to know are too obvious to need discussion. The essential point is that so long as the competitive system lasts the ignorance must last; it would seem, then, that under this system an honest, enlightened democracy is well-nigh impossible. If the voter not only is to-day ignorant of the facts necessary to make a sound judgment on the political problems he is called upon to solve, but if he must always remain ignorant of them so long as he is kept by the competi- tive system subject to the tyranny of the Market, does it not seem difficult to believe that a real democracy can prosper? As a matter of fact, no prosperous democracy ever has 314 COLLECTIVISM existed, if by democracy is understood government by the people. Every form of government tacitly assumes that it is to be controlled by a few ; and every form of government has been controlled by a few. The people are given a periodical opportunity to throw out one oli- garchy, but only on the condition of putting in another. In availing themselves of this opportunity the people exercise undoubtedly a valuable control. But the people cannot be said to govern; they are governed, and by a succession of oligarchies, with the privilege of being ungrateful to them all. And it is because every democratic government is to this extent a sham that so-called democracies have sometimes prospered. It is because the few well-informed men in a community, for the most part, prove themselves stronger than the un- informed many, that republics survive. Unfortunately, what has been the rule up to the present can no longer be counted upon as likely to be the rule hereafter. The uninformed many, without having acquired enough in- formation to be able to solve the problems of govern- ment, are rapidly becoming sufficiently organised to wrest the reins of government out of the hands of the minority, and when they do this we shall see the work- ing of a real democracy under the competitive system. It is hardly necessary to add that the selfishness of the workingman, embittered by hatred and uninformed by education, is not likely to deal gently with those to whom they attribute all the evils of past misgovern- ment, nor is it likely that in the satisfaction of a long- pent vindictiveness they will be in a temper to build up an enduring or a prosperous government of their own. When, after the passage of the last Reform Bill in England, Mr. Lowe, in speaking of the workingmen to whom the franchise had been extended, said, "Now let SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 315 US educate our masters," he did not appreciate that by educating them they would become masters in fact as well as in name. Indeed, the irascibility of conserva- tives over the growing power of the workingman is very much like that of a parent who, to stop the clamour of a disobedient child crying for a loaded weapon, were to put it in his hand and then grow angry when the child, having learned its use, proceeded to employ it to his own advantage. Fortunately, just as competition in the realms of nature under one set of conditions produces the tiger, but under other conditions produces the ant, so compe- tition in our own community under one set of conditions produces the sweater, and under other conditions pro- duces the trade union. And although it is impossible to expect that the workingman will, under the competi- tive system, get the leisure to study the abstract science of government, the trade union furnishes him with a school of practical politics which is of incomparable value. When, during the last century, the old guild ceased to exist, and our legislatures became impregnated with the doctrine of laissez faire, the workmen were reduced to combine as the only alternative to starvation wages, and in their combinations they were ruled by the doc- trines which successively overthrew the revolutions of 1789, 1830, and 1848. They were indoctrinated by the theory of the equality of men and of the natural consequence of the doctrine that " what concerns all should be decided by all;" and so early trade unions were characterised by the most extravagant democracy. There were no permanent officers, no permanent com- mittee, no permanent secretary; the chairman was elected at every meeting for that meeting only ; every member voted on every measure ; in a word, the gov- ernment was that of a town meeting. As trade unions 316 COLLECTIVISM became too large and scattered for this simplest form of government there was gradually developed a system of instructed delegates ; that is to say, of persons delegated by every branch to cast the vote decided upon by the branch at a meeting of delegates of all the branches. And all questions that were raised at the meetings of dele- gates upon which the delegates had not received instruc- tions from their various branches were referred back to the branches by referendum. This system necessitated a recording secretary in each branch and a recording secretary for the meeting of delegates ; and as the trade union increased in numbers and in strength, more and more work fell upon the secretaries, so that it became impossible for them properly to do the work of the trade unions and at the same time do the work of their respective trades. Paid secretaries became therefore necessary, and with the paid secretary came, under the democratic system, all the evils of a practically omnipo- tent bureaucracy; for the secretaries soon became so superior to the ordinary workingmen in the handling of political machinery that the referendum became as purely a matter of form as was the plebiscite under the Empire. This the rank and file would not long tolerate ; and, what with the decay of some trade unions through disaffection of members, and the purgation of others through their revolt, there gradually became evolved a system of representative government such as we have in our most enlightened republics, under which a rep- resentative body of workingmen keep control of a paid body of administrative experts, tlius as nearly as possible solving the problem of combining efficient administra- tion and popular control. Now let us consider the political errors which some of the trade unions have corrected in their members. First, they have learned that all men are not born SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 317 equal, in the sense that some men are better fitted to manage a trade union than others. Secondly, that a man cannot work in a factory and manage a trade union at the same time. O Thirdly, that factory hands cannot by any system of instructed delegates or referendum manage a trade union themselves. Fourthly, that a paid expert is the best person to administer. Fifthly, that an elected representative is the best per- son to control. Sixthly, they have learned to distinguish between those matters which should be left to the administrator, those wliich should be left to the representative, and those which should be reserved to the members. Or, in other words, they have learned the proper functions of administration, representation, and referendum respec- tively. In addition to these political lessons, trade unions have taught their members some valuable social lessons also. For example : They have become accustomed to see the funds which they contribute to the trade union spent in supporting those members who are out of work. They have even become accustomed to see these funds applied to the maintenance of a strike in a different place and for the immediate benefit of members who are total strangers to them ; and, in the effort to maintain a high standard of wages for all, the workmen in one town where wages are high have been known to con- sent to a reduction of their wages in order to raise the general level above that which ruled in other places. It is a fact of no small importance that when the question was put whether the York branch of the Flint Glass Makers would consent to a reduction of their wages in 318 COLLECTIVISM the interests of other branches, the vote in favour of consenting to this sacrifice was 75 to 9.^ It is true that the motive which underlies the sacri- fices involved, in the foregoing examples is the selfish desire to maintain high wages, each for himself; but two distinct steps towards collectivism are made by the adoption of the trade union plan. In the first place it tends to create a habit of opinion that the interests of the individual can best be advanced by advancing the interests of the whole group to which he belongs ; and in the second place it creates a willingness to make a personal sacrifice for the realisation of this general end. It must not be imagined that trade unions are an unmixed good because they result in these two advan- tages. It has already been pointed out that, like all the fruits of the competitive system, trade unionism has its bad as well as its good side, but in connection with the question we have particularly studied it is obvious that trade unions constitute a school of political science and moral discipline to which it would be a good thing if our millionaires were sometimes subjected. Neverthe- less, the education furnished by trade unions is in some respects not beneficial, for it produces a type which, because it is the result of successful battle, has all the evil characteristics which successful battle tends to produce. Upon this subject no better authority can be cited than the authors of " Industrial Democracy," themselves warm admirers of trade unions and earnest advocates of the principles for which they stand. " Those who know the trade union world will have no difficulty in recognising, in certain of its sections, both in corporate policy and in the characters of individual leaders, the same strong, self-reliant, and pugnacious 1 Address of the Central Secretary of the Society in the Flint Glass Makers' Magazine, October, 1895, vol. ii. uo. 8, pp. 447-451. SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTR'ISM 319 spirit ; the same impatience of sentiment, philanthropy, and idealism ; the same self-complacency at their own success in the fight, and the same contempt for those who have failed ; above all, the same conception of the social order, based on the axiom that to him that hath shall be given, and from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath. To the idealist who sees in trade unionism a great class upheaval of the oppressed against the oppressors, it comes as a shock to recognise in the trade union official of this type, pushing the interests of his own clients at the expense of everybody else, merely another embodiment of the ' spirit of the bagman.' " ^ It is questionable whether the benefits that workmen derive from trade unions compensate for the spirit of "complacency" and "contempt" which they engender. For this is the very spirit which is most hostile to that of sacrifice and considerateness under which alone a col- lectivist State could survive. It is to be feared, therefore, that, with trade unions or without, the workingman has a long way to travel before he can understand or appre- ciate the principles which lie at the very foundation of collectivism. To the ignorance which specifically characterises the wealthy minority on the one hand and the unwealthy majority on the other must be added another kind of ignorance which characterises both of them, — such ig- norance, for example, as that regarding the true character of pauperism and crime, to which reference has already been made. Obviously there is for this triple ignorance only one cure, — education ; and not only the education of schools, but the education of experience. How the edu- cation of experience can be applied belongs to that part of our subject which deals with the proper steps to be taken 1 Industrial Democracy, p. 581. 320 COLLECTIVISM in order gradually to fit our present society for collectiv- ism, and this will be studied later. Reverting now to the question from which we di- gressed in order to consider the difficulty in the way of collectivism which results from the ignorance of the com- munity, — that is to say, the question of how tasks are to be classified so as to reduce the inequalities and con- sequent injustice which characterise our existing system, — let us consider how far the work allotted to each in- dividual in a community would be affected by its diver- sity. § 5. DiVEESITY OF WOEK Few things perhaps deserve more attention in making a study of collectivism than the diversity of work which it would occasion. Under our present system we suffer much from the monotony of our employment. One of the principal objections to machinery is that it tends to convert the man who attends the machine himself into a machine, and this tends to degrade him and produce a degenerate type. The same is true more or less of every unskilled workingman ; he is converted by the character of his employment into little better than a beast of bur- den. The same is true, to a less degree, of those en- gaged in mental labour. It is probably the exhaustion which attends mental labour that contributes very largely to the infertility of those engaged in this kind of work ; moreover, mental labour, attended, as it usu- ally is under the competitive system, with worry and excitement, doubtless contributes to the nervous pros- tration from which the wealthy suffer; so that the wealthy, after having devoted more hours of the day than they ought to the work of their brains, are driven to all sorts of expedients in order to counteract the mental labour by reaction of muscle and limb. There SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 321 are very few men confined to crowded court-houses who do not feel the necessity of physical exercise, and there are still fewer who can afford to indulge therein until their systems are already broken down by the want of it. It is no small merit, therefore, of the collectivist system, that it would permit rotation of tasks so that no man's whole time would be given to unskilled labour and to the work of attending upon the same machine, neither would it be confined to a counting-house or government office ; the diversity of employment so occasioned would bene- fit not only every individual, but, to a still more impor- tant degree, the entire race. There is little hardship attending two hours of physical labour, or two hours of factory work, or two hours of mental labour, but there is an exhausting and degenerating consequence of ten hours devoted to any one of these things. Another element in collectivism which should be pointed out is that there are certain occupations that cannot conveniently be distributed among different citi- zens, for example, such expert work as civil engineers or that of physicians ; these cannot be intrusted to any but men specifically educated for the purpose ; nor is it practicable for an engineer who is in charge of a great work to devote thereto only a few hours of each day ; nor for a doctor when engaged in practice, by confining his laboiu's to certain hours in the day, to expose his pa- tient to the danger of death during the other hours. In these occupations, therefore, a somewhat different prin- ciple would have to be applied. The engineer or the physician would work continuously while he worked, and being engaged, therefore, twice as many hours in the day as his fellow-citizen, he would be entitled to complete rest for as long a time as he was working twice as many hours as the rest. There is no reason why this principle should not be 322 COLLECTIVISM applied to other men as well as to engineers or physi- cians, and why a man or woman should not elect for a given time to work double hours or extra hours in order to secure a corresponding amount of complete leisure. In this connection it may not be inadvisable to point out that the complete leisure men would enjoy under these conditions during a part of the year would give them as much opportunity for enjoyment as they now have. It would enable a few of them to combine in a yachting cruise ; it would enable another one of them and his family to set aside certain months in the year for embellishing a country home ; the rent for which would consist of so many hours of extra work to the State. In other words, the amount of direct pleasure that could be secured under a collectivist State would depend much more upon the skill and industry of its citizens than now. For now the large majority are com- mitted to lives of labour from which pleasure is for the most part excluded altogether, whatever be their skill and whatever be their industry. And those who, on the contrary, have leisure for enjoyment cannot but be sad- dened by the thought — if the thought ever occurs to them — that their leisure is enjoyed at the expense of others. Having now briefly considered the industrial changes that would take place in a collectivist State, let us as briefly consider some of the special characteristics of its government in its internal affairs first and its external affairs afterwards. As has been already suggested, the general classifica- tion of tasks in the first place, and the attribution of tliese tasks to individuals in the second place, must be intrusted to somebody ; and it is the fact that this duty is imposed upon government that constitutes one of the SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 323 chief dangers and difficulties of collectivism. At the present time this task is confided to no one. It is left to competition. Men are born under conditions which make the opportunities for selecting agreeable and re- munerative tasks open to some and closed to others ; but the merit of the competitive system is, that notwith- standing the fact that the race is an unjust handicap, those who are best fitted for the difficult tasks are generally in industrial matters intrusted with them, the process of selection being an automatic one similar to that adopted by nature. It is because the competitive system in this respect is a natural one that it has re- ceived the support and admiration of those who believe in natural rights, who believe that the system of nature is the best system, and that it is a necessary one. The effort of this book has been to demonstrate that the system of nature is not the best one, and that it can be in large part replaced, and the injustice of it elimi- nated, by wisdom. But the injustice and inequality of nature can be eliminated only by wisdom ; it can never be eliminated by folly ; and so long as folly prevails in a community, so long collectivism is impossible. To the extent, how- ever, to which wisdom prevails in a community, collec- tivism is possible. In other words, if we can conceive of a community composed entirely of men who appreci- ate the difficulty of government; who appreciate the inequalities of men, and the better fitness of some men than others to conduct the various branches of govern- ment for which they are specially fitted ; who recognise that the advantage of the whole community and of themselves as members of that community is best served by putting the best men into office ; and from whom the necessary motive for office has been eliminated by the substitution of co-operation for competition, — obviously 324 COLLECTIVISM in such a community collectivism would be the best form of government. But we have seen that the com- munity in which we live is characterised, on the con- trary, by two kinds of ignorance : the ignorance of the wealthy minority, which does not believe in the possi- bility of collectivism at all ; and the ignorance of the unwealthy majority, which believes not only that collec- tivism is possible, but that it is possible whatever be the men intrusted with the government thereof. Under these conditions we cannot but regretfully admit that an attempt at full-fledged collectivism to-day would be ruinously premature. Let us assume, however, that it is possible, by certain steps which will be discussed later, gradually to diminish the ignorance of both the wealthy minority and the unwealthy majority so that the one have abandoned the theory that collectivism is impos- sible, and the other have learned that government can safely be put only into the hands of men specifically fitted therefor. In such case what would be the machin- ery of such a government, and in what particulars would it chiefly differ from our own ? § 6. Internal Policy In the first place it would be indispensable, in such a community, that every member in it be known, and all not members be rigidly excluded from its benefits. This would mean an absolute end to immigration for the purpose of permanent residence within its bordere. The exclusion of all foreigners from permanent resi- dence would be necessitated by the fact that every mem- ber of the community would be entitled to a share of its income as well as a vote in its government. This share and this vote would become so valuable that every man entitled thereto would not fail to secure his right by a SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 325 proper system of registration, and as the fundamental theory of such a community would be that no man should be compelled to work save for the State, which was itself organised for the benefit of all who worked for it, it would not be consistent with this principle to employ the labour of others who were not members of the community. For this reason, therefore, no person could be admitted to naturalisation except under such peculiar conditions as now give rise to La Grande Naturalisation in France ; that is to say, by a decree specifically granting naturali- sation for extraordinary services in each case. Inciden- tally this would settle the question of impoverishment by accretion of population from outside, or degeneration of citizenship for the same reason. This policy would not be open to the charge of imjust exclusiveness because it would proceed upon the theory that collectivism was the highest type of government, and that by excluding the members of other nations from the enjoyment of ours, the adoption of this system by other nations would be encouraged. It would be of interest to every collectivist State to encourage the adop- tion of collectivism in other States as will be seen when we come to regard the external relations of a collectivist State. Moreover, collectivism, properly understood, is a religion, and the spread of this religion could best be served, not by admitting foreigners within the State, but by compelling them to remain outside and converting them into apostles of this religion within their own. Every adult man ^ in a collectivist State is to have a vote in its government, and the exact form of this gov- 1 It is believed by many that by the time humanity has reached the stage which fits it for collectivism, the circumstances attending politics will have so changed as to eliminate the objections which now exist to female suffrage. But whether this be so or not must depend upon circum- stances, and it is not herein intended to judge of these circumstances beforehand- 326 COLLECTIVISM ernment would not differ much from that of our own. The idea, however, that such a government would, as imagined by Bebel, be entirely free from party or faction, is assuredly a mistake. The management of such a government as that of the United States under a collec- tivist plan would resemble the management of an enor- mous corporation by the side of which no existing corporation could compare in magnitude. The deter- mination of how the resources of this vast country could best be employed to the benefit of every individual in it would be a matter not only of great difficulty, but one upon which opinions would be found to differ. The classification of tasks, the system of rotation, the prefer- ence given to one class of tasks over another, the attri- bution of tasks to individuals, — all these things would give rise to differences of opinion. The extent to which those men most gifted by nature would be permitted to enjoy benefits obtained through their superior ability to do their work in a shorter time, or through the rendering of extraordinary services to the State, would doubtless give rise, not only to differences of opinion, but to differ- ences of opinion so radical as to create parties in the State. One party would doubtless contend that there should be no option whatever given to the more gifted individual, but that all should toil the same number of hours under as nearly as possible the same conditions, whereas another party would favour the granting of special privi- leges to persons who are able to render special services to the State. Again, there would doubtless arise two questions of foreign policy to which we shall refer pres- ently, upon which a profound difference of opinion would exist ; and in addition to differences of opinion there would be perpetual conflict for office, arising out of the desire of men for the consideration that springs therefrom. As has been already suggested, the struggle SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 327 for wealth is in great part a struggle for the considera- tion and power that arise from wealth ; and although we may eliminate private property from a community, we can never eliminate the desire for consideration and the desire for power, and both of these are inseparably connected with public office. The fact that this struggle would subsist in a collec- tivist State is one that cuts both ways. It clearl}^ gives rise to the possibility that faction might become suffi- ciently powerful to wreck the State ; but at the same time it furnishes the argument that if the struggle of faction is great enough to make it possible to wreck the State, it must also be amply sufficient to prevent the uniformity of type which has so often been regarded as hostile to it. We have insisted upon the extreme im- portance of avoiding institutions that would create such uniformity that variability would disappear, and with variability progress. The effect of collectivism, however, would not be to create such uniformity as to limit the activities of men. The limit imposed upon men by col- lectivism is a limit to the accumulation of individual wealth. No limit would be imposed upon the work of accumulating wealth for the State. On the contrary, the leisure at the disposal of individuals which could be devoted to this work of accumulating wealth for the State would be much larger than at present, and the consideration that would result from such work ought to be a sufficient motive to justify it. It does not seem, therefore, that there would be a dangerous diminution of party activity in a collectivist State. One element of discord and hatred would be eliminated from it ; that is to say, the mercenary motive. That the mercenary mo- tive has heretofore been sufficient to divert every good institution from the object for which it was organised has already been sufficiently insisted upon. The impor- 328 COLLECTIVISM tance of eliminating such a motive, then, is obvious. It is submitted, however, that if this mercenary motive be eliminated, while a necessarily degenerating influence will have been withdrawn from politics, politics will still remain sufficiently animated by differences of opinion to prevent the uniformity inconsistent with a progres- sive type. It may be recalled that in discussing the ques- tion of variability the suggestion was made that, until man became perfect, variability would be indispensable to perfectibility. It may now be added, as a corollary to this statement, that, until man becomes perfect, there will be faction in the State. When man is perfect, if that time ever comes, there will be need neither for faction nor for variability. § 7. ExTEENAL Policy It must be remembered that a collectivist State will still be subject to competition of other States, or at any rate it will be subject to such competition until all the other States in the world are collectivist also. As the likelihood of this last taking place is extremely remote, we shall have to assume that if a collectivist State is sur- rounded by other States which are not collectivist, there will between these States be competition. It is obvious that the task of steering a collectivist State through the dangerous channels of diplomatic re- lations with States that are not themselves collectivist would be a difficult, if not an impossible one, and in this respect some States are infinitely better situated than others. The problems presented to such a country as that of the British Empire would in such case be of enormous magnitude. To us in the United States, who are self-supporting, the task could hardly be regarded as a difficult one, and yet the policy to be adopted in SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 329 various contingencies would be likely to give rise to considerable differences of opinion. The foreign com- plication in wliich we were lately involved by the mis- government of Cuba furnishes a case in point. That part of the community with whom indignation predomi- nates would urge a collectivist State, as in ours, to intervene ; but in a collectivist State, as in ours, there would be a part of the community that would compare the evil that would result from intervention with the evil to which intervention would put an end ; under the in- fluence of this comparison it would decide that a higher wisdom required us to abstain from an intervention that was as likely to increase bloodshed as to diminish it. Moreover, a collectivist State ought to succeed in limit- ing moral responsibility more intelligently than we do. Among many of our best citizens there appears to be no sense of limitation whatever. Whenever evil exists, they regard themselves to a certain extent responsible for it. They are as willing to dash our armies against the Turk in Armenia as against the Spaniards in Cuba, and are willing to neglect the arab in their own streets for the Bedouin in the desert. A collectivist would be permitted to apply a different principle ; his argument would be this : the only political institutions consis- tent with the doctrines of Christ are those of a collec- tive form of government, because these are the only principles consistent with peace it would be inconsistent, by violating peace, to force these principles upon other men. It would be contrary to our principles to do so. What we can do is to present an example to other men for other men to follow, and we shall not be tempted by any consideration to part from the doctrines of peace except in the defence of the institutions which religion has taught us to create and cherish. Millions for de- fence, then, but not one life, not one cent, for aggression. 330 COLLECTIVISM § 8. Value, Exchange Value, Currency, AND Foreign Trade Existing works on " Socialism " devote much time and space to the discussion of value. But the form of collectivism proposed in the foregoing pages renders the discussion of value unnecessary. Before proceed- ing to the explanation of this, it should be pointed out that political economists are not concerned with a defi- nition of the word "value," but only with that of the words "exchange value;" that is to say, in order to have correct notions as to the economic forces engaged in the industrial field, it becomes important to determine what elements enter into determining the exchange value of a commodity. Exchange value is clearly de- termined primarily by supply and demand, or, in other words, when supply is small and demand great, ex- change value rises ; whereas when supply is large and demand small, exchange value sinks. One of the in- conveniences of this obvious fact is that it applies as much to wages as to any other commodity, and political economists are therefore obliged to admit that, under existing industrial conditions, the wages of men and women, upon which their very life depends, are a math- ematical result of the relation between supply and demand, and that during the occasional crises that characterise our present industrial system the periodical increase of supply and diminution of demand cannot do otherwise but drive men to beggary and women to prostitution. There is, however, a limit to the minimum exchange value of an article, and this limit is cost of production ; in other words, exchange value cannot long remain be- low cost of production, and therefore cost of produc- SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 331 tion must enter as an element in determining exchange value. The question is still further complicated by the fact that exchange value is measured by a medium which itself varies in exchange value. In other words, gold and silver, which serve to state in figures the exchange value of commodities, are themselves subject to varia- tion in value, and it becomes difficult, therefore, to de- termine in any given case whether a modification of the price of a commodity is due to a modification of the ex- change value of the commodity, or to a modification of the exchange value of the gold or silver which state in figures its market price. These questions are not raised here for the purpose of solution, but only for the pur- pose of pointing out that in the form of collectivism proposed in the foregoing pages they have little or no importance, and in order to make this clear it becomes important to state with more accuracy than has hereto- fore been stated what machinery will, in the proposed collectivist State, replace the existing system of ex- change and circulating medium. In discussing this subject we must begin by carefully distinguishing between internal and external industrial conditions. Let us begin first with Internal Industrial Conditions : (a) Internal Industrial Conditions The essential feature of collectivism is that in its inter- nal industrial conditions there is little exchange, little trade, and no circulating medium. All adult individuals, male and female, with the exception of paupers and criminals, are entitled, by virtue of the compulsory work that they do for the State, to a certain proportion or dividend of the State income, and this proportion is delivered to them in the shape of dividend coupons, 332 COLLECTIVISM divided into fractional parts in much the same manner as our own currency.^ These dividend coupons must not be confounded with the labour cheques proposed by Karl Marx or Rodbertus, or with the labour exchange notes that were actually used by Josiah Warren and Robert Owen. Neither do they represent gold or credit, as bank notes do under our conditions, nor are they any longer, therefore, subject to the fluctuations in the value of gold and silver and credit, whether due to ac- cidents of discovery, to interested legislation, or to com- mercial panic. A dividend coupon means nothing but that the individual to whom it is delivered has become entitled, by virtue of the compulsory labour he has done, to the fractional parts of the State income expressed therein. These dividend coupons ought, unless the State be bankrupt or less productive than any State now in existence, to be sufficient to assure to every adult individual, not a pauper or a criminal, the necessaries of life. The more prosperous the State, the larger the amount of comforts and luxuries these dividend cou- pons will assure. If the preceding estimate of the economy of a coUec- tivist system is at all correct, the degree of comfort and luxury such a system should furnish every individual ought to be considerable. In addition to the dividend coupons issued against compulsory labom- just explained, another variety of cou- pons will be furnished to every individual who chooses to contribute any part of his leisure to the benefit of the State. These might conveniently be termed " volun- tary labour cheques." It has already been explained that the State ought not, under a collectivist system, 1 How these dividend coupons are calculated is explained in chap. SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 333 to exact more than half of a day from every adult individual in it. Every such individual in it, then, would have half of every day at his or her disposal. The use to which this leisure will be put will obviously depend upon the taste of every individual. The artist will devote it to art ; the poet to literature ; the scien- tific man to science ; the statesman to politics ; others, and even the foregoing at times, will devote this leisure to increase their material comforts ; as, for example, — the construction of a house in the country ; the secur- ing of instruments of amusement, or of a longer vaca- tion than the State habitually affords. Through the instrumentality of these voluntary labour cheques, the industrious individual will secure an advantasre over the less industrious. Through the thrift with which both kinds of labour cheques are used, the thrifty will have an advantage over the unthrifty. Under this plan, therefore, the objection that collectivism will necessarily reduce all men and women to one dead level falls to the ground. Every man willing to work will have work, and will receive for that work an assured and sufficient share in the necessaries and comforts of life ; but be- tween the man who does least for the State and the man who does most for the State there will exist a dif- ference in the positive pleasures of life which ought amply to satisfy the industrious without giving the unindustrious legitimate cause for discontent. Those who attack most successfully this scheme of distribution point out that if dividend coupons are transferable there will be the same opportunity for ac- cumulation of dividend coupons as for accumulation of money, and that by virtue of this accumulation those who accumulate will be able to reduce to subjection those who do not accumulate. They also point out that after the system of accumulation has operated during a 334 COLLECTIVISM sufficient time it might become of a character to bank- rupt the State, for the State being prepared only to sat- isfy every year the dividend coupons distributed during that year, and calculating every year its income upon the basis of actual wealth and actual population, might one day find itself called upon suddenly to honour a vast accumulation of dividend coupons in the hands of the few thrifty, and thus render it impossible for the State to furnish to the unthrifty even the necessaries of life. These objections seem fatal to a coUectivist sys- tem, and no form of collectivism to which they apply would seem likely to survive ; and yet they depend for their efficacy upon a condition which, under the pro- posed coUectivist system, would not exist. They take for granted that dividend coupons are to be transfer- able. They take for granted that under a coUectivist system dividend coupons are capable of accumulation. It cannot be too emphatically insisted upon, then, that dividend coupons, under the proposed coUectivist State, would be neither transferable nor valid for more than a stipulated period. Inasmuch as it is the specific inten- tion of collectivism to prevent traffic and to prevent ac- cumulation, it is obvious that dividend coupons issued for this purpose must be neither transferable nor valid for more than a limited period. The instinct of accu- mulation for the benefit of one's self is the very instinct which a coUectivist State is intended to discourage and destroy. The instinct of accumulating for the benefit of the community is the instinct which collectivism is intended to encourage and promote. Centuries of self- ish accumulation have created in us a habit with which none of us are happy, and without which, nevertheless, we would be unhappy. What man needs for his happi- ness is to escape from the despotism of this instinct of selfish accumulation. This instinct is so essential to our SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 335 present system that the whole economy of our State would go to pieces were it not to exist, and it has become so far a part of the fibre of every thinking man and woman that we find it diificult to conceive of a condi- tion of things which would render the exercise of this instinct unnecessary and immoral. But inasmuch as the scheme of collectivism has for its express purpose to assure to every man a fair share of the necessary com- forts of life, not only during his working years, but also during that old age in which no work can be done, and inasmuch as the economy of the collectivist plan herein proposed seems sufficient to justify the belief that this fair share of necessaries and comforts can be assured to all the citizens of a collectivist State at one-half of the labour now employed in securing it only to a few, there is left under the collectivist system neither necessity nor motive for accumulation. Although it is important that dividend coupons which are issued against compulsory labour applied to the production and distribution of necessaries should not be transferable, there is no reason why such a restriction should be put on voluntary labour cheques. The essen- tial task of collectivism is to assure to every man and woman a real as well as nominal liberty of contract by assuring the necessaries of life to all in exchange for a few hours of labour. As regards the hours of labour required for producing necessaries, liberty is impossible in any condition of life save for a favoured few ; but as regards the hours of labour voluntarily undertaken to increase the pleasures of life, liberty is possible for all under the collectivist plan, because under this plan no one man is able to dictate terms to another thi'ough con- trol of the means of subsistence. Once, therefore, the means of subsistence are assured, and thereby liberty of contract, every man is free to offer services or return 336 COLLECTIVISM them according to the terras offered. Accumulation and exploitation are therefore not to be feared as regards voluntary service offered to obtain the pleasures and luxuries of life, as they are to be feared in the securing of necessaries. To secure necessaries a man must work ; to secure pleasures or luxuries he may or may not work as he likes. For this reason voluntary labour cheques may be transferable, whereas dividend coupons may not. This matter is more fully explained in Chapter V. on the practical working of collectivism.^ The dividend coupon, then, is not money, one of the essential uses of which is to enable one man to accumu- late with facility by substituting for divers bulky com- modities one single commodity that is not bulky and can therefore be easily accumulated. Dividend coupons simply constitute the machinery through which every man will take the income to which he is entitled in the shape in which he desires it, so that every man may spend his income in the way most suited to his taste : one in the luxuries of the table ; another in beautiful raiment ; a third in scientific investigation ; a fourth in music or art or literature ; a fifth in out-of-door exer- cise, — leaving to every man that most precious of all human liberties, the right to apply the product of his labour as suits best his own individual taste. By this method, then, collectivism will control a few hours of every man's day, but the remaining hours will be at his disposal for the satisfaction of individual tastes in a manner which no civilisation up to the present time has been able to compass. This is the true measure of in- dividualism, for it is an individualism which assures the maximum of liberty to every man, with a minimum of risk and a minimum of inconvenience to all. 1 See pp. 410-412. SOME FEATURES OF COLLECTIVISM 337 (h) External Industrial Conditions^ or Foreign Trade It is a somewhat singular fact that most writers on " Socialism " take it for granted, that in a collectivist State foreign trade would cease to exist. Professor Flint 1 goes so far as to say that " Socialists, being obliged to admit that foreign trade would disappear in a so- cialist community, have entered upon a conspiracy of silence on the subject, owing to their inability to face the difficulties which this disappearance of foreign trade is likely to occasion." It is difficult to understand to what the idea that foreign trade must disappear in a collectivist com- munity is due. Every community is likely to produce more of an article than it can itself consume, and to be able to engage advantageously in exchange with other nations of its surplus production for theirs. The only difference between foreign trade as practised by our industrial State and that practised by the proposed collectivist State is that in our case individuals carry on foreign trade, whereas in the proposed collectivist State the State alone would carry it on; and in order to carry on this trade, gold would remain an important element in the wealth of the State. Indeed, the wealth of the State would be enhanced by the fact that inas- much as gold would no longer have any use as currency within the State, the gold employed under existing in- dustrial conditions for currency within the State would all of it be available for the purchase of commodities abroad ; and with the view of being able to continue the purchase of commodities abroad, the State would have an interest in mining gold if it produced gold ; or, if it did not produce gold, in producing articles which could readily be exchanged for foreign products. The 1 "Socialism," p. 246, by Prof. Robert Flint. 22 338 COLLECTIVISM machinery of foreign trade would in no way be changed, although it would be relieved of the pressure which now forces prosperous nations to conquer new markets by the perpetual tendency, under the profit sys- tem, of production to outstrip purchasing power; be- cause in a collectivist community, the moment it was found that a given commodity was being produced in larger quantities than either the State itself could con- sume, or other nations be willing to purchase, the State could immediately diminish the extent of this manufac- ture and apply the labour theretofore employed by it to industries for which there existed a greater demand. Some authors ^ think that the State will find it difficult to put a money value on products sold to foreigners be- cause of the absence of the use of money to determine cost. This objection seems to indicate a failure to grasp the real facts of the case. The dividend coupon proposed will be a far more efficient method for deter- mining cost than the present system of coin, because coin is at present subject to variation in value, whereas no such variation in value will interfere with the calculation of the cost in labour of every commodity. Moreover, foreign trade will be determined, under a collectivist State, as in ours, by foreign demand, cost of production being serviceable only for the purpose of fixing the minimum price at which it will be advantageous to export. 1 Graham, "Socialism New and Old," p. 208. OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 339 CHAPTER IV objections to collectivism discussed § 1. That it Would Promote Over-population One of the formidable objections made to collectivism is that it would furnish no check to population ; and that therefore the principle announced by Malthus would eventually prove ruinous to the State. To this objec- tion there are many answers. In the first place, it is no longer contested that it is not the well-to-do who most increase the population, but, on the contrary, those who are reduced to a state of such misery that no increase of responsibility can make the misery much worse. In other words, reckless fertility is the result of despair, and infertility among the poor is due more often to phy- sical degeneration than to prudence. Malthusians will answer that in our State prudence checks population in a large class ; whereas under collectivism prudence would not operate at all. To this a very simple answer can be made. There is a form of collectivism which proposes to give to every man unconditionally according to his needs, to which this objection would apply ; but nothing would be easier, under the form of collectivism here proposed, than to give a prudential motive for the check of population, which would probably be far more effec- tual than that which exists under existing conditions. In other words, a coUectivist State could lay down the principle that no person was entitled to a full share of the coUectivist income until he attained the age of 340 COLLECTIVISM twenty-one years ; that prior to that time, and as soon as a child is born, the father would have to furnish hours of work, in excess of those which he owed as an indi- vidual, for every child brought by him into the world. It is submitted that this plan would operate as a check to population as great as that which now exists, because whereas under our present system it is the woman who bears the immediate brunt of every child that is born, under this plan the man would at once bear a share of it also; and as the man is the one of the two most re- sponsible for increase of population, it is upon him that it is most important that a check should fall. In addition to the check herein proposed, and which could be made more or less by the State according as there was a tendency in the population to increase too fast or to diminish too fast, we have to take into con- sideration the fact often already suggested, that the enhancement of the position of women which character- ises this century has already been found to do much to determine this question of population. The more of a drudge a woman is, the less she has to say on this sub- ject: the higher the part she plays, the more she has to say upon it; and as the collectivist form of government has for its direct purpose to make the benefit of the State serve the benefit of the individual, thereby bringing about an equality between individuals which cannot exist under the competitive system, women will share in the advantages to be derived from collectivism more than men; for they will no longer suffer from the in- dustrial inequality to which, under our existing laws and customs, they are subjected. Because, therefore, there will be no element of the population reduced by recklessness to disregard the ques- tion of population ; and because, on the contrary, it is the sex most responsible for increase of population that will, OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 341 under the system proposed, suffer the immediate conse- quence thereof; and because the enhancement of the position of women who suffer most therefrom will give them more to say on the subject, — it is likely that a State of collectivism will have as much, if not more, control over population than ours. § 2. That Collectivism Would Be Destructive OF the Home The popular notion that collectivism would tend to break up the home is founded on the vague notions of such a common table as existed in Sparta, and upon the better-founded fear arising from the fact that many of those who to-day preach socialism denounce the insti- tution of marriage. For the first of these two notions there is no ground whatever, as a common table forms no part of the proposed collectivism. As regards the second, it is a lamentable fact that some of those who most loudly advocate collectivism, and most urgently demand that it should be immediately instituted, tend to regard collectivism as a system under which they will be relieved of every restraint, whether upon lust or upon vindictiveness. The greatest danger, indeed, that we have to confront is the possibility of a collectivist ex- periment being undertaken upon these lines. Enough has been said to show that collectivism is consistent only with a high degree of self-control; it must fail, and fail ruinously, if attempted upon the principle of self-surrender. The very fact that some partisans of collectivism are enemies of the institution of marriage is perhaps the most serious reason why it is indispensable that the subject of collectivism be earnestly studied by the conservative element in the community ; for no greater calamity could fall to any State than 342 COLLECTIVISM that its government should be handed over to men who, by destroying the institution of marriage, would break down the very prop upon which all sound government rests. It has been repeated, perhaps, too often that marriage and the family which results from marriage furnish in themselves the first and best school for self-control, and for all the social qualities. Indeed, one of the indict- ments made against the industrial system is that it tends to break up family relations. In many of the cotton in- dustries in the United States the employment of women has become so universal that men have been driven by it to herd in lumber camps; and the most important centres of cotton industry have, through this exclusion of the men, received the name of "she towns;" and even when the sexes are not separated, the employment of women in factories has caused the housewife to dis- appear; the result being that families working in facto- ries do not have homes of their own, but live in large boarding-houses, thus leading, not only to relaxation of family ties, but to a diminution of parental authority. Not only, however, does the industrial system to-day tend among working people to break up the home, but it is itself responsible for many of the evils which attend marriage, such as those that result from "ma- nages de convenance " and those that result from prostitution. The evils that attend marriages that are made for money have already been treated at some length; it does not seem necessary, therefore, here to do more than recall the fact that although all marital unhappincss does not by any means inevitably result from these, a great deal of it undoubtedly does; moreover, the preva- lence of the idea that marriage can be resorted to for any other purpose than the life association of men and OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 343 women who love one another, creates confused notions about marriage which tend to obscure and diminish its sacramental character. With the disappearance of the sordid motive which now degrades the approaches to marriage, it would be easier to maintain the high ideals of married life that would contribute most to making unhappiness in it improbable. But the greatest boon which collectivism would bestow on the institution of marriage is that it would put an end to prostitution. In an earlier part of this book it was promised that the question how prostitution could be prevented would, in its proper context, be examined. The subject is not an easy or agreeable one to treat; it will be disposed of, therefore, in the fewest words possi- ble. If, however, the treatment of it is summary, it is not so because the subject itself is unimportant. On the contrary, if it is true that collectivism would put an end to prostitution, this alone, for those who can com- prehend the horrors of it, ought to justify the sacrifice necessary to the realisation of it. If it is clear that our present competitive system is responsible for the evil and injustice to both sexes that result from prostitution, then the maintenance of this system is, so far as every one of us by indifference tolerates it, nothing less than a crime. We must begin by making ourselves clear as to what prostitution is. Mere promiscuity of sexual relation does not consti- tute prostitution, for many a woman is unfaithful to her husband many times without losing social consider- ation, provided only she conduct herself with sufficient discretion to avoid scandal. Nor does sexual intercourse for money constitute prostitution; for then prostitution would include all those who marry for money. The real definition of a 344 COLLECTIVISM prostitute is a woman who has intercourse both promis- cuously and for a money reward. In other words, both promiscuity and gain must be united in order to consti- tute a prostitute. Now it is clear that in a collectivist State, because every woman in it received the same income, she would be lifted by this income above the necessity of prostitu- tion for a livelihood. Prostitution is generally the direct result of the dis- grace put upon a woman by loss of virtue. She is turned out of her home and out of her legitimate employment. She has then but one recourse. It is sometimes due to lack of employment; and sometimes to the greater facility prostitution affords for making a livelihood with the least labour. In all these cases the " primum mobile " is the making of a livelihood. As collectivism would remove this "primum mobile," as collectivism would assure a livelihood to every woman upon the single con- dition of her performing her allotted work, there would be practically no motive for prostitution. If she refused to perform her allotted task she would become a pauper — but a prostitute never. For a collectivist State, as has already been stated, would segregate paupers, and not leave them to demoralise its citizens by profligacy and prostitution. It may be objected that society keeps itself pure by casting out women of loose character, and that an inno- cent girl should not be called upon to work at a factory side by side with one who will deprave her if she can. An exhaustive answer to this question would involve a study of the special conditions of each State, the laws of each State, the mental attitude of the people, their tolerance of morality or their intolerance of it. It is a problem common to every society and not to the collec- tivist society alone. This exhaustive study it is not the OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 345 province of this book to undertake ; it must be disposed of, therefore, by the following few general considerations. In the society of the wealthy to-day we are constantly confronted by the same problem as would be presented by a collectivist State, in which prostitution would be rendered impossible by State employment regardless of morality. In other words, wealth does for the wealthy class what collectivism would do for the unwealthy ; it makes prostitution improbable if not impossible. And the wealthy manage to solve the problem of promis- cuity, — every wealthy society for itself in its own way. Again, the likelihood of immorality would be indirectly as well as directly diminished by the absence of prosti- tutes as a class. It has been already intimated that prostitution committed injustice to hoth sexes. By this it was intended to refer to the injustice of exposing our young men to the perpetual temptation furnished by the facilities of prostitution. The whole question of sexual morality is mainly one of suggestion. Take eight men who have grown accustomed to believe that they cannot dispense with sexual connection ; put them in a crew and remove the suggestion that they can obtain relief at any time by substituting therefor the notion of loyalty to the crew or a desire to win a race, and the sexual desire which before seemed uncontrollable practically disap- pears. The moment the race is over, the old suggestion returns, and the night of a boat race has become prover- bial in consequence. The same is true of men who go on hunting expeditions, yachting cruises, into lumber camps, etc. Sexual desire becomes dormant or con- trollable as soon as facilities for gratifying it disappear; the moment the facility returns, the moment they return to the suggestion, once more desire becomes uncontrollable. 346 COLLECTIVISM What, then, would be the consequence if the sugges- tion were minimized by the absence of prostitution altogether ? But this is not all : the men who seduce young girls and married women are men who have learned to gratify their passions through the facility afforded by prostitu- tion. If our youths were never afforded the chance of taking that first step which leads to the facilis descensus^ they would, from the fact of never having gratified their passions, be less likely to undertake to gratify them at the cost of seduction. The suggestion would be absent; all women would tend to be as sacred to a man as his sister; the relation of the brother and sister is due entirely to the absence of suggestion ; he has learned to regard her with an unconscious respect which removes the possibility of erotic suggestion. What actually happens in the small family of to-day could also happen in the larger family of to-morrow. This must not be understood as a contention that collectivism would destroy immorality ; far from it ; the subject is a difficult one and uncomfortable to discuss. All that is claimed is that it might diminish immorality and that it would put an end to prostitution. This last is reason enough for it. In conclusion, then, an intelligently constituted col- lectivism would appreciate the importance of maintain- ing, above all things, the integrity of the home; the common table would therefore be discouraged; the separation of members of a family would be avoided; every family would be encouraged to live permanently in the same house, to adorn the house and make it attractive; and the right of inheritance, limited as described already, would permit of the handing down of all those things which tend to make the home charac- teristic and beautiful from generation to generation, not OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 347 only for a few rich, but for every member of the com- munity alike. Few attacks upon collectivism are more insidious than those which set up as a warning the failure of the numerous attempts at socialism which were made at the beginning of the century in America. All these attempts proceeded upon the plan that men and women could live harmoniously in a so-called colony, sharing a common table and daily brought into dangerous and unavoidable propinquity. The hopelessness of such an experiment is well conveyed in "La Clairiere," and ought to serve as an explanation why our American at- tempts at socialism universally failed. Collectivism does not offer a solution of the sexual problem ; it only eliminates the economic causes of prostitution, and the economic reasons which induce men and women to many for money instead of marrying for love taken in its highest sense. The sexual problem will doubtless always remain a source of ecstasy and rage; it will produce discord in the home and in the street; it will determine political as well as social conflicts; it will serve not only as a scourge, but as the stimulant so insisted on by individualists. It will promote the variety so necessary to evolution, — human as well as natural. It is the instrument of nature for torturing and delighting man which no political scheme can ever eliminate. The attempt to dispense with the home is an attempt to disregard a natural occasion of unhappi- ness which human effort may diminish, but cannot hope entirely to destroy; for the home is the human device for diminishing the effects of this natural occasion of unhappiness upon the happiness and advancement of man. The mistake, therefore, of eliminating the home from the ideal collectivist State cannot be too much insisted upon. For the home is the school and shelter 348 COLLECTIVISM of family afEection and family sacrifice, where men and women learn control over sexual passion and the beauty and happiness of devotion to others. § 3. That Collectivism Would Be Destructive OF Liberty The most formidable objection to collectivism is that it will interfere with liberty. A chapter has already been devoted to studying what liberty is, and the con- clusion has been arrived at that of the three great liber- ties, — freedom from physical restraint, freedom from political oppression, and freedom from want, — the first seems to have been practically as well as theoretically solved ; the second has been theoretically but not practi- cally solved ; and the third has not been solved at all. The question presented in this section is capable of being more clearly stated now that the economy of col- lectivism has been explained ; it divides itself into two parts: Does collectivism offer a practical as well as a theoretical solution of the problem presented by the effort to attain political liberty; and Does collectivism furnish any solution at all of the problem presented by the effort to attain economic liberty. Of these two, let us consider the last first. (a) Economic Liberty Mr. Spencer adopts Sir Henry Maine's theory that social life must be carried on by either voluntary co- operation or compulsory co-operation ; " the system must be that of contract or that of status, — • that in which the individual is left to do the best he can by his sponta- neous efforts, and get success or failure according to his OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 349 efficiency, and that in which he has his appointed place, works under coercive rule, and has his apportioned share of food, clothing, and shelter."^ This theory fails to recognise that the system of con- tract under the competitive system, far from permitting a large element of liberty, is one which, on the contrary, submits the community which adopts it to a condition of economic despotism. The actual experience of the last century in its effort to realise so-called liberty of con- tract has demonstrated that under competitive conditions liberty of contract is impossible. A community which adopts or consents to the competitive system deliberately puts into power a despot more evil than Nature, — for the Market favours a few at the expense of the many without securing for the favoured few the fertility essential to the wholesome perpetuation of the race. Now if the tyranny of the Market makes liberty of contract impossible ; if in addition, by favouring an un- fertile few at the expense of the fertile many, it exercises a debilitating and demoralising effect upon the race, it fails not only in securing the liberty which Spencer claims for it, but also in realising those conditions which have been laid down as essential to the attain- ment of justice. So much depends upon this part of the argument that no excuse ought to be necessary for dwelling a moment upon it. Until the revolutions which in England and France substituted constitutional government for that of abso- lute monarchy, the mass of men were subject to indi- vidual lords ; the tyranny exercised over them was an individual tyranny, — that of one man over another. The forces which overthrew the individual tyrant were those of industry and commerce. But in dethroning 1 "A Plea for Liberty." Introduction, p. 6. 350 COLLECTIVISM the king the merchant did not secure liberty; he only changed tyrants. The new tyranny is one of condi- tions or institutions, such as the tyranny of the Market, tlie Trade Union, Employers' Associations, and Trade Alliances. The new tyranny is in one sense less obvious than the old ; it is perhaps less humiliating ; but it is none the less destructive of liberty. Nothing need be added to the chapter on Private Property in order to demon- strate that the vast majority are the slaves of the par- ticular occupation through which they earn their daily bread. If the tyranny of the Market secured a living under reasonable conditions for all, it might still be endured ; but in this it fails lamentably. It grinds humanity as in a mill, and its results sorted out are : a very few mil- lionaires; some men of moderate fortune; a mass of workingmen on the ragged edge of want; and a daily renewed fifth of prostitutes, criminals, lunatics, and paupers. Again, if the tyranny of the Market wrought out of the misery it occasions some lasting moral good to man- kind, then, too, it might be endured. But except that it is part of the engine of tribulation out of which some sanctity emerges, but much more despair, the direct tendency of the Market is to promote selfishness and deceit. The substitution of the tyranny of the Market for that of the absolute Monarch, then, is not only degrad- ing to the morality of mankind, but fails to furnish security from want. Does it secure political liberty ? OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 351 (b) Political Liberty Spencer is himself a witness that the existence of this system, even under popular forms of government, does not secure political liberty; he says: "How little the men who drew up the American Declaration of Inde- pendence and framed the Republic anticipated that after some generations the Legislature would lapse into the hands of wire-pullers; that its doings would turn upon the contests of office-seekers ; that political action would be everywhere vitiated by the intrusion of a foreign element holding the balance between parties; that electors, instead of judging for themselves, would habitually be led to the poll in thousands by their ' bosses ; ' and that respectable men would be driven out of public life by the insults and slanders of profes- sional politicians." 1 Under no competitive scheme of government that has ever been suggested has political liberty been in fact attained, and neither Herbert Spencer nor any individ- ualist has ever shown us how, under the competitive system, the vicious circle through which political revo- lutions have despairingly revolved can ever be broken. So long as ninety-nine hundredths of the working popu- lation are engaged all day in the labour necessary to earn a bare living, these ninety-nine hundredths can neither study their own needs nor understand their own misfortunes, nor watch the government, nor effect the necessary combinations to secure the execution of their collective will. They are committed by economic con- ditions to ignorance, and delivered by both to the machine and to the boss. It would seem, then, that a careful analysis of our 1 Introduction to "A Plea for Liberty," p. 13. 352 COLLECTIVISM existing conditions demonstrates that not only do we fail to enjoy liberty, whether political or economic, but that the competitive system is destructive of both. Let us, then, begin the study of how far collectivism affects liberty by ridding our minds of the assumption that individualism favours it. Most students are inclined to accept without scrutiny the assumption that individualism means liberty, and collectivism restraint. This is the assumption implied by the title, "A Plea for Liberty," a book written by a group of individualists already quoted. But it is demonstrable, on the contrary, that individualism is destructive of political liberty ; and that it makes eco- nomic liberty impossible. We are now in a position to push the analysis of liberty a step farther, and inquire how far it is inaccurate to say that individualism is consistent with personal liberty — or security from per- sonal restraint. (c) Personal Liberty The question of liberty is to-day fundamentally a question of economics. Before the merchant turned the soldier out of the political arena, the minority ruled the majority by military organisation. The condition of inequality produced by the military plan is perpetu- ated by the economic, no workingman being able to lift himself out of his condition unless possessed of extraordinary genius or favoured by such conditions as lately presented themselves in the United States. By this, however, it is not meant to imply that the revolution which put the merchant in power instead of the feudal lord brought no improvement. On the contrary, it has conferred upon the workingman a boon of priceless value; for it has given him the OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 353 political franchise, — that is to say, it has put into his hands a weapon by the use of which he can secure all the liberties, provided economic conditions permit of its intelligent employment. Unfortunately, economic con- ditions are such that the workingman is as yet unable to wield the weapon which political revolutions have put into his hand. He is learning to use it; the informa- tion he is acquiring in his trade unions is teaching him to use it; but they may not be teaching him to use it wisely, and there is probably no greater danger now menacing civilisation than the possible misuse of this weapon by the proletariat. The enemy of liberty, then, to-day is economic both in the sense that the Market, which is the economic despot of us all, keeps down wages, thereby making four- fifths of our population slaves to their employ- ment, and in the sense that, so long as wages are kept down, the entire energy of this four-fifths of the popula- tion is consumed in making bread, there is no surplus energy left at the end of the day for political instruction, combination, or efficiency ; or perhaps it would be more correct to say there is just surplus energy left for polit- ical combination, but not enough for political and eco- nomic instruction, and without instruction combination is a menace to the State. Keeping the economic char- acter of the problem clearly in our minds, let us now compare the degree of personal liberty attainable under existing conditions with the degree of personal liberty attainable under a collectivist State. Liberty has been defined to be the freedom, consistent with security, from physical restraint, political oppression, and want, and with a high degree of socialisation; it has been roughly stated that, as regards physical restraint, the problem has been in great part solved ; but by physical restraint has been meant only the restraint exercised by 23 354 COLLECTIVISM imprisonment; it has not covered the physical restraint to which every workingman is put by his employment. And yet this is no small part of liberty. At present it is fully enjoyed only by a few wealthy. Under the collectivist State it would be enjoyed in a great measure by all. The economic character of the problem of liberty has been insisted on because one of the chief claims of collectivism is its economy. Collectivism harnesses all its horses to the same end of the cart. Every human being capable of useful production is encouraged by it to co-operate with every other in producing for the com- mon benefit, instead of being encouraged (as he is in the competitive plan) to do his utmost to prevent his neigh- bour from so doing. It is contended for this system that, taking account of the immense number of men and amount of time now dissipated in the mere work and waste of competition, the diminution of pauperism and crime, and the general enhancement of human pro- ductiveness by diminished hours of toil, the same amount of comfort as is now enjoyed by the middle class could in a collectivist State be enjoyed by all with a daily task on the part of every one of not more than three to six hours, — the shorter period being allotted to the more disagreeable tasks, the longer to the more agreeable. If this be true, then, the liberty enjoyed by the citi- zens of a collectivist State as compared with that enjoyed by citizens to-day is a matter of arithmetic. To-day a workingman's liberty of action is practically confined to one day in seven; for the hours of exhaustion in which he is neither working, eating, nor sleeping during the week days can hardly be counted. In a collectivist State he would have, in addition to the day in seven, one-half of every day, and the hours of exhaustion would. OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 355 owing to the diminution of time spent in toil, cease to be hours of exhaustion and become added to his hours of leisure. When, therefore, individualists, in declaiming against collectivism, hold up liberty as the particular appanage of their system, they are confounding the shadow of liberty for its substance under conditions which furnish a striking example of credulity on the one hand, and, on the other, of their capacity for self-deception. To a nation whose chief wealth is derived from factories where workmen rise at morn to the sound of the factory bell, labour by time according to a factory clock, and are regulated as to rest and recreation by factory hours, the authors of "A Plea for Liberty" in the chapter entitled "A Plea for Liberty /or Za&oitr," denounce collectivism as a "conception of life or conduct" which would compel men " to rise at morn to the sound of a State gong, breakfast off State viands, labour by time, according to a State clock, dine at a State table sup- plied at the State's expense, and to be regulated as to rest and recreation." The only points in which the State despotism de- nounced in this paragraph differs from the factory des- potism actually in force are points as to which the individualist author is altogether wrong. Collectivism does not involve "dining at a State table," and the form of collectivism under discussion, which upholds the family as the most precious of human institutions, expressly disclaims it. In other respects the two des- potisms are exactly the same, save that individualism exercises its tyranny upon every waking hour of a work- ingman's life, and by so doing deprives him not only of personal liberty, but also of that which is political and economic; whereas the so-called collective despotism would exercise its so-called tyranny during less than 356 COLLECTIVISM one-half of a man's waking hours, would secure him absolute economic liberty, and furnish him the leisure for securing him political liberty also. (d") Summary and Conclusion In our first inquiry into the meaning of the word *' liberty " we had to content ourselves with an incom- plete analysis, because the ideas of it entertained under our existing competitive system are so distorted by the system, and our language contains so many of the errors regarding liberty incorporated within the terms which we have to use in describing it, that, so long as no other than the competitive system was before our minds, it was impossible to reach a final conclusion regarding liberty. For the purposes of analysis, therefore, we began by dividing liberty into three kinds : First, jDcrsonal liberty, or freedom from restraint. Second, political liberty, or freedom from despotic government. Third, economic liberty, or freedom from want. Of these, the first was described as freedom or secu- rity from such personal restraint as imprisonment, and we had to content ourselves with this superficial notion of personal liberty. The second, or political liberty, was described as freedom or security from despotic government, security consisting mainly in the faculty afforded by the electoral franchise for turning out a government if it became despotic or obnoxious. This, again, was a superficial interpretation of the phrase " political liberty," because it failed to take account of the fact that a nation might be in the nominal possess- ion of the electoral franchise and yet the vast majority be disfranchised by economic conditions. OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 357 Adopting these provisional and superficial accounts of personal and political liberty, we concluded that in the most civilised countries to-day we had secured per- sonal liberty, had theoretically, but not practically, secured political liberty, and had failed to secure econo- mic liberty altogether. The further conclusion was reached that, under the competitive system, economic liberty, or security from want, was impossible except for a very small minority. A study of collectivism presenting an economic con- dition which ought to diminish by one-half the labour of every individual in a community, and thus create a leisure during one-half of every day for every individual therein, and a very brief examination of the conditions created by such a system, serve to show that the leisure so created is the real equivalent for liberty, — that we have heretofore contented ourselves with the shadow instead of the substance, — with appearing to enjoy liberty when in fact we were not enjoying it. The reason of this will best be understood by considering for a moment what are the fundamental problems which the political student is called upon to solve. In a previous volume ^ it was pointed out that there were certain conditions imposed upon us by nature which man can never eliminate by art. In so far as these conditions are hostile to happiness, the best he can do is by art to diminish the extent of this hostility. The task of the sociologist and political student is to examine the systems adopted by man to diminish this hostility, with a view to determining whether they are the best systems possible. Among the conditions imposed by nature which contribute both to his happiness and unhappiness are two instincts which are necessary to his existence. 1 Government, or Human Evolution, pp. 307-316, 338-342. 358 COLLECTIVISM One is the instinct of self-preservation, which sets man upon furnishing himself with food, clothing, shelter, and physical comforts, and gives rise to what may be called the economic problem of society. The other is the instinct of self-perpetuation, which gives rise to the sexual problem. The two instincts which set man upon the solution of these two problems are overmastering. If, in a given community they ceased to be overmastering, the community would disappear. Of the two, perhaps the economic comes first, because in the life of man it precedes the other and acts upon him every hour of every day, whereas in the life of man the latter comes subsequently to the former and acts upon him fitfully rather than all the time. Theoreti- cally, therefore, the economic problem comes before the sexual problem. In fact, however, under the competi- tive system, the sexual problem becomes also an econo- mic problem ; so that it may be said that the economic problem is immeasurably the more important of the two. Moreover, the extent to which economics are the basis of all our problems — political, social, and religious — becomes clear when we remember that food, clothing, and shelter a man must have. It is only after these are provided that he can satisfy, or even entertain, his spiritual, intellectual, and moral aspirations. The first, fundamental — the essential — problem, therefore, for every community, is how to obtain food, clothing, and shelter for all. The slavery imposed by it is a natural slavery, shared by the savage and the lower animal. It is one at which, in this world, it is useless to complain. These three things, food, clothing, and shelter, must somehow be secured. The question humanity has to solve is how these things can be secured with the greatest safety and with the least effort. As a matter of fact, the history of civilisation OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 359 is the history of a long attempt to solve this problem ; and because it is complicated with another natural law known as " the survival of the fittest," it has given rise to the competitive system under which we now live, and which individualists defend as the best of which man is to-day capable. The coUectivist answers by pointing out that the survival of the fittest is a natural law which, ever since the dawn of civilisation, man has been more or less unconsciously engaged in combating, and one which he has succeeded already, to a large degree, in eliminat- ing from social conditions ; that his efforts, however, in eliminating the application of this cruel and unjust law to social conditions, have had for effect to prevent the extermination of the weak only on the condition of maintaining them in the miserable existence endured by the pauper, the criminal, and the insane ; that, in so far as the competitive system still prevails among us, it constitutes a mill the unlovely product of which mercy compels us to support in lunatic asylums, peni- tentiaries, and almshouses ; that the system is attended by gross and unnecessary economic waste ; and that it is so exacting upon the time and energy of the race that, except for a small and favoured few, it practically deprives them of liberty altogether; that, in a word, given the simple problem of how a given community should procure for itself food, clothing, and shelter for every individual in it, the plan adopted by the com- munity for solving it under the competitive system is one which if, as illustrated at the opening of the chapter, a drayman were to apply to the harnessing of his team, we should regard the drayman as insane ; that the problem has been complicated by the applica- tion thereto of the competitive system, whereas, as a matter of fact, it is a comparatively simple one. Re- 360 COLLECTIVISM turning to the illustration with which this chapter opened, if a drayman were to hitch his three horses to different parts of liis cart, so that they work against one another in different directions instead of working with another in the same direction, the problem of get- ting his cart to market would be not only complicated but practically hopeless, whereas, if he were to adopt the more rational method in common use among us, the problem of getting the cart to market becomes one which is solved every hour of the day. Collectivism, then, does no more than propose a sane in lieu of an insane method of national production and one which, if substituted, solves the problem of liberty. The natural slavery to which the necessity for food and clothing sets the savage is measured by the number of hours which he has daily to devote to the task of securing them. Men have been engaged, since the be- ginning of the world, in performing only that part of the task which is agreeable, and putting that part of the task which is disagreeable upon others. Thus, in the savage state, the men do the hunting and the women do the rest. In the more advanced stage of civilisation a few men appropriate to themselves the easy and pleas- ant tasks and put the difficult and unpleasant tasks upon the majority; and this exploitation of the majority by the minority has been going on under different forms of government ever since the world began, so that to-day, under forms of government which we call "poj)ular," thanks to the competitive system, the workman is more of a slave, so far as the enjoyment of real liberty is con- cerned, than he was under the despotism of a Genghis Khan. The economic problem presented to humanity is how to secure the necessities and comforts of life with the greatest security and the least effort. It has already been shown that the greatest security can only be OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 361 obtained by collective effort, — that is to say, by associ- ation. The question presented by the collectivist and individualist respectively is: whether in this association individuals are to work against one another, or whether they are all to work together. Now, the claim of the collectivist is that, by constituting the society in such a manner that every individual in it is co-operating with every other individual in it, the problem presented by nature — how to secure food, clothing, shelter, and the comforts of life — will be solved with the greatest security and the least effort; and, as a necessary corollary, the time which every man is obliged to devote to this work by a law of nature, the effect of which we can diminish but never eliminate, will be reduced to the least possi- ble, and the leisure which every individual in the com- munity will enjoy will be increased to the utmost possible. Now, this leisure, as has been stated, is the real equivalent of liberty; for liberty has been defined subjectively as being the faculty to do what one wants, and has been defined objectively to be freedom consistent with the greatest security. Now, in so far as the secur- ing of food, clothing, and shelter involves irksome duties, it is a nahiral and necessary limitation to man's freedom ; and the community which solves the problem how to reduce the hours devoted to irksome duties to the utmost is the community which will best have solved the problem of liberty, for it will have extended to the utmost the hours in which every man will be free to do what he wants. If, therefore, the collectivist is right in claiming that the substitution of collective action for com- petitive action would have for effect to reduce the hours of labour of every man in the community, collectivism is the social scheme which best solves the problem of liberty, for it is only during hours of leisure that a man is really free. 362 COLLECTIVISM And leisure not only gives a man a right to satisfy his subjective notion of liberty, — that is to say, the right to do what he wants, — but it also solves the problem of political liberty ; for it gives him the time indispensable to acquiring a knowledge of the needs of the community, for determining the political action necessary to satisfy these needs, and for combining to make that political action effectual. Revising, then, the rough, incomplete, and superficial classification of liberty with which we had to content ourselves in the chapter devoted to this subject, and viewing liberty from the point of view of the collectivist State, the following conclusions seem to result from it. First, as regards personal liberty : in so far as by per- sonal liberty is meant freedom from false imprisonment, our present State practically has secured it; but in so far as it means freedom to do what a man wants to do, as opposed to doing that which the necessities of life oblige him to do, personal liberty is a part of the economic problem, and, as such, has not been solved under the competitive system at all. The problem of personal liberty is best solved under the social scheme, which would enable every individual to perform that part of the task of securing food, clothing, and shelter that is irksome in the shortest possible time, thus leaving him free to do what he wants during as large a number of waking hours as possible. This is the result claimed for collectivism. Second, as regards political liberty: it will be seen that whereas we at present have in our hands the electoral franchise, — that is to say, the machinery through which we can, theoretically, turn out a bad government and put in a good, — the vast majority is, as a matter of fact, so overworked that it has no leisure OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 363 either intelligently to frame a political programme or, when framed, to enforce it; so that our political ma- chinery rusts from disuse, and we remain subject, as before, to the despotism of the minority. Collectivism solves this problem, in the first place, by simplifying the problem of government, through the elimination of the economic complications that result from the competitive system ; and, in the second place, by giving every indi- vidual leisure in which to follow day by day the action of the government, and to combine, whenever neces- sary, to secure the execution of the collective will. It is only, therefore, through collectivism that political liberty can be really attained. In the third place, collectivism solves the economic problem or furnishes to all equally security from want. It seems, then, that it is only by a collective form of government that the three great liberties can be enjoyed, not only in semblance, but in fact. And with the enjoyment of real liberty comes eman- cipation from different forms of subjection to which men and women are to-day exposed. The tyranny of the Market, which is the necessary product of the competi- tive system, and is bearing mercilessly upon us all, for- bidding the few who have wealth and are willing to be generous from being generous, and committing the rest, who have no wealth, to a life of hopeless toil and daily anxiety, — this tyranny disappears, and with the disap- pearance of it disappears also the problem of the unem- ployed and the slavery of prostitution, of pauperism, and in great part of crime. And of all the contentions made by the individualist in favour of the competitive system, none, perhaps, now seems more ironical than the contention that the com- petitive system develops character. It has already been pointed out that, if by character is meant selfish- 364 COLLECTIVISM ness, ferocity, and lust, then the competitive system does favour this development; but if by character, on the contrary, is meant the faculty of self-control, of self- sacrifice, and the attending virtues which arise out of the social state because they are indispensable to it, then it will be seen that the competitive system tends to render this character impossible, whereas collectiv- ism promotes these qualities all the time. Last, but not least, the competitive system creates an environment to which the vast majority of the individ- uals of a community are unconscious slaves. The work- ingman does not know the extent of his slavery, — the deo"ree to which he becomes a mere part of the machinery which he keeps in motion. The business man, the bank president, whose daily life in another place has been described, — nay, the members of our government, who appear to enjoy positions of authority, — are themselves unconscious of the daily habits to which they are not- knowing slaves. The compulsion which the competitive system puts upon every workingman, whether he works with his brains or with his hands, moulds him contrary to his conscience and contrary to his will. The more compelling the environment, the more hopeless it is for the individual to criticise or resist its action upon him. It is in hours of leisure only that a man is released from the subjection of the environment, and it is during the hours of leisure that he can learn to emanci- pate himself from the slavery of the environment and develop whatever there is in him of individual good. That the leisure afforded by collectivism will be applied by many to mere relaxation and idleness is undoubtedly true, but that every man wlio has in him the rendering of some social service will have leisure for that service is equally true; so that the faculty of social service which we see now daily crushed out of men by the neces- OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 365 sities of competitive life will in all of them have in the collective State the fullest opportunity for the freest exercise. The artist will no longer be subject to the control of the wealthy patron, the writer to the require- ments of the paying public, or the preacher to the regu- lations of an established church or the caprices of a fashionable congregation. During the hours of leisure secured by collectivist economy a man, having his phy- sical needs satisfied, will for the first time be indeed free, and have his time and energy emancipated for the untrammelled satisfaction of spiritual and mental aspirations. § 4. That Collectivism Would Fuknish Insufficient Stimulation It does not seem to occur to those who object to col- lectivism on the ground that it would not furnish suffi- cient stimulation for individual activity, that the curse of our present system is that it so over-stimulates indi- vidual activity as to lead not only to individual but to racial degeneration. This matter has been sufficiently discussed to make it unnecessary to enlarge upon it again ; suffice it to remind the reader that the true art of government would seek to get out of every human being the maximum amount of work of which he is ca- pable, not during the first few years of his life only, but through the whole productive period thereof. Under the present competitive system undue pressure is brought to bear upon us from our infancy : the number of hours which a French child is obliged to spend over his books is recognised now by the highest medical authorities in France as destructive rather than constructive of brain tissue; experiments made upon the attention of men, women, and children have demonstrated that such 366 COLLECTIVISM attention as a child gives to the learning of a lesson can only be maintained without exhaustion for about twenty minutes at a time ; and yet children are called upon in France to spend as much as twelve hours in the day with a book before their eyes. It has been well said that children are saved from insanity by the very inat- tention which teachers are expected to punish and pre- vent. It is probable that one of the principal causes of the superiority of the Anglo-Saxon over the Latin race generally is due to the fact that our children are not so much exhausted by early education as theirs ; but it is also probable that over-education is still an injury to our race, and the increased prevalence of examinations as a condition of preferment is likely, if continued under our present institutions, to increase the temptation to begin the process of cramming at an early age, and to keep it up as long as is necessary for passing exami- nations. And the pressure under which children suffer, owing to the necessity of passing examinations in some cases and the ambition of parents in others, is continued throughout the mature years of life and generally to the grave. Indeed, those men are often the least unhappy who are driven by this pressure to an early death; for they are saved the dreary torments of a long struggle with ill health. The competitive system presents throughout a wasteful, unjust, and merciless plan; every man and woman engaged in the competitive mill, instead of receiving the interested care for the future which characterised the slave-owner of old and char- acterises the cab-driver of to-day, are pitilessly driven by the lash of competition, so as to expend in a few years the energy of an entire lifetime, at the cost of misery to themselves and degeneration to their offsj^ring. As a deliberate plan of government, such a system as OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 367 this is not only immoral but imbecile ; it submits us to a less intelligent regime than that of the slave and of the cab-horse. In this connection it may not be unwise to ask our- selves whether the necessity for stimulation has not been much exaggerated. Those who admire fine phrases more than precise thought will quote in this connection Emerson, who says that " Mankind is as lazy as it dares to be." Nothing can be more untrue. If we judge mankind from the degenerate types produced by the over-stimulation of the competitive system, Emerson may be right. Tramps are lazy ; so also are paupers ; so also are those who have been degenerated by wealth and those who have been degenerated by a tropical climate. But wherever we find man undegenerated, he is characterised by a prodigious activity. We shall be told that this activity is due to the competitive system; what shall we say, then, of children? Who can have failed to notice the perpetual movement in which they delight; the busy toil with which they construct toy castles and ineffectual encampments in the sand; with which they imitate the industry of their parents ; boys playing horses ; girls playing at cookery, and the dress- ing and undressing of dolls ; artificial shops, mechanical toys ; everything, in fact, which permits of their giving activity to the principle of imitation, which is the first expression of their intelligence ? , But those who oppose collectivism when unbiassed by personal interest do so for the most part through defect of imagination ; they insist upon trying to impose col- lectivism upon our own generation, whereas this has over and over again been pointed out to be a mistake. The children of this generation learn to adopt the view of life which they find in their environment. If they be children of healthy and industrious parents, they will 368 COLLECTIVISM be naturally as industrious as is the ant. If, on the other hand, they are children of parents who have been worn out by the competitive system, or of those who have been long affected by wealth, they will either be brought up to try and shirk work, or to believe that they are dispensed from it. This will create two cur- rents of thought, very different in kind but identical in result; for the result of both is the laziness which Emerson so improperly applies to the whole race. In a collectivist State the idea of not working would not occur to a human being from the cradle to the grave. On the contrary, the necessity of working would be as perpetually present to his mind as that of food and drink; none in the community would during the years of production be dispensed from work; and therefore the example of laziness would nowhere be seen. Under these conditions the suggestion of lazi- ness, to which most of the laziness that exists in the world is due, would be entirely absent. Tramps and paupers for the most part are slaves to the suggestion that they can get on without work : this paralyses their nervous centres and makes them unfit for work; and just as persons believing themselves paralysed and bed- ridden for years have been known to jump out of bed on the cry of "fire," so the pauper and the tramp, when the suggestion under which they labour is removed and another will substituted for their own, are found j)retty nearly as able and willing to work as others. This has been amply demonstrated in the labour colonies of Bel- gium and Holland. The power of suggestion involves two elements: first, an enfeebled bodily condition which renders an individual subject to suggestion; secondly, the example of laziness which makes the sug- gestion possible. Now a collectivist State would rid the race of both of these elements; for there need be OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 369 neither the over-exhaustion which tends to subject men to the force of suggestion, nor the example of laziness which tends to create the suggestion itself. Under these conditions, habits of industry are likely, under a collectivist State, to be not only more contin- uous but more universal than under our own. It may be objected, however, that although habits of industry will suffice to keep a people alive, they will not suffice to advance a people along the line of progress. For this purpose it would seem that something more than habit is necessary, and that the competitive system alone can furnish this kind of stimulus. In order to test this objection it may be well to consider for a moment of what elements stimulus to exertion, outside of habits of industry, is made up. Obviously men will not do more work than their habits direct unless such work is either aimed at the avoidance of pain or done in the pursuit of pleasure. The aim of the collectivist system is to reduce pain; it need not, however, for that reason diminish the element of stimulus which consists in the pursuit of pleasure. If we analyse the motives which induce men to engage in scientific research, they will be found to consist mainly of three distinguishable motives : curiosity, the pleasure which accompanies doing anything that we are fitted to do, and a desire for consideration or fame. Now, curiosity will be enhanced rather than dimin- ished in the collectivist State, because it is killed in most of us by the overwork involved in earning our daily bread. Curiosity is consistent only with a certain freshness of the mind and body: a horse, when first taken out of the stable, will observe and shy at every object in his path ; but as soon as he becomes fatigued he will cease to take notice of these things altogether. 24 370 COLLECTIVISM The same thing is true of ourselves in a long day's walk. We are all of us familiar with the eager interest we take in a new book during the first hours of reading, and how the interest flags as the brain grows weary; and we are all familiar with the fact that young men who are keenly interested in scientific subjects at the University lose all interest in them when their minds are worn out by professional labour. Obviously, then, if collectivism prevents both mental and physical ex- haustion, curiosity will be enhanced by it rather than diminished. Moreover the pleasure which accompanies the doing of anything that we can do well is like curiosity in the fact that it is consistent only with the absence of fatigue, and that when fatigue is absent the pleasure of work is in itself stimulus enough. But of the three elements which go to make up the stimulus for human action, none is as powerful as the desire for human consideration. As has been already pointed out, once we are beyond the reach of hunger, the race for wealth becomes, in fact, a race for human consideration; but the race is distorted in its purpose and disgraced in its methods by the substitution of the means for the end, — of wealth for affection. So long as men desire the affection of one another, — and we cannot conceive of men ceasing to desire this, — so long they will have always the stimulus necessary for the fullest development and use of all their mental capacities. The conclusion, then, to which we seem to be led, is that the effect of collectivism would be to diminish the stimulus that results from pain and enhance that which results from pleasure. All trainers of animals will bear witness to the fact that, of these two stimuli, pleasure is the more potent. Nor is it otherwise with OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 371 the human race. Every individual, too, in a collectivist State, would have a stimulus for the rapid performance of his work, in the fact that, through the adoption of the piece-work plan, the sooner the daily task was accom- plished, the more time he would have for himself. This time he could devote to securing means of enjoyment and all such specific advantages as a man can furnish his family and himself without making these means of enjoy- ment an opportunity for oppressing his fellow man. And if to these direct sources of pleasure to himself there be added all those pleasures connected with efforts to advance the general good, the dignity of such efforts, and the social position which success in these efforts commands, clearly there is in the collectivist State no lack of stimulus. All that collectivism does, then, is to diminish the stimulus of pain; it enhances that of pleasure. § 5. That Collectivism Would Be Aktificial or Contrary to Nature It ought not to be necessary, after all that has been already written about nature, to deal at any length with this objection. It has been pointed out before that all civilisation is contrary to nature. In the natural state men hunt and devour one another; every device which man has invented to diminish the rigour of climate, his method of preparing food, — in a word, everything which distinguishes man from beast, — is artificial or contrary to nature. There is nevertheless a principle underlying this objection which is sound ; for there are friendly forces in nature as well as hostile, and it is when we violate or ignore these friendly forces that we are guilty of error or even crime. The objection, therefore, that 372 COLLECTIVISM collectivism is contrary to nature must be examined in order to test whether there is in it anything which vio- lates a friendly law of nature, or one which, even though not friendly, is imperative. In other words, is there anything in collectivism which is unwholesome, immoral, or unwise? A full answer to this question involves an answer to every objection that can be raised to collectivism, one after the other. This has been already in great part attempted. All, therefore, that will be added here is to point out that in its essential characteristics collec- tivism is less artificial, less contrary to nature, than our present system. For the two systems differ mainly in the fact that whereas our present system admits pri- vate property, collectivism admits it only to a very small degree; and it has been already pointed out that the recognition of private property by a community is a device peculiar to man. In nature we find two main theories of property: First, among insects that live in communities there is the theory of property in the community alone, and, secondly, among those that do not live in communi- ties there is the theory of private property for those who are strong enough to claim it; but there is seldom any recognition of private property in the individuals of a community or pack. Among the solitary carnivora the sense of private property is most highly developed, but it is defended only by its owner. In the larger carnivora private property is defended by violence; among the smaller rodents it is defended by stealth. Squirrels hide their store of nuts; seldom outside of man is private property respected. Even when carnivora unite, as wolves do to hunt in packs, there is no recog- nition of private ownership by the pack; every wolf takes what food he can for himself, the strongest get- OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 373 ting most, the weakest least. In no community in nature does there seem to be the recognition of the right of one member to accumulate for himself, in order, by such accumulation, to command the services of other members. Now this is the essential feature and the essential evil of private property and of our existing system. Collectivism proposes to eliminate just this : it pro- poses to recognise private property only in those per- sonal effects the accumulation of which can never enable one man to control the services of another; all those things, on the contrary, the accumulation of which could control the services of men, are owned by the entire community. Now, this is the system that we observe in the most highly developed communities furnished by nature, in the hive of the bee and the hill of the ant. Collectivism is therefore less artificial than individu- alism. Again, the competitive system, as has been already pointed out, occasions distress, owing to the tendency of production power to outstrip purchasing power. Outside of man food is secured and accumu- lated directly for consumption; under our existing in- dustrial system food, clothing, and the other necessaries of life are produced or manufactured, not for consump- tion, but for money. There may be a glut of food and clothing in the Market, and yet thousands suffering from the want of both because they have not the money to pay for them. This is highly artificial ; highly con- trary to nature. Collectivism, by eliminating the dis- tressful factor of money, is returning to nature. Here, again, the collectivist plan is less artificial than our own. 374 COLLECTIVISM § 6. That Collectivism Would Be Prejudicial TO Art Those who are impressed by the fact that art seems to have flourished most prosperously at periods of great wealth are disposed to believe that collectivism, which is ineradicably associated in the minds of the ignorant with the disappearance of wealth, would necessarily in- volve the disappearance of art also. The fallacies attending this reasoning are numerous. Collectivism, as has been already explained, by no means involves disappearance or even a diminution of wealth. On the contrary, it is believed that collectiv- ism will greatly increase collective wealth. It is true that collectivism means the disappearance of enormous fortunes in the hands of a small minority, and if the possession by a very few persons of great wealth is nec- essary to the cultivation of art, then indeed must it be admitted that collectivism would be injurious to art; but the notion that an accumulation of large wealth in the hands of a few persons is necessary to the cultivation of art is wholly wrong. Undoubtedly, under the com- petitive system, such an accumulation of wealth in the hands of a few is necessary to the cultivation of art, because, art being a luxury, no one can indulge in it who has not great wealtli, and so art has been the first to suffer when a period of wealth has been succeeded by a period of poverty; but with the concentration of wealth in the State, the extent to which art will prevail will depend, not upon the taste of a few individuals, but upon the wealth of the community, and if it has been proved that a larger degree of wealth can be main- tained, under a collectivist form of government, with less labour than under a competitive form, then the great obstacle to the cultivation of art will be removed, OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 375 for the principal obstacle which now stands in the way of the cultivation of art is the necessity under which the artist labours of earning bread. Collectivism, then, does not involve the diminution of wealth. Under our present system wealth is con- centrated in the hands of the few at the expense of the many. Collectivism will concentrate wealth in the State for the benefit of the many, and it is believed that this concentration will result in greater wealth than has ever been known before. It is also believed that, owing to the economy of production and distribution, every individual in the community will have a much larger share of luxury than under existing conditions ; that no one willing at all to work will lack either the necessaries or the comforts of civilised life ; and if this be true it should not be difficult to show that collectiv- ism, so far from prejudicing art, will, on the contrary, greatly enhance it. Before, however, further considering the effect of collectivism on art, let us consider briefly the effect upon art of our existing competitive system ; for it is difficult to conceive of conditions more hostile to the development of art than those which prevail to-day. If art suffers by poverty, it suffers almost to the same extent by wealth ; no artist can live unless he can sell the product of his labours. He is to this extent, there- fore, the slave of the wealthy. The standard of his art is set not by his own ideal, but by the ideal of the patron for whom he works. If his patron be a Julius the Second or a Lorenzo de Medici, he may produce the work of a Michael Angelo, but if his patron be a Chicago pork-packer or a Manchester cotton-spinner, his work is more likely to be that which we so often find disgracing the walls of our modern exhibitions. Unfortunately such patrons of art as marked the 376 COLLECTIVISM periods of Pericles and of the Renaissance are rare. The tendency of commercialism is to degrade standards rather than elevate them, and under these circumstances it is not a matter of surprise that wealth should have produced more bad art than good, or that to-day it should be engaged in diverting genius from working out high ideals of art in order to immortalise the fea- tures of voracious middlemen. But commercialism tends not only to degrade art by the general lowering of its standards, but it degrades the artist by forcing him to expedients which charac- terise promoters of patent medicines. The artist must advertise. He rarely can support life while he waits for an artistic public to court his studio. The public is engaged, not in collecting works of art, but in making money ; and only a very few, therefore, devote any con- siderable part of their time to art. We find, therefore, artists combining, as merchants do, for the purpose of bringing their works before the eyes of reluctant pur- chasers. They organise exhibitions, salons, art asso- ciations, and these promptly get into the hands of the most skilful manipulators among them, so that genius tends to be excluded from the very exhibitions organised in order to bring genius to public notice. Sometimes the organisation of art and literature is left to the State; it was George III. who instituted the Royal Acad- emy; Richelieu who created the Academy in France. But the art institution, like all other human institu- tions, is promptly captured by an intelligent and interested minority, who use the institution to advertise themselves at the expense of the institution and the object for which it was constituted. And so Whistler never gets into the Royal Academy, and the doors of the Immortals are closed to Balzac and to Alphonse Daudet. OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 377 Commercialism, too, creates the dealer. In the days of the soldier the patron of art went himself to the artist's studio and commissioned him to create after his own imaginings. But the merchant and manufacturer are too busy "higgling" and manufacturing to search for art. Just as by the power of the purse they converted the mediseval knight into the modern mercenary, so to- day they impose their standards upon art through their control of the Academy and of the dealer. It is the dealer to-day — the eternal middleman — who visits the studios; and the dealer commissions the artist, not to paint as his heart may inspire, but to supply the demand of Birmingham and Manchester. It is true the dealer sometimes educates the Acad- emy. The first paintings of Burne-Jones were refused by the Academy. A dealer — and the world owes him thanks — took up Burne-Jones, invested largely in his paintings, needed the talismanic letters R. A. to raise prices to a maximum ; and so Burne-Jones became an Academician. But our dealer and Academy alike weighs the tyranny of the Market. And the Market in art means portrait- painting and the commonplace. Royalty, too, exer- cises an influence on literature and art. In Germany both are harnessed to the chariot of the Hohenzollerns. In England the throne lifts from obscurity a Belli, a Winterhalter, and an Edgar Boehm. It condemns London to the sculpture that disgraces the ancient site of Temple Bar. And because Royal Academies, aldermen, and State institutions at large become captured by commercial- ism, the individualist rails against all interference of the State with art whatever. But State intervention is in some fields of art essen- tial; it is essential, for example, in that of architec- 378 COLLECTIYISM tures no other instrumentality can replace it. In order to be persuaded of this we have but to compare the architecture of our American cities, where individualism has been allowed to run riot, with cities in Europe where the State has at certain periods been allowed to exercise a beneficent control. The only city in the United States which has any claim to beauty is Wash- ington, and Washington was laid out and in great part built by the State. In New York every public square is disgraced by the incongruity of buildings put up to suit individual tastes and individual necessities. At the very gateway of Central Park is a block of build- ings which may serve as a comment on individualism in architecture. On the south corner is a huge Astor hotel nearly twenty stories high, with a showy fagade a few yards wide on Fifth Avenue and about an acre of hideous brick exposed on its side and rear. Next to it comes a building one-third its height, put up and occu- pied by a grocer. Next to this is a brick building about a third of the height of the grocer's ; and next again, on the north corner, a wooden shanty one story high occupied by a liquor saloon. In Paris, the beautiful city of the world, the most beautiful of the public places have been laid out entirely by the State. The Place Vendome was built in one piece by Louis XIV., the Place de la Concorde by Louis XV., and the Place de I'Etoile by the Empire. All the great buildings which at every corner delight the eye have been built by the State, — the Louvre, the Luxembourg, the old Palais de Justice, the Sainte Chapelle, the Pantheon; and within a few months the In- valides, heretofore lost to view on the other side of the river, has been brought within the landscape effect of the Champs-Elys^es by a bridge and two State buildings. If a city is to be beautiful, it can be so only through the collective action of the State. OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 379 Again, if our landscapes are to be saved from the factory and the railroad, it can be accomplished only through the collective action of the State. And if State institutions have heretofore fallen into the hands of an interested minority, it is because State institutions themselves are subject to a higher sov- ereignty than the State, — the sovereignty of the Market. Very few are alive to the extent to which industrial- ism is responsible for the ugliness of our modern life. Nowhere is this perhaps better illustrated than in approaching a picturesque town by train. Railroad builders, in laying their tracks and designing their yards, have considered nothing but how to secure the largest profits from the least expenditure. The result of this is that they have never sought to conceal their work when unsightly, or adorn it when capable of adornment. Upon approaching, therefore, such a town as Angers, it is difficult to believe in its traditional pic- turesqueness, so thoroughly has the railroad builder devastated that portion of it where the traveller lands. It is only after the traveller has got entirely beyond the reach of the railroad builder that he discovers the beau- ties of the place. This is true of almost every pictur- esque town in the civilised world. Under a collectivist form of government the object to be secured is not the making of money, — it is the happiness of the people ; all would, therefore, be equally concerned in so disposing of the railroad plant as to conceal it where it could not be adorned. Where it was possible, tracks would be sunk ; and on the other hand, when they must be raised, they would be laid upon viaducts that would add to the landscape rather than detract from it. There are few things more beautiful than an artistically con- structed bridge. There are few things more painful to 380 COLLECTIVISM the eye than a raiboad bridge constructed with regard only to economy. Many artists have undoubtedly sym- pathised with Ruskin in his onslaughts upon railroads, but they seem none of them to have appreciated that the hideous results of railroads were mainly due to the sacrifice of every consideration to that of making money. There is nothing in the modern spirit incon- sistent with the highest art provided only this sordid motive for economy were eliminated. By this it must not be understood that economy will be a matter of no importance to a collectivist State. On the contrary, economy, in so far as consistent with happiness, should be its special care; the curse of the present system is that economy is practised on the public for the benefit of the few, whereas under a collectivist State economy will be practised by the public for the benefit of all. Any public work that would perma- nently set up an object of ugliness to the public eye would, upon this theory, be a thing not only evil in itself, but evil in its consequences ; for it would be in- consistent with that high standard which it is the special province of collectivism to attain, and would therefore be inconsistent with the happiness and dignity of the people. Illustrations could be heaped one upon another, showing the extent to which beauty is sacrificed by the competitive system. There is hardly a beautiful spot in the civilised world that has escaped the degrading hand of the advertiser. There is hardly a street in our Amer- ican cities which some individual has not, out of regard for his pocket, disgraced either by leaving a portion of it unimproved and exposing thereby the blank party walls of the buildings on either side, or by building to a height grotesquely greater than his neighbours and ex- hibiting his own party walls in all their dreary ugliness high above the adjacent roofs. There is hardly a cathe- OBJECTIONS TO COLLECTIVISM DISCUSSED 381 dral on the continent of Europe which is not crowded ahiiost out of sight by private buildings erected to fill a private purse. Let but once this necessity for collect- ing rent disappear, and the State will have no interest in crowding ; no interest in making one building higher than another; for refusing to build where a building is required by symmetry, or insisting on building where, on the contrary, art demands an open space. The havoc, too, which the existing industrial system is playing with our scenery is a matter for public lamen- tation. Few industries contribute more to this than that of lighting by electricity. The Swiss have discov- ered that waterfalls can be coined into gold ; and coin them into gold they do with reckless disregard for the beauty of their vales. Witness, for example, the Valley of the Inn between the Lake of St. Moritz and Celerina, where, in the space of four hundred yards, two electric lighting ]3lants have been constructed, and one of the most picturesque glades in Switzerland converted into a hideous factory. Before the necessity of making money every consid- eration has yielded and does to-day yield, — considera- tions of beauty, of art, of morality ; it is only by elimi- nating the necessity of making money, or rather by confining compulsory labour to a few hours of every day, that man can become emancipated from the slavery of modern conditions, whether it be for the develop- ment of individual character or for the realisation of artistic ideals. In a collectivist State there will be artists recognised by the State performing their daily task for the beauti- fying of the State. And there will be by their side artists unrecognised by the State; so that if the State be controlled by inartistic people there will be, never- theless, thanks to the leisure furnished by collectivism, 382 COLLECTIVISM free scope for the exercise and development of indi- vidual genius by the side of those favoured by the State. Here is illustrated the essential difference between the collectivist and the individualist scheme of government. In the latter men seem to be free, but are in fact slaves ; in the former men are obviously, during a few hours of the day, subject to State rule, but during the remainder of the day they are in fact free. And the enjoyment of tliis real freedom will have for result to create a freedom in literature, music, and art unknown before. For under the competitive system genius is daily being stifled by the necessity of making bread ; whereas, bread being pro- vided by the few hours of compulsory labour required by the State, the artist, the writer, and the musician will be free during the remaining hours to work out each his own conceptions before a public itself free to appre- ciate them, not under a false standard of exchange value, but for what they have in them that is beautiful and true. PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 383 CHAPTER V practical working of collectivism § 1. Introductory The previous chapters having laid down a few of the general principles of the collectivism proposed for study in this volume, we shall next endeavour briefly to sketch how collectivism can be rescued from the dreamland to which individualists are disposed to consign it and re- duced to a practical programme applicable to-da)^ ; how the change from our present conditions may be slowly effected ; and how the collectivist plan, more or less real- ised, may be made to work so as to combine economy of production with the fullest individual liberty. In one sense of the word collectivism is already a part of our existing political programme, and already to a considerable extent realised. Every public park is a tribute to collectivism. It is the appropriation of land by the State for the enjoyment of the public. The post-office is a demonstration of the utility of collectiv- ism; for through the post-office the State undertakes the collection, transportation, and distribution of letters and small parcels. And the unreasonableness of some individualist opposition to collectivism is made clear when we consider that while no individualist objects to the State carrying small parcels, any programme that would suggest the advisableness of the State carrying large parcels, live stock, or human beings would be stig- matised in the United States as rank socialism. And 384 COLLECTIVISM yet this rank socialism is peacefully and beneficially realised in Belgium and other European States. And in Australia the State not only owns the railroads, but acts as salesman of the products transported. So also in the United States our cities generally own their water- works, but seldom their gas-works ; whereas in England the reverse is true, and correspondingly the ownership of gas by the city is denounced as immoral by owners of gas stock in New York; whereas shareholders in water companies in London look with approval on the ownership by the city of its lighting plant, but condemn city ownership of water-works as dangerous socialism. It seems probable, therefore, that much of the opposi- tion to collectivism is due to so-called "vested interests," • — the vested interests of shareholders in gas and water stock, — and when we remember the riot caused by the rag-pickers when, in 1832, the Parisian authorities for- bade the exposure of rags in the streets owing to the danger of cholera through infection, when we remember that the rag-pickers based their right to indignation and revolt upon their vested interests in rags, and found many individualists to espouse their cause, we may well look with scrutiny upon opposition to collectivism which is marshalled under the banners of "vested interests." § 2. Preparedness of Different Countries FOR Collectivism Singularly enough, the United States presents a strik- ing contrast to the rest of the civilised world as to its maturity for the adoption of collectivism. As regards the actual adoption of the collectivist programme it is behind, but as regards commercial development it is ahead, of other countries. In other words, while in PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 385 Europe and Australia the ownership by the State of public utilities is far more extensive than in the United States, the development of commercial enterprise with us has, in the necessary evolution of individualism under the spur of intelligence, prepared our industries for pur- chase by the State to a singular degree, and presents a remarkable example of how individualism carries within itself the seeds of its own destruction. For just as the freedom of contract which ushered in the industrial revolution of the close of last century carried within itself the seeds that eventually destroyed freedom of contract by the organisation of trade unions, employ- ers' associations and trade alliances, so also competi- tion has ended in the United States by destroying com- petition in many trades through the organisation of trusts. This is, perhaps, due to the fact that, politics not furnishing in our country the prizes offered in Europe, genius has abandoned the political arena for that of business, and the progress made in the develop- ment of business has therefore been more rapid in the United States than in Europe. Under these circumstances it is not easy to decide what country to choose as the arena for our hypothetical collectivism: the United States, which is behindhand in the actual adoption of collectivism and ahead in com- mercial preparedness for it, or some European State where the converse is true. And indeed this suggests one of the difficulties that attends the hypothetical treatment of the question. § 3. Theories of Karl Marx and the Fabians For not only do conditions vary in every State to start with, but it is impossible to conjecture what direction 25 386 COLLECTIVISM the movement may take at the various stages of its de- velopment. Karl Marx was probably wrong in his con- jecture. To him conditions were becoming rapidly worse and worse to the unwealthy, and he therefore con- cluded that they would ultimately become so intolerable that a new social State would be born out of the revolu- tion to which the concentration of capital inevitably seemed to tend. But although capital has in our country continued to become concentrated in a few hands, wages have increased, hours of labour have di- minished, and the small farmer and tradesman, though in certain places harassed and impoverished, cannot at large be said to have been expropriated in accordance with the prophecy of Karl Marx. The same is true in Europe. The Fabian theory of collectivism seems more sound than that of Marx. According to this theory, collec- tivism is to creep upon the ci\dlised world by invisible steps, and is, perhaps, never to be realised in its en- tirety. To this last point it may be well for us to give a few moments' consideration, for it is one upon which there exists a widespread misunderstanding. The first questions a wealthy inquirer is likely to put upon tliis question of collectivism are : " Will there be any domes- tic servants in your collectivism ? shall I Ije able to keep my horses ? where shall I go for my grouse-shooting ? " It is a pit}^ perhaps, that the wealthy are so little alive to the misery occasioned by present conditions as to be unable to accept a programme that looks to the elimina- tion of this misery without first assuring themselves that it shall not interfere with a single one of their comforts and amusements. No wealthy man who was animated by a religious spirit would take this view of a great social problem. But we must reluctantly admit that the number of wealthy who are willing to sacrifice a single PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 387 amusement for the diminution of harlotry and pain are few ; and that if the wealthy are to any important de- gree to become interested in socialism, it must be on the condition that the collectivist programme will not sensibly affect their comforts and may perhaps avert an impending danger. To them, then, let it be at once made clear that collectivism involves no unremunerated expropriation, no spoliation of deer forests, no destruc- tion of game. They may adopt collectivism with as little real sacrifice of personal convenience as when of old the Roman Senators adopted the ritual of Christianity. In- deed, they may derive from it some of the advantages which the corrupt Roman Empire derived from the still honest Christian ofQcial. For just as the days of the Empire were prolonged by the infusion into its admin- istration of Christians unpolluted by the pervading corruption, so the days of the millionaire may be pro- longed by the avoidance of the Revolution prophesied by Karl Marx, and in some countries to-day by no means impossible. Adopting, then, the Fabian theory of gradual rather than revolutionary development, let us consider some of the phases through which this development might pass in our own country, — the United States of America. § 4. Hypothetical Development of Collectivism EST THE United States (a) Present Political Conditions Most cities of the United States are to-day adminis- tered by an organisation primarily constructed for the purpose of keeping control of municipal spoils, and secondarily associated with one of the national parties. In Philadelphia the organisation in control is Republican; 388 COLLECTIVISM in New York it is Democratic. Obviously the party not in control is willing to adopt any policy not too incon- sistent with its national platform which seems likely to oust its rival from the city offices ; it naturally, therefore, comes to pass that the party not in control is generally the party of municipal reform, because in the first place it is the natural ally of the independent reformer, and in the second place, being driven by this chronic though reluctant alliance to favour good and oppose bad administration, it attracts to itself the moral element of the community. There is therefore in every city a national party not in control which is willing to adopt a programme likely to dispossess the enemy, provided this programme be not too violently inconsistent with the national platform. The wage-earner is the element in the voting popula- tion which the party not in control has to secure in order to dispossess the enemy, because, in the first place, he represents a large vote, and, in the second place, he is the natural ally of the organisation in control. Upon this last point it is difficult to be too emphatic. The wage-earner generally supports the organisation in control, however corrupt, for two reasons : In the first place he has little advantage to derive from honest gov- ernment. He pays no taxes; he is not aware of the incidental consequences of high taxes on rent, etc. ; he is secretly and sometimes avowedly pleased to see the rich bled by the organisation to which he belongs. In the second place, if he derives no direct advantage himself from the organisation, his friends and his rela- tives do : one is a barkeeper interested in violating the law regarding early closing; another is a policeman in- terested in levying tribute on the barkeeper, who is himself thankful to be permitted by the protection of the organisation to secure large profits during Sunday PRACTICAL WORinNG OF COLLECTIVISM 389 and late hours by the payment of a relatively small tribute to the policeman ; another is a street-cleaner at two dollars a day; another is a public-school teacher; another is employed in the Building Department, an employment furnishing numerous opportunities for petty plunder. Absence of sensible interest in good government, and an indefined but no less for that reason ineffectual sympathy with bad government, keeps the wage-earner loyal to the organisation in control. He is, however, by no means incapable of revolt against the organisation. On the contrary, the moment the small stake he has in the government is attacked, he at once makes himself felt. The public parks are his, and any attack upon them is at once resented ; the down- throw of Tammany Hall in 1870 was preluded by an out- burst of popular protest against a supposed expropriation of Central Park; and that of 1893 began with the attempt of a few Tammany horse -fanciers to take a strip from the same park for a speedway. Moreover, willing though he may be to see the policeman add to his salary by an occasional present from a willing saloon-keeper, the indignation of the people blazed in New York when it was revealed that the police had become so far corrupt as to extort money from a widow by depriving her of the custody of her children. (5) Extension of Municipal Otvnership and A dministra tio n The wage-earner is therefore by no means irrespon- sive either to an attack upon his own slender rights or to an attack upon the rights of the defenceless. It does not, then, seem unreasonable to believe that he 390 COLLECTIVISM would respond to and support a programme which sen- sibly increased his stake in good government, and by so doing enhanced his value and dignity as a citizen. For example, the high price charged for gas by the private corporations which furnish gas to New York make the use of gas as fuel impossible to the unwealthy, and sub- jects them to the necessity of using coal which they have to buy in small quantities at correspondingly high prices because they have no room to store it. If, instead of having to pay to a private company $1.15 per thou- sand feet for gas, the city were to manufacture its own gas and furnish it, as Glasgow and Manchester do, at fifty cents a thousand feet, the city would be conferring a benefit to every wage-earner which in dollars would mount up to three figures at the end of the year; he would then for the first time realise the advantage of good municipal government and the importance of pre- serving it from jobbery, sinecurism, and corruption. The same is true of transportation. At present the cost of running a street railway by electricity is probably small enough to permit of three-cent fares without loss. The existing companies, capitalised at figures far exceed- ing cost and built in large part with the proceeds of bonds bearing four per cent interest, are making fortunes for their promoters. Were the city to buy these tramways at an honest price, — that is to say, a price that would fairly compensate the promoters, not only for outlay, but also for the courage and ability they have sho^yn in bringing tramways to their present state of improve- ment, — the city would not only immediately save the difference between the four per cent paid by the present companies on their bonds and the high dividends dis- tributed on their stock on the one hand and the two per cent paid by the city on the other, but it would also benefit by the economy it could bring into the original PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 391 cost of new tramways in as yet undeveloped thorough- fares. Municipal ownership and administration of lighting and transportation plants would not only give the wage- earner a substantial stake in the city, but would result in an appreciable saving to him of money and make him for the first part a veritable partner in municipal enter- prises. It is true that such an experiment might not succeed ; it might result in the construction by the city of lines that would not pay ; it might result in extrava- gance ; in a deliberate increase of officials for the pur- pose of increasing municipal spoils and securing political support. And if the carrying out of this programme is left to Tammany Hall, such will probably be the case. But if the programme is presented to the people and carried out by men of conscience such as exist in New York, there still is a chance of its succeeding as well in New York as in Glasgow, Manchester, and other cities of England and Germany. The wage-earners of New York are rapidly learning the value to them of such a programme ; they will one day certainly insist upon it ; the question which men of conscience and education have to decide is whether they will wait to see it increase the power of Tammany Hall, or, by proposing and carry- ing it out themselves, secure for it the advantages economic, political, and moral derivable therefrom. There will, of course, be pessimists to say that the experiment will fail ; to such, two answers can be made : The first, that a properly understood political faith will not permit the possibility of failure to paralyse an effort which is in itself commendable.^ The second, that if the experiment fails, it will only show that our cities are not yet fit for the collectivist programme. It will not prove that the collectivist programme is itself impracti- 1 See book ii. ch. vi. § 3. 392 COLLECTIVISM cal, for European cities have already shown themselves fit for it. That Americans will willingly admit them- selves inferior to other nations in this respect is not con- sistent with American traditions, and need not therefore prevent our proceeding with our hypothetical collectiv- ism. It may take time for the wage-earner to learn the advantages of honesty and the necessity of vigilance. But he will probably learn it at last ; and then he will have fitted himself for a new advance. But assuming the worst, — that he does not, — we shall have then to admit that we are unfit for collectivism, and proceed with our hypothesis in Europe rather than the United States, — an assumption which, be it clearly understood, is believed to be unjustifiable and superfluous. Assuming, then, that eventually a large number of our cities have learned the art of furnishing cheap and good gas and transportation, the next natural step for them to take is to apply post-office methods to the city distribution of coal, ice, milk, and all those things as to the production of which there does not enter the element of skill to an appreciable degree. The foolish manner in which these things are now distributed has already been described ; an economy of certainly thirty per cent would be effected by delivering through one agency from door to door instead of through a thousand agencies at spots widely distant from one another. Municipal dis- tribution, however, need not and should not put an end to private enterprise. Some persons will want to have coal of a particular quality, ice made by a particular process, milk from a particular farm. Let these remain gratified and let private enterprise be allowed to gratify them ; so far let individualism be not only tolerated, but even fostered ; for here we come to a point in our col- lectivist scheme which cannot too much be insisted on. There are certain functions, such as tramways, which are PEACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 393 in their nature monopolies; no more than one pair of rails can be conveniently laid in a street. There are other functions which in their nature partake of mo- nopoly without being essentially so, as, for example, bridges and ferries; there is a limit to the number of bridges or ferries that can be profitably used. There are other functions, such as the distribution of coal, which, while they can conveniently and economically be performed by the city, can at the same time be per- formed by private enterprise. It is no part of intelligent collectivism to refuse to private enterprise all the hberty it needs in those fields where it can be exercised without public detriment ; indeed, it will be later seen that it is upon this liberty that collectivism depends to keep it free from the levelling tendency of which individualists accuse it. (c) Extension of National Ownersliip and Administration While cities are learning to furnish gas and transpor- tation, and to distribute ice, coal, milk, bread, and all the other articles that enter into necessary daily con- sumption, the extension of municipal activity cannot but have its echo in national affairs. One of the national parties will become alive to the fact that what a city can do with city utilities a nation can do with national utilities. It is impossible to predict which of the national parties is most likely first to adopt this pro- gramme. It may seem to-day as though it belonged most naturally to the Democratic party, which poses as the champion of the wage-earner. It must not be for- gotten, however, that the Republican party is endeared to the workingman by the conviction that protection secures him high wages and that it is the party of cen- tralisation, whereas the Democratic party, by repudiat- 394 COLLECTIVISM ing protection, brought about the closing of factories in 1893 and is the party of decentralisation. Moreover, if the municipalisation of public" utilities is to be accom- plished by the educated element in New York, it is the Republican party that must do it, not the Democratic ; while if it is to be so accomplished in Philadelphia, it is the Democratic party that must do it, not the Republi- can, Again, monopolies are being so harried by State legislatures that it is not at all impossible that they may themselves seek salvage at the hands of the national government. For example, the Oil Trust is being attacked in almost every State in the Union; some of these attacks have gone so far as actually to indict the magnates at the head of it. If these attacks become in the future as dangerous as they have been heretofore persistent, it is not inconceivable that the magnates may themselves propose to sell out at a reasonable figure. Now, no city or State could buy out the Oil Trust, for the field of its operations is confined to no city or State, but extends over the whole United States and elsewhere. Under these circumstances it is to the national gov- ernment alone that the Oil Trust could sell ; and it is the Republican party which, both through its traditions in the past and its affiliations in the present, is likely to accomplish such an arrangement with the least diffi- culty. It is impossible, then, to say whicli of the two parties will eventually propose this programme ; the only thing that can be said in the connection with some assurance is, that without doubt the people will ulti- mately insist upon it. Indeed, if to-day either one of the parties could drop every issue save one, — public ownership of public utilities,^ — it would probably sweep 1 This phrase may not be an accurate one, but it has been so currently used in the United States that it has become useful in spite of slight inaccuracy. PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 395 the country with an overwhelming majority. For every man who voted for Bryan in 1896 would vote for this platform, and it would also have the votes of the many workingmen who voted against Bryan, especially in the Eastern States, because they were persuaded that free silver would diminish the purchasing power of their daily wage. Under these circumstances it is possible that the question itself will not become an issue between the parties, but that both parties will take it up, the Republican seeking to centralise the purchase of public utilities in the nation, the Democratic seeking to decen- tralise them in the cities and the States. When this time comes, the danger is that public utilities will be absorbed by the government with inordinate rapidity ; it will undertake more than it will at that time be able to accomplish ; a reaction will set in and Individualism will furnish a wholesome reaction. But if it be, indeed, true that collectivism furnishes the higher ideal of gov- ernment, the truest solution of the economic problem, the only realisation of justice soundly understood, the reaction will give way once more to a further advance; the State will have got rid of its vacuoles.^ Without endeavouring to prophesy at what periods reaction will set in and at what periods collectivism will renew its onward march, let us now consider briefly how the economic changes can^ rather than how they will^ be brought about. {cT) Puhlic Stores Once the cities have learned the art of distributing the necessaries of life, and the nation has learned the art of running railroads and administering the Oil Trust, the Sugar Trust, the Whiskey Trust, and the other large 1 See vol. i, pp. 160. 163. 396 COLLECTIVISM trusts now in existence, the State will have become the owner and manager of enormous business interests. The ownership of the railroads will naturally lead to the ownership of elevators ; the United States will learn a lesson from South Australia and undertake the sale of live stock and farm produce ; the Department of Agri- culture will no longer confine itself, as now, to advice, but will undertake administration. Instead of transport- ing cattle, as Armour once did, from Kansas to Chicago, to be cut up there and returned for distribution as meat to Kansas, the department will either itself institute packing-houses in every suitable centre, or induce the City or State to institute them. And the price of coal being for the most part made up of the cost of transpor- tation, ^ the nation will acquire coal-fields, and thus fur- nish the cities and citizens with coal at a lower price. The government, national and municipal, — which for the purpose of brevity we will now unite in the single word State, — will become the employer of labour to so large an extent that it will be easy to create in all large centres State stores at which goods will be fur- nished at a small profit, presumably lower than at the department stores.^ But goods will be furnished at cost to all those who are provided with State orders. Every official will be given the option to take his wages either in currency, or in State orders, or in both, in the proportion he may name. The State order is at this stage of collectivisyii a transferable order on the public stores expressed in money. If a workman earns two dollars a day and he takes his entire pay in State orders, he will daily receive orders on the public stores for goods 1 In many States, e. g. Colorado, coal can be profitably extracted from the mine at $1 a ton. It costs the consumer $4 to §4.50, 2 The expression " department stores" is used in the United States to mean all large shops in which there are many departments. PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 397 to a value of two dollars. The State order will read: "Good for $ at the public store." As the State order will have an advantage at the public stores, the workman will presumably take at least a part of his wages in State orders ; and as the State order will go to a small premium in view of the advantage to the non-official of securing a part of the favour allowed to these State orders at the stores, it is probable that the official will take all his wages in State orders. Dur- ing this period the State will acquire the experience necessary for determining the exchange value of the commodities sold. It will know the cost to the State of meat per pound, of bread per loaf, of coal per bushel ; it will know the price at which it can be sold to the official with a margin for safety, and the price at which it can be sold profitably to the public without competing too severely with the department stores and private enter- prise in general. The profit made will serve to reduce taxation for all, and to create a sinking-fund for the redemption of bonds issued in purchase of public utili- ties. Public stores mark a great stride towards col- lectivism, for they will lead to the gradual purchase of large tracts of farming-land, the building of improved dwellings, and the slow conversion of the retail dealer into a government official. And they can do this with- out despotism or occasioning distress. A sound scheme for establishing public stores will provide for the issue of bonds necessary to buy up the stock of honest retail- ers who run danger of insolvency through State compe- tition. Public stores will not necessarily occasion more insolvency than department stores. Small retailers have on their side the advantages of neighbourhood, personal acquaintance, and personal taste, and they may continue to have this advantage even in the final development of collectivism, as will be later shown, thus leaving a large 398 COLLECTIVISM latitude for individual enterprise and full scope for the satisfaction of personal taste. Obviously the introduction of public stores marks a phase of development fraught with danger and likely to occasion a reaction in favour of individualism. For if it proceeds too rapidly, the State bonds offered in pur- chase of stock may go to a dangerous discount, and more retailers may apply for State employment than the State can usefully employ. Hence the need for great caution and deliberateness in this part of the programme, — a caution and deliberateness which is likely to be wanting if this movement be left entirely in the hands of dema- gogues or the discontented poor. But if this part of the process is in the hands of such men as to-day manage the administration of large trade unions and successful co-operative stores backed by men of wealth, leisure, and education, it is not inconceivable that it may be introduced with sufficient self-control to avoid either widespread distress or national bankruptcy. In such case the State will already have assumed the principal features of a coUectivist community; that is to say, it will be the owner of a sufficiently large part of the national land and other sources of production to show the results of collectivist economy in higher wages and shorter hours of labour, and State orders will have largely replaced coin as internal medium of exchange. As soon as the State has become a sufficiently large owner of the sources of production to be able to employ all that part of the population which desires State em- ployment without too great a cost, it will then, perhaps, have attained the last stage consistent with human im- perfection; it will not have attained the ideal; but it may take centuries to attain the ideal, and man may be incapable of it altogether. Let us, then, consider a little more closely this phase which for the purpose of brevity we may call Partial Collectivism. PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 399 (e) Farm Colonies — Pauperism, Prostitution, and Crime There is one important function of the State the de- velopment of which has not been considered, — the work of what in New York City was formerly called the Department of Charity and Correction. These branches have lately been separated for administrative reasons, but they form part of the same subject, so far as the student is concerned, for they deal with the same prob- lem, — the treatment of the waste of our population. The subject has been already discussed.^ No more will be added here than is necessary to show how an intel- ligent treatment of this waste will dovetail in to the collectivist programme. The pauper and criminal — an exception being made of the crimes passionels which form a relatively unimportant part of offences now punished in our criminal courts — constitute the waste of our population, — that is to say, that part of it which is un- fitted for social life by moral or physical degeneracy. The Dutch, and more lately the Belgian, method of treating the pauper and the criminal as incapables is the only one that recommends itself to mercy and to common sense. They are put into farm colonies, where they are induced to do the most work possible, and in a manner to contribute most to their own support. The inducement offered is of two kinds : there is a cell with bread and water for the recalcitrant ; and there is a small wage which can be spent in tobacco, tea, and other lux- uries for the industrious. Experience shows that the cell is never used with paupers, and seldom with criminals. Criminals are kept in totally different colonies from 1 Ante, book i. ch. iii. § 7 (a). Poverty ; and Evolution and Effort ; ch. X., The Problem of Pauperism. 400 COLLECTIVISM paupers. It is probable that as yet the differentiation between different classes of criminals and different classes of paupers is extremely incomplete, and that a State which gave proper attention to this, the most burning question of social life, would arrange for a large variety of colonies through which criminals could grad- uate one after another, and thus become ultimately fitted for social life. Moreover, when the State became a large landowner, the difficult problem how to secure employ- ment for the graduate of a pauper colony would be solved. It would then become possible for the State to devote some attention to a fraction of our waste popula- tion that has heretofore proved an insoluble problem, — the prostitute. That a State professing and calling itself Christian should have tolerated all these centuries a con- dition of things under which a woman could be com- pelled by purely economic considerations to join the ranks of harlotry is an admission which no self- respecting man or woman can make without a burning sense of shame. State employment under the same gentle inducements as was suggested for the pauper seems to furnish a simple solution of the problem; but it must be noted that while State employment would in an individualist community be stamped as ignominy because it took the shape of an asylum. State employ- ment need never in a collectivist community bear this stamp, except where the cell has actually to be used. In order to make this distinction clear, the municipality would, before it owned farms of its own, have to create two kinds of colonies, the Voluntary and the Involun- tary, to which those who committed themselves and those who were committed would respectively be con- fined. So long as these so-called voluntary colonies bore the outward and visible sign of employment for the purpose of furnishing relief, tbey would be shunned, PRACTICAL WORKIXG OF COLLECTIVISM 401 and would in the minds of the ignorant be vaguely asso- ciated with prisons and imprisonment. But as soon as the municipality owned farms of its own and opened public stores, then all outward and visible signs of pau- perism would disappear; all unemployed persons will- ing to work would be taken into the employment of the State, and only those unwilling to work would be consigned to the compulsory colony, where no great severity, to judge from existing experience, need be applied, but the indignity attending which most would wish to avoid. Now the day when the State shall have become a sufficiently large owner of land and a suffi,cie7itly extensive employer of lahour to he able to furnish eiiiploy- ment ivithout shame for the pauper who has been restored by sound food and regular hours of labour to a normal condition of body and 7nind, for the crhninal who has graduated from the criminal and compulsory pauper colony and become thereby fitted for social life^ for the woman who has been betrayed^ and for the widow who has to support a child, a sufficient progress will have been made to justify the effort, — nay, even the danger of the experi- ment, — for then, for the first time, will a solution have been proposed of the economic problem presented by prostitution, pauperism, and for the most part also by crime. (f) Advance from Partial Collectivism to Collectivism, Proper So long as the State is not substantially the only owner of the sources of production, ^ the proposed collec- tivist scheme will not be realised ; for so long services will be remunerated upon the wage plan, and there will 1 Production of necessaries and ordinary comforts, but not necessarily of superfluities, which may indefinitely be left to private enterprise. 26 402 COLLECTIVISM consequently be a perpetual struggle for the more highly remunerated otHces, a struggle which will have an econ- omical as well as a political stimulus. It is quite possi- ble that humanity will never get beyond the partial collectivism above described, and if it did not, an advantage would already have been secured of priceless importance. But there is no reason why humanity should not, when once this advanced stage of partial collectivism were attained, ultimately improve suffi- ciently to enter the next phase and emerge into a condi- tion which, though not ideal collectivism, may, perhaps, conveniently be called Collectivism Proper. It is obvious that as the State slowly increased its ownership of the sources of production it would keep track of the cost of production, as regards every neces- sary of life, and it would be in a position, therefore, to state the exchange value of these commodities in terms of what may be called dividend coupons upon the col- lectivist principle, — that is to say, upon the principle that all who contributed to production were to share equally therein, or as nearly equally as conditions might permit. It has been objected that this calculation is difficult, if not impossible. It may be well, therefore, briefly to consider how the exchange value of commodi- ties can be expressed in dividend coupons. Of) Determination of Exchange Value of Commodities^ Expressed in Dividend Coupons It has been already explained that under a collectivist regime there will be two kinds of scrip: dividend cou- pons and voluntary labour cheques.^ The former will ^ It must be carefully remembered that the State order recommended during the initial steps towards collectivism is totally different from the PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 403 be issued to represent that part of the nation's income to which the holder is entitled by virtue of the compul- sory labour he does with a view to the production and distribution of necessaries ; the second will be issued to represent so much time voluntarily expended for the purpose of securing a particular advantage. These two kinds of scrip differ essentially in kind, and their ex- change values represent different things. The essential feature of the dividend coupon is that it represents a fraction of the national income. It is proposed to cal- culate it as follows : — At a time when the population of the United States was fifty millions, Mulhall estimated that the amount of grain annually produced in the United States was 2,400,000,000 bushels. Of this, ten per cent must be deducted for seed, and a further deduction of about fifty per cent must be made for the feeding of stock. This would leave about 1,000,000,000 bushels available for hu- man food. This figure divided by 50,000,000 would en- title every inhabitant, upon an equal division, to twenty bushels of grain per annum. This amount of grain, therefore, would represent the share of every member of a collectivist community in the grain production of the State. If, at the time of the conversion of exchange medium from currency to dividend coupons, $1.00, or a hundred cents, were the cash value of a bushel of grain, one hundred units might conveniently be taken as the commercial expression in dividend coupons of a bushel of grain; and every inhabitant would therefore be entitled to 20 X 100 or 2000 units of value arising out of his right to an equal share in State production of grain. dividend coupon recommended in a collectivist State. In the former case it is an order to purchase so much goods expressed in dollars, and is transferable. In the second it represents a fractional part of national in- come, is expressed in units, and is not transferable. 404 COLLECTIVISM The same kind of calculation could be applied to meat; the number of pounds of meat ^ to which each inhabitant was entitled could be arrived at as in the case of grain. If meat at the time of conversion was worth twenty cents a pound, the number of pounds of meat to which every inhabitant was entitled would be multiplied by twenty units, and this figure, representing the share of every inhabitant arising out of meat production, would be added to the 2000 units representing his right to a share in the State production of grain. This process would be applied to all the commodities produced by the State through the medium of compul- sory labour, and thus the total share of each inhabitant in the total income of the State would be determined in dividend units or coupons. Under this plan every inhabitant would be free to spend his dividend coupons as he chose ; one preferring much meat and little bread ; another much bread and little meat; and a family adjust- ing their provisions to their respective tastes in exactly the same way as we now do through the exchange medium of currency. These dividend coupons would be subject to readjust- ment every year according to the abundance of the crops and of the commodities manufactured respectively ; and it would be subject to a further occasional adjustment, in view of the fact that infants do not eat, and that up to a certain age it may or may not be expedient to throw the support of children upon the parents. ^ This adjust- ment would be effected by deducting from the popula- tion the number of infants that do not eat solid food, 1 Miilliall (Industries and Wealth of Nations, 1896, p. 5) explains just what he means by, and how he arrives at, the annual production of pounds of meat. 2 See Chap. lY., Objections to Collectivism, Sec. 1: Tliat it would promote over-population. PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 405 and the number of those children whose support the State deems it wise to impose upon the parents. Now what can be done for meat and grain can be done for everything which the State produces, superfluities as well as necessaries, pianos, bicycles, yachts, as well as coal, ice, and milk. There will, however, in the collectivist plan proposed, be, as already stated, two different systems applied to the production of necessa- ries and the production of superfluities that contribute to refinement, amusement, and pleasure. The labour necessary to produce the one will be exacted; that necessary to produce the other will be voluntary. Thus, if a man desires a bicycle or a woman desires an extra gown, they will be informed that the bicycle or gown costs a certain number of hours of labour or a given quantity of piece work ; and they will have to do these hours of labour, or the given quantity of piece work, either at the production of necessaries or at that of super- fluities, according as the exigencies of production may require. The element in this system most repugnant to indi- vidualists is the element of coercion ; " it is odious, " says he, " to have to work as directed by the State, instead of working at the employment chosen by one's self." (Ji) Choice of Occupation The question how far a man to-day chooses his own occupation has already been discussed. Here no more need be said than to recall the undoubted fact that wage- earners cannot be said to choose their occupation at all ; and professional men for the most part select the occu- pation to which they are most fitted when it is not already selected for them by the profession of the father. Nature, therefore, determines for these last the choice, 406 COLLECTIVISM rather than the individual. Let us now consider how this choice of occupation would be determined, first, in a partial collectivism, and next in a collectivism proper. In a partial collectivism the conditions as regards choice of occupation would be similar to those which prevail to-day, because the individual could always choose between the occupation offered him by the State and the occupation he could make for himself outside of the State. Nevertheless, the large scope of State employment would enable the State to offer good terms, and thus render it a formidable rival to individual employers. It is probable, therefore, that the children of parents employed by the State would regularly become State employes, and that they would only exceptionally abandon State employment. Under these circumstances, the State, through the machinery of State schools, would apply its method of selection early, — that is to say, as soon as children developed special faculties in special directions. For example, as soon as a child developed a faculty for engineering, he would be given an educa- tion specifically adapted to develop this faculty; and the same would be true of medicine, science, mechanics, etc. In this manner the ablest children would become separated out from the less able. In view, however, of the fact that the greatest ability is often the slowest to develop, all children would be given opportunities for education to a mature age, a careful difference being made between that part of the education that was com- pulsory and that which was voluntary. It might hap- pen, for example, that, owing to slow development or administrative error, a youth might be put into the group of manual labourers although he possessed a genius for some higher occupation. The State would be very unwisely administered if it did not provide for such a case. And the obvious method of doing so would be PRACTICAL WORKIXG OF COLLECTIVISM 407 for the State to offer opportunities for study to all citizens, up to any age, during the hours of leisure which collective production would allow. But genius often works out its own method of education, and it is not at all certain that it would need State aid for its develop- ment and expression. Genius has more to fear from crushing hours of labour than from lack of education. Let every man in the State have half the day in which to work out his individual faculties, and there is little room for fear that genius will fail to find its legitimate expression in a collectivist State. The ablest children being early sorted out as above described, the rest would be classified according to the exigencies of State production. There would be a group of artisans, of agriculturists, of clerks, of manual labourers ; and out of these classes it would be possible for any individual at any time to graduate into another by showing fitness for a higher occupation. This method would proceed closely along the lines of nature ; it would seek to discover the natural adaptabil- ities of each, and apply each to the work which each was best fitted to perform. But within every class there would be a large oppor- tunity for choice. Among the agriculturists, for exam- ple, every member could state his preference whether for farming on a large scale or on a small; for the growth of grain, or vegetables, or fruits. A youth born upon a farm would have a prior lien for work on that farm if he desired it; but, subject to the considerations arising from the advisableness of keeping a family to- gether, every individual could exercise a choice. It would, of course, often occur that there would be more applications for a particular employment than there were places to fill. In such case the issue would have to be 408 COLLECTIVISM decided by lot. And those who drew a bad lot would not have half as much reason for discontent as the youth who draws a bad number for military service to-day in France or Germany. This principle would be applied in every occupation. The lirst consideration would always be that the mem- bers of a family should be given employment in the same i)lace, — that is to say, at the common home ; the next consideration would then be the choice of the indi- vidual within the group to which he was assigned; and it would only be when the necessities of State produc- tion made the employment selected impossible that indi- vidual choice would have to be disregarded. Now, in this method is there really much to distin- guish it, so far as freedom of choice is concerned, from that prevailing to-day ? Would not the man who wanted to become a doctor become one ? — the man who wanted to become an engineer become an engineer? — the man who wanted to become a farmer become a farmer ? And if one engineer wanted to abandon engineering and raise sheep, would he not have abundant leisure to qualify himself for sheep-raising, and could he not, therefore, change his occupation as readily under a coUectivist State as under present conditions? And those who were assigned to manual labour, would their lot be a very hard one? They would be so assigned because they were physically fit for it. Five hours of manual labour is not an irksome task for a man easily able to perform such labour for ten. And the rest of his day he could devote to whatever most inter- ested him ; the rest of the day he would enjoy the truest libert}^ the only liberty worthy of the name. Under partial collectivism the question of employ- ment would be complicated by the question of wages. But if collectivism proper were introduced as heretofore PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 409 suggested, that is to say, by the wage-earner supported by men of wealth and conscience, the wage question would slowly become eliminated ; there would be a slow increase in the wage paid to the manual labourer with- out a corresponding diminution in that paid to the man- agers ; the increase in the wage to the manual labourer resulting from the slow increase of economy under a system which replaced competition by co-operation. In- dividualists contend that individualism means levelling up, and collectivism levelling down. Our crowded gaols, penitentiaries, and almshouses bear witness how untrue it is that individualism levels up. The fore- going explanation how wages would rise under collective production bears witness how little collectivism levels down. It may be urged that this system of levelling up would have for effect to drive all the most successful managers into the ranks of the competing individualists, and this is undoubtedly true ; the struggle between collec- tivism and individualism would be long and bitter. And it is well that it should be so ; for until the people were sufficiently developed morally and intellectually to make the collectivist plan prevail over the individu- alist, the adoption of collectivism would lead to failure and calamity. It must not be forgotten, however, that, the more the State acquired, the less field would there be for indi- vidualist enterprise. If the State expropriated a mine as soon as it began to pay, no great individualist wealth could be made of it. The fact that the State paid fairly for such a mine would encourage individuals to explore and develop mines, but the fact that the State would eventually purchase them would prevent any great ac- cumulation of wealth in individual hands. It is probable, therefore, that individualism would find little field for 410 COLLECTIVISM action outside of such occupations as required great skill, taste, or talent. The manufacture of pianos might long remain in individual hands, as might that of articles of dress and personal adornment; actors and opera singers would doubtless long find higher remun- eration outside of the State than within it. But it seems as though the field of operation for individual effort outside the State would eventually be confined to a comparatively few occupations ; in these occupations in- dividual enterprise would operate through the voluntary labour system. Qi) Voluntary Labour Cheques Let us suppose, for example, that the manufacture of pianos had been organised into a trust and been pur- chased by the State, and that, owing to the incapacity of State management, pianos ceased to be manufactured up to old standards. There would be nothing to pre- vent those having special genius for such manufacture combining during their leisure hours to manufacture pianos of a better grade. And this need not involve actual co-operation in the manufacture of every per- son interested in good pianos; for voluntary labour cheques would, though limited in time, like dividend coupons, differ from dividend couj)ons in that they would be transferable. Let us see how this principle would work. Let us suppose A to have such gifts as Steinway had, and to desire to manufacture pianos of the greatest perfection. He would raise subscriptions from all interested in the work exactly as Steinway doubtless did to secure the capital for his enterjirise; only the subscriptions would not be in money, but in voluntary labour promises. Assuming that A induced a hundred persons to promise an extra hour of labour a PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 411 day, or its equivalent in piece work, for six months, in return for which each was to have a piano of superior make, A would go to the Labour Bureau and tender these promises of voluntary labour, in exchange for which he would secure from the Labour Bureau skilled labour from the State Piano Factory to do the work under his supervision, either from the ranks of compul- sory or from those of voluntary labour. In other words, the subscriber would labour in accordance with his labour promise, and thus earn voluntary labour cheques, which he would transfer to A, and with these A would secure skilled labour, transferring these voluntary labour cheques either to the State for compulsory skilled labour, or to individuals for voluntary skilled labour. Now, what could be done for pianos could be done for dress, for country houses, yachts, automobiles, and for all the other things that enter into the enjoyment of life.^ There is no greater error than to suppose that collec- tivism involves levelling down, or the reduction of free men to the condition of State slaves. On the contrary, it is a system of collective production, which diminishes the time that must be given to the work of production and distribution of necessaries to a minimum, and thus leaves to every man the maximum of time and liberty for the satisfaction of his individual tastes and the development of his industrial abilities. But if the State bureau refused the application of A for labour ? There is obviously ample room for error and for spite in the collectivist State, and individualists dwell much on the helplessness of the individual in such case. There does not seem, however, room for apprehension on this score. The task of A, for example, might be made 1 The subject of Voluntary Labour Cheques is further treated, post, 416, 419. 412 COLLECTIVISM more difficult by such refusal, but it would not for that reason become impossible. On the contrary, he could still find out for himself, without State aid, all the per- sons willing to give voluntary labour for the compensa- tion A could offer them. Let us consider a moment what is the character of this compensation, and, in con- nection with this subject, what are the probable limits of State and individual enterprise. (j) Limits of State and Individual Enterprise It has already been pointed out that one of the funda- mental evils of the competitive system is its wasteful- ness ; but another evil as great is the exploitation of one man by another to which it gives rise. The facility which is given by it to the money-making man for accumulating wealth at the expense of others, ^ so that a few are very rich and the many are very poor, is too obvious to need exposition. Now this condition of things renders easy the exploitation of the poor by the rich ; for the poor have to work in order to earn bread ; they have no choice. They are kept by the fear of hunger from demanding a just comiDensation.^ To countenance this system on the plea of liberty of con- tract is rank hypocrisy. The isolated workingman is only able to demand compensation when he is in a posi- tion to refuse his labour; at all other times he has to take what is offered to him. 1 Individualist economists insist that wealth is not made by one man at the expense of others, but to their benefit. Undoubtedly the wealth of one man often and generally benefits others ; but the net actual, visible re- sult of the competitive system is that a few are undeservedly favoured ; the majority earn a bad living ; and a fifth are in misery. This is what is meant by the words " at the expense of others." 2 Traile unions do much to diminish this helplessness, but it has been shown that they can only do this at periods of expanding trade and high prices. When trade contracts or prices go down they are helpless. PKACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 413 Now this helplessness of the poor is clue to the fact that the wealthy control the employment which the poor need in order to live ; and it is this helplessness which col- lectivism is mainly concerned in preventing. Moreover, it is the function of collectivism to prevent this, not by the tender of alms, which is humiliating and unjust, but by the furnishing of bread for labour to all in the com- munity under similar conditions, so that all contribute and all receive an equal share of the common enterprise. From this point of view it might be wise for the State to undertake nothing more than the management of natural monopolies and the production and distribution of necessaries^ leaving the production and distribution of comforts and luxuries entirely to private enterprise. Indeed, the scope of State enterprise beyond that of monopolies and necessaries would remain a matter of policy as to which it would be impossible to establish any rigid rules. If the State were admirably adminis- tered, doubtless the economy and convenience of State management would tend to increase its scope, whereas if State management were not good, private enterprise would tend to take everything but the necessary func- tions of the State out of its hands. It will be seen, therefore, that collectivism by no means involves a total subordination of individual to State enterprise, but, on the contrary, permits of every possible degree of both, provided only the State keeps control of monopolies and of the production and distribution of necessaries, thereby making the exploitation of one man by another impos- sible by providing the necessaries of life to all. As, however, it may not seem easy to understand how individual enterprise could take any given industry out of the hands of a collectivist State, let us consider a little more closely how A would set about the task referred to. 414 COLLECTIVISM If State-made pianos were badly manufactured, there would doubtless be many persons desirous of possessing pianos of a better make. Let us assume that two hun- dred families averaging five members each were found desirous of owning good pianos; they would probably most of them be quite unfamiliar with the manufacture of pianos; they could not, therefore, themselves con- tribute usefully thereto. A would, therefore, have to find a sufficient number of skilled men who would be willing to devote extra time to the manufacture of pianos, according to A's method, in return for certain advantages which A would have to secure to them. These advantages would take the shape of voluntary labour cheques issued, not through the State, but by A. Were pianos the only things manufactured by private enterprise, the rewarding of labour by voluntary cheques would be a matter of some difficulty, but if many things were manufactured outside of the State there would arise by the side of State cheques a system of private cheques which would facilitate the task of A. In other words, there would grow up by private enterprise private labour bureaus or banks, at which all persons desiring things not procurable from the State would apply, ten- dering therefor products of voluntary labour or promises of voluntary labour in exchange therefor. The artist who desired an automobile would tender the work of his art, and according to his skill would receive the automobile in exchange for more or for less hours of labour.^ The mechanic who wanted a cow would ten- der his labour, and according to his skill would receive 1 It must be remembered that the piece-work system would be largely used in a collectivist State, and that an artist, therefore, would probably oirer his completed work, instead of so many hours of labour, in exchange for voluntary labour cheipies, and use the voluntary labour che(|ues so obtained to purchase his automobile. PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 415 the cow in exchange for more or for less piece work or hours of labour. Thus, by the side of the State system of dividend coupons and labour cheques, would grow up a private system of labour cheques, more or less im- portant than the State, according as the scope of the State were small or large. And the voluntary system, whether public or private, would involve two kinds of scrip, — promises of labour and voluntary labour cheques. Individuals would tender promises, and thereby induce others to offer voluntary labour. Both sets would then set to work in their respective fields, redeem their promises, and receive voluntary labour cheques in exchange therefor, which each could use in exchange for the product of the work of others. To make this subject clear: A obtains from BCD prom- ises to labour in return for a piano. With these he secures the voluntary services of P Q R, skilled work- men in the piano trade. BCD labour in their respec- tive fields and become entitled to voluntary labour cheques which entitle them each to a piano. P Q R labour at the manufacture of pianos and receive vol- untary labour cheques therefor. The labour cheques which P Q R earn, they exchange for any of the arti- cles manufactured through the labour of B C D and others. Side by side, therefore, with State production would arise a system of production by private enterprise, and thus collectivism would escape from the rigidity and uniformity which individualists insist are indispensable to it, and which all would, if indeed indispensable to it, greatly deplore. For man needs variety and freedom, and any system of government that would eliminate these must occasion either degeneration or discontent. Too much emphasis, therefore, cannot be put upon the unlimited scope permissible to private enterprise, once 416 COLLECTIVISM only two things are provided for by the State, — the ne- cessaries of life, and economy in the production of them. These two are indispensable attributes of a wisely con- stituted State, because, if the necessaries of life are not furnished to every member of the community, a large part of the community — under our present system the larger part — is subjected to exploitation by the minor- ity on the one hand, and on the other hand is delivered over to pauperism, prostitution, and crime. If the necessaries of life are not furnished with the greatest economy of production and distribution, so much of the time of the community is spent, as under our present system, in the drudgery of production and distribution, that no time is left for individual enterprise, for individual improvement, for the exer- cise of individual liberty, or the pursuit of individual happiness. Collectivism is thus shown to contribute, as our defi- nition of justice demands, to the care of the individual as well as to that of the race, and, indeed, properly limited, to furnish the only full scope to individual initiative, so often stifled, under our existing competitive system, by the crushing necessity of earning our daily bread. (Z;) Dividend Coupons, Labour Cheques, and Currency The question naturally arises. Why, under the con- templated collectivism, is it proposed to substitute divi- dend coupons and labour cheques for coin as a medium of exchange ? No categorical answer will be attempted to this question, because it is quite conceivable that col- lectivism should attain the highest development consist- ent with human imperfections, and coin be maintained as a medium of exchange outside of the public stores. Coin PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 417 must be eliminated from the public stores because, as has been already explained, State production and distri- bution being conducted on the plan of equal division, every member of the community would be entitled to his share of State income, and this share could be most conveniently expressed and utilised by the dividend coupon already described. But it might very well happen that the development of collectivism would never proceed beyond the purchase of monopolies and of sufficient land to assure a sufficient share of the neces- saries of life to all applying to the State for employment. This would constitute the condition already described as Partial Collectivism. The existing competitive system for the production of luxuries might be main- tained, with its currency and banking system, its profits and accumulated advantages to those possessing the special talents of the money-maker. There are, how- ever, obvious objections to such a system. In the first place, it would fall far short of the moral standards we profess; in the second place, the competitive system, with its attendant joint-stock companies and coin cur- rency, would exert a dangerous influence on those charged with the government and administration of the collectivist State. It does not seem conceivable that those in control of so powerful a machinery as that of a collectivist State could resist the corrupting power of wealthy magnates able by accumulation of wealth to offer enormous rewards for political favours. And these considerations permit of our understanding clearly the difference between the labour cheque and coin as me- diums of exchange. Coin is capable of unlimited accu- mulation ; the labour cheque is capable of accumulation within narrow limits only. Let us consider how this principle would work in the example already furnished by our piano-maker A. 27 418 COLLECTIVISM Were A to raise subscriptions in coin and pay workmen in coin, he would be enabled, by a margin of profit on every hour of labour furnished, to put aside an amount of coin that would represent value, not only during his own life, but in all time. Were he, on the contrarj^ to receive subscriptions and pay workmen in labour cheques that were of value only for a limited time, he would have no interest in endeavouring to make a margin of profit out of his workmen ; for by the time the margin of profit was realised the labour cheque would have ceased to have value. Let us take an example: two hundred families of five members each want pianos; each piano requires two hundred hours expended on it. Each family furnishes promises of two hundred hours of labour, or their equivalent in piece work, — that is to say, each person furnishes promises of forty hours of labour, or their equivalent in piece work ; these promises are good for one year only.i They are therefore inca- pable of accumulation; profit thereon is incapable of accumulation. A, or rather the private labour bureaus or bank through which A works, could, of course, con- vert the promises of labour into commodities ; and these commodities could be converted once more into new labour promises. But unless these new labour promises were expeditiously used, they would become unavailable by lapse of time. There is therefore a material diffi- culty about accumulating wealth upon the labour cheque plan which is conspicuously absent from the coin system. The fact that labour cheques are limited in ^ The term of one year is purely arbitrary ; it miglit be one month or it might be two years; if ingenuity succeeded in finding a method for accu- mulating and exchanging cheques that were due for cheques that liad still their time to run, doubtless the term of the cheque would be reduced to render the process cUfficult ; if, on the other hand, no such effort were made, and it were found useful to favour the negotiability of labour cheques, their term would be extended. PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 419 time would involve a difficult and constant readjust- ment that would stand much in the way of extensive accumulation. Doubtless human ingenuity would, under the mercenary stimulus, find a way for accumu- lating even under adverse circumstances ; but if it did, those who suffered by it would always have a remedy ; they could turn to the State; contribute to make its management better, and fit it to take the industry which gave rise to accumulation out of the private hands that accumulated. Thus the two systems would stand forever watching, controlling, and supplementing one another. Individualists will mock at this system of labour cheques as barbarously clumsy, forgetting that this very clumsiness is its particular virtue; for individualists cannot rid their mind of the idea that the object of manufacture is to make profit, whereas the proper in- tention of manufacture should be to supply wants. Under the labour cheque system, therefore, men will be set to manufacture to supply a want, and not to make profit; and manufacture will thereby be restored to its true function, and rescued from the false function to which it has been put by those who seek to make profit for themselves out of the labour of their fellow-men. (Z) Elimination of Corruption hy Substitution of Labour Cheques for Coin as Medium of Exchange Let us next consider the role which joint-stock corpora- tions and coin currency play in political corruption. There are two obvious methods by which a legislator or official can be bribed. One is by the payment of money; the other l)y the contribution of stock. This last takes different forms. Tlie briber either offers stock out and 420 COLLECTIVISM out, or, when the legislator is a little fastidious, he is told to buy stock in the companies to be benefited, and a margin is supplied by the briber to cover fluctuations. Now, so long as these two principal instruments of corruption exist, the temptation to exercise them and be influenced by them is too great for many of our fellow-creatures, whereas if, by the substitution of labour cheques for coin, profit-making were practically eliminated, these two instruments of corruption would cease to exist, and it is diflicult to see how they could be replaced ; for the sudden possession of labour cheques by an official would have to be explained, and would, in fact, be inexplicable in any quantities sufficient to constitute a bribe. A money bribe can be more conveniently handled. The sudden possession of a large sum of money by a poor official would, of course, create suspicion; but money can be put safely away; it can be locked in a safe until it is invested in small enough fractions to escape inquiry. Labour cheques could not be thus concealed; they have to be used within a limited period, or they have to be invested in commodities within that period, or they must be exchanged in a bank within that period. They are clumsy, and their clumsiness is their advantage to the community; for their clumsiness makes corruption as well as accumulation difficult. (m) Land, It has been already pointed out that the first steps of collectivism in the direction of ownership of land are likely to be taken for the purpose of creating farm col- onies for paupers and criminals, and for the purpose of PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 421 erecting suitable buildings for the housing of State officials; but it is by no means impossible that the application of single tax might be a still more likely method of securing State ownership. The theory of single tax has not been given the attention that it perhaps deserves in this volume because it has given rise to controversy, and the claims of its adherents seem greater than the theory warrants. In other words, the application of single tax does not seem suffi- ciently effectual in one sense, and in others it might become altogether too much or too rapidly so. It has been deemed wise, therefore, to omit from our study of collectivism this particular method proposed for attain- ing it; the more so as other more direct methods seem sufficiently efficacious. But there are other methods for State acquisition of lands which might anticipate those already mentioned; for example, a repetition of such a condition of things as occurred a few years ago in New England, where thousands of farms were abandoned because they did not furnish a sufficient inducement for cultivation. This opportunity has now been largely seized by men of means, who have converted these abandoned farms into summer homes, for which the picturesqueness of the country admirably fits them. If such a state of things, however, were to take place on a sufficiently large scale in our prairie States, which afford few attractions for summer residence, a State bent upon extending its ac- quisitions to land would doubtless avail itself of the opportunity. And the use to which the State would put such acqui- sitions would depend largely upon the conditions then prevailing. If the land was abandoned for some reason which the State could eliminate, as lack of railroad accommodation, or high rates of transportation, the 422 COLLECTIVISM State would doubtless use the land for the purpose of collective production. If, however, the culture of the land were abandoned because of infertility requiring slow and expensive treatment, the State would apply it to the purposes of a farm colony, where the education of the pauper or criminal was of more importance than agricultural profits. Once, however, the State became a large owner of laud, the economy of State production and distribution ^ will enable the State to offer farm jjroduce at lower prices than private owners. These lower prices, how- ever, will benefit only a part of the population, for at the initial stage only officials receive State orders avail- able at public stores, and State orders alone receive the benefit of the lower prices resulting from State produc- tion. To others, farm produce will be sold at market prices. As, however, the official world would increase in size, the demand for farm produce other than that produced by the State would diminish, prices would fall, and the individual farmer would cease to produce as profitably as before. A considerable extension, there- fore, of State production is likely to lead to agricultural distress. This distress, however, can be averted by a still further development of collectivism. Every farmer who feels the competition of the State could be allowed to sell his produce to the State, receiving therefor labour cheques, and profiting thereby from the lower prices prevailing at the public stores. Such a farmer need not be deprived of his farm; indeed, neither a farmer nor a farmer's children for endless generations need ever be deprived of the family farm. On the contrary, it would be the policy of a wise collectivist State to keep 1 It is everywhere assumed that State administration is good ; if it is not good it will not be tolerated, individualists will resume control, and the progress of collectivism be consequently arrested. PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 423 families in their respective farms. Nor should the task be a difficult one. For what would be the possible his- tory of a farmer in the slow development of the coUec- tivist State? He might begin by paying his taxes in produce ; he might end by bringing all his produce to the public stores. So long as he brought a proper amount of such produce, the State would have no reason for turning him out; it would only be in case he grossly failed to furnish the amount of produce his acres should harvest that the State would have to inter- fere. And the farmer would have the same interest then as now to furnish the maximum possible; as the more he furnished the more would he be entitled to take out of the public stores. The farmer's children would doubtless be attracted then, as now, to the towns, but one of them would be encouraged to remain on the farm, because the farm would furnish them all a summer home. And it would be the wisest economy of a collectivist State to encour- age all the members of a farmer's family, wheresoever they reside, to return during the harvesting season to the ancestral farm, thus emptying the cities during the months least fitted for city life, furnishing the country with labour at the time when labour is most needed there, and maintaining the family affection, from which all other human sympathy starts. Then, indeed, will Thanksgiving Day have restored to it its original sig- nificance and become a national holiday in fact as well as in form. Nor does it seem necessary for State ownership to be extended to farm lands, except for the purpose of pre- venting idleness or checking land hunger. Whatever land a family can profitably cultivate, it ought to be allowed to cultivate, no farmer being allowed to exploit a farm labourer, through the wealth of the one or the 424 COLLECTIVISM poverty of the other; but, both being put on a basis of equality by the assurance to both of the necessaries of life, liberty of contract becomes for the first time possible. And so a farmer needing labour would apply to the State for it; the State would furnish it; and the happi- ness of both employer and employ^ would depend, not upon economic, but upon personal considerations. Each would have an interest in being personally agreeable to the other; the employer, so as to have the benefit of cheerful and effectual service; the employ^ so as to have the benefit of a comfortable home. And if they quarrelled, the quarrel would ultimately tend to injure the one at fault ; for an employer who quarrelled with all his employes would lose the benefit of additional help, and the employd who quarrelled with all his em- ployers would be relegated to State farms and eventually to pauper colonies. And so personal relations would be very much then what they are now, except that the economic causes for misery would be eliminated; and we are thus brought to the conclusion for which we were prepared at the outset, that collectivism is essentially a matter of economics. (n) Domestic Service One of the features of collectivism which render it most repugnant to the educated and wealthy is that it seems to make domestic service impossible ; and the edu- cated are so accustomed to lean on this kind of service that they cannot conceive of existence being tolerable without it. Individualists used to dispose of collectivism on this score by the question, " Who will black our boots under your collectivist regime ? " This attack upon the whole moral, political, and economic theory united in the PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 425 word ''collectivism " has had much of its virus removed by the late introduction among fashionable people of yellow shoes that do not need blacking ; and this pin- prick into the inflated arguments of individualism is a type of much that is said for and against the details of collectivist life. It is easy for individualists, resting comfortably in the luxuries provided by the system they uphold, to ridicule conditions in which the prospect of their ever being deprived of their luxuries becomes suffi- ciently humorous to carry with it a conviction of its impracticability. But the questions involved are too serious to be disposed of by a joke. Domestic service, like slavery, may long still be ne- cessary, not only for the masters, but also for the ser- vants, and it is probably the institution which will be the last to go. Perhaps, indeed, it will never go. Per- haps there will always be born into the world men and women naturally fitted for nothing but domestic service ; perhaps also domestic service may remain indispensable to the educated class: but there is something in these words which is familiar; they seem to have been heard before. In the fifties this is exactly what slaveholders contended regarding their slaves; and yet the slave- holders have learned to do without slaves; and their slaves, a naturally subject race, seem to be learning to earn their own livelihood. It is by no means indispensable to the demonstration of the superiority of collectivist over individualist econ- omy that we should describe just how the community is one day to dispense with domestic service. Even though collectivism never attained the development which would dispense with domestic service, it would, by the practical abolition of pauperism, prostitution, and for the most part of crime, have rendered an incalculable ser- vice to mankind. 426 COLLECTIVISM Moreover, as has been already explained, invention will be directed in a collectivist community towards diminishing the need for, and the drudgery of, domestic service. Already this has been to a great extent accom- plished. The introduction of hot and cold water into every bedroom, though open to objections arising from imperfect plumbing, which are easily removable, greatly diminishes the labour of servants ; the same may be said of a more extensive use of bath-rooms and closets. The introduction of cheap fuel gas would lighten the labour of cooking and eliminate the dust and dirt of our exist- ing coal ranges. Dust could be eliminated from our streets, and in great part, therefore, from our homes, by the substitution of mechanical for animal traction and asphalt for stone pavement and macadam. When a few generations of those who fare sumptuously every day have been replaced by a less gluttonous progeny, a very slight modification of meal-time would again diminish the necessity for domestic service. The breakfast to which the entire French nation has accustomed itself can be prepared with the minimum of labour; the midday meal would be the only one requiring much preparation, the evening meal being restored to the simplicity which is recommended by hygiene, and therefore contributes to comfort and well-being. If our memories carry us back to the days which immediately followed the close of the Civil War, we shall recall many a delicate lady who, in the conquered South, deprived of her slaves and too poor to pay ser- vants, did the domestic service of the entire family without losing her refinement or even imperilling the whiteness of her hands. Indeed, to some of us the per- formance of this menial service gave to the Southern lady a new interest and a new dignity, and we are tempted to inquire which of the two, the Southern lady PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 427 before the war, who did nothing, or the Southern lady- after the war, who did everything, was most entitled to our affection and our esteem. § 5. Summary Let us now briefly resume the stages through which it is imagined a collectivist State is likely to pass. I. Partial Collectivism. In the first stage the State issues to all working for it transferable orders on public stores, expressed in currency, and this it continues to do until it has become sufficiently master of the sources of production to realise the economies of collectivism. It will acquire enough land to create more or less self- supporting colonies of different grades which will assure work to every person ajjplying for it, and to which paupers, criminals, and prostitutes will be committed; different degrees of crime, prostitution, and pauperism being kept in different colonies, so as to permit of gradu- ation from the lowest grade, through intermediate grades, into those where no coercion is necessary, thereby pro- viding, not only for reformation, but for restoration to community life. During this initial stage pauperism and prostitution ought entirely to disappear with the economic conditions that give rise to them, and crime to be much reduced. The economies of collectivist pro- duction and distribution will be applied to slowly raising the wages of its employes to a single standard. When this single standard is realised, it will be in a position to pass to the next stage, called — II. Collectivism Pro'per. In this stage the State begins by confining itself to the purchase of all monopolies and quasi monopolies, — such as railroads, municipal fran- chises, and trusts, — and to the production and distribu- tion of necessaries. It need not attempt to produce 428 COLLECTIVISM luxuries. All persons in the State are required to per- form necessary labour in as nearly equal proportions as may be, piece work being applied to the utmost possible, for the double purpose of encouraging efficiency and furnishing to every man the opportunity to get through his compulsory work in the shortest possible time. In exchange for compulsory work, which, it is assumed, will take only a comparatively small part of the day, every citizen is provided with lodging and dividend coupons, which he can apply as he chooses to the pur- chase of clothing and food. But outside of State enter- prise, individual enterprise will flourish to whatever extent the genius of the people shall determine ; indi- vidual enterprise may even compete with State enter- prise; coin currency may be maintained; farms may continue to be worked by farmers upon the condition of furnishing to the State a given product per acre accord- ing to the fertility of the soil. But during this stage an advance may be made by substituting for coin currency a system of voluntary labour cheques, transferable but limited in time, with a view to preventing corruption and accumulation. These volimtary labour cheques would probably be issued primarily by the State as soon as it undertook to produce other things besides necessaries; and if the State, by the ownership of mines and considerable con- trol of foreign trade, could withdraw coin from circula- tion, and it was deemed advisable to do so, it could force the system of voluntary labour cheques on private enterprise also. PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 429 § 6. The Ideal Collectivist State It is by no means necessary to the adoption of the collectivist theory of economics or to the political pro- gramme of collectivism, that we should be able at this time to demonstrate clearly and precisely that the ideal collectivist State — that is to say, a State in which there is no private enterprise whatever — is practically possi- ble. The preceding sections have attempted to show that the slow adoption of the collectivist theory would have for result, at different stages of its development, first, the elimination of pauperism, ^prostitution, and in great part of crime, and, secondly, the elimination of the corrupting instrument of gold and joint-stock com- panies. The effort has also been made to show that this would not be attended by a blunting of individual enterprise, but, on the contrary, that by increasing the leisure of every man and assuring him the necessaries and probably the comforts of life, he would for the first time in human experience enjoy true liberty. If such a re- sult were achieved, it would be attended by a total transformation of human character, the perpetual effort to improve one's own condition regardless of conse- quences to others having been replaced by a similar effort to improve the social condition of all for the legiti- mate consideration and affection which such improvement would bestow. When, by the elimination of coin as currency, private enterprise becomes engaged in satisfy- ing a general want, not for profit, but directly for con- sideration, and when consideration can be secured only by voluntary service, sympathy, and affection, and no longer through wealth or money, the environment will be so changed that it seems unphilosophical to attempt now to forecast the exact social and political conditions 430 COLLECTIVISM that will result. Christianity has suffered from the attempt to describe a future State which our present mental and moral structure makes us unable to under- stand or appreciate. So also collectivism would prob- ably suffer by an attempt to define conditions for which we are now wholly unprepared. The political student cannot be asked to do more than to show reasonable ground for believing that col- lectivism slowly and wisely introduced can eliminate the evils which are to-day the greatest shame to our civilisa- tion, that it conforms to the demands of justice, that it violates no necessary laws of nature, and that it assures the truest liberty. The task of describing the social, political, and economic millennium to which collectivism may give rise must be left to works of poetry and imag- ination, a flight of literature to which the present volume does not aspire. In conclusion, then, although no attempt to justify ideal collectivism is made, the conditions presented by what has been called partial collectivism and collectivism proper seem practicable and worthy of earnest consider- ation. In the foregoing brief sketch the effort to show that the many insoluble problems presented by the exist- ing industrial system would find their solution under a collectivist State, has been far from exhaustive. For example, all those who study the question of taxation with any care will unanimously admit that no scheme of taxation has ever been framed or is likely to be framed under our existing institutions that does not bear more hardly upon one part of the community than another; and that a just system of taxation is exposed to in- convenience so great as to be practically prohibitive. All, too, will admit that in the injustice that attends taxation the honest are likely to suffer more than the PRACTICAL WORKING OF COLLECTIVISM 431 dishonest; that taxation is directly the cause of mani- fold forms of dishonesty in the effort that men make to escape it; and that, all men being subject to the same pressure and engaged in the same task, there has grown a tolerance of dishonesty in this particular direction which exerts a demoralising effect upon the whole com- munity. It is hardly necessary to point out that taxa- tion would disappear in the collectivist State. If now we take into account the fact that under a collectiv- ist form of government all the pauperism that results under our present industrial system from over-produc- tion, from the sweated industries, and from the conflict between capital and labour, would disappear; that pros- titution would also disappear; that the dishonesty which results from the relation of business to politics, and the dishonesty which is stimulated by competition in busi- ness would disappear; and that the tolerance of evil which has been seen to constitute the necessary result of the relations of every church to every State would also disappear, — it must be admitted that the evils attend- ing collectivism must indeed be great in order to com- pensate such priceless advantages as these. And when we consider the standard objections to col- lectivism, they seem to fall to pieces one after another. It is perfectly true that in the present condition of igno- rance and selfishness an attempt to impose collectivism upon us to-morrow would be more likely to occasion a destructive revolution than a constructive benefit; but if time be given for the slow adaptation of human character to the new order of things, it seems impossi- ble to deny that collectivism furnishes, not a Utopia which men can never attain, but a model of government to which men should at any rate slowly direct their steps; and under such a form of government not only would the home be preserved in its entirety, but every 432 COLLECTIVISM individual would secure tlie greatest freedom of action consistent with the greatest security from risk ; under it we should have at last created an environment calcu- lated to stimulate the noble qualities of man rather than those which are base, and promote a higher type rather than one that is degenerate; and under it alone can we ever hope to come up to the standards of morality set up for us in the Sermon on the Mount. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 433 CHAPTER VI SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION Before attempting to draw a general conclusion from the arguments hereinbefore presented, let us briefly summarise these arguments and connect the particular conclusions to which we have come. The word " nature " is for the most part used to in- clude everything in the world except spirit and art. Everything we call natural is so called to contrast it with things spiritual or artificial. We have therefore concluded not to use the words "nature " and "natural " in such a way as to confoand them with the words " spiritual " and "artificial," with which they are con- trasted. They have accordingly been used to include everything that is material in the world unaffected by the conscious effort of man ; and to exclude, therefore, conscious, deliberate, non-natural, or religious, human effort; this last being expressed by the words "artifi- cial" and "spiritual."^ And as man is himself found ^ The use of the word "nature," here suggested, is by no means intended to convey that human evolution is not a part of the evohition that pre- ceded man, as some of the critics of the first volume seem to have inferred. (See Professor Giddings's review in the " Political Science Quarterly " for December.) It is proposed to exclude from the meaning of the word "nature" what we call art and spirit, because the word "nature "is currently used in contrast and opposition to the words "art" and " spirit," as is the word "natural " used in contrast and opposition to the words "artificial" and "spiritual." To use the word "nature" at one time to include art and spirit, and at another in opposition to art and spirit, is to court confusion. The extent of the confusion resulting from this double and inconsistent use of the word "nature" has already been 28 434 COLLECTIVISM to include two personalities, — one a mere automaton, partaking of the undeliberate, unconscious mechanism of the lower animals and including the purely natural part of him, and the other a conscious, deliberate, con- trolling personality, which we may, for the purpose of this argument, call will, — we are led by our definition to include the human automaton in the word "nature," but to exclude the human will. When we apply this definition to the expressions, "natural law," "moral law," "law of nature," "natural rights," we are driven by it to recognise that natural law is a totally different thinff from moral law and that it is fatal to confound them. For the law of nature which determines the re- lations of animals to one another is the law of natural selection, — a law that ignores mercy and justice, and is for that reason diametrically the opposite of the moral law, which takes account of little else. And so in treat- ing of matters sociological we have decided to confine the words " law of nature " and " natural law " to the law of natural selection, and never again to use them to include the moral law, which is diametrically opposed to them. And as to the words "natural rights," we have de- cided to obliterate them from the language altogether, because if they can be deemed to have any meaning at all, it must be held to be misleading. There are no rights in nature ; rights are the creation of man. dwelt on in the first volume, and need not therefore be repeated here. But in order to demonstrate the absence of any intention to betray the reader into an admission of a break or discontinuity between nature and art or spirit, it is suggested that the words " cosmos " and "cosmic " can conveniently be used to include all three, — nature, art, and spirit. Under this phraseology there is only one evolution, — cosmic evolution; but cosmic evolution can be conveniently divided into natural and artificial, or prse-human and human, the ambiguity of the word "nature" being thereby eliminated and the question of the continuity of cosmic evolution left undisputed. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 435 The law of natural selection, or, as it is generally called, the law of evolution, we have found to be very different from that of human selection, because man is no longer a mere product of the environment of nature, but has created for himself an environment of his own. This artificial environment created by man is the result- ant of several forces which have at different periods of human history operated in different directions; these forces are selfishness, intelligence, and religion, and, taken singly, these three forces may be regarded as respectively the instruments of nature, art, and spirit. At times it would seem as though spirit and art were allied against nature, as in the gospel of Christ and in the epistles of Saint Paul; but most of the time nature is strong enough to harness both to her chariot wheels. We find, therefore, that the artificial environ- ment created by man — that is to say, his social and political institutions — has been for the most part sug- gested by selfishness, but that this selfishness has been tempered by religion and intelligence. The most striking feature, however, in human history is that although man seems to be consciously creating his own institutions, they are, as a matter of fact, for the most part the product of a selfish instinct profoundly igno- rant and generally proceeding in a direction hostile to human happiness in general. In other words, although the conscious deliberate pur- pose of man has been resisting nature for thousands of years, what with the ignorance with which the struggle has been maintained on the one hand, and the perpetual stimulation of the selfish automaton by the artificial environment created by himself on the other, it will have to be admitted that improvement has been inter- mittent and extremely slow. But it is because man has not been clearly alive to 436 COLLECTIVISM the factors of the problem before him that he has to so great an extent failed. A few flashes of intelligence have occasionally illuminated his path, and some of these flashes have been briefly referred to in the preced- ing pages ; but they have partaken of the character of genius in a few, rather than of intelligence in the many ; and this mainly because the artificial environment created by man has been such as to blunt the intelli- gence of the many and to stimulate selfishness ; whereas the truest happiness of the race would, on the contrary, be promoted by institutions that would stimulate the intelligence of the mass and diminish the egotism of all. The question whether our institutions can be so mod- ified as to increase the happiness of man and diminish their unhappiness is the main question presented for solution in this book; and it has been shown that in order to prepare ourselves for an answer to it we have to take into account one after another, in the first place the character of the environment produced by nature, in the second place the character of the environ- ment created by man, and in the third place the nature of the human temperament or social mind which has been the product of this last environment ; and partic- ularly how far by change of the environment the social mind is still subject to modification thereby. The study of these two environments — the natural and the human — has led us to the conclusion that while the latter has resulted in a distinct improvement of type through the self-restraint necessitated by such an insti- tution as marriage, the artificial environment, neverthe- less, preserves, through the maintenance of the competi- tive system, still so much of the natural j^redatory law that further improvement is likely to be miserably slow if, indeed, it takes place at all. The role of selfishness in dragging down religion and SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 437 every high ideal, whether in terms religious or not, has been traced throughout recorded history, and the con- clusion has been drawn that so long as our institutions are the mere result of the conflict between the selfishness of one class and that of another, the improvement is likely to be so slow that, when we compare it with the agony it occasions, we cannot but be filled with despair. Indeed, we have seen that there are two tendencies at work in our present system which may destroy our civil- isation faster than improvement can vitalise it. For in the first place the artificial conditions we have created tend to degenerate type through the reckless fertility of the lowest types and the comparative infertility of the best. And in the second place recent inventions, such as railroads, telegraphs, telephones, — in fact, steam, and electricity in all their operations, — are continually en- gaged in unconsciously speeding up the machinery of which we form part, and in wearing us out before our time. One of the devices by which employers slowly seek to get more work out of their factory hands without a corresponding rise in wages is imperceptibly to speed up the machinery, so that in the same amount of time the same number of hands produce a much larger outjiut. But the speeding up of machinery has been found to be so exhausting to workmen that in the cotton indus- tries and many others they have compelled their employ- ers to adopt an elaborate system of piece work, so that every speeding up of the machinery will involve either higher wages for the operators or shorter hours. It has been estimated that a hand-loom weaver can work thir- teen hours a day without exhaustion, whereas mule- spinners complain that they are exhausted by more than eight. ^ We are not all of us sufficiently alive to the 1 The Cotton Trade in England and on the Continent, by Dr. G. von Schulze Gaevernitz, London, 1895, pp. 126, 127. 438 COLLECTIVISM extent to which the pressure at which we work has been increased by modern invention. The fact that tlie cable and telephone puts every business man in imme- diate connection with every part of the civilised globe imposes upon him the necessity for a rapidity of decision that is in the highest degree exhausting. Every man who has had to correspond much by cable will testify to the infinitely higher degree of concentration that it requires over that of corresponding by mail. Moreover, a man who sits at his desk with a telephone at his side continually putting him in communication with other offices, cables brought in to him at every moment, some of which exact an immediate answer, letters brought by a messenger with instructions to wait for a reply, a client in the chair in front of him, and perhaps several other clients waiting for him in the adjoining room, is not conducting one business matter at a time, but a dozen ; he is not conversing with one man, but a dozen ; his faculty for transacting business is increased twelve- fold, but the strain upon him is increased twelve-fold also. Under this strain our business men are daily breaking down, and, if this strain be taken in connection with the tendency of type to degenerate, as above mentioned, it threatens us with a danger not only sensible in degree but imminent in time. It is possible that the present competitive system may over-stimulate the best of us and under-stimulate the rest, and in such case it is a matter for serious question whether the extremely slow tendency to improvement may not be overtaken by the more rapid tendency to degeneration. With a view, then, to concluding whether it is pos- sible for man, by intelligence and effort, to hasten the rescue of man from the sufferings to which his present SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 439 institutions commit him, we have endeavoured to clear our minds regarding a few of the questions which in practical politics seem most to perplex us; and among these perplexing problems first in order comes the ques- tion what justice is. In attempting to answer this question we have been facilitated by having come to a clear idea of nature and natural law; for the moment it became obvious that nature was essentially immoral or non-moral, inasmuch as it recognised no right, but, on the contrary, ruthlessly sacrificed the lives of the unfit many to the survival of the favoured few, whereas, on the contrary, the ultimate aim of human institutions is to protect the lives of all human beings, whether fit to survive or not, it seemed reasonable to suppose that the justice of man consisted in the struggle to resist the injustice of nature ; and the more closely we examined nature and justice from this point of view, the more clearly it appeared that, although our institutions have as a matter of fact been for the most part the result of selfish conflict, they have seldom, if ever, advanced the happiness of men except when they have consciously or unconsciously proceeded upon the plan set forth in this definition of justice. And one of the most important conclusions to which we were led by this view of nature and justice was, that nature presents two kinds of obstacles to the happiness of man, — one kind which man can by no political insti- tution very much modify, and the other kind which man can, by substituting wisdom for folly in the making of his laws, not only profoundly affect, but even put an end to altogether. This classification of natural obsta- cles to happiness served to limit human responsibility on the one hand, and to accentuate it on the other; so that while one large domain of human effort was ad- mitted to be wholly within the province of religion, 440 COLLECTIVISM another large domain of human effort was found to lie within the domain of politics ; religion being chiefly con- cerned with the life of man in his individual capacity, politics being chiefly concerned with the life of man in his social relations. But while it is possible to separate these spheres of activity in theory, it is not possible to separate them in practice ; because a study of the history of man demon- strates that so long as the political institutions which man has made for himself are such as perpetually set him upon benefiting himself regardless of his neighbour, religion is incapable of effectually persuading men to conduct their lives so as to benefit their neighbours re- gardless of themselves. The hopeless and remediless inconsistency between the preaching of politics and the preaching of religion was dwelt upon for the purpose of demonstrating the necessity of a profound change in our political system if we are ever to bring about a reconciliation between politics and religion. When we come to examine the inconsistency that makes it impossible for us to practise the religious prin- ciples that we profess, it is found to result mainly from the competitive system. The competitive system to which we are all subjected is regarded by many political philosophers as necessary, because it is the system of nature. They, however, disregard two facts, — one that man is no longer the slave of nature, but in part its lord ; and the other, that although nature's plan is essentially a competitive one, it also has found room for co-opera- tion, as, for example, in communities of ants and bees. If nature, then, can work upon the co-operative plan as well as the competitive one, it would seem as though we had the choice between them. Moreover, reason recommends co-operation, and religion commands it. Nature, however, is subject to limitations within SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 441 which co-operation seems to be confined; for under nature's plan co-operation sacrifices the individual to the community, whereas we have seen it to be an essen- tial feature of human design to make the community- serve the happiness of the individual. Again, nature's community plan involves the entire sacrifice — not to say the massacre — of one sex. It seems, then, as though we could not copy the system of nature, because the system of nature is neither expe- dient nor just. For the solution of the problem just presented to us, it is indispensable that we should have clear ideas about government. To this end a special study of government and society was made, with a view to determining whether society was or was not an organism, and what relation government bears to society. The study of the question whether society is an organism or not led us to the following conclusions : In some of the lowest types of animals, society is in very fact an organism, — as, for example, in the mixomycetes, the sponge, and the hydroids ; for in all these the free- moving larvae become at a certain stage of their exist- ence merged together into a new individual, of which they become almost indistinguishable parts. The larvae are unable to resist the force which brings them to- gether; once brought together, they all obey a law which to them is absolute and inexorable. They become differentiated according to the parts of the individual to which they belong, and are compelled by the law of their being to serve the interests of the new individual with- out consideration for their own, which indeed has become merged in the new organism of which they form a part. In this lowest class of society the individual, upon be- coming a part of this society, loses all capacity of indi- vidual action, and is compelled, by a law over which it 442 COLLECTIVISM has no control, to act in accordance with the needs of the new organism of which it has become a part. As animals develop we find that the societies which they form involve less and less abandonment by the individual of the capacity of individual action. The individuals remain, however, subject to a law which they seem powerless to resist, and which may be said to constitute the law of their society; but, nevertheless, every individual constituting this society remains capable of free motion. Nature presents us with almost every form of society, from the loose and occasional grouping of wolves, driven by exceptional cold to hunt in packs, to the compact and continuous grouping of bees in per- manent communities ; all are characterised by practical freedom of individual movement ; and yet, the more per- manent the social bond, the more the individual is sacrificed to the community. Thus the bee will use its sting in defence of the hive, but, in using it, will sacri- fice its own life. And the ant never seems to work for itself directly, but always for the community to which it belongs. Nature, therefore, when left to herself, develops ani- mals of totally different kinds along two lines of devel- opment that in one respect seem diametrically opposed to each other. Along one line it develops the car- nivorous mammals, which in proportion as they grow powerful grow solitary. In another line we see her developing the insect tribes, which in proportion as they grow social grow powerful. Thus the competitive sys- tem has made the lion king in Asia, and the co-operative system has delivered over Africa to the dominion of the ant. Now, the law which governs communities of ants is as much the law of nature as the law which governs the felidse ; but if we can imagine the ant as conscious of the law which governs its community, the ant, in SUIVIMARY AND CONCLUSION 443 using our language, would describe its social law as its government. But it is apparently unable to change its social law or to resist it ; the social law of the ant-hill is the automatic result of co-operation developed by the competitive system, for it must not be forgotten that although competition is eliminated within the ant- hill, it is operating without; and it is through the operation of competition without the ant-hill that the ant has, through its capacity for co-operation, become the terror of an entire continent. Communities of men differ from those of animals in two respects : man is able consciously and deliberately to determine within certain limits the laws of his gov- ernment; man is also capable of exercising a high order of self-control. It has been shown that he has hereto- fore exercised this deliberation and self-control only at rare intervals to any great extent, and only slightly dur- ing the rest of the time. In other words, two processes are going on in the development of human society, — the unconscious law of nature, and the conscious effort of man. In so far as the former is at work, human society is still an organism ; and so far as the latter is at work, human society is also a construction. Just in the same way as human society is partly an organism and partly a construction, so is human government, which is the law of human society, in part the law of nature and in part the law of man. But man, in modifying the law of nature, does so in two different ways. When human intelligence allies itself with human selfishness, it operates to enhance the injustice of the competitive system. When human intelligence allies itself with morality, it operates to diminish the injustice of the competitive system. We therefore have a series of alliances, the operation of which it is important to keep in mind, — the alliance of selfishness and intelligence, 444 COLLECTIVISM that we may call craft, and which tends to appropriate the docility of the mass to its own use, and to create insti- tutions that will maintain the crafty minority in power at the expense of the uncrafty majority ; the alliance of selfishness and ignorance, that we may call folly, which makes the uncrafty majority an easy prey to the crafty minority; and lastly, opposed to these two, the alliance between intelligence and self-control or morality, called wisdom, which seeks to attain justice. The operation, then, of craft and folly is to maintain institutions that put the many at the mercy of the few; the operation of wisdom is to create institutions that attain justice or a greater measure of equality for all. As, however, wisdom has played a subsidiary and only spasmodic part in the history of the world, our institutions are principally due to the operation of the craft of the few and the folly of the many. The result of this is that while the few are protected from some of the inequalities of nature, the many have new inequali- ties thrust upon them. The new inequalities thrust upon the many by the institutions prompted by craft and folly mainly result from the institution of private property. But it must not be supposed that the institution of private property is one with which man could have dis- pensed ; on the contrary, it constituted a phase through which man had to pass. It has its foundation in the law of nature; for we find the fundamental notion of private property of one man in another in the slavery which we know to exist in communities of ants ; it may be traced again in the sense of property which the male has in the female, and which developed into one of our most useful institutions, — marriage. The notion of private property we find as a necessary outgrowth of primitive religion. Upon these three notions — prop- SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 445 erty, marriage, and religion — is built the patriarchal system, which was found ultimately more fitted than the horde system (which it supplanted) to furnish the stimulus for industry indispensable to the develop- ment of civilisation. It was to protect private property as well as to secure life and limb that the patriarchal system yielded to the City State; it was through the accumulation of private property that the aristocracy of birth, to which the patriarchal system slowly gave rise, yielded its privileges to the people ; it was there- fore through the system of private property that oli- garchies became converted into democracies, and it is through the wealth accumulated under the system of private property, and the civilisation built upon the system of private property, that democracy may ulti- mately be replaced by collectivism. For political economy is at last, in its very effort to explain the beauties of the industrial system, laying bare the selfishness which lies at the root of it, and the wastefulness and degeneration to which it gives rise. As our knowledge increases, it becomes clear that selfishness is not productive of happiness, even to the most successful few ; that the unconscious growth that characterises organisms ends in decay, whereas the de- liberate development that characterises wisdom need not end in deca3\ For a clear understanding of what justice is will permit us, through wisdom, not only further to diminish the inequality and injustice that characterise nature, but also to eliminate those which human craft and human folly have added to her. We are led by these considerations to a clear idea of human government. All societies we have seen to be governed by some law, and this law, roughly, is the result of the combination through which weak individ- uals seek to protect themselves against the strong. The 446 COLLECTIVISM law which governs societies of animals other than man is natural law; the law which governs man is not the law of nature alone, but the law of nature modified by man ; the modifications brought by man to the law of nature are those which result from his struggle with the inequality and injustice of nature. The government of human societies, therefore, differs from the govern- ment of animals other than man in that it partly con- sists of a conscious construction of institutions for the deliberate purpose of attaining justice in the protection of the individual as well as the community, and, as such, is, in a sense, opposite to the unconscious growth of the environment that has an indeliberate tendency to perpe- trate injustice by sacrificing the individual to the com- munity. Or it may be expressed as follows : — Government substitutes for the law of nature alone, which sacrifices the individual to the community, the law of nature modified by human wisdom, which seeks to protect the individual as well as the community ; full recognition being given to the fact that man is subject to the law of nature, and that it is by modifying this law that human conditions can be improved, and not by ignoring it. The main purpose of government is to create institu- tions which will to the utmost possible produce equal happiness for all, greatest in amount and best in kind. A study of human history demonstrates the fact that human happiness has been advanced by what we call noble types of men, and has been, on the contrary, diminished by what we call base types of men.i We therefore cannot disregard the fact that certain insti- 1 By noble t_ype is meant the type that seeks happiness through the happiness of others ; by base type is meant the type that seeks happiness regardless of the happiness of others. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 447 tutions tend to improve the type which conduces to hap- piness, while otiier institutions tend to degrade the type, leading by such degradation to unhappiness. All efforts, then, to secure happiness for humanity, without takingr account of the effect which institutions have on type, are likely to prove futile. It becomes, therefore, an important duty for government to create an environ- ment that will tend to produce a noble rather than a base type. It may be said, therefore, that the first test of human institutions is whether or not they will tend to produce a noble or a base type. When we applied this test to the competitive system we found that while in one respect it tends to stimulate intelligence, in another respect it tends to diminish it ; for although it stimulates intelligence in the few who are already intelligent, it tends to render these few infertile, whereas by with- drawing hope — and therefore an incentive to prudence — from the least intelligent, it promotes the fertility of the lowest types. Poverty and the poorhouse are the alternative to success. The fear of these drive men to efforts which exhaust, and occasion perpetual worry; these lead to alcoholism, and alcoholism leads to pau- perism and crime. The competitive system, therefore, tends rather to degenerate type than to improve it. The question arises, however, how we can eliminate the competitive system without exposing humanity to corresponding evils. We have seen the unwisdom of forgetting that men are organisms and not machines; they cannot be dealt with, therefore, without remem- bering that they remain subject to natural law. In studying, therefore, the possibility of replacing the competitive system by some other, we have to ask our- selves what are the objections imposed by nature to such a change, and we have in this respect to remember, first, that man is by nature so constituted that he must in his 448 COLLECTIVISM political system, however organised, satisfy his natural needs. Secondly, he is the creature of comxDetition as much as of co-operation, and partakes, therefore, of the selfish nature of the carnivora as well as of the social nature of the ant. Thirdly, he must not in any change proposed be subjected to conditions that will destroy variability. Fourthly, it must be remembered that organ- isms cannot be subjected to sudden changes. In other words, man is an organism, and selfish as well as social in temperament; he is not adaptable to sudden changes, and uniformity would put an end to his improvement. But it has been seen that the law of nature cannot be set up as an argument against co-operation, because nature herself has used the method of co-operation to produce an insect which by this means has become the terror of a continent. But it is also true that she has done so by the adoption of a plan which sacrifices the individual to the community, and one sex to the other. We are now in a position to grapple with the j3roblem whether we can borrow the co-operative plan adopted by nature, and combine it with the competitive plan in such a manner as to make the community serviceable to the individual, and make it possible for both sexes to live in harmony therein, without forgetting the four limitations to which we have referred. It is submitted, first, that through self-control the prob- lem of the sexes has already been partly solved by the institution of marriage; secondly, that the only way of satisfying reason and morality is through the adoption of institutions by which the satisfaction of human needs and the pursuit of human happiness can be attained through the happiness of others instead of at the ex- pense of others, thereby borrowing from nature its i)rin- ciple of co-operation; thirdly, that no political institu- SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 449 tions can eliminate the struggle arising from differences of personal attractiveness, and that, therefore, this ele- ment of human unhappiness cannot be eliminated by political institutions, even if such an elimination were desirable ; fourthly, that ample room must be left under such a system for competition in connection with the natural desire men have in common with other animals for affection, and for consideration, which is allied to affection; fifthly, that the competition which will arise from this source, though it will necessarily give rise to some unhappiness, will maintain a sufficient struggle to prevent uniformity; sixthly, and lastly, that, the vari- ability of the race being preserved by this struggle, its inadaptability to sudden changes must also be taken account of by making this change slowly, in proportion as the improvement of type permits. Let us now see whether the proposed system of col- lectivism satisfies the conditions just set forth, and to this end let us study collectivism, first, from the rational point of view; secondly, from the practical point of view; thirdly, from the prudential point of view; fourthly, from the moral point of view; and fifthly, from the political point of view. § 1. Rational View op Collectivism Our mental habits have become anchylosed into the conviction that the only desirable thing in the world is money; whereas the really desirable things in it are our own comfort and the affection and consideration of others. We really value money only because it can procure for us these last; but we have lost sight of our real ends in our perpetual effort to secure the means. The tendency to confound means with ends is observ- 29 450 COLLECTIVISM able in many other fields of action, and is extremely serviceable, for upon it is often founded our most valuable arts. The object of rowing is to transport men and things over water; but this object is totally lost sight of in the art of rowing, which, for the purpose of cultivating the art, resorts to boats totally unsuited to the end of transportation. A principal object of study- ing history is to get light from the failures and successes of human institutions in the past upon the framing of institutions for the future; but it is found that men who study history in order to bolster a particular theory are apt to distort historical facts in order to fit their views ; and so it has become useful to profit by the dis- position to substitute means for ends, and to encourage the study of history for its own sake. The study of history, therefore, has become separated from that of politics, which it is intended ultimately to serve, with profit to both; for we get better history, and from a more truthful history we ought eventually to get less unwise politics. Again, the chisel and brush, originally used as a vehicle of expression, religious and other, have now become an end in themselves; and we therefore hear artists repudiating the theory that art is a vehicle of expression, and demanding that it be cultivated for its own sake ; and one of the results of this view is that we get art purged of literature and restored to the simplicity and singleness of j)urpose which characterise the works of Michael Angelo and Praxiteles. Art gains by the doctrine that it is an end in itself through the sincerity that this doctrine engenders ; but in gaining sincerity it tends to lose sight of its original purpose, so that while we make skilful oarsmen on still water, we lose skilful oarsmen on rough ; while we gain truthful recorders of past events, we tend to lose intel- ligent application of lessons to be drawn from past SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 451 events to the present; while in art we gain sincerity of technique, we tend to lose genius of conception. Ultimately, however, the benefit outweighs the loss ; for there arise new men who use the faithful history of the purely historic school and the sincere technique of the purely artistic school, and apply the one to the foundation of wiser institutions, the other to the crea- tion of loftier works of art. Something of this kind may yet take place in the present disordered attitude of our minds toward wealth. We have lost sight of the real purpose of our lives — hap- piness — in the pursuit of the means for attaining it, wealth. As a result of this unfortunate delusion the whole human race has been set upon a relentless pursuit of riches, in the course of which, although they have forgotten the real object of their endeavours, they have acquired an amazing ability for acquiring, creating, and accumulating all those things which go to make up comfort and happiness. It is probable that in no other way could this ability have been attained; at any rate the human race is to-day the richer for having attained it, but it is none the more happy for it; on the con- trary the race is kept in misery by a system for creat- ing wealth which deprives the larger part of the comforts of life in order to sicken the lesser part with surfeit of them. It is like a hypnotic subject pursuing its own unhappiness under the domination of a false suggestion. Is it possible for us to arouse ourselves from this hypnotic sleep, to rid ourselves of this false suggestion, and awake to the facts that it is not private wealth we really need, but the comfort, the considera- tion, and the love that private wealth may promise, but seldom if ever bestows ; that private property has only served the purpose of all pain to inform us how we can use our gifts without abusing them; that we have re- 452 COLLECTIVISM fused so far to learn our lesson because our minds have been clouded by error and our hearts sickened by fear; that just as the genius of art borrows the technique of those who have laboured in sincerity, so the genius of wisdom may borrow the wealth of those who have laboured in pain; and that the faculty of acquiring wealth that has been attained through the injustice of the competitive system may be utilised to attain the jus- tice of collectivism? If all human effort and human morality can be reduced to the effort to secure the highest type of human happiness, and if we are persuaded that private owner- ship of the sources of production, though necessary as a stage through which humanity had to pass in its search of happiness, is, nevertheless, now clearly seen by human wisdom to be a source of unhappiness, then assuredly it is not unreasonable to propose that humanity should, in the framing of its political institutions, look to a slow abandonment of private ownership of the sources of production and the substitution therefor of property in the State, it being understood that such a change can be effected only by steps taken slowly and conformably to improvement in type. § 2. Practical View of Collectivism It has been urged that collectivism is not practical ; indeed, books have been written to prove that it is im- possible. To this objection there are several answers. In the first place, no great work was ever proposed but so-called practical men denounced it as impossible. All the engineers in England without a dissenting voice declared the Suez Canal impossible. Thiers, after per- sonally examining the first railroad in England, decided SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 453 with unfaltering self-satisfaction that railroads were "not suited to France." When a few young men, in 1891, proposed a permanent organisation of citizens in New York against misgovernment, permanent organisa- tion to this end was denounced by practical politicians as impossible. Indeed, everything that is very useful and a little difficult appears to those who have not enough imagination to see its feasibility to be impossible. And everything that is at all worth while doing is difficult. Indeed, if it is worth doing, it must be diffi- cult, or it would have been done before. The mere fact that collectivism seems impossible to many is no argu- ment against it; experience has proved over and over again that what seems impossible to one generation is achieved by the next. At the beginning of the century would not the wise and ignorant alike have declared railroads impossible ? And what would they have said only fifty years ago of telegraphs and telephones and Rontgen rays ? In the second place, collectivism is doubtless not practical to-day ; but this is no reason for believing that it may not become practical — nay, imperative — later on. As has been already explained, we are too ignorant — both rich and poor — to accept collectivism or adequately practise it ; the rich would not without a struggle give up what they have, because their imaginations do not seem able to grasp the relief from anxiety that they would get in exchange ; the poor would not be content with what they would get because they expect more than any intelligent or maintainable system of collectivism could give them. Neither the one nor the other have sufficiently studied the subject to effect the change without danger of shipwreck in the process ; it is only through a long system of education by experience that the community can be made fit for it. 454 COLLECTIVISM It is conceivable that a popular revolt might bring to the front a man who was a Napoleon for organisation and a Washington for self-restraint; and that in the hands of such a man the revolution might be effected rapidly without danger to civilisation. But it is ex- tremely unlikely that any form of collectivism adopted suddenly through the genius of a single man could be permanent; the moment his hold weakened with age or was withdrawn by death, the unfitness of the community for so advanced a condition of civilisation would express itself in dissatisfaction and revolt; the crafty would profit by them to secure the reins of government and direct it for their own advantage ; this would speedily restore existing conditions, and the failure of a prema- ture experiment would disproportionately retard its ulti- mate success. But this is no argument against recognising at once that a more or less partial collectivism is the form of government towards which we should direct our efforts ; for every day that we postpone such efforts we increase the danger of a premature and, therefore, ruinous attempt at it ; whereas if we at once take steps to bring about gradually what will otherwise happen cataclysmi- cally, we may avoid the ruin that such a calamity would involve. In the third place, this book is not written for the purpose of showing that collectivism is practical; it is Avritten for the purpose of demonstrating that it is de- sirable; and, above all, that there is in science not only no argument against it, but, on the contrary, a powerful argument in its favour. Moreover, in this connection, the distinction made in the Preface between collectivism as an ideal or end, and collectivism as a method or pro- gramme, must be carefully kept in mind. The extent to which collectivism can be adopted depends upon the SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 455 perfectibility of man; how far man is perfectible is to-day a matter of pure speculation; whatever be our opinion regarding the degree to which man is perfec- tible, there is an important difference between the opinion that man is capable of perfection and the opinion that man is capable of improvement; the extent of man's perfectibility is a matter of speculation ; the capability of man for improvement is a matter of faith. An effort will be made in the next section to demonstrate that the belief in the capacity of man for improvement is a duty; and if it be a duty, then it becomes a duty also to study in what direction this capacity for im- provement lies. Collectivism, whether as a method in economics, or as a programme in politics, or as a creed in religion, has been presented as furnish- ing the direction towards which human improvement lies. Again, however impractical ideal collectivism may be, there is a stage in the progress towards it, called partial collectivism, which is not impractical ; and the fact that partial collectivism suggests a solution to the problem presented by pauperism and prostitution, and in great part also by crime, suggests that intelligent efforts could and should be made at once gradually to fit us for it. It is true that it may take centuries to accomplish this ; but, on the other hand, some solution of existing prob- lems may be forced upon us before we are prepared for it ; and it is our immediate duty to decide what steps can usefully be taken at once to forestall a possible ex- periment that would be dangerously premature. I shall therefore here confine myself to the expression of the belief that a political programme looking towards the slow adoption of collectivism is to-day not only practical but imperative; and that if such a programme be not pursued we shall witness an effort to impose upon us 456 COLLECTIVISM one that will be neither conceived with wisdom nor executed with moderation. We are confronted with very much the same condi- tions as preceded the outbreak of the French Revolu- tion. There was a tension then in the relations of the Crown to the bourgeoisie which is no greater than that which exists to-day in those of capital to labour. Capital, in intrenching itself behind trusts, and labour, in fortifying itself within trade unions, have respectively separated themselves from that neutral part of the com- munity which under less organised conditions leavens the mass; the combatants are not only separated and singled out, but they are unconsciously urging one another on to battle ; capital blinds itself to the rights of labour; labour blinds itself to the limitations of cap- ital ; and both, ignoring their respective strength as well as their respective weakness, are preparing to strangle each other. If there be in the community wisdom and temperance enough to establish a modus vivendi pending the slow adoption of institutions which will substitute co-opera- tion for the present animosity, a revolution may be avoided ; such is the character which any practical pro- gramme should adopt. If none such is presented while capital and labour are struggling for the control of the ship, she may be driven on the rocks. This is the alternative; under these conditions is it the time to ask whether collectivism is practical ? As well might Charles I. or Louis XVI. have asked if a constitutional monarchy were practical. We are not confronted with the question whether it is practical, but by the fact that it is imminent. What we have to de- cide is whether it shall bring with it " airs from heaven or blasts from hell; " whether it shall find us prepared or unprepared. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 457 But collectivism is not the insane dream which most people think it is. The wastefulness of the existing sys- tem in money, labour, and agony has not yet become obvi- ous to the practical man, who has through thousands of years been educated to believe that it is not only necessary, but, because necessary, right. When his eyes become opened to the economy of money, of labour, and of pain that would result from a conservative system of collectivism, he will wonder that the difBculties in the way of it ever seemed to him worth taking account of by the side of the benefits to be derived from it ; and although he may still recognise the unwisdom of an attempt to foist collectivism on a people not yet fitted by knowledge and self-control for it, he will strain every nerve, by education and by slow changes in our rules of government, to make them fit for it. And in the effort no consideration of time will have any importance for him. It took Islam eight hundred years to march from Mecca to Byzantium, and in this march the life of no one man counted for anything. There was in the ranks of Mohammed a sense of fate that urged them on re- gardless of so small a span as a day, a year, or a cen- tury; huge castles and cities arose wherever the Moslem host rested on its way; springing up as it arrived, per- ishing as it moved on ; and vast ruins to-day serve as footprints to mark its giant strides. Such was the force of a mere idea. And if so narrow and selfish an idea as that of the subjugation of a capital could relentlessly move gener- ation after generation of men to the accomplishment of its end, how much more could it accomplish were the idea one that looked not to the conquest of a city for a tribe, but to the realisation of an ideal for the whole world. And the task is not so difficult or so revolutionary as 458 COLLECTIVISM may at first appear; for although we all of us are, and for centuries have been, committed by commercial- ism to a struggle for loaves and fishes, nevertheless our arts, sculpture, music, literature, betray the fact that what we really aspire to is the heroic and the beautiful. I have seen a New York private detective, whose business it was, in the pursuit of gain, to hound his fel- low men, forget the business which brought him to Paris as he stood lost in bewildered admiration at the beauty of Notre Dame. And yet the cathedral that overcame this human sleuth-hound is a symbol of sacrifice: its gothic arches; the dim light of its stained glass; its lofty pillars and fretted vault ; the scheme of the cross upon which it is built, — all tell the same story. What- ever beauty it has, whatever message it bears, is a beauty and message of sacrifice. Again, of all cities in the world Paris is the one in which material things, perhaps, engross most the minds of its inhabitants; and yet all Paris for months flocked to "Cyrano de Bergerac " because in him are united courage, strength, and the nobility of a great sacrifice. We are not as sordid as we seem. The passages in history and literature to which we thrill tell of those who died for their country and of men and women who have suffered for one another; the great works of art that adorn the walls of the Sixtine Chapel or were des- tined for the tomb of Julius II. set up ideals before which we stand awed because they embody the beauty of self-sacrifice and self-control. These are the things we really love, and the ideals to which we really aspire. We hourly sacrifice them because thousands of years of competition have closed our eyes to the possibility of abolishing it. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 459 But our eyes will be opened ; it may take centuries of pain ; we may have to pass through revolutions so long, so universal, so bloody, that by the side of them the horrors of the Reign of Terror will seem the momentary triumph of a local mob; it may be that the whole race may perish in the conflict; but if it survives, it can only do so on the condition of at last learning the lesson that the multitude which all these years has been docile to the domination of a crafty few has at last acquired or is surely acquiring enough intelligence and enough education either to possess itself of its share in the good things of the world or to destroy the whole system which deprives them of it. In the struggle which is impending, every man and woman has to decide what part he or she is to play in it. Shall the educated class, with wisdom and temper- ance, so lead the movement that the revolution may take place slowly and imperceptibly, as once in England, or violently and with bloodshed, as in France ? Shall our civilisation be exposed to the danger of disappearing altogether, as did that of Egypt and Assyria, because having ears we hear not, and having eyes we will not see ? Or shall there be revived once more the faith that for centuries followed Jesus of Nazareth along the way of the cross ? This faith was strangled by the alliance of the Roman Church and Roman Empire, and is to-day strangled for every one of us by the attempt to reconcile the teaching of Christ with the competitive system. It can live once more only on the condition of abandoning this attempt, — not by rash and revolutionary changes, but by prudent efforts to reconcile our institutions with our faith step by step, as our weakness will permit, rather than by leaps and bounds, as enthusiasm might prefer. There is more virtue in the self-restraint that will 460 COLLECTIVISM consent to undertake this work gradually than in the zeal that would work to accomplish it at once ; for we shall not live to enjoy the fruits of our labour in the one case, and we are perhaps inspired by the hope of enjoying them in the other. We cannot hope that our consciences can rest until the perpetual conflict between profession and practice comes to an end. It can end only when we make up our minds that we can abolish the reign of egotism in our hearts only by abolishing it in our institutions. Collectivism is founded upon the theory that selfish- ness, hatred, and violence are immoral. It may be re- garded as a sort of political religion. It is therefore to those who are earnestly desirous of seeing morality prevail in the world that the task of introducing collec- tivism into it should be intrusted. By this it is not meant to imply that there is any particular class in our existing community better fitted than any other class for this work. On the contrary, it is believed that the work can be successfully accomplished only through the good element which exists in all existing classes. The danger, however, which threatens us is that the task of introducing collectivism into our society is likely to be taken up, not by those who are anxious to see unsel- fishness, love, and peace prevail in the world, but by those who, incensed by the injustice of existing condi- tions, discontented with their own lot and inflamed by vindictiveness, are likely to attempt by violence what can be successfully accomplished only by persuasion. "We have already seen that every effort made by humanity in the direction of a high ideal, whether it took tlie form of Christianity, or jVIohammedanisra, or the Crusades, or Chivalry, served ultimately only to secure the ends of selfishness. If the task, then, of in- SUIVIMARY AND CONCLUSION 461 trodiicing collectivism into our civilisation is to be sur- rendered to those who are animated only by selfishness, it would be inconsistent with the whole history of man that such an effort should succeed. Prudence, therefore, suggests the importance of at once drawing up a political programme which will give to those who suffer from the existing conditions all the satisfaction which existing conditions will afford; but this should be done, not from a purely prudential mo- tive, not merely to save ourselves from revolution, but in order ultimately to secure the greatest and best happiness for all. § 3. Moral View of Collectivism In the course of this work the word "morality" has been used without any attempt to define it. It has been assumed that we all know what morality is. But stu- dents of moral philosophy are familiar with the fact that there is room on this point for profound differences of opinion. For example, is morality the product of the blind and mechanical process of evolution, or does it come from God; is it natural or supernatural; is it human or divine? To the scientific man — that is to say, the man who confines his reasoning to physical facts alone — it seems capable of proof that morality is the product of a blind and mechanical process. Herbert Spencer has shown that morality arises out of the extension of the con- cern of the individual for himself to that of the indi- vidual for the female in sexual intercourse ; of concern for the female to concern for offspring; of concern for offspring to concern for the family; of concern for the family to concern for the tribe ; of concern for the 462 COLLECTIVISM tribe to concern for the nation ; and that our morality is now in process of developing from concern for the nation to concern for the entire race. This growing concern continues to be selfish; it attends a growing satisfaction, but it represents a tendency to substitute for satisfaction of self regardless or at the expense of others, satisfaction of self through the satisfaction of others; and the more complete this substitution, the more highly socialised becomes man. It is difficult to add anything to the pages of the "Data of Ethics " on this subject. The religious, however, are not satisfied with this ex- planation ; to them morality is divine ; it comes clothed with a divine inspiration; it is because it is so clothed that it is a law to them. "Science," they say, "affects to ignore the supernatural on the ground that nature furnishes a sufficient explanation for all authentic phe- nomena without the necessity of calling in a super- natural power; that the observed sequence between cause and effect furnishes a more certain guide for human conduct than the assumptions of religion." But science fails to recognise that the sequence of cause and effect upon which it so confidently builds is itself without any foundation ; that it has never explained the first cause of all, — tlie Creator. And not only has it failed to account for the very beginning of all things, but in the development of man which is called evolution there are great breaks: science has never furnished an explana- tion for the appearance of life in the world, for the appearance of consciousness in it, or for what Herbert Spencer calls the " Power which works through evolu- tion," and through the operation of which, as he has shown, morality has been slowly developed in the animal world until it has reached its highest development in man. All that science does or can do is to describe SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 463 what happens and what is the apparent law of these happenings ; it is incapable of explaining what the force is which animates the world or whence it comes. It seems as though there were lacunae in the scientific argument against the supernatural which no truly scien- tific man can afford to neglect. He can say that science will eventually explain them ; that it is easier to believe it will explain them than to adopt the faith of religion, which can be often proved to be the product of igno- rance, — the ignorance, for example, which attributes to Providence what science can show to be due to purely natural causes. But it is when we come to analyse these words, "natural causes," that a great part of the confu- sion that presides over the discussion between religion and science become explained. What are natural causes ? What is nature ? What are its limits? What separates it from the divine ? An answer to these questions has been already at- tempted in the first volume ; and the general conclusion to which we then came was that there had gradually developed in nature a power which is to-day able in great part successfully to resist her. Science has traced the slow development of this power, has described many of the physical laws through which it works; but as to what the power itself is, whence it comes, what gave the bird the faculty to build a nest, the bee to construct a hive, the beaver a dam, and man his ancient temples and his modern homes, science offers no explanation except that it is due to a combination of accident and the survival of the fittest. But this theory of accident is not insisted upon by science. As regards all these metaphysical questions, it has adopted a method for disarming its religious 464 COLLECTIVISM antagonists, — the method of agnosticism. It assumes an air of humility and says, " There are some things in the domain of the natural which I do know, but outside of this domain — that is to say, of all that belongs to the domain of the supernatural — I know nothing." Asa strategic measure this attitude is undoubtedly in part successful; it, as it were, makes it impossible for the wrestlers to close with one another; but for that reason it must forever leave the contest unconcluded. It is questionable, however, whether the agnostic posi- tion is altogether sincere; for science has learned, by continually fighting the assumptions of religion, indis- criminately to hate them and to hate the religion it holds responsible for them. And so agnosticism, which in form is a correct statement of one of the attitudes of science to religion, is of chief use to science in disguis- ing its real attitude, which is one of denial. It has thus become, like the green lawns that drape our modern for- tifications, a screen behind which its guns are masked. Religion is not in this respect at any rate so insincere. Religion boldly proclaims, not less than it knows, as science does, but more than it knows under the author- ity of Revelation. "God is all good, all wise, all powerful. He rewards piety with heaven ; He punishes impiety with hell." The Roman Catholic Church goes farther. She professes to know just what sins commit sinners irretrievably to eternal flame, and what are expiated by a temporary punishment in a mitigated hell, which she calls purgatory. Now, in the court of reason, the bishop who pretends to know too much is out- argued by the sceptic who pretends to know too little ; but the fact probably is that both are equally wrong. The bishop may have insufficient ground for his asser- tions, but the sceptic has still less ground for his denial. We do know that a power exists for which science is SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 465 utterly unable to account; we do know that this power has, in general compliance with laws with which this power does not always seem to comply, set in operation a sequence of cause and effect upon the certainty of whose action we can for the most part count, but over which this power seems at rare intervals to have kept the masterdom ; we do know that as a part of this plan there has been developed a force in man which is capa- ble of resisting the sequence of cause and effect which has been called natural evolution, so that instead of Nature being left blindly to stagger from experiment to experiment, she may by this new force in man slowly be led along a consistent course of conscious and deliberate design. It seems as though science had been led by the vocif- erousness of her denials at last to believe in them; so that, just as an angry man feeds and inflames his anger by the expression of it, science has fed and inflamed her scepticism by the clamour to which she has been driven in order to drown the not always unreasonable conten- tions of her antagonist. No attempt will be made here to reconcile the conflict between religion and science ; this task belongs to those who write books of religious controversy ; and from reli- gious controversy we should, above all things, keep our- selves clear. On the other hand, after having, in com- pliance with the passion for excluding sentiment and, above all, religious sentiment from political discussion, that characterises this century, treated morality as a fact upon the same plane as the fang of the carnivora or the social instinct of the sponge, it becomes necessary, before closing, to point out that there is between the fact of morality and the other facts discussed here the difference that separates man and beast. And, without adopting all the assumptions of any one creed, it is 30 466 COLLECTIVISM above all things important to discard the hostility towards faith which lurks behind the cloak of agnosti- cism. The word " faith " is not used here inadvertently ; for although, in the sense in which it is sometimes used, it may be quite foreign to political science, there is a sense in which it may become an essential factor of it. This ought to furnish a sufficient apology for introduc- ing into a work on political science a short discourse on faith. (a) Faith Faith may be roughly defined to be a willingness or faculty to believe things that are incapable of proof. Now, just as obedience to temporal rulers is enjoined upon us by the Church in temporal matters, so obedience to spiritual rulers is enjoined upon us in spiritual mat- ters ; and this obedience in spiritual matters practically consists in a submission of our minds to spiritual author- ity, — that is to say, in a willingness to believe regard- ing spiritual matters what the Church or recognised spiritual authority tells us to believe. It has been elsewhere pointed out^ that obedience, which was a cardinal virtue under the conditions which prevailed in the time of Christ, ceased to be a virtue under the conditions which prevailed in the sixteenth century. Man had grown; there was a certain kind of obedience which he had outgrown; and this kind of obe- dience gave way, therefore, to the " sacred right of in- surrection." Something of the same kind took place regarding faith, — the obedience to spiritual authority which put the reins of civilisation, from the fourth to the sixteenth century, into the hands of the Church, diminished in proportion as the Church became less fit 1 "Evolution and Effort," p. 278. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 467 to hold them. So, in compliance with the law that those only are allowed to govern who can, submission of the mind to spiritual authority disappeared as soon as the constituted authority became incapable any longer of justifying itself. The Reformation was a revolt against authority ; and it is of no small interest to note that the first throne to totter was that of the Pope. It is amaz- ing how much and how long men will endure domination if they get something for it; it is when they get nothing for it that they revolt; it was when the people got noth- ing from the king that they revolted in 1789; it was when they got nothing from the Pope that they revolted in 1525. When the spiritual authority of the Church was broken down in the sixteenth and ensuing centuries, an attempt was made to set up another authority in its place; and the Bible for a long time served this pur- pose. But literal inspiration of the Bible was incapa- ble of withstanding the onslaught of rational criticism, and when the difficulties attending the alternative be- tween literal inspiration on the one hand, and private judgment on the other, had become sufficiently ob- vious, all attempt to believe things incapable of proof was abandoned by science and recourse was had to agnosticism. Now, throughout the early history of faith the main question is one of submission to authority. Paul preached this duty of submission as the one indispens- able virtue necessary for salvation; and the Christian world remained subject to this controlling thought until the authority itself was shaken. With Protestantism and with the setting up of a book in the place of a throne, there necessarily came a confusion regarding faith which was well-nigh inextricable. The hopeless- ness of reconciling private judgment with authority 468 COLLECTIVISM made it necessary to revise the very foundations that underlie the meaning of the word "faith." There is still a thing we call faith ; but it is no more the faith which Paul preached than electricity is to-day the amber (eXeKTpov) from which it derives its name. The faith of which we speak to-day (though it may retain its original meaning in the Roman Catholic Church) is, outside of the Roman Catholic Church, no longer a matter of religious authority ; it has become one of private conviction. But if faith has become purely a matter of private conviction, it seems to have lost the specific quality which made of it a virtue. In the old days faith in- volved an element of sacrifice; it sacrificed the very con- viction which it seems to be the glory of modern faith to encourage and proclaim. The moment the element of sacrifice and submission is eliminated from faith, it apparently ceases to be a virtue and becomes an accident of temperament, custom, or education; one fraction of Christendom is born Roman Catholic and remains Roman Catholic; another is born Baptist and remains Baptist ; or, again, one man temperamentally a Romanist but educated by Protestants, as soon as he is weaned from educational influences, follows the dictates of his temperament and joins the Catholic Church; another, temperamentally a Protestant but educated by Catho- lics, if weaned from the Catholic environment, joins the Protestant Church. Here there is no element of sacrifice; on the contrary, the whole condition is one of surrender, — surrender to habit in the first group of cases, to temperament in the second. It is earnestly submitted that conviction which is a mere surrender to mental constitution or emotional tem- perament or habit is Tiot faith. Faith involves the idea of an act of will in obedience to what is believed to be SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 469 a religious or moral duty. Unless there be found in a man's attitude towards morality some element of choice, — and generally choice that involves some sacrifice, — his attitude cannot be characterised by the word "faith." Otherwise faith becomes another word for conviction, and a very unnecessary word for it ; worse, indeed, than unnecessary, for it is confusing. It may, however, be urged that if Protestantism has killed the authority of the Church, it has killed faith; and that no faith is any longer possible in Christendom outside of the Roman Catholic Church. This is believed to be a profound mistake. Faith is as possible to the man of pure science as to the most bigoted Papist, and it is in the emphasising of this contention that we ap- proach the value of faith in matters of political science. Hence the importance of it. Of the two theories presented to students of science regarding the problem of human will, one declares man to be the slave of his greater inclination, and the other maintains, on the contrary, that he is master of it. As between these two contentions, logic seems to be on the side of the determinists ; but there is an intermediate contention that man can by effort contribute to the making of his greater inclination; and that therefore, although the greater inclination once formed he must act in obedience to it, man is nevertheless master of his own conduct through the fact that he is by effort capable in great part of determining what his greater inclination is to be. Now, in this intermediate contention there is no logi- cal flaw; it is open possibly to the objection that man's inclinations are so much more determined for him by his temperament than by any effort of his own that the latter becomes, by the side of the former, a negligible quantity. But this objection is an argument of despair. 470 COLLECTIVISM It means that man is incapable of self -improvement ; it is the last expression of pessimism. Now, of the two doctrines, the optimistic doctrine that man is capable of self-improvement and the pes- simistic doctrine that man is incapable of it, which is he to choose ? Is he to surrender to the pessimistic tem- perament in him, or is he, on the contrary, to resist this pessimistic temperament, and by an act of choice, or by the exercise of effort, deliberately decide in favour of self -improvement ? This is the point at which, to my mind, there is scope for the action of faith in the truest sense; and here it is that the action of faith can be made serviceable to political science. Not only in questions of pure ethics, but also in many political problems, of two theories proposed one will be found, if adopted, to favour the social perfectibility of men, and the other will be found to disfavour it. In both the field of ethics, then, and in that of political science there is in every such case room for an act of faith ; in other words, we can resist the tendency in us to adopt the theory which will disfavour social perfecti- bility, and we can by effort decide to adopt the theory that will favour such perfectibility'. Here, then, seems to be a shibboleth by which we can decide between two equally opposed and equally plausible arguments; namely, which of the two will tend most to the perfection of man and incidentally to his highest happiness. Of course many men are constitutionally optimistic and benevolent; to them such problems present no difficulty; they will adopt the optimistic argument in natural compliance with an optimistic temperament. Others, again, are constitutionally selfish beyond the reach of argument. Nothing is capable of reaching them SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 471 but tribulation, and many are proof even against this. But there is a large class of political students for whom, by dint of reading such works as those of Herbert Spen- cer, the native hue of resolution has been sicklied o'er by the pale cast of thought; they have been persuaded by the determinist argument; they have not had presented to them the moral issue which sets against the deter- minist argument another argument just as logical and possessed of the social advantage that it militates in favour of human happiness and dignity, whereas deter- minism leads to human unhappiness and probable degradation. One of the principal purposes of this book is to bring compendiously before the mind of the reader the facts which go to show that if man is willing to sit as a silent spectator of the process of evolution, as Herbert Spencer seems in many passages to recommend, the chances are rather that he will degenerate than that he will improve ; whereas if he recognises that he has himself, by his intel- ligence and his capacity for deliberate effort, become the principal factor in the process, there is no limit to his perfectibility, no limit to the happiness and dignity he may eventually attain. Faith, then, in political science is the virtue which by effort adopts of two equally plausible theories the one that will advance the social perfectibility of man rather than that which will retard it.i 1 This brief sketch of faith has not included the somewhat special con- ditions which result from the attitude of the Anglican or Episcopal Church. Like all Anglo-Saxon institutions, the English Church has looked more to the utility of its creed than to its consistency ; and because obedience to the Church is as valuable a \'irtue to the community as independence of thought, she has included them both, however discoi'dant they ma}' some- times be. Thus she has preserved the authority of the Catholic Church in her so-called doctrine of Apostolic succession, but has kept clear of the logical conclusion therefrom which in Rome has taken the shape of Papal infallibility. The fact, however, that the Anglican Church does not re- 472 COLLECTIVISM And now we are in a position to return to the question of agnosticism. Have we a right to be agnostics ? Just as private wealth is a phase through which civil- isation has had to pass in its progress from property of no one individual in anything to property of all in everything, so agnosticism seems to be a phase through which the mind has to pass in its progress from the religion of authority to that of collectivism. When religion professed to know more about the divine than it could know, reason resisted the claims of religion by denial; and when denial overstepped the bounds of reason by denying more than it need, reason recovered her balance in agnosticism. We know that God exists, said the Church. We know He does not exist, said the atheist. We don't know whether He exists or not, said the agnostic. It seems, however, that if we are to restore its virtue to faith it is our duty to know something about Him; and it seems demonstrable also that if the political student is really engaged in the problem how social conditions can, through the machinery of government, be improved, it is his duty to have convictions about the supernatural ; for if the distinction that has been made between the natural and the supernatural is correct, it will be found that it is with the supernatural that the political student has most to do. To this distinction between the natural and the supernatural let us for a moment revert. In the confusion which reigns regarding the meaning fuse the prop of ecclesiastical authority to those who wash to lean upon it does not prevent her permittiiifj large scope for the play of private judg- ment, and particularly for tlie exercise of the faith which in obedience to a supposed religious duty deliberately chooses of two equally plausible doctrines the one most consistent with the liigliest morality. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 473 of the word "nature," it seemed as though the only way out of it was to take the most universally employed meaning of the word and eliminate all other meanings which are inconsistent with it. And as nature was characterised best by its opposition to art and spirit, it was decided that nature must be deemed to include everything in the world except what pertains to spirit and to art. Under this definition nature includes that part of man which is common to the lower animals, but does not include that part which is in the main peculiar to man, and which is found perpetually opposed to the animal in him. Thus the animal is an unconscious product of its environment. Man, on the contrary, is continually engaged in consciously moulding an envi- ronment of his own. Animals are relatively incapable of refusing a present pleasure to avoid a future pain; whereas the whole moral education of man consists in strengthening the faculty in him by which he can forego a present pleasure in order to avoid a future pain. The actions of animals are determined by habit or instinct, which is the necessary product of their respective environments; whereas man, though lamentably still a creature of habit, is able, by education and reiter- ated acts of self-control, to create habits which, because they substitute notions of general utility for notions of individual utility, gradually lead to a system of ethics, and this system of ethics differs in every social group according to the extent to which human effort in the direction of high standards of social life have been suc- cessful. The highest standards of social life are obviously those which lead to the greatest and most equally dis- tributed happiness for all; and political students are confronted with the problem of how to frame institutions which are most likely to result in this desired end. And 474 COLLECTIVISM in framing these institutions they have to take account of the obstacles which nature puts in their way, — such, for example, as the instinctive selfishness which centuries of competitive struggle have created ; sexual jealousy, which condemns all existing collectivist com- munities in nature to the subordination and massacre of one sex by the other; the almost uncontrollable impulse of sexual desire, which necessarily characterises all races possessed of high vitality ; the evils which must result from the necessary effort, by such artificial in- stitutions as marriage, to control this impulse; the continuity which links generations of men so that we cannot confine- our view to one generation, but must create institutions that will tend to perpetuate a noble type rather than a base; the extreme slowness with which organisms adapt themselves to new environments, and the consequent danger of revolutionary change. In this study of the formidable difficulties which nature opposes to the efforts of man, the political student is driven to revise the somewhat simple code of morals which is taught by our religious creeds. The ten com- mandments thundered from Sinai and the more modern Sermon on the Mount are found to order conduct which is not consistent with the institutions under which we live. We are told, "Thou shalt not kill," and yet in all our churches in 1898 prayers were offered up to the Almighty beseeching him to strengthen our arms that we might kill the greatest number of Spaniards possible. We are told, " If any man would take away thy coat, give unto him thy cloak also," and yet the competitive system which some of our political philosophers find so good is one which permits of our surviving only on the condition that in the struggle with our neighbour we contrive so that he be the one that suffers and not ourselves. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 475 In the conflict between the code we preach and the code we practise, a quiet conscience is. impossible; its voice may be stifled altogether, as in the case of those who either never had a conscience or have cynically silenced it ; or it may, refusing to be altogether silenced, make itself heard occasionally, like the groans of a Des- demona under the pillows of a reluctant Moor. But a voice which can express itself only exceptionally under the pressure of intolerable conditions is not likely to speak words of unfaltering wisdom. Let us consider for a moment how in the field of morality this uncanny system works. (J) Morality of Co7npensation Competition creates a peculiar kind of morality that may be called the morality of compensation. It proceeds upon the theory that as the struggle for life obliges the successful man to be the occasion of death to some of his competitors, of ruin to many, and of serfdom to the rest, he can satisfy his conscience by surrendering to works of philanthropy some part of the income he cannot conveniently spend upon himself. This willingness to throw a sop to conscience was thoroughly exploited by the Church in the Middle Ages, and is exploited still by our churches, our philanthropic societies, and even our reform associations, so that we continually find the very men who corrupt our legislatures subscribing largely to good government clubs and occupying prominent places on committees organised for the very purpose of making legislation pure. This morality of compensation has a subtle effect upon our entire population ; we are all of us dimly conscious of the evil which results from the social conditions by which we profit, but, unable to see any solution for the problems to which these give rise, we 476 COLLECTIVISM are driven by conscience to look beyond the field of our own responsibility for occasions of compensating piety and self-sacrifice. This leads bankers who know how to make profit out of the fluctuating values of coin at the expense of the farmers when it rises, and of the workman when it falls, to head committees to secure universal peace and induces fashionable women who exact lower prices from their dressmakers because of the vogue their patronage can confer, to inflame the nation to war with Spain out of sympathy for the reconcentrados. Is it any wonder that Christ said to the young man who asked what he should do to be saved, "Sell that thou hast, and give to the poor"? And yet we are by no means to conclude that if Christ were among us to-day this would be his instruc- tion. Things have changed since Christ preached in Judea; and, aware that they would change, He said, " I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye can- not bear them now." Wealth can best be conceived by us as a trust, sad- dled by heavy responsibilities ; and the first duty of the wealthy is to learn. If they are capable of throwing off the prejudice which wealth inevitably imposes upon them in favour of the institutions through which they retain their wealth ; if they will give to the solution of social problems half the time they do to the protection of their property ; if they will endeavour not merely to silence con- science but to satisfy it, — they can do far more towards diminishing unhappiness by using their wealth than by dissipating it. For it must not be supposed that these problems can be solved in a day. Not only does it take centuries to prepare the human machine for great social changes, but it generally takes years to prepare a single human mind for the adoption of sound social views. Reading one book will not do it, nor reading many; SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 477 perhaps the only way is the way of suffering. If, reader, after having suffered, you are driven by it to the endeavour to relieve the suffering of others, and you find every effort to do this fail because the social conditions manufacture suffering far faster than you can relieve them ; if your eyes are open to this fact, and it at last becomes a burning conviction, so that wherever you look you find the traces of it, — in the paupers that infest our cities, the criminals that fill our jails ; in the envy that broods in the cottages of the poor and embitters even the homes of the rich ; in the servility of some and the truculence of others ; in the falsehood, the slander, the backbiting that the wicked use to prevail over those less wicked than themselves ; in the sacrifice of all that we value most in our hearts, because by this sacrifice alone can we make sure of the things that we have learned to believe are indispensable to our bodies, — if there is anything in you that revolts from this sacrifice of all that is noble in life to all that is base in it, then you will be driven by a logic which is inexorable to ques- tion this morality of compromise, which, taken at its best, is little more than the tribute vice pays to virtue. Nevertheless, the morality of compensation has ren- dered a service to the world, for not only has it con- tributed wealth to good work, but it has kept alive the dwindling spark of conscience. When one robber baron builds a church, it suggests the founding of a hospital to another; and thus the voice of conscience makes it- self heard and perpetuated. But as a theory or rule of conduct the morality of compensation will not bear scrutiny. If we would conform ourselves to the dictates of jus- tice, it is the inequalities in our own environment that we are bound to diminish, not those in the environment of others; and it is, above all, the inequalities that 478 COLLECTIVISM result from our own actions to which our attention must first be directed, especially when they enure to our own advantage. We must be just ourselves before we preach justice to others. We must rid ourselves of the beam in our own eye before we set about removing the mote from the eye of our neighbour. Now, so long as the competitive system exists, there is a discord between morality and practice which is entitled to every dollar of money, every instant of time, that we have to devote to repairing injustice. Doubt- less there is more injustice in Armenia than in New York; but the injustice of Armenia is not our injus- tice, whereas that of New York is. With which, then, are we to deal first? Many pages have been devoted to proving that the competitive system is not only an occasion of injustice, but that it is an inevitable cause of it ; and that every man and woman who is drawing income from invest- ment^ is directly profiting from this injustice. This fact is so obvious that it tends to argue in favour of revolution rather than of further compliance; it seems to command us to "sell that we have " rather than remain partners to so unjust a system ; it makes us feel indi- vidually responsible for all the pauperism and crime we see about us ; and it seems as though we must immedi- ately remove ourselves from complicity with the social conditions that give rise to them. Such a conclusion would seem, however, to be im- moral as well as unwise. It would be a surrender to emotion ; it would be on a par with a father who aban- dons his family to secure the calm, even though he suffer the rigours, of a monastic life. We are not alone in the world; we are bound to our fellow-creatures by bonds that belong to nature and religion as much as to art. 1 See ante, book i. ch. iii., §§ 4, 5. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 479 We have not forged all these bonds ourselves nor will- ingly submitted to them ; they have been imposed upon us. It may be more self-indulgent to shake off these bonds than patiently to endure them. The problem before us is, not to secure freedom from what galls us in these bonds for ourselves, but to secure this freedom for others ; and in no problem is better illustrated the rule of wisdom, — for wisdom bids us refuse to listen to a voice that sounds like the voice of religion, whereas it is in fact the voice of eagerness; and behind the enthusiasm of eagerness we shall generally find the cloven foot of egotism. This point is of sufficient im- portance to deserve special consideration. So long as we are all driven by the conflict of life, each of us to enrich himself regardless of our neighbour, the question arises whether it is not a good thing to encourage the sentiment that is willing to sacrifice it- self in the interests of humanity, however foreign from our own field of responsibility may be that in which the inhumanity is practised. For example, admitting that we of the United States are not responsible for the in- humanity practised by Spain in Cuba, is it not a better thing that we should be alive to the claims of humanity there than that we should be dead to them? Does it not tend more to the general good that we should, at a sacrifice of wealth of limb and of life, hold up a high standard of national morality than that, obeying the logic of prudence, we should stay at home to in- crease our hoard of prosperity and self-satisfaction ? The interest of this question lies in the fact that we seem to have no sure guide to its solution. Some will think we should mind our own business; others will answer that minding one's own business is the princi- ple of the Levite who crossed to the other side of 480 COLLECTIVISM the way. And between the two the problem remains unsolved. If, however, we were not only clear as to what our duties really are, but were also engaged in performing them, we should not be left without a rule of action ; we should, above all, not seek to compensate for the injustice of which we are ourselves hourly the occasion by undertaking to repair the injustice occasioned by others ; we should understand that we must clean our own stables before we meddle with the stables of Augeas. Here is an example of the importance of coming to a clear understanding as to the limits of our responsibility ; and here an illustration of the utility of the conclusions to which we came in the discussion of justice: if we clearly understand what justice is, we can do justice; otherwise we shall be committing injustice in our very efforts to suppress it. For if it is true that we are engaged in a conflict with certain forces in nature of which some are within our control and others beyond it, clearly we are responsible only in so far as we apply the necessary effort to subdue the forces that are subject to such effort; and we are not responsible as regards those forces that are not subject to it. In the correct analy- sis of these forces lies the main problem of human responsibility. The lesson to be learned from the preceding pages seems to be that not only does the conflict between the competitive code of ethics and the ideal code produce a false code, — the morality of compensation, — but that, so long as this conflict continues, the morality of com- pensation may be better than no morality at all. Nevertheless this conclusion does not much advance us, for there seems to be no code of morality that we can reconcile to our consciences and yet carry into our SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 481 every-day life. For example, of all the simple rules of morality, the one comprised in the two words "Be just" is perhaps the one which we are most puzzled to obey. We have seen that the competitive system which we have deliberately adopted, and of which Herbert Spencer and his following so indiscriminately approve, is the system of nature which ignores justice. How, then, shall we compete and nevertheless be just? If our wealth is to be earned at the cost of poverty to others, how are we just ? If at recurring industrial crises the employer can no longer make a livelihood except by reducing wages, how can he be just ? And if the work- ingmen at such times can raise wages above the star- vation level only on the condition of ruining their employer, how can they be just? If it is part of the competitive system that it should create a tyranny, — the tyranny of the Market, which is as irresistible in its pressure as the ocean tide, — how can those who are equally crushed by it, employer and employ^, and are driven by the system to fight one another in order to come out alive from under it, how can they be just? The conclusion inevitably brought home to us by these facts is that under existing conditions we appear to be hopelessly adrift, and are reduced to asking one an- other with haggard eyes : — " Ainsi toujours poussds vers de nouveaux rivages Dans la nuit eternelle, emport^s sans retour, Ne pouiTons nous jamais sur I'ocdan des ages Ne pourrons nous jamais jeter I'ancre un seul jour ? " That we are indeed storm-tossed on a rocky coast seems true ; but that we are without a compass, without a port, without anchorage, is not true. Those who, like pirates, are deliberately preying upon one another may be; but all, I think, who want to do their duty may PA 482 COLLECTIVISM without much difficulty find out what this duty is ; and this, when clear, will be compass enough. Meanwhile it must not be expected that with the wisest captain at the helm the ship of State can sail straight for the des- tined port. She will encounter adverse winds before which she will have to tack, — sometimes far away into the sea of individualism ; sometimes dangerously close to the rocky coast of anarchy ; but we have the instruments at our hand to determine our course if we choose to use them. Let us for a moment consider what these instru- ments are. (c) Morality of Collectivism Obviously justice is the admitted aim of political in- stitutions and it is the implied aim of individual religion. Religious teachers may have couched their lessons in other terms ; other virtues may have been given greater prominence in different religious systems ; but the prin- cipal result of all ethical doctrines upon the relations of man to man is that they exhort us to act justly. Unfor- tunately the first difficulty that presents itself to a man who desires to act justly is the problem what justice is. It has been pointed out that the position of an employer who stands between misery to his employees or misery to his own family is inextricable ; and it has been justly said that the most cruel tragedies are those that result, not from a conflict between right and wrong, but from a con- flict between right and right. It is because this conflict between right and right is continually presenting itself in the competition of life that our first duty must be to make up our mind what justice really is. And the study we have made seems to show that justice cannot be in- cluded within the four sides of a definition, but that it is a perpetual struggle which man is doomed to make SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 483 against the injustice of Nature ; that Nature is indiffer- ent to justice; that she pursues her ends through the inequalities of her subjects, through their misery and destruction; that all that is most abhorrent to us for its brutality, its venom, and its injustice is the direct result of the favouritism shown by Nature to those best able to kill and eat; that whereas Nature has herself pointed the way towards co-operation as an improvement upon competition, she has not been able to reconcile co-operation with sexual jealousy; nor has she in co- operative communities any concern for the individual, but only for the race ; that, in a word, the deification of Nature is a gross blunder; that in the world about us there is much that is beautiful and Qiuch that is bad ; that man can by art favour the survival of the beautiful and disfavour that of the bad; that weakness forces the weak many to combine against the few strong ; that this combination, by promoting mutual happiness, encour- ages an extension of sympathy from sexual to parental love first ; then from parental to tribal ; next, from the tribe to the city, from the city to the State, and, last of all, perhaps, from the State to the whole race ; that the extension of sympathy and love, which is the most conspicuous beneficent tendency in the scheme of crea- tion, continually nerves man to substitute love in his relations to his fellow-creatures for hate ; but that the competitive system which he has unnecessarily adopted is irreconcilable with this substitution ; that this irrecon- cilability has not yet become clear to him because centu- ries of heredity and education have closed his mind to the possibility of dispensing with it, and because the same centuries of heredity and education have made him so selfish that he is still unfitted to dispense with it; that nevertheless he has been unconsciously set, by the extension of his sympathies, upon a struggle with Nature 484 COLLECTIVISM which, when analysed, turns out to have a definite though as yet but dimly perceived purpose ; that this purpose is to reduce to the utmost possible the effect of natural inequalities upon the happiness of men by sub- stituting, to the utmost possible, co-operation for com- petition in his social and economic institutions, and so to frame these institutions as to make them serve the happiness of the individual as well as promote the im- provement of the race ; that in his efforts to accomplish this task he has been assisted by two great principles, — the tendency of sympathy to develop and expand, and a faculty of the mind whereby it attributes a divine sanction to this tendency. The former of these is termed morality; the latter religion. Both have been continu- ally at work framing institutions which selfishness has as often succeeded in appropriating to its own use, but on the whole the perpetual necessity of the weak to combine against the strong is gradually preparing man for a deliberate reconstruction of his social system, so that, instead of leaving justice to the accident of the conflict between opposing egotisms, the scope of ego- tism may be so much reduced that morality will become the rule and egotism the exception. In the course of our studies we have endeavoured to distinguish the forces in nature which were opposed to us from those that were in our favour, and those which must apparently always be opposed to us from those which we may hope ultimately to overcome. And it has seemed clear that, so far as our present imperfect knowl- edge can foresee, we can never entirely overcome the consequences upon different men of the inequalities which Nature stamps upon them at their birth. But it has been shown that egotism has appropriated to its use the very devices conceived by man to diminish the in- equalities of Nature, — as, for example, the device of SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 485 private property, — so as to convert it into the greatest of all sources of inequality and injustice. And it has been shown that so ingrained has become the respect for the "sacredness" of private property, so powerful have become those who have profited by it, and so slow is the human organism to adapt itself to the profound changes which the abandonment of private property would occasion, that the abandonment cannot be effected rapidly without danger to the State. Under these cir- cumstances the difficulty of so ordering our conduct as to do the utmost possible in order to effect the change, and yet not do that utmost so rapidly as to endanger the State, becomes one of extreme perplexity. With a view of throwing some light upon this subject, the following considerations may be submitted : — ■ In the first place, no Christian can entertain a doubt as to the religious desirability of collectivism. He may doubt its practicability ; but that collectivism is tlie only form of government consistent with the Sermon on the Mount cannot be denied. Commercialism makes Chris- tian life impossible ; the attempt to reconcile them can lead to but a single result, — hypocrisy. Undoubtedly there are exceptional conditions in which great wealth permits of great philanthropy; in such case a Christian life may be led by one engaged in commerce. Fortu- nately, too, there are many occupations in and around the commercial system in which a contented spirit may lead a Christian life ; but these are exceptional, nor are they ever secure. At any moment the pressure may come, and then it is "Every man for himself, and the devil take the hindmost." The constant pressure of commercialism (and it is this very pressure that Spen- cerians most approve) perpetually urges men to get the better of one another, and in so doing to violate the fundamental principles of Christ. 486 COLLECTIVISM Collectivism, on the contrary, makes Christianity pos- sible; moreover, it is the only political system which does. This argument it is difficult to resist. The light may dazzle us as it did Paul on the way to Damascus ; we may strive to resist it; but if we do, we shall hear the words of the Master, " It is hard to kick against the pricks." In the second place, however desirable collectivism may be, it is not immediately realisable. The arguments against any attempt to introduce col- lectivism suddenly into our political system founded on science and expedience have been made elsewhere. Moreover, they do not belong to this context. But there are moral grounds against such a course which deserve attention. The chapter on wealth will have been written in vain if it has not proved that the rich are for the most part as helpless regarding the injustice that prevails as the poor. Undoubtedly there are rich men who deliberately and mercilessly oppress the poor ; but the vast majority of them are as little to be blamed for the misery in the world as those who suffer it; and many among them devote both time and money to attempts — for the most part futile — to suppress it. We are like men in a panic-stricken crowd: every one thinks he is being crushed by his neighbour, whereas the neighbour is merely the body through whom the crushing force is transmitted. It is upon this point that Socialists have for the most part erred. They have inflamed the hos- tility of the unwealthy for the wealth}- by describing the rich as "grinding the faces of the poor." But with rare exceptions it will be found that this accusation is not justified; even the "Sweater," who so long figured in the pages of Punch as a gorgeously dressed but brutal Jew with a finely polished new silk hat and massive gold SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 487 chain and seal, turns out to be a mere fiction of the brain : he is not a sweater but a sweatee ; he is in the garment business not in order to lower wages, but be- cause wages are low ; his profit on every garment hardly amounts to a penny, and if the price paid per garment were raised a penny, his profit would disappear. There are a few, a very few, wealthy middlemen in sweated industries. But this is because at the low rate of wages that prevails a few have the skill immensely to extend their business, and are enabled by the largeness of their transactions to make up for the minute profit on every item. Nay, more, the sweater turns out to be a benefit to the community ; for if he were to disappear and no better employer were to step in his place (and the com- petitive system would produce none), the wretches who now live on his wages would be even worse off than they are to-day. The evil does not reside in the rich, but in the system that produces the rich. If, then, the rich are not to blame, justice forbids that they should be punished. They are capable of suffer- ing as well as the poor, and, indeed, infinitely more capable of it ; for their doom is that, rich though they be, they are but little if any happier. They, too, are vic- tims of the system. The man who labours with his brain is worn out far sooner than he who works witli his hands; as long as the work lasts, the latter brings to every meal at least a large and wholesome appetite; whereas the former is driven to eat by exhaustion rather than desire. What would be the consequence of setting these two men down to a common table 7^ Not only 1 Not that a common table forms part of the proposed plan of collec- tivism, which, on the contrary, attaches the greatest importance to the preservation and adornment of the home. But a common table would probably form part of any scheme of collectivism that emanated from those now agitating it. 488 COLLECTIVISM would the brain-worker in the end starve, but he would immediately become useless to the community. It is not his fault that a mistaken system of education has forced upon his brain hours of labour at an age when it was totally unprepared for labour of any kind ; and that it has ever since called upon that brain for work accom- plished at the expense of every vital organ that he has. Nor is it his fault if a defective digestion, shattered nerves, or a weak heart permit of his remaining useful to the community only on the condition of a well-served table, delicately prepared food, and carefully selected wines. These things no longer give him pleasure; they have become a necessity. To deprive him of them would be as unjust as to deprive a workman of his bread. This may not sound reasonable to a workman ; to him these things, far from being a necessity, seem an exorbitant luxury; he little knows the keen enjoyment which a tired brain-worker takes in that first return of appetite that responds to a period of brain rest. He cannot understand the frantic exercise that rich men take — deer-stalking, mountain-climbing, and the rest — merely in order to recover the appetite that can bite with pleasure into a loaf of bread, — the appetite which the workman himself enjoys at eyery meal ; nor can he appreciate the misery which the absence of this appetite brings with it, — the pain of exhaustion, the discourage- ment, the despair. On board a Dover packet once I witnessed a scene between a sailor and a millionaire which illustrates the argument. The sailor had been caring for the rich man during the stormy passage; securing him a seat least exposed to spray, covering him with tarpaulins, and rendering him such other services as are needful during that mauvais quart dlieure. As we reached port the rich man gave the sailor a sovereign; the sailor's eye SUMMAEY AND CONCLUSION 489 glistened. "What will you do with it?" said the rich man. The sailor — for he was a Frenchman — answered volubly, but the crowning glory of his expected treat was, "un bon petit diner avec la bourgeoise." "Ah," said the rich man, sadly, "with ten times that money you could not give me a dinner I could enjoy;" and from the expression of his face I am mistaken if that sailor did not for the first time, perhaps, wonder whether he was not the better off of the two. If the rich are victims of the competitive system as well as the poor, clearly there is no imperative duty to punish them for its injustice. On the contrary, it is clearly our duty to see that the guiltless among them suffer from a change of institutions the least possible. We now pass to the third point, which is, perhaps, the most important of the three. If collectivism, though ultimately desirable, is not realisable at once, what is our moral duty in this connection ? One of the principal objects of this book is to present the difficulties which stand in the way of justice; to show that these difficulties are some of them beyond our reach and, therefore, outside of our responsibility ; that our success will depend upon our knowledge of the forces in nature that we can summon to our aid and our ingenuity in the application of these forces to the ends of justice, — in other words, that justice is a matter of morality and intelligence, and not of morality alone. And morality and intelligence combined have been called wisdom. It is the misfortune of this age that morality and in- telligence have been mutually repelling each other in the so-called conflict between science and religion. Science began the conflict quite unintentionally by breaking down the authority of the Catholic Church; 490 COLLECTIVISM and she aggravated it next by breaking down the authority of the Protestant Bible. The inevitable con- sequence has been that the religious world has learned to look upon the scientific world with suspicion; and the scientific world has returned the compliment by looking on the religious world with contempt. In this so-called conflict is illustrated again the fact that men may be driven to fighting one another and yet neither of them be responsible for it. Science did not set to work with a view to breaking down the authority of either Church or Bible; but the effect of her re- searches was to accomplish both. The religious world, on the other hand, was shocked in its most sacred senti- ments by what seemed the rank blasphemy of science ; hence a fire was kindled which neither the leaders of science nor the leaders of the Church could extinguish. It is true they did not make much effort to do so ; some of them, indeed, did what they could to spread the con- flagration. But to-day, though many on both sides are eager to extinguish it, they are to a great extent power- less to do so. Religion has created a habit of mind among its votaries which can only regard the dissent of science with indignation. Most Christians, for ex- ample, are so wedded to the doctrine of future jninisli- ment tl^at the Church to which they belong would estrange them by abandoning it. And they must not be estranged ; they need the support of the Church ; it is upon this support that what morality they have de- pends ; no one who understands the temperament of the ignorant could look upon the decay of the Roman Church with any other feeling than that of dismay. Fortu- nately the human mind is complicated enough to be able to reconcile even the doctrine of hell with the liighest intellectual attainments, and we may look with confi- dence to a long survival in the Roman hierarchy of a SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 491 priesthood capable of preaching this doctrine without conscious insincerity. We have therefore to reconcile ourselves to a protracted struggle between the Church on the one hand and science on the other. The human machine is so constructed as to make this conflict not only necessary, but even expedient. Doubtless it will become less and less bitter with the spread of education ; doubtless among those Christians who are capable of what are denounced by the others as broad views it has already disappeared altogether. But for those who are ignorant and for those whose education has run into a mould from which they cannot escape, the conflict must continue. There is one field, however, upon which all can meet, — ignorant and educated; religious and irreligious; sceptic and devout; Romanist and Protestant; broad views and narrow views ; orthodox and heterodox ; rich and poor, — all can meet and co-operate upon the neutral field of politics. And the duty to do this is, perhaps, to-day the nearest and most imperative duty of all. For never are two or three men gathered together for a political purpose but egotism is somewhere at work to appropriate the result of their action to its own ends. And unless all the morality in the nation is engaged in fighting this egotism, this last will end by prevailing in the future as it has in the past. But there is probably more morality in the world than the best of us know ; we see so much more of the evil that we tend to overlook the good. Even in politics, which we in America are so willing to denounce as corrupt, there is far less iniquity than is imagined. Only a very few political leaders are really bad ; most of them are anxious to be as good as circumstances will permit, — not always for the best of motives, but out of respect for the morality in the community which makes 492 COLLECTIVISM it wise for them to " pander a little to the public will. " Our fellow-citizens would be surprised, were they care- fully to study our history, to find how often, when a clear moral issue has been raised, the majority has voted on the right side; they would also be surprised were they to collect the excellent laws which public morality has extracted from the worst of legislatures. We are not an immoral people; on the contrary there is per- haps no people in the world more sincerely moral than the people of the United States. It is not our morality that is at fault; it is our wisdom. We often do not understand the issue; we see the evils before us con- fusedly; we do not know how to overcome them; we stumble in our efforts ; and egotism is always watching its opportunity to take advantage of our mistakes. And wisdom must not be confounded with knowl- edge, for "knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers." We need knowledge too, but knowledge comes in vain if it is not wedded to morality. It is the combination of knowledge and egotism that keeps our institutions bad; it is only a combination of knowledge and moralit}^ that can make them good. Here, then, is the importance of making up our minds what justice is, and, once known, of keeping it before our minds as the mariner does the polar star. For so long as the framing of our institutions are left to the accidental results of perpetual conflicts between oppos- ing egotisms, improvement, though possible and prob- able in the end, is not only uncertain but may be protracted indefinitely. We are like Mr. Thorndike's cat in the box with a latched door.^ Eventually, in the frantic movements of the cat to escape, accident will cause some part of its body to move the latch, and it will escape. But our position is still more complicated than 1 See vol. i., "Justice," pp. 166-168. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 493 this ; for we are, as it were, in a labyrinth, and we can never tell whether the door we, by these unreflecting movements, open, will lead us to liberty or, on the con- trary, remove us farther from it. We should now no longer allow this question, fraught with such weighty consequences, to depend upon the accident of conflict- ing selfishness. The method of accident is that of the lower animals. We have already seen how that of man differs from it ; animals learn by the slow acquisition of habits; men learn by the immediate flash of intelligence. Let us apply our intellectual methods to politics ; let us at last make up our minds what we want to attain ; and let us deliberately make our plans to lift the latches that keep us from attaining it one by one, not by hazard, but by design. And let us above all things possess our souls in pa- tience. Among the vast and stupendous ruins that have survived the decay of Egypt, there is not a single pri- vate dwelling or a single palace of a king. They are all temples or tombs ; for the Egyptian religion taught that life was a brief span in a long existence, and that the only monuments worth building for a permanence were the temples that prepared the body for the future life and the tombs that preserved it there. So also an Arab tale likens a dwelling to an inn; for no sooner does one man arrive but he leaves, and his place is taken by another. " 'Tis but a Tent where takes his one day's rest A Sultan to the realm of Death addrest; The Sultan rises, and the dark Ferrdsh Strikes, and prepares it for another Guest." In this thought will be found the faith which permits men to labour without eagerness ; that is content to sow without reaping; and that does the duty which is 494 COLLECTIVISM nearest without aiming at that which flatters egotism because it seems to be tlie most heroic. Patience, then, is the hall-mark of political morality. ((T) Morality and Religion The moral view of government would not be complete without some consideration of the distinguishing char- acteristics of morality and religion ; for the differences which characterise them have no small bearing upon the success or failure of our political programme. The mere fact of association develops in animals qual- ities specifically different and even opposite to those of animals that lead solitary lives. The large carnivora which are driven by their ferocity to solitude, and fitted by their strength for it, enjoy the greatest liberty or freedom of action ; they are stimulated by one motive, — selfishness ; they are incapable of obedience or discipline. Animals, on the other hand, which are driven by their weakness to associate with one another, in order by association to resist the strong, sacrifice a portion of their liberty for the security which the association affords, and are driven by the very fact of association to comply with the law of their society, whatever that law may be, thus acquiring notions of obedience and disci- pline; and the more intimate the association and the more highly developed, the more selfishness yields to unselfishness. It appears, therefore, that individuals associated in a community derive satisfaction from the benefits they confer upon the entire community, whereas solitary animals derive satisfaction only from the benefit which they confer upon themselves. The explanation afforded by science for the development of unselfishness is that the connnunities the individuals of which pos- SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 495 sessed it most highly developed, were the communities which ill the struggle for life survived ; it has become a habit which is inherited; and in animals it is termed instinct. It is almost certain that ants have no option as regards their social functions; they perform them automatically, and probably in great part unconsciously. When ants tear a moth apart, instead of devouring the morsels, as dogs would, they carry these morsels imme- diately to the nest. The instinct of the dog or wolf, even those that hunt in packs, is for each to satisfy his own hunger ; the instinct of the ant is to store food for the benefit of the community. Man has doubtless acquired habits from long social life in much the same way as the ant; but the social qualities which man possesses differ radically from those which ants and all the lower animals possess, in the fact that while the latter do not seem to be free to adopt an alternative course, man is free to do so. In other words, the question how far a man will be selfish and how far he will be unselfish is a matter which is left largely to his determination. He may decide to be selfish ; or he may decide to make the necessary effort to be unselfish ; or he may satisfy unselfish instincts and be unselfish without effort. The element of choice or effort distinguishes man's social qualities from that of lower animals and fur- nishes the characteristic of what is called virtue; in this way the mere instinct of the ant becomes converted into virtue in man through the necessity in man, for the most part, of some effort or sacrifice for its exercise. Virtue does not always involve either effort or sacri- fice, because some men are born with social qualities highly developed, so that they more naturally act un- selfishly than selfishly. Others, again, are at birth en- 496 COLLECTIVISM tirely deficient in social qualities, so that they by nature act selfishly rather than unselfishly. And between the individual born a saint and the individual born a crim- inal there is every conceivable grade. As language, however, is practically made by "the average sensual man," unselfishness is a virtue for the reason that it does generally involve some effort, and sometimes involves a great deal. It may be said, therefore, that the social qualities of the lower animals differ from the social qualities of men, in that the former are instinctive, unconscious, undeliberate, and unattended by effort; whereas social qualities in men generally involve some effort, some consciousness, some deliberation, and some sacrifice. Aristotle's definition of virtue, that it is a habit of the mind, entirely fails to take account of these differences between the social qualities of the lower animals and those of man. The social qualities of the lower ani- mals are truly described as habits ; but the social quali- ties of man are in part habit, and in part deliberate acts of choice. It is because the social qualities of man are generally characterised by effort or sacrifice that they have been specifically given the name of virtue. There is another difference between the social quali- ties of man and of the lower animals which for the sake of clearness it may be well not to overlook; the social qualities of all lower animals resolve themselves into habits of the body for the most part, being for the most part unattended by emotion, or hesitation, or conscious- ness. They are practically automatic. The ant takes his morsel to the nest without conscious or unconscious struggle; it is its nature to do so; it cannot do other- wise. The construction of man is more complicated ; he acquires and undoubtedly inherits habits of the body much in the same way as tlie lower animals do; but he SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 497 also acquires and inherits habits of the heart, or of the mind, which are far less certain in their operation and which depend in every individual upon his environment as well as his parentage. It is these last habits of the mind or of the heart which are called conscience. Habits of the body and habits of the heart do not always coin- cide : as where a man is at heart a murderer, but is pre- vented from committing murder by the fact that his hand will not respond to his heart; or the inverse case where a man's physical habits lead him to violence, but this violence is perpetually restrained by tenderness of conscience. It is not, however, necessary for the purpose of this argument to distinguish between the two different habits of heart and body. The man who has highly developed within him both social habits of the body and social habits of the mind that would make him refrain from anti-social acts may be defined generally as a moral man; the man who has these qualities not highly de- veloped or not developed at all may be regarded gener- ally as a non-moral man. Let us now consider how the moral man and the non-moral man are respectively in- fluenced in their conduct by their intelligence. The naturally moral man will find morality justified by the general happiness which results therefrom, and if he be not tempted by the possession of extraordinary intelli- gence which can set before him the advantages which his extraordinary intelligence gives him for getting the best of his fellow-creatures, his morality and intelligence will combine to enhance his social qualities rather than to diminish them. Prudence, on the other hand, will recommend the non-moral man of average intelligence to make the effort necessary to live in social harmony with his neighbours. But if the non-moral man is possessed of intelligence above the general average, 32 498 COLLECTIVISM there will be nothing in him to resist the temptation to use that intelligence for his own advantage at the expense of others. Superior intelligence, therefore, sets all non-moral men to taking advantage of those who are of a lower order of intelligence. There is thus maintained in human society a perpetual conflict between intelligence and morality. The issue of this conflict is uncertain. It is difficult, if not impossible, to say whether existing conditions are likely to pro- duce more men of both morality and intelligence than men who have equal or even more intelligence and no morality. On the whole, history seems to mark a slow improvement towards morality in the most civilised of our nations ; but this improvement is at the same time attended with tendencies towards degeneration, which have been already insisted upon. The only thing that can be stated with certainty is that so long as our institutions are of a character, by the competitive system, to stimulate selfishness, the progress towards unselfishness is likely to be exceedingly slow ; and that it is not impossible that the tendency to degeneration may overtake it. Let us now compare morality in its nature and in its consequences with religion. And first as to its nature. It has been seen that morality is the result of association ; that it is developed in the search for happiness; that the question if it will prevail in the community depends upon two things: first, whether the majority of the community is persuaded that most satisfaction can be obtained by every one seeking it for himself, or by every one seeking it for all. And, secondly, upon whether the competition with other communities is of a character, by eliciting unselfishness, to promote moralit}'-, or, by eliciting selfishness, to diminish it. Religion, whatever may be its origin, derives its SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 499 morality, not from unconscious social needs, but from a belief in the supernatural. Religion teaches that morality is an order imposed upon us by divine power ; that we owe obedience to this power; and there is in religious people an aspiration towards the supernatural which inclines them to adopt its creed. The aim of religion is not happiness, but holiness. Holiness may furnish a satisfaction in one sense of the word, and, therefore, be a form of selfishness, just as the satisfac- tion derived from benefiting the community may also be regarded as a form of selfishness ; but it is the kind of satisfaction that makes the saint and the Sister of Charity. It is not contended that this form of religion, or rather this fundamental basis of all religions, char- acterises all religious people; because, unfortunately, many people who are termed religious are kept within the pale of the church by mere superstition or fear. It is believed, however, that the above is a description of what is most valuable in all religious creeds and of what underlies them all. Just as political faith has been defined as the delib- erate choice of the political theory which is most condu- cive to the social perfectibility of man, so religious faith may be defined as the deliberate choice of that moral theory which is most conducive to the individual per- fectibility of man. Both have in them the idea of some effort and of some sacrifice. Religious faith is the subjection of human will and reason to the divine will and the divine reason; and is justified to reason not because reason furnishes evi- dence amounting to proof of the existence of the divine, for then it would be conviction, not faith, but be- cause there is evidence in favour of the existence of the divine, and not evidence amounting to proof against this existence; and belief in God and submission to 500 COLLECTIVISM Him is more conducive to the individual perfectibility of man than denial. The value of religion in social life receives a startling support in the fact that the only communities that have long survived have been religious communities; the Roman Catholic communities, and particularly those engaged in active philanthropic work, as, for example, the orders that minister to the poor and the sick, are among those which have shown most vitality. Noyes has written an interesting history of a large number of the experiments at communal life which were made in America during the first part of the century ; ^ and it is a remarkable fact that of all these experiments the only one that has signally succeeded is one that was founded on religion, — the Shakers. Of the rest, most fell to pieces within a few months ; and only one or two have maintained an obscure existence. It is not easy to argue about religion ; most men and women are too much absorbed in the competition of life to have much time to devote to religion, any more than to politics ; nor is the opportunity given to many of them to come into fre- quent contact with the saints produced in such abund- ance in Roman Catholic communities. When they do, they are apt to entertain the angel unawares; or if some slight impression be made upon them, the impres- sion is apt to disappear in the dust and turmoil of active life. Religion is unfortunately to-day suffering from the discord produced by different dogmas, and much weighed down by the superstition that results probably more from the ignorance of the people than from the deliberate intention of the Church. If, however, polit- ical students could recognise the immense value of re- ligion once rescued from these adventitious impediments to the making of good citizens, they would not be dis- 1 "History of American Socialisms," by I. H. Noyes. I SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 501 posed to believe that political problems can be solved without regard to religion ; for religion may turn out to be the most powerful factor for solving them. Not only does religion appeal to the disinterested motives of man, but it confers upon him one gift of priceless value, — the gift of reverence. The morality of the competitive system treats men as Polonius would the players, "according to their deserts;" but the morality of religion would treat them, in the words of Hamlet, "after our own honour and dignity." And in a republic the standard of reverence set by religion is, above all things, precious and essential. Bagehot has explained the utility of the throne in the respect it main- tains for government in England. In our country we have no throne, no fountain of honour, no respected tradition ; on the contrary, the license of criticism makes our highest public office a mark for contempt, and even besmirches the fairest deeds of army and navy alike, through the degenerate demand for sensational journal- ism. Had we the sense of our own honour and dignity which religion fosters in the doctrine that every man is or can become a temple of God, we should, by entertain- ing respect for our governors, make governors worthy of respect possible. To those who desire to increase the scope of government for the benefit of the masses, few obstacles seem so great as the widespread contempt for our governors that prevails in the United States. It is true that our governors have not always commanded respect; but were the angel Gabriel himself to mount the presidential chair, he would not escape calumny. No self-respecting citizen accepts public office but knows beforehand that calumny inevitably awaits him there. The contempt which the average American feels for his government is a part of that universal contempt which curls the lip of the agnostic. If there is no divine in 502 COLLECTIVISM the world, there is no room for reverence ; for reverence is the fruit of faith. Here, then, is one of the most priceless gifts of re- ligion ; for of all the virtues none brings man nearer to the divine than reverence. Man, then, is lifted above the lower animals by two distinct moral steps : the first is the step from the in- stinctive morality of the insect to the deliberate moralitj^ of effort; the second is from the interested morality which results from the mere action of social life to the disinterested morality which is ordered by a divine power. To exclude the latter would be to forego the advantages of a superior ground. What, then, are the conclusions to which we are led by a study of government from the moral point of view ? In the first place, we are led by it to a distinction be- tween mere conviction and faith ; and between religious faith and political faith. Of two theories, one of which asserts the existence and authority of the divine and the other denies it, neither of which is capable of absolute proof or absolute disproof, religious faith adopts the former because most conducive to individual perfectibility. Of two theories, one of which asserts the power of man by effort to resist the forces in nature hostile to social perfectibility, and the other of which denies or ignores it, political faith adopts the former, because more conducive to social perfectibility. In the next place, we seem forbidden to shield our- selves behind the curtain of agnosticism; we may not know as much about the supernatural as some churches assert they know, but we do know more about it tlian the atheist or the agnostic; we know that outside of what we have defined as nature, developed, perhaps, out SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 503 of it, but able in great part to control it, is the intelli- gence and will of man. We know that this intelligence and will, united in the faculty called wisdom, are capable of more and more modifying conditions of nature until they shall have reduced to a minimum the consequences not only of the inequalities imposed upon man by nature, but also of those imposed upon him by his own insti- tutions. This is the end of justice. The attain- ment of this end should be the deliberate purpose of government. In the third place, it seems as though the failure to recognise exactly what justice is, and, above all, the limits of its attainment, has given rise to disturbed views of moral responsibility ; so that while, under the influence of these disturbed views, we often fail to do our nearest and obvious duty, we are driven by a guilty but misguided conscience to the attempted performance of duties that belong to others and not to ourselves. This has been called the morality of compensation, and it has been pointed out that as long as there was no morality of enlightened justice, the morality of compen- sation was perhaps better than no morality at all ; for it keeps alive a conscience which may eventually put us on the right road. In the fourth place, we seem to have been kept from the right road by the unfortunate but necessary conflict between science and religion. Science has produced a morality built on selfishness, which, though it might eventually, by the principle of reaction, develop a high order of morality, is likely to do this so slowly as to be possibly overtaken by the tendency towards degeneration which accompanies it. Religion, on the other hand, proposes a morality founded on divine sanction, unhampered by stimulus to selfishness, and, if rescued from superstition and fear, of 504 COLLECTIVISM priceless value to both the individual and the social perfectibility of man. The conflict between science and religion, because some men are more endowed with reason than with con- science, and others more endowed with conscience than with reason, is likely to continue for many generations ; but, however long this conflict must continue upon the fields of religion and science respectively, there is a neutral field upon which all men may unite. Upon this field alone the rival claims can be forgotten in the prac- tical work of so framing our institutions as to diminish the injustice and misery in the world. And in this work religion combines with science in two conclusions of vital importance: — In the first place, religion rebukes the impatience of the egotism which lurks behind eagerness ; it points out that there may be as much injustice in too sudden a change of constitution as in too protracted a delay; and that wisdom is bent more in attaining justice in the end than in ourselves figuring prominently in the attainment of it. In the second place, religion clothes the argument in favour of steering our course towards collectivism with divine sanction, for it is the only course that is con- sistent with religion. Every gospel that has ever com- manded enlightened assent, — the gospels of Confucius, of Buddha, of Plato, of Mohammed, of the Roman law, of our own law, and, above all, the gospel of Christ, — have all taught the same doctrine : " Do unto others as ye would they should do unto you." But ever since the world began we have failed to practise the gospels we have professed because the necessity of self- preservation under the economic institutions which have prevailed have made the practice of this gospel impos- sible. It is time, at last, that this inconsistency be re- SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 505 moved, and that we be rescued, not only from injustice, but from hypocrisy, by framing institutions under which alone we can dispense with both. § 4, Political View of Collectivism All the points of view from which we have heretofore studied problems of government converge in a last, most comprehensive and most important of them all, the political. It may be contended that, however rational and moral collectivism may be, however prudent its study and practical its ultimate end, all these considerations go for nothing, or for very little, to the statesman, unless it can be shown that collectivism has come within the range of practical politics. Mankind is striving vaguely to attain many ideals of life and conduct with which the statesman, as such, has little or nothing to do, because, desirable as these ideals may be, they are either desired only by a few or not sufficiently desired by all to become the basis of a political programme. The question whether a particular measure or group of measures comes within the range of practical politics is complicated. There is little doubt that when Turgot, in 1776, abol- ished the guilds in France, the time had come when the guilds were no longer fit to exercise the power which they enjoyed. In this sense the measure was oppor- tune ; but Turgot did not take sufficient account of the power of the guilds, and the result was that in those cities where they were most powerful and the need of their abolition, therefore, the most urgent, the edict abolishing them was practically disregarded; in this case, though the measure was opportune, the State had not the power to enforce it. 506 COLLECTIVISM When, on the other hand, Leo the Philosopher put an end to all municipal franchises because, as he said, they no longer had any reason for existence, exactly the opposite conditions are observable. It would be diffi- cult to conceive of a measure more inopportune, for his- tory shows that the advance of civilisation has in large part depended upon the very municipal franchises which Leo thought it useless any longer to maintain ; but, how- ever inopportune the measure, the State had at the time the power to enforce it, and municipal develop- ment, which turned out later to be the source of all our liberties, was for the time arrested. When, on the other hand, Alexander put an end to serfdom in Russia, he enacted a measure which was not only opportune, but that he had the power to enforce. In these three examples we find illustrations of two of the elements which must concur in order to bring a measure within the range of practical politics ; it must, in the first place, be opportune, and, in the second place, the State must have power to enforce it. These are not, however, the only elements which have to be considered in the connection. Statesmen are not always masters of the measures which they would push forward; for an active, small, aggressive minority may often bring before the public measures for which the community is not yet ripe. Indeed, this is the contin- gency which is likely to occasion statesmen the greatest embarrassment; for, while they themselves may be per- suaded of the wisdom of a measure, it may also be clear that the community is not prepared for it; or, on the other hand, while it may be clear that the community desires a measure, it may be equally certain that the measure is not expedient. An example of this embarrassment is to be found in SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 507 recent legislation on Ireland. The action of both the liberal and the conservative parties leaves little reason to doubt that they both long ago recognised the necessity of remedial legislation in Ireland; neither of them, however, seriously undertook legislation upon Irish matters until the Irish members of Parliament, under the leadership of Parnell, constituted a sufficiently important body to hold a balance of power. The Irish question, therefore, was not submitted to the nation through the wisdom of a statesman ; it was dragged into the political arena through the political genius of Parnell ; and the question of relief to be given to Ireland became not a question of political morality or wisdom, but a factional issue on which various interests, in large part selfish, were arraigned on either side. This brings us to an important distinction between the conditions under which legislation takes place under more or less absolute monarchy and those under which it takes place in a popular government under the com- petitive system. Under an absolute monarchy measures which recommend themselves by their morality are more likely to be enacted as such by a just king than under a popular government; because, whatever may be the theory of popular government, practice seems to demon- strate that legislation in the latter depends not so much upon its wisdom as upon the capacity for aggressive political action which those who are urging it possess. Thus the authors of "Industrial Democracy" point out (page 365) that "the factory legislation which each trade has obtained has, during the past twenty years, varied in stringency and effectiveness, not according to the misery of the workers or the profitableness of the enterprise, but almost exactly with the amount of money which the several unions have expended on official and legal assistance. " 508 COLLECTIVISM Not only is this system profoundly bad in principle, inasmuch as it leaves legislation to the initiative of sel- iishness rather than to that of wisdom, but the effect of it is deplorable, as may be seen by the lack of consistency in the legislation to which it gives rise. The authors of "Industrial Democracy" have collected the cases in which the British Parliament has of late dealt with the question of vested interests, and they show not only a real divergence between the plans adopted in different cases, but an utter lack of any principle which could reconcile this divergence. ^ In our own legislation 1 " The action of the English legislature in awarding compensation for disturbance of vested interests has, indeed, been capricious in the extreme, depending, perhaps, on the momentary political influence of the class con- cerned. Thus, no compensation was given to the large class of lottery- keepers and their servants, either for loss of capital or loss of occupation, when private lotteries were, in 1698, suddenly prohibited. The shipowners and merchants who had invested a large capital in specially designed slave- carrying ships received no compensation when the slave trade was abol- ished in 1807. On the other hand, when, about 1834, the slaves in the British colonies were converted into indentured servants, twenty millions sterling were voted to the owners, though no other country before or after has taken this course. The owners of Irish Parliamentary boroughs were compensated when the Union deprived them of these seats, but the owners of English Parliamentary boroughs, which had equally been recognised sources of income, received nothing when the Reform Bill of 1832 swept them away. In our own day, when a town council sets up its own works, and uses public funds to dispense altogether with its former contractors, it pays them no compensation for loss of capital or livelihood. But if the new workshops so much as darken the view from the contractor's windows, the town must pay damages. Parliament gives public authorities full power to ruin, if they can, the ])rivate owners of existing gas-works by setting up public electric lighting works, and even to destroy the business of joint-stock cemeteries by starting public burial-grounds. But the House of Commons has jealously refused to permit any town council to put up gas-works of its own whilst any private gas-works are in the field as opponents ; or even to sink its own wells to get a new and en- tirely different supply of water for the public, without first fully compen- sating any existing water compan}', not for taking away any land, works, or water, or infringing any monopoly rights, but simply for loss of income. Whether the holder of an annually granted terminable license to sell SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 509 vested interests are protected by a clause in the United States Constitution ; but this clause has been interpreted so variously that it is difficult to state positively in advance what the Supreme Court will decide is a vested interest which must be protected, and what an interest which need not be respected. The severest criticism, however, that can be made upon this provision in our Constitution is that in spite of its admitted reasonable- ness and justice, if any part of our community suffered under the disadvantages under which Ireland has so long laboured, this clause in our Constitution would make it impossible for us to remove them; in other words, the statutes which even the Conservative party in England have thought it right and necessary to enact for the relief of distressed Ireland would in the United States, under this clause, be impossible because unconstitutional. Volumes might be written regarding the want of any guiding principle in the legislation of our respec- tive States so far as the element of justice is concerned. If the British Parliament, which is supposed to be beyond the reach of corrujition, is vacillating as regards vested interests, how much more vacillating must be State legislatures, which are in large part creatures of private corporations. But it is not the object of this book to attempt to map out a political campaign for any particular country. Its object has been rather to lay down the fundamental principle of government, to establish clearly what justice is, to mark out the limits which nature opposes to polit- ical action, the evil forces in nature with which politics are not directly concerned and cannot hope directly to intoxicating liquors would or would not be equitably entitled to compen- sation if Parliament decided for the future not to renew it is a hotly contested question." 510 COLLECTIVISM resist; the evil forces, on the other hand, with which man has already begun an almost unconscious warfare, and which he can, by a sufficiently deliberate effort, in great part subdue; and, lastly, the evil forces which have resulted from man's own blundering methods, and which might, by taking due account of the time neces- sary therefor, be ultimately disposed of altogether. In the course of these studies, the selfishness which underlies the competitive system has been shown to be the enemy which appropriates every institution, how- ever high at the outset the ideal upon which it is organ- ised, to its own base use ; it has been shown that this selfishness can be removed only under a form of govern- ment which would slowly substitute co-operation for the present competitive system ; that such a government, however unfitted to man in his present condition of igno- rance and self-absorption, might become eventually fitted to him in proportion as ignorance was dissipated and self-absorption yielded to the recognition that the high- est happiness is to be obtained, not out of private greed, but rather through the common good. Could any sub- stantial part of the people become persuaded of these things, then it is conceivable that slowly there might rise among statesmen a political standard by which the various measures proposed for enactment could be tested; so that instead of leaving remedial legislation to the selfish aggressiveness which now seems to deter- mine it, and thus becoming a prey, like a rudderless ship, to every wind that blows, we may, on the contrary, have before us definite sailing-orders, — that is to say, a port, however distant, for which we are making, and towards which, however devious our path, we may still, persist- ently, with deliberation and increasing wisdom, direct ourselves. It would not be consistent with the general lines of SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 511 this work to enter into the particular measures which it would be wisest immediately to adopt with a view to the ultimate realisation of a collectivist form of govern- ment. In the first place, this question is not so much one of principle as of detail; in the second place, the conditions presented in every country differ so widely that it would be imjDossible to propose a general scheme that would be fitted to all. This becomes clear the moment we consider the conditions which present them- selves respectively in this connection in England and in the United States. In England the working population is far more homogeneous than in our country; this has enabled large groups of workingmen in England to come to a common understanding regarding their aims and the best methods for securing these aims ; whereas in the United States divergencies of opinion following divergencies of temperament and nationality have made this concurrence of opinion far less complete and far less effectual. This must not be understood to imply that there is even in England a complete concurrence of opinion; on the contrary, different trade unions adopt widely different and even inconsistent policies; thus, for example, the policy of the boiler-makers in re- stricting the trade to those who have served an appren- ticeship is diametrically opposed to the policy of the cotton trade unions in keeping the trade open to ten times more applicants than the industry can ultimately support. All that is meant to convey is that very large groups, such as the cotton and mining industries, have succeeded in establishing a common rule, and have done this through an organisation which, though neces- sarily complicated, is amazing in its efficiency. It has been already pointed out that in so doing they have gone so far towards solving the great political question bow best to secure efficient administration and popular 512 COLLECTIVISM control ; and their experience, not only in trade unions, but in co-operation, has contributed to furnish them a valuable education. If, now, we turn to the United States, we find a totally different condition of things: while there are undoubtedly powerful and well-organised trade unions in our country, there is not one that can relatively com- pare in magnitude and efficiency to that of the cotton operatives in England. Not only do differences in nationality and temperament tend to make this difficult, but the very size of our country is an obstacle to effec- tual organisation. A trade union, in order to be effi- cient, ought to cover the entire field of competition, and this field in the United States often coincides with its entire territory. It is probable, therefore, that although many trade unions in the United States are composed of as efficient and as intelligent workingmen as any trade union in Great Britain, the whole mass of the workingmen in the United States are less prepared by industrial experience and sagacity for the adoption of measures looking towards collectivism than their brethren in England. On the other hand, the United States have an im- mense advantage over England in another respect : the very vastness of the territory, while it renders powerful trade unions difficult, makes ultimate adoption of collec- tivism far more easy; for, unless the country is driven by military enthusiasm to colonial expansion, it is by its very size and situation entirely self-supporting and therefore outside of the necessity of involving itself in the affairs of other nations. England, on the other hand, because her power is in great part colonial, and because she is driven by vast possessions beyond the sea to the protection of those possessions against the perpetual envy of her neighbours, SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 513 is committed to perpetual conflict; and, as has been already pointed out, the battle of words which charac- terises diplomacy may in the end be more demoralising to a nation than the battle of lives which characterises the condition of actual war. But the main object of collectivism from a moral point of view is to render our institutions consistent with our professions, so that a man may practise in his life the code of morality which he professes in his home ; in other words, its aim is to eliminate battle from the every-day life of every indi- vidual in the State, substituting for the selfish conflict of competition the unselfish considerateness of co- operation; it is in the subjective influence of this perpetual appeal to his affections, rather than to his egotism, that collectivism is believed to possess so many advantages over our present system. But if men, while at home engaged in mutually helping one another, are driven by competition outside the border to duplicity, stratagem, and violence, the beneficial effect of collec- tivism at home will be in great part counteracted by the injurious efl:ect of competition abroad; in other words, one of the chief jewels of collectivism — consistency — will be wanting. It seems obvious, therefore, that the conditions pre- sented by Great Britain and the United States respec- tively are so different that no programme fitted to one could be fitted to the other; and that every nation, therefore, adopting the creed of collectivism, must be allowed to work out its own programme for itself. Again, the measures which will be fitting for a nation in one phase of its existence may be totally unfitted to it in another. Nations j)ass through moods as various as those of a neurotic subject, who, when the wind is north-northwest, is as mad as a March hare, but, when it is southerly, can tell a hawk from a hand-saw. While 33 514 COLLECTIVISM a nation is inflamed by military success into passion for foreign conquest, it would be idle to speak of a collec- tivist programme at all; or as long as the country is possessed by the notion, however erroneous, that every individual in it can immediately be made rich and pros- perous by the free coinage of silver, it would seem vain to propose a programme that only promises prosperity after the lives of many generations. Men anxious to be rich themselves are not willing to entertain a doctrine that offers them only a crumb of comfort and reserves the loaves and fishes for children yet unborn. Indeed, in such a country as the United States the question is not only one of opportuneness, but also one of locality. Measures that might be seriously considered in New York would probably be rejected with contempt in Arizona; and those which might be pushed to the front with enthusiasm in Texas would be regarded as revolu- tionary in Maine. And so it will be seen that the character of a collectiv- ist programme will differ in every year for every nation, and in some nations will differ in its different parts. Nor must it be imagined that a collectivist programme is necessarily a radical one. On the contraiy, in some respects, if controlled by wisdom, it would seem to be an extremely conservative one. For example, there are few measures which the radical or popular party in the United States push more persistently and unanimously to the front than the referendum. ^ But the referendum, while of value in certain cases, has been found by some English trade unions to be subversive of the very popu- lar control which its promoters believed it would secure. ^ ^ The Populist party, which has always favoured the referendum, has now made it the principal plank in its platform. 2 In Switzerland the referendum has sometimes defeated popular measures voted by the legislature. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 515 And yet it would be a task of the greatest magnitude to persuade the popular party in the United States that an unlimited use of the referendum should not imme- diately form part of the collectivist programme. This cannot but accentuate the importance of a careful study of collectivism, not only by those who seem to have most interest in advocating, but also by those whose interest it may seem to Ije to resist it. For it may turn out that an intelligent collectivist programme is not only in the end, but even immediately, more conservative and more in the interest of order than the wholesale opposition to all popular measures which characterise the wealthy element in our community to-day. We have seen that a political programme looking to social improvement is essentially a question of place and time ; and that it is not necessarily a radical one, but, on the contrary, must, in order to succeed, be in some respects highly conservative. Let us now sum up compendiously the general con- clusions on this whole subject to which the arguments of this book tend to lead. The political view has been left to the last because it not only comes last in order of logic, but deserves the last word on account of its consummate importance. The one thing we all desire in this world is to secure happiness. It seems probable that nothing within the scope of human effort contrib- utes so much to this end as government ; and yet gov- ernment is probably the last thing of which the vast majority in pursuit of happiness think. It is also probable that nothing within the scope of human effort contributes so much to morality as government; and yet one of the greatest steps in advance believed in the United States to have been made in modern civilisation is the separation of Church from State. These two considerations alone ought, if true, to 516 COLLECTIVISM justify the importance of studying what government is, and how it can be made to bear upon the two greatest problems of the race, — the problem of human happiness and the problem of human morality. Of still more im- portance will this study become if it turns out that both these problems are solved, or can only be solved, through the instrumentality of government. With a view to bringing this home, let us briefly review the conclusions to which from different points of view we have been respectively led. Government is the law of society. There are three great branches of knowledge to which we can go for light upon this law : — We can go to science for instruction as to what human society is, and particularly as to the fundamen- tal and disputed question whether society is an organism or not. Science alone can tell us the law of .social de- velopment and its relation to the law of natural selection so persistently misunderstood under the name "evolu- tion." Science, too, can tell us how the human machine is constructed so that we may understand the social laws under which it operates.^ We must go to history in order to learn the actual steps which human society has taken in advancing from barbarism to our present civilisation; for it is history which furnishes us the experience of the race, — the facts from which alone a sound political theory can be drawn. 2 ^ This study was made iu book ii., entitled "Evolution," of vol. i. p. 53, and was continued in the present volume, book i. oh. iv., "The So-Called Social Mind." 2 This study was made in chapter iv., entitled " Human Evolution in its Relation to Government," of book ii. vol. i. (p. 175), and was continued in the present volume, book i. ch. ii., entitled "Individualism in History." SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 517 Lastly, we must go to ethics in order to learn what government ought to be, as distinguished from what it has been. ^ A study of government, therefore, includes roughly three different investigations: the scientific investi- gation, what society in view of the nature of man tends to be ; the historical investigation, what society in the experience of man actually has been; and the ethical investigation, what society under the rules of morality ought to be. These three investigations ought to furnish us with some answer to the practical political question, — what society can be. It is impossible to study the facts and conclusions regarding sociology, which belong to science, history, and religion, apart; the moment a social influence is isolated, it ceases to operate in the same way as it operates when a part of the social nexus. An effort to study a particular social influence apart from the other influences at work in the social field is something like an effort to study the functioning of a particular organ in a living body; the moment the function is isolated it ceases to operate in a normal manner. In the same way we cannot study religion apart from history, nor history apart from religion, nor political science apart from either. It is, perhaps, because some scientific men and some religious men have endeavoured to do this that they have been condemned to irreconcilable and irre- sponsive conflict. And the confusion which arises from this conflict is due to the fact that men not only differ with one another regarding the aims of government, but also regarding the difficulties in the way of attaining our respective 1 This has been attempted in the chapters on Justice (vol. i. book iii. eh. iii. p. 275), and Collectivism (vol. ii. book ii.). 518 COLLECTIVISM aims. For example, religion sets up holiness as the aim of human life, and holiness involves absolute jus- tice ; science responds that the real aim of humanity is happiness ; that the struggle for happiness in social life has resulted in morality, and this struggle can be de- pended upon to develop sentiments of moralit}^ so that injustice will eventually disappear. According to the philosophy of science, therefore, as interpreted by Her- bert Spencer, all we have to do is to allow selfishness to operate, and the general tendency of selfishness enlight- ened by intelligence will be to substitute for the selfish- ness which seeks happiness at the expense of others what we have called the unselfishness which seeks hap- piness only through the happiness of others. Science also points out that there are natural obstacles in the way of perfect justice which religion makes a mistake in ignoring. There is therefore at the very outset a fundamental difference of opinion between science and religion as to the aim of government. If, now, we look at the difficulties which stand in the way both of the morality taught by science and of that ordered by religion, we find again not only a radical difference of opinion between science and religion, but a still more radical difference of opinion between differ- ent groups in the religious world. It is not, however, easy to state just what religion regards as the difficul- ties in the way of human perfection, because different creeds attach different importance to different factors in the problem. With some it is absence of faith; with others it is absence of good works; while with others it is absence of grace: all the difficulties dwelt upon by religion being in some way connected with the operation of the divine power on the human heart. Science takes a radically opposite view of the difficul- SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 519 ties in the way of justice : it studies the constitution of man as a fact, and the history of man far back into the incalculable recesses of geologic time; it studies the human body as it is now constructed, — the human brain; its habits, and the laws under which it operates; it studies, above all, the environment with which nature furnished man at the outset, and the environment which man has made for himself. From this point of view the divine element is elim- inated altogether. Science ignores the source whence man derives his life and power, and studies merely the laws of his life and the laws of his power. And as to the operation of these laws, scientific men radically differ; some regarding man as the necessary result of a natural environment over which he has ]3ractically no control, and the other regarding him as consciously capable of creating a human environment opposite in its character to that furnished by nature and over which he may eventually have an almost complete control. The conclusions arrived at by these two schools are diametrically opposed to one another, as they logically should be. The first school believes in the laissez /aire principle, and in leaving evolution to do of itself the work of improvement, regardless of the possible risk of degeneration, and, trusting in the overpowering suprem- acy of natural laws over human interference, demand that this interference be the least possible, — that is to say, maintain that the best government is the govern- ment that governs least. The other school, on the con- trary, claims that the first err in the statement of facts ; that the human environment is not identical with the natural environment ; that man, ever since he emerged from the caves of the Dordogne, has been ceaselessly engaged in modifying his environment, and has now so modified it that in many respects it is diametrically oppo- 520 COLLECTIVISM site to that which was originally furnished him by nature. This school admits that morality has been slowly devel- oped by the social life of man, and that this morality shows hopeful signs of further development; but it also points out that the artificial environment created by man has in its interference with nature been not alto- gether wise; that while it has created a developing morality it has at the same time created conditions under which degeneration may take place at a more rapid rate than improvement. It insists that so long as moral development is left in the charge of selfishness it is likely to be hopelessly slow ; that there is no longer any reason why it should be left to this treacherous prin- ciple ; that, on the contrary, man is capable, by wisely directed effort, of framing his institutions in such a manner as to diminish the operation of selfishness instead of stimulating it. Upon the choice between these two schools depends the fundamental question whether government sliall undertake deliberately to create a wholesome environ- ment, or whether, according to the Spencerian method, government shall, by effacing itself to the utmost pos- sible, leave the development of morality to the uncon- trolled action of human selfishness. An attempt has been made in this book to show that the real enemies of human justice are the very inequalities of nature upon which Spencer depends for the agony through which, according to him, human development is slowly to take place. These natural inequalities man has clearly already comljated by taking the control of the government out of the hands of the muscularl}^ strong but intellectually weak, and bestowing it upon those who are intellectually strong but muscularly weak. In the process of effecting this change man has created a new inequality unknown to nature, — that is to say, the SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 521 one that separates the rich from the poor. This new inequality, which results from the institution of pri- vate property, though a necessary phase through which humanity had apparently to pass, has given a character to the human environment which has a deplorable effect upon type. Both scientific schools admit the influence of environment upon type; that if the environment is noble the type will be noble, whereas if the environ- ment is base the type will be base. It seems difficult for any one to deny that the pursuit of wealth tends to produce a sordid type, nor does any scientific man deny that the existing struggle for life as determined by the pursuit of wealth tends to create infertility in the intellectual type and a fertility of despair in the type which is unintellectual. Science without a dissenting voice recognises the immense slowness with which func- tion adapts itself to environment, the destruction which tends to accompany rapid changes, and the necessity, therefore, of patience in any modification of environment which depends for its success upon the slow modification of type thereto. At this point history can be advantageously invoked for the light it throws on human development, on the extreme slowness with which this development advances, and the rapidity with which it disappears. There is not a XJage in the whole of human histor}'^ which does not illustrate the perpetual tendency of selfishness to drag down high ideals of government and to appropriate them to the use of a selfish minority. This subject has been already once recapitulated ; it seems unnecessary, therefore, to do more than merely recall its conclusions in support of the general argument of science. We have seen how humanity has stumbled round a vicious circle from the tyranny of one group to the tyranny of 522 COLLECTIVISM another while civilisation after civilisation has passed away. The disappearance of the Assyrian, Egyptian, and Roman Empires ought to be warning enough to us that no civilisation is beyond the possibility of decay. If a note of warning may, in view of the immense devel- opment of social progress, seem groundless now, it may not be unwise to consider the mockery which would have greeted a prophet in the reign of Rameses who should have foretold that the body of this mighty con- queror would not for ever remain in the imperishable dwelling prepared for it, but would one day be exposed in a glass case to the idle curiosity of Cook tourists in a modern museum ; or a later seer who should foretell that the mighty palace of Augustus was destined to dis- appear, and that the very record of it and of his empire would be saved only through the industry of the de- spised Nazarenes. This would have seemed as improb- able then as it may seem improbable now that our civilisation, planted upon such wide and solid founda- tions as the results of science during this century, should ever share the fate of the Egyptian and the Roman empires ; and yet, when we see things as they are rather than as we want them to be, it is certainly an impressive fact that the whole tendency of civilisation since the beginning of the century has been to group the employ- ers together in gigantic monopolies and trusts, and the employees together in equally formidable trade unions. We cannot afford to neglect the fact that the unwealthy, though recognised and believed to com- pose about four-fifths of our entire population, have never in the United States yet gone together to the polls. Whenever a popular issue has been raised that might have united them, they have been disunited by a false financial theory. The presidential election of 1896, instead of uniting the workingmen under the banner of SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 523 Bryan, profoundly divided them ; for silver legislation, which would have relieved the farmer of a part of the burden upon his land, would correspondingly have di- minished the wages of the workingman; and the latter learned this before election day. The immense vote, nevertheless, polled by Bryan, notwithstanding the alienation of the Eastern workingman, ought to be some measure to us of the power of the popular vote if not dis- united by a dividing financial doctrine. If, for example, the popular party were to take up with the same enthu- siasm as was evinced at the presidential election of 1896 such a single issue as the nationalisation of railroads, monopolies, and trusts, — issues upon which they need not be divided, — is there any doubt but that they would carry the country with an overwhelming ma- jority? And if they did so carry the country, is there not ground for fear that such a revolution would be attended by serious consequences to the State ? In England, political students seem to be persuaded that workingmen are so divided between the two politi- cal parties that there is no danger of their uniting on a political programme. It seems possible, however, that they undervalue the effect of such a strike as that of the engineers during the winter of 1897-98 ; the workmen were beaten, and this defeat was regarded by some as a victory for capital. But this victory may turn out to be more dangerous to capital than a defeat; there are already indications that the workingmen, having been defeated in this strike, are beginning to lose their con- fidence in trade unions as the exclusive method for main- taining wages, and are being driven by this conclusion to the only alternative, — politics.^ If once this idea 1 Since 1898, Trade Union Congresses have twice applauded collect- ivism, whereas prior to 1898 collectivism was distinctly out of favour with them. 524 COLLECTIVISM takes hold of workingmen's minds, it may seize upon one of the parties as uncontrollably as the silver craze possessed the Democratic party in the United States in 1896, with a result that may be formidable to British institutions. One thing, however, seems certain, if the workingmen once succeed in securing the reins of power and attempt to introduce a socialist form of government, the experi- ment will be left in the hands of those who have the greatest selfish interest in the change ; in other words, it will tend to be a repetition of what we have already seen occurring over and over again, — that is to say, of a high moral and social theory pushed to the front, not because of its moralit)^, but because it serves the interest of those engaged in pushing it; and if logic or experi- ence have any value we are bound to conclude from the lessons drawn from the past, as well as the necessary consequences of the working of observed laws, that the experiment is under such circumstances likely to prove a failure. If, on the other hand, the experiment were attempted, not for the immediate purpose of benefiting a particular class, but for the ultimate purpose of benefiting all alike, and with the patience and deliberateness that both science and religion unite in recommending, then it is conceivable that by slow steps humanity may Ije gradu- ally adapted to a form of government that will not only in itself be just, but will permit of justice in the indi- vidual relations of man to man. The lessons to be derived from the moral view of gov- ernment have too recently been recapitulated for it to be necessary to enlarge upon them here. We may confine ourselves, therefore, to some of the most important con- clusions derivable therefrom. We have heretofore gone to science for our physical SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 525 improvement, our sanitation, our physical comforts ; for medicine and surgery, for nutritious foods, and for all that contributes to eliminate physical pain. For our moral improvement we have gone for the most part to religion ; we have sought it at the altar and the confes- sional, from the lips of the priest or the word of the gospel. But for our political improvement we have gone to neither science nor religion. We have left political changes practically to the mercy of human selfishness. No political measure is enacted into law unless it has behind it the organised effort of a part of the voting population sufficient to force it upon the at- tention of the legislature. It sometimes happens that the very iniquity of political conditions creates a suffi- cient reaction on the morality of the mass to arouse it to the necessary political effort. We see this operating in the abolition of slavery, in the improvement of our ballot laws, and in the mitigation of the horrors of war through the slow development of public international law. But this beneficent action is comparatively rare, whereas the action of selfishness in politics is constant. As has been already remarked, even in the British Parliament, where no reasonable man believes that the corrupt use of money is to any extent possible, only those measures for improving the condition of the work- inofmen have been enacted which had behind them the largest political fund ; and if this be so in the British Parliament, how should it be otherwise in State legisla- tures, which are for the most part elected through the distribution of campaign funds collected from the cor- porations which have an interest in controlling them ? Under these conditions it seems unlikely that any reasonable improvement can take place within a reason- able time until the enactment of our laws is guided by some better principle than egotism. 526 COLLECTIVISM When, however, we go to science for assistance, we have to recognise that there is a tendency, through what is believed to be an error of one of its most important schools, to discourage human effort by destroying human hope. For if the laws of nature are to be allowed full play; if justice involves, as claimed, the rewarding of men according to their deeds rather than according to their needs ; if the most crafty are always to prosper at the expense of the rest; if man is practically powerless by the side of the overmastering supremacy of such laws as that of natural selection, — then effort is vain. On the other hand there is a tendency in religion also to discourage effort by exaggerating the role of Providence in the world. Nothing, for example, is more calculated to discourage it than the theory that man can be saved only by divine grace ; or that we must depend upon Providence and not upon ourselves for our advancement. It is not necessary to deny Providence in order to enhance the importance of human effort ; but it is, above all things, necessary to keep human effort alive by not exaggerating the role of Providence. This must not be construed as an attack upon the theories of science and religion in their own respective fields: let science continue to develop its theory of natural selection in the realm of nature, and let religion continue to dwell upon the power of the supernatural within its own sphere. So far as the individual conduct of man is concerned, religion is still called upon to perform a task of priceless value by keeping every indi- vidual man up to a high standard of morality. What is asked of both science and religion is that in the neutral field of politics the obvious facts which have been given in this book be recognised, and that both science and religion help to persuade men that the great obstacle to human happiness is selfishness; that our SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 527 present institutions stimulate selfishness so as to consti- tute a perpetual obstacle to happiness ; that so long as our institutions oblige every man to seek satisfaction for himself, they are bound to keep alive in every man the very selfishness which makes happiness impossible. Science amply demonstrates the limits within which man can, by effort wisely directed, diminish the conse- quence of natural inequalities and at the same time eliminate the necessity for conflict by substituting co- operation for competition in our social and industrial system. And what science shows can be done, religion has, ever since the beginning of the world, been ordering us to do ; and it is because our institutions have made it impossible to obey the orders of religion that the voice of religion remains to-day in great part in- effectual. It is time that religion and science join hands to show us the true principles of government; science contributing knowledge and religion self-control. Then shall our institutions be founded on neither selfish- ness, folly, nor craft, but on the combination of knowl- edge and morality which we have called wisdom ; and then shall we be rescued from the evolution of nature by the effort of man. § 5. Conclusion For the purpose of defining the conclusions to which we have been led, let us now revert to the four different points of view from which at the opening it was stated that government could best be studied : — The Historical — or what it has been. The Morphological — or what it is. The Physiological — or what it does. The Teleological — or what is its purpose or aim. § 1. History demonstrates that government has for 528 COLLECTIVISM the most part been the rule of collective conduct which, under the operation of the natural law of competition, the crafty minority has in its own interests imposed upon the less crafty multitude. At rare intervals a non- natural motive, taking the form of the Church one day or Cliivalry the next, has sought to take the framing of government out of the hands of selfishness. But the effectual action of this non-natural motive has been in- termittent, whereas the effectual action of selfishness in consequence of the competitive character of our indus- trial system has been continuous. Every effort of this non-natural motive, therefore, to improve conditions tends sooner or later to be captured by craft and made to serve the interests of egotism. This must continue to be the case so long as industrial conditions are such as to force all of us into the demoralising scramble for wealth. The scramble for wealth, too, has been shown to be prejudicial to type. § 2. Morphologiccdly^ government is the rule of social conduct which prevails in every community. An ex- tended study of government from the morphological point of view would involve that of constitutional law, which is foreign to the main purpose of this book. § 3. Physiologically^ the rule of social conduct adopted by every community performs the function of equalisa- tion, — that is to say, of reducing the inequalities of nature so that the violence which prevails in nature no longer prevails in civilised communities. But the func- tion works badly; for although it has dragged down the violent man, it has lifted in his place, not the moral man, but the man of craft; and in levelling natural inequali- ties of muscular strength it has created artificial ine- qualities through the institution of private property, which is responsible for pauperism and prostitution, and in great part for crime. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 529 § 4. Teleologically, whereas the purpose or aim of gov- ernment has been to attain justice, it has in fact worked injustice. Justice has been found to include two things, — the virtue of justice, which consists in an attitude of mind towards social relations, and the act of justice, which consists in a rule of conduct as regards social relations. This rule of conduct has been defined to be a per- petual effort to diminish the inequalities of nature with a view to making the community serve the interests of the individual rather than the individual serve the in- terests of the community, and to perpetuate a noble type rather than a base one. The virtue of justice, if the preceding definition of the act of justice be adopted, will include a habit, a desire, and a resolve to make the effort therein defined. This effort has encountered throughout history the opposition of selfishness and intelligence, which, when united, have been denominated craft. Craft has in- trenched itself in the notion of private property, and has been helped in so doing by the undoubted fact that the institution of private property was a phase through which man had to pass in order to develop out of the fierce individualism of the carnivora in nature. But property is of three kinds : — 1. Property of the male in the female, recognised in the institution of marriage. II. Property of a privileged class in political office recognised in the so-called rights of the king, the nobility, and the Church to the functions respectively usurped by them, and to-day main- tained through the self-constituted authority of political machines. III. Property of a minority in wealth. 34 530 COLLECTIVISM Of these, the first — ^ property of the male in the female — has yielded to a notion of mutual and lifelong loyalty which, if maintained, would make every family a school of social and political as well as individual improvement. The second — property in political office — has in pop- ular governments disappeared in theory, though not in fact. The Reformation destroyed it to a great extent for the Church, and the Revolution has destroyed it for the king and noble. The usurpation of political office by the political machine is to-day being limited by civil-service reform and the exercise, when intelligent, of the independent vote. The third — private property in wealth — still controls our social, industrial, and political institutions. But the power of the majority which it condemns to com- parative want is increasing rapidly; it is organising in trade unions and compelling counter-organisation by capital in trusts and protective associations. The two forces, instead of being diffused and dissipated through- out the social structure as in the beginning of the cen- tury, are to-day massed and intrenched face to face with every omen of impending conflict. It has been argued that such a conflict would be dan- gerous to civilisation, inconsistent with our religious professions, and is, in view of the ultimate feasibility of a more or less partial collectivism, unnecessary. It has been argued that such a conflict can only be averted provided the morality and intelligence — that is to say, the wisdom — of the community rescue the making of our institutions and laws from the hands of folly and craft. Political wisdom involves an alliance of science and religion upon tlie field of politics. Its first duty is to frame a programme which will have for effect, by steps that are each of them slow and practical, to fit men SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 531 for a collectivist State, — the only one in which the element of selfishness is reduced to a minimum. The attainment of justice is the main purpose of gov- ernment. But it has been shown that there are occa- sions for inequality and unhappiness in nature which no wisdom which we now have can remove. No purely political change can secure happiness for man. Where political wisdom breaks down, moral wisdom or enlight- ened religion may step in. With the role of religion over our individual lives, this book does not undertake to deal. But the role of religion over our collective conduct is an essential part of every political scheme. It is in great part because politics have been divorced from religion that the making of our laws has been left to the war of opposing interests. The morality which, unsatisfied by ecclesiastical ritual, has been dissipating itself in ineffectual schemes of private philanthropy will find its true mission in effectual schemes of State philan- thropy. The evils and dangers which confront us are beyond the reach of private effort; they can be suc- cessfully overcome only by the collective power of the State. They consist in great part in defects in our State constitution, in our State laws, and in our com- mercial system. It is only by changes in our institu- tions, then, that they can be made consistent with the morality we profess. We are all being driven by the same relentless goad, — omnes eodem cogiinur. It is use- less to oppose militarism and expansion, when over-pro- duction leaves us no option but either to create nev/ markets or to shut down our factories. It is useless to attempt to relieve the poor so long as social conditions are grinding them out faster than we can relieve them. It is useless for employers to rail against organised labour now that organised labour has acquired the intel- ligence and self-restraint necessary for effectual collec- 532 COLLECTIVISM tive action. Labour organisations indeed have attained that momentous coign of vantage that they are likely in their conflicts with capital to gain even more by de- feat than by victory. For while victory will serve only to strengthen them in the industrial field, defeat will drive them, with all their collective strength, into the field of politics; and here their action, if united, will be irresistible. We are like dwellers by an encroaching sea of which "Walt Whitman wrote, — "Surely some right withheld." Dare we any longer withhold this right? And if we dare, ought we any longer to withhold it ? The progress of man has not been straight, but, like a stream, it has at one time wound deviously through pleasant places ; at others, been dashed headlong between jagged cliffs. But at all times, whether in Assyria and Egypt man is driven in hordes by instinct or habit, blindly following the lead of a military chief; whether, inspired by a fierce individualism, he is creating the city republics of the Greeks; whether excess of individual- ism exposes him to conquest by the Macedonian horde again, or with a higher collective ideal he recreates a greater republic in Rome ; whether he lapses once more by sheer degeneration into empire and suffers the price of degeneration in the riot and darkness of the Middle Ages, only once more to reassert his individualism in the Reformation of the sixteenth century and the Revo- lution of the centuries that followed ; whether in polit- ical declaration of rigfhts or in industrial cries for freedom of contract; whether in the making of guilds to protect the collective idea, or the destro^'ing of guilds to renew that of individualism ; whether at last, in the organisa- SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION" 533 tion of trade unions, he reaffirms the necessity of collec- tive action in the ranks of labour or in the organisation of trusts, protective associations, and Birmingham alliances, — he is brought back to the necessity of associ- ation in the ranks of capital. Man is slowly learning the lesson that he can attain the highest happiness only by lifting himself out of the instinct and competition that characterise nature, into the wisdom and the self-restraint that distinguish him from all other animals. He may yet have to swing many a time from the extreme of individualism to that of solidarity, and back from that of solidarity to that of individualism; but if he is to escape degeneration he can do so only in one way, — by the enhancement of the faculty of individual and social self-control. Collectivism is the ideal form of government to which a high faculty of individual and social self-restraint is essential, and in which will be found the highest happiness. At present collectivism is a creed rather than a pro- gramme. But it is a practical creed, — one we can take into politics with us as well as into church. The question that every nation, every State, every city, has next to solve is what is the first political step that will move most effectually towards this distant goal? I I APPENDIX TRUSTS The aspect presented by trusts differs according to the point of view; politically and socially regarded they seem an unmiti- gated evil, for they tend to destroy individual initiative, and they present an occasion, a necessity, and a power for political corruption unexampled in history. From a purely economic point of view, on the other hand, and upon the assumption that the competitive system is a sound one, they seem an unquali- fied good ; for they represent to the highest conceivable degree the glorification of the survival of the fittest,-' upon which the competitive system is based; they attain the maximum of econ- omy both in production and in distribution ; and they secure the advantages of competition in tending to keep prices reason- able and regular without the disadvantages which attend com- petition, such as irregular employment, fluctuating prices, and last, but not least, the anxiety and want that attend bankruptcy of employer and non-employment of employee. Tliis Appendix is written for the purpose of pointing out the facts elicited by the late Industrial Commission, which empha- sise the econoinrc advantages of Trusts ; and in the course of the argument light will be thrown upon several points which have been incompletely treated in this volume for the reason that at the time it was written the facts in question were not easily accessible. The evidence taken by the Industrial Commission has elicited facts that tend to the following conclusions : — 1 Witnesses to the prosperity of trusts are continually justifying them on the principle of the Survival of the Fittest. See the testimony of Messrs. Boyle (p. 486) and Archbold (p. 568) in the Report of the Indus- trial Commission. 536 APPENDIX 1. Over-production is so constant an attendant of competi- tive production as to seem a necessary feature of it. 2. Over-production is the principal cause of trusts. 3. Competition is needlessly wasteful. 4. Industry is driven towards the trust system by over-pro- duction ; it is also drawn towards it by economy. The maximum of economy can be obtained only through the minimum of com- petition, or economy increases inversely with competition. 5. Combination, even imder competitive conditions, secures the benefits of competition without its evils : it substitutes order for disorder; it adjusts supply to demand, thereby checking over-production and waste. In the international struggle for the market, therefore, the industry in which combination is most highly developed is the industry which because it is the most orderly and economical will in the end prevail. It would seem, therefore, that industry is driven by inter- national as well as by intranational competition to develop more and more along trust lines; or, in other words, — Trusts are likely, under the competitive system, to increase rather than to diminish in number and in strength. 'O' The evidence taken before the Industrial Commission has re- enforced two arguments attempted in the foregoing pages. First, that over-production and the misery that attends it are constant features of the competitive system; and, secondly, that an enormous economy results from combination. Now, com- bination is a step towards collectivism in production and distri- bution. And over-production and waste are the two principal economic disadvantages that attend competition. These, there- fore, are the points to which attention will be first directed. I. OVER-PPtODUCTION. Over-production has given rise to considerable difference of opinion. Early writers were much concerned with the possi- bility of a " universal glut; " that is to say, of over-production extending over the whole field of industry and tending to result in a general industrial paralysis. J. B. Say was the first to APPENDIX 537 point out that under-production was as much to be feared as over-production, the reasons for over-production of a particular commodity being " either that it has been produced in exces- sive abundance, or that the production of other commodities has fallen short." In other words, over-production often takes place in one industry because there has been under-pro- duction in others. The evil in such cases is one of proportion that easily rights itself. This view, which is undoubtedly sound so far as it goes, has given rise, however, to a false security ; for although there cannot be said to be even in Mexico the ' ' in- disposition to consume " of which Malthus in this connection wrote, there is at times an inability to consume, due to irregu- larity of employment, Avhich is quite as serious in its conse- quences upon human happiness. Again, many economists have, since Say's lucid exposition of the subject, put over- production out of sight almost entirely, forgetting that although Say attributed it in part to under-production, he by no means failed to recognise that it could take place quite independently of under-production. Say's words are that over-production of a particular commodity takes place because " either it has been produced in excessive abundance., or the production of other commodities has fallen short." This is a plain recognition that over-production can precede under-production and can take place independently of it. There is a school of modern economists which persistently belittles the extent of over-pro- duction and the evil that results from it. With a view, there- fore, to demonstrating that over-production is an evil which we cannot afford to neglect, a few instances of it have been col- lected from the history of our largest trusts. It would seem from these instances that over-production is far more the parent of trusts than the tariff; for though the tariff may tend to stimulate over-production, over-production will be found in practically every industry that has given rise to trusts whether protected by a tariff or not. And with a view to making this clear the first industry quoted will be that of anthracite, to which no tariff applies.^ 1 As regards the Anthracite Trust, see Mr. Q. 0. Virtue's article entitled " The Anthracite Combinations," Quarterly Journal of Economics, April, 1896. 538 APPENDIX The history of the production of anthracite is interesting from many different points of view to show the unliappiness that results from the present competitive system. When an- thracite was first worked it was found relatively near the sur- face ; and villages sprang up around every centre of production. When, however, larger beds were discovered at greater depth, requiring larger capital for exploitation, the villages which had sprung up at the places where the surface beds were worked disappeared, and families were ruined and scattered. In the 'sixties the workmen employed in the large anthracite mines were for the most part American, and were strongly organized in trade unions. When the inevitable tendency of all large exploitation to produce the utmost, in order to pay in- terest on capital and on plant, occasioned a larger production of anthracite than the country could at remunerative prices con- sume, the mine-owners, driven to reducing cost, reduced it at the only point where cost can in such cases be reduced ; that is to say, they reduced it by lowering wages. The workmen struck; but the strike was of a peculiar character; they did not strike for the purpose of compelling their employers to pay them a higher wage than the Market could afford. They struck in order, by stopping over-production, to restore the Market to a condition which would enable the employers to pay the pre- vious wage. For this purpose the workmen decided to stop working an entire month; their calculation turned out to be sound ; an end was put to the glut which had reduced prices, and at the end of the month they returned to work at the old wages. The mine-owners, however, did not care to have the question of production determined by their workmen; they therefore substituted for American workmen foreigners who were care- fully recruited at the emigrant stations and even in Hungary and other European centres. This broke down the strength of the trade imion and throw the question of production back into the hands of the mine-owners, with the usual result, — over-production. There then followed a series of agreements between mine- owners to diminish production, the principal of which were APPENDIX 539 those of 18G9, of 1872, of 1877, and of 1885, each of these agreements being in turn violated and leading in turn to rupture until over-production became so intolerable again tliat another agreement became necessary. Nothing is more clear than that every mine-owner throughout this period was driven by competition to make his production as large as possible, so as to make small profits on large transactions compensate for the larger profit on smaller transactions which competition no longer rendered possible. The tendency of every mine-owner to produce to the utmost was encouraged by competing railroads, which had an interest in carrying the largest amount of anthracite possible and offered rebates to the largest shippers ; inasmuch as anthracite is bulky, and freight enters very largely into the cost of anthracite at seaports, transportation forms an important feature in the economic conditions affecting it. In 1892 Mr. McLeod, Presi- dent of the Reading Railroad, sought to effect, by a combination between the roads that carried anthracite, what the mine- owners had theretofore been unable to efi'ect; under his plan the railroads were to control the mines and were to acree to keep down over-production and divide the traffic. The McLeod combination had immediately for effect by lowering production to raise the price of coal, stove size, at Eastern ports from $4.09 to $4.19. But the Reading Road was not strong enough to carry the burden it had undertaken ; with its bankruptcy in that year came an immediate fall to $3.60 in Eastern ports in 1894 and to $3.08 in 1895. The over-production became so great that instead of working the normal ten hours a day dur- ing six days of the week, the Reading men in 1895 worked only eight hours a day for three or four days in the week. Over-production having to a certain extent been controlled by this process, in 1896 the working hours were increased to nine a day for five days in the week; but even under these conditions over-production was still the rule. The American Market was at that time capable of purchasing forty million tons of anthracite coal while the mines were producing forty- six million tons, or six million tons more than the Market could take. This condition of things gave rise to another agreement 540 APPENDIX in 1896 under which the Reading Company agreed to reduce its production to eight million tons, or one fifth of the total production. Since 1896 a complete reorganisation of the Reading Road has led to a still stronger control of production, which has resulted in the present high prices. The history of the steel trust is similar to that of anthracite. It began with numerous pooling arrangements to limit pro- duction, every pooling arrangement resulting in higher prices, but eventually in rupture and a subsequent reduction of prices. The difficulty of keeping the parties to the agreements made compelled Messrs. Carnegie and Rockefeller to effect the com- bination which has now brought the mines of Lake Superior into the same combination that produces steel at Pittsburgh. Doubtless, economy of production is one of the great advan- tages secured by this combination; but it is interesting to note that the first cause which led to the pooling arrangements that preceded the trust was over-production. The same thing is true as regards sugar. The first pool of sugar-refiners was the result of a strike in New York, and in this respect the sugar trust resembles the anthracite trust. Before the strike there had been a cut-throat competition between refiners which had caused refined sugar to be sold at a price below cost. When, however, the workmen in New York struck, the refiners who had theretofore been bitter enemies combined so as to enable the refineries of Boston, Philadelphia, and other Eastern seaport towns to supply the demand for refined sugar, notwithstanding the cessation of work in New York; the profits upon all the sugar manufactured being divided proportionately among all the refineries, including New York. Refiners, having once got together on this basis, remained together, and were driven by anti-trust legislation into organising in a more and more compact form, until to-day it has taken the shape of a corporation which is probably beyond the reach of anti-trust legislation altogether. It is important, however, to note the extent to which over-pro- duction was an essential factor in the organisation of this trust. The refining of sugar requires large capital; sugar, being APPENDIX 541 easily kept, can be stored in large quantities for considerable periods without injury; the fact that the amount of capital invested is large pushes refiners to producing the utmost possible ; and the fact that sugar can be stored encourages large production by enabling refiners to hold over for a better market. Over-production under these conditions became so excessive that out of forty refiners eighteen became bankrupt just prior to the organisation of the first sugar trust. Of the twenty- two that remained eighteen combined. Of these eighteen, eleven refineries were closed, leaving seven to do profitably the work which had previously been done unprofitably by forty. The history of the whiskey trust shows over-production to a still more aggravated degree. Before the organisation of the Distilling and Cattle Feeding Company, several agreements were entered into by the majority of the distillers; under one of them they agreed to reduce production to forty per cent of what it at that time was ; under a subsequent agreement they agreed to reduce still further to twenty-eight per cent; and out of eighty of the principal distillers who organised the Distilling and Cattle Feeding Company, sixty-eight were closed, leaving only twelve distilleries operating. The same succession of events is to be found in the history of the American Steel & Wire Company, and indeed of practi- cally all American trusts, and it may be laid down as a general rule that, in the first place, competition tends to produce over- production; in the second place, over-production reduces prices to a ruinous degree ; in the third place, high prices are restored in one of four ways : — 1. The low prices oblige a reduction of wages; the reduction of wages occasions strikes; and the cessation of production occasioned by strikes, by putting an end to the glut that lowered prices, restores the proper relation of demand to supply. Or, — 2. Prices become so low as to cause the bankruptcy of the weakest competitors; this bankruptcy causes the shutting doAvn of some of the mills, and thereby relieves the over-production and restores prices. Or,— 542 APPENDIX 3. Foreign trade ^ relieves the domestic market. Or,^ 4. Combination upon the trust plan applies intelligence to the adjustment of production to demand. 1 The, Industrial Commission has furnished some remarkable examples of the extent to which over-production compels the conquest of markets abroad. At one period prior to the organisation of the whiskey trust, distillers agreed that an assessment should be levied which each distiller should pay upon each bushel of corn mashed, in order to export the goods at a loss, and thus, by relieving the home Market of the surplus, make sufficient provision for selling the domestic production at a remunerative price (Jenks, Trust Problem, p. 108). Another of the pools formed, under the name of the Western Exporters' Association, prior to the organisation of the first whiskey trust, determined the producing capacity of each distillery and divided among them the producing capacity of the country pro rata. Distillers producing in excess were required to export at their own cost, while any surplus arising fortuitously was exjiorted at the expense of the Association, the loss being met by assessment. (Testimony of Messrs. McNulta (p. 200) and Clarke (pp. 168, 169) in the Keport of the Industrial Commission.) At a time when the American trade was paying $28 a ton for steel rails, the same steel rails were being sold to Japan at $20. (Monde Economique, Feb. 20, 1897.) When the pooling arrangement under which this export of steel rails at a lower price in Japan than prevailed in America was broken up, the price of steel went down to $15, and this resulted in 1897 in enormous orders abroad, 25,000 tons being ordered in England and 15,000 tons in Japan ; and three weeks afterwards another sudden reduction in price brought about orders abroad of 1,500,000 tons at a value of 150,000,000 francs. Mr. Guthrie, President of the American Steel Hoop Company, testifies : — "American manufacturers, too, sometimes follow the practice of exporting a surplus product at a price less than the average cost of the entire output — considerably less than the price in this country. The Carnegie Company thus at one time proposed to sell a large quantity of steel abroad at twenty per cent less than the domestic price in order to • keep things moving and bring gold back to this country.'" (Report of the Industrial Commission, p. 193.) Mr. Gates, President of the American Steel and Wire Company, testifies : — " The price at which the American Steel and Wire Company is selling in foreign markets at present is less than the domestic price. The reason for this is that by working up a permanent foreign business the company can assure the constant operation of its mills and thus make goods cheaper, and can make profits from maintaining foreign prices at times when there APPENDIX 543 It is interesting to note that of these four escapes from the evils of over-production, the first two are automatic, or, as some economists would say, natural, and involve great misery without permanent benefit; the third is automatic with a dash of intelligence in it; whereas the fourth is wholly deliberate and intelligent, or, as some economists would say, artificial, and results in lasting economy. 11. ECONOMY There is an economy which results from all concentration of capital, such as the manufacture of waste products. This econ- omy is sometimes of startling importance. The managers of the Standard Oil trust testify that among the waste products capable of being utilised in sufficiently large refineries are gaso- line, paraffine, lubricating oil, vaseline, naphtha, aniline dyes, and no less than two hundred drugs, and that the total value of these waste products is actually as great as that of the oil itself.^ But it is not the economy which attends mere concentra- tion of capital which particularly interests us. The economies is a decline in the home price. By manufacturing perhaps 200,000 tons of wire per annum for export the entire cost of manufacture can be mateiially cheapened, and in the long run the domestic consumer will receive a lower price." (Report of the Industrial Commission, p. 205.) Mr. Gaiy, President of the Federal Steel Compan}-, testifies: "Steel has also been shipped recently to Japan at a price below the domestic price." (Report of the Industrial Commission, p. 199.) Mr. J. W. Lee, President of the three independent pipe-line organisa- tions, testifies that prior to 1895 "export oil was sold in New York below the cost of crude at the refinery." (Report of Industrial Commission, p. 121.) The representatives of most of the trust combinations pointed out the enormous increase in the export trade due to these combinations ; and those of the Standard Oil Company claimed that this trade could not have been secured without the expenditure of large sums of money such as only a great combination can control. (Report of the Industrial Commission, p. 22, and witnesses cited. ) In other words, a trust possesses the means and the information to use foreign trade as a resource, whereas competition reduces small manufacturers to resort to it as an extremity. The above illustrations are cited in aid of the contention that over- production stimulates and comjiels the conquest of foreign trade. 1 Testimony of Mr. Arcbbold (pp. 570, 571) in the Report of the In- dustiial Commission. 544 APPENDIX which particularly interest students of trusts are those that re- sult from the combination of many factories under one manage- ment. These economies may be divided into two classes : (a) Economies in production; and (b) Economies in distribution. 1. Economies in Production (a) Economy Occasioned by Working Factories at Maximum Efficiency Under the system of free competition every factory is sub- ject to variations of demand: at one season the factory is over- worked; at another it is not enough worked to occupy its employees. A factory is working at the maximum profit when it is working at its highest efficiency ; every factory, therefore, has an interest in working at the highest efficiency. This hardly ever takes place under the regime of free competition except at seasons of extraordinary prosperity. When, however, many factories combine under one management, most of them can be run at maximum efficiency, and the variation in demand can be concentrated upon comparatively few factories. In the case of the sugar trust, of the seven refineries which are main- tained, six work without interruption at maximum efficiency, and the entire variation is made to fall upon a single refinery, — the one in New York. An incidental economy resulting from this plan is to be found in the fact that the adjustment of the work of a factory to a fluctuating demand is the most difficult part of a manager's task, and the task being difficult it is high priced; in other words, if the seven refineries now constituting the sugar trust were working under the system of free competition upon their own account they would have to pay high prices for this expensive management. By combining these seven factories under one management, the expensive management is confined to a single refinery. We should underestimate the economy resulting from this head were we to consider only the seven refineries now consti- APPENDIX 545 tuting the sugar trust; it must be remembered that before the sugar trust was organised the number of refineries operating was not seven, but forty ; so that under the system of free com- petition forty factories were all working under expensive man- agement and at great disadvantage, whereas now the same work is being done by seven refineries of which six are working at maximum efficiency under the best conditions and without ex- pensive management, and only one is now subjected to the dis- advantageous circumstances and expensive management that prior to the combination diminished the profits of every one of the forty competitors. It has been estimated that the saving to the sugar trust arising from this advantage alone is as high at times as one-eighth of a cent per pound, or $2.50 per ton. The sugar trust refines about 1, 800, 000 tons per annum, thus making from this source aloue an economy, if maintained throughout the year, of about $4,500,000 per annum. (h) Economy of Time in Manufacturing Only One Dimension In the manufacturing of steel hoops eighty-five different sizes have to be made. When every factory is called upon to fill an order comprising many sizes, much time is lost in changing the rolling-machinery for difi"erent sizes. Mr. Guthrie, the Presi- dent of the American Steel Hoop Company, testifies that by specialising products in difi'erent plants an economy of $1 to $1.50 per ton is effected.^ A similar economy is made in the manufacture of shoes and many other articles of different dimensions. 2. Economy of Distribution (a) Gross-Freights A refiner of crude petroleum in the Eastern States, in com- peting with a refiner in Chicago for Western trade, is at a dis- advantage owing to the necessity of paying cross-freights ; that is to say, he has to pay the cost of transporting crude oil from 1 Report of the Industrial Commission, pp. 953-957. 35 546 APPENDIX the wells to New York, and then the cost of carrying the re- fined oil back over practically the same ground to the West. When, however, factories in Chicago and New York are put under one management as in the Standard Oil trust, these cross- freights are avoided, the crude oil taken to New York is re- fined for the Eastern market alone, and the Western market is provided with oil refined in Chicago. The salt and the tin- plate trusts also effect a great economy by the elimination of cross-freights. (b) " Getting the Market " The expression " getting the Market " is used to cover all the expenses attending the bringing of goods to the attention of the public, and they may be roughly divided into two principal categories, — advertising and commercial travellers. The public little appreciates the enormous cost which, under the system of free competition, attends the work of finding a purchaser. Mr. Bradley, after a careful calculation, estimates that " somewhere between the distiller and the consumer in this country forty millions of dollars are lost; this goes primarily to the attempt to secure trade." ^ He testifies that the combination of Ken- tucky distillers was able to dismiss three hundred salesmen; the Steel and Wire trust dismissed two hundred salesmen. Mr. Dowe,^ the President of the Commercial Travellers' Na- tional League, testifies that thirty-five thousand salesmen have been thrown out of employment by the organisation of trusts, and twenty -five thousand reduced to two-thirds of their previ- ous salaries. This would represent a loss of $60,000,000 in salaries on a basis of $1,200 each. He cites, as instances of trusts that have dismissed salesmen, the baking powder, bicy- cle, chair, paper-bag, rubber, tin-plate, steel and rod, sugar, coffee, thread, and type-founders' combinations. Not only do trusts dismiss salesmen, but they substitute for salesmen who prior to the organisation of the trust had been earning $4,000 to $5,000 a year, cheaper salesmen who receive 1 Report of the Industrial Commission, pp. 829-831. 2 Md., pp. 27-36. APPENDIX 547 $18 a week. He also estimates that the dismissal of commer- cial travellers means a loss to railways of about $2.50 per day for 240 days in the year, in all $27,000,000. The loss to hotels is about as much, and " many hotels are likely to become bankrupt if any more travellers are taken off." To Mr. Dowe and the organisation he represents the dismissal of commercial travellers is of course a disaster; but from a purely economic point of view, assuming the competitive system to be a sound one, what is a disaster to the Commercial Travellers' National League is a benefit to the industry and to the nation at large, for it represents so much economy realised. This question admirably illustrates how the competitive system sets one group of men in conflict with others without offering any satis- factory solution for the misery which this conflict occasions. The subject of trusts presents an insoluble problem when studied from the point of view of human happiness; but it is full of valuable lessons when studied from the point of view of the collectivist, for it furnishes not only demonstrative proof of the fact that competition is necessarily attended by over- production and waste, but also figures showing the extent of the evil in both cases. 3. Prices The principal advantage claimed by individualists for com- petition in industry is that it tends automatically to keep prices at a reasonable figure. It is not contended that compe- tition keeps prices constant; the fluctuation of prices is too obvious to permit of such a contention; but it is claimed that under the salutary influence of competition, though prices may occasionally go far above a reasonable figure and even fall below cost, there is a tendency to return to what is called a normal price. By normal price is generally understood a price that will cover cost of production and a reasonable profit. Classical economists call this " natural " price, because it is the price towards which fluctuations naturally tend. Professor Clark ^ prefers to call this price " static. " He describes the industrial 1 The Distribution of Wealth, by Professor John Bates Clark, p. vi. 548 APPENDIX •world as in a perpetual state of " change and progress." Because of this state of change and progress, standards of wages and of interest and of profits vary. ' ' But there are normal standards to-day. In the midst of all changes there are at work forces that fix rates to which, at any one moment, wages and interest tend to conform. However stormy may be the ocean, there is an ideal level surface projecting itself through the waves, and the actual surface of the turbulent water fluctuates about it. There are likewise static standards with which, in the most turbulent markets, actual values, wages, and interest tend to coincide. " Professor Clark assumes that the industrial sea must continue always to be swept by hurricanes, and its shores strewn with wrecks of bankruptcy and victims of irregular employment; and although he does not in terms say it, the competitive system is silently recognised to constitute the " cave of the winds " which lashes our industrial sea with conflicting gales, tornadoes, and typhoons. It is by no means sure, however, that competition in the aggravated form now in operation is a necessary element even of the competitive system; it is conceivable that its capacity for mischief may be much diminished by the application to economic conditions of intelligence and art. There are two methods under which the evils attending competition can be diminished or eliminated: one is purely economic; the other is partly economic and partly political. It is with the first of these two that we have to deal in studying trusts, for an examination of the efi'ect of trusts upon prices will lead to the conclusion that, once the trust is firmly established, it produces a lull in the industrial storm; it may be that the lull is a temporary one, but lull it is; and a method by which such a lull is secured deserves the careful attention of social economists. Professor Jenks prepared for the Industrial Commission a table of the prices of articles which had given rise to trusts, showing the fluctuations of these prices from month to month. These charts are reproduced by Professor Jenks in his book on the trust problem. The principal lines in these charts are APPENDIX 549 three : the highest line indicates the price of the manufactured article, the line next below indicates the price of the raw material, and the lowest line of all indicates the difference between the price of the raw material and the price of the manufactured article, and marks, therefore, at every month, the cost of manu- facture plus profits realised at the prices reigning during the month. These tables constitute a record of the influence the trusts have had upon prices, upon cost of production, and upon profits realised. The first impression produced by a glance at these tables is that in every case prices have on the whole gone down. This lowering of prices in connection with all articles controlled by trusts cannot, however, be put to the credit of trusts; the prices of articles controlled by trusts have gone down because all prices have gone down, probably owing to the demonetisa- tion of silver and the consequent appreciation of currency. But the important conclusion to be drawn from the lowering of prices in articles controlled by trusts, even though it be explained by the appreciation of currency, is that trusts have been unable to resist the general effect of the appreciation of currency upon general prices; in other words, articles manufac- tured by trusts have obeyed the general law ; trusts have not been strong enough to resist the application of the general law. So far, therefore, as the general trend towards lower prices which characterises the last quarter of the last century is concerned, trusts have been powerless to resist it; to this extent, therefore, trusts have not dictated prices. The table of American prices of sugar shows also the fluctua- tions in the prices of sugar in England and Germany ; it is interesting to observe that every fluctuation in the lines of European prices is reproduced in the lines showing American prices. When the raw material in Europe goes down, the raw material in America goes down; and with the reduction of the raw material in America follows a reduc- tion in the refined article; so that all the lines, whether of refined or of raw sugar in America, or whether of refined or of raw sugar in Germany and England, move up and down, with negligible variations, together. The conclusion to be 550 APPENDIX drawn from this is that here again the trusts are unable materially to affect the fluctuations determined by the world's production. Mr. Post, commission-merchant in sugar, testifies that the production of beet-root sugar in Europe chiefly determines the price (Industrial Commission, pp. 153-158); and against this dominating influence the trust is powerless. Here again is evidence that tends to show how untrue it is that trusts can dictate prices. A more analytical inquiry into these tables of prices shows a still more important fact ; namely, that competition exercises a wholesome influence over trusts, even in cases where actual competition is practically nil. It exerts this influence poten- tially ; it is a perpetual menace to the trust ; and prosperous trusts have learned the lesson that they can remain pros- perous only on the condition of keeping prices reasonable. A brief examination of three of these tables will serve to illustrate this fact: the sugar trust was organised at the close of 1887 after a period of low prices which had put into bankruptcy eighteen out of forty refineries. During 1888 and 1889 prices of sugar went up, but they went up in Europe relatively almost as high as in America, the rise in the prices being determined mainly by the shortage in the sugar crop; in other words, it was the raw material that advanced more than the manufactured article. Nevertheless, the absence of competition enabled the sugar trust to manufacture at remunerative prices, and the profits made during 1888 and 1889 were undoubtedly large, as can be seen by reference to the third line, which indicates the difi'erence between the cost of the raw article and that of the refined. The result of the high profits made in 1888 and 1889 was to encourage competition. Spreckels became an active competitor in Philadelphia, and for two years he fought the trust. Prices went down, but they went down in great part owing to a reduction in the price of raw sugar. Here again we must have recourse to the third line, showing the diff"o,rence between the cost of the raw sugar and of the refined, in order to determine the influence of competition upon profits. It will be seen by reference to these lines that profits very nearly disap- peared during this period, and this will prepare us to under- APPENDIX 551 stand why in 1892 Spreckels sold out to the trust. This resulted in an immediate rise in profits, and this rise was maintained from 1892 to 1898. In 1898 Doscher set up an independent refinery, and Arbuckle Brothers, who had a patent for putting up packages which they had applied up to that time to cofi"ee alone, went into the sugar business because they could apply this patented process to the packing of sugar also.^ Since that time these competitors have remained in the field, and the cost of manufacture has gone down and remained for eight months at a time as low as it was during 1895, when eighteen out of forty refineries failed. It is interesting to observe that, notwithstanding this decline, the sugar trust declared last year a dividend of twelve per cent. It would seem, therefore, that prices that cause ruin under a regime of free competition permit of the payment of twelve per cent dividends under the regime of such combinations as the sugar trust. The lessons to be drawn from this examination of the table of prices of sugar are twofold : — 1. That although trusts may eliminate the waste that at- tends competition they nevertheless remain subject to the salutary influence of competition in posse if not in esse. 2. That with the economy effected as above explained the sugar trust can manufacture at a profit, though prices fall to a point which involved bankruptcy under the system of free competition. If we want a startling illustration how ineffectual combina- tions are to maintain prices high above a reasonable figure, we may turn to the table of prices of spirits and corn; that is to say, to the prices that prevailed under the auspices of the whiskey trust. The original organisers of combinations in this article were men of more audacity than prudence; they conceived that they had found through the instrumentality of combination a system by means of which they could raise prices far beyond a reasonable figure and maintain them there. The result proved disastrous. We have but to glance at the tables to see how disastrous. Prices are pushed up in 1882 and 1883 1 Report of Industrial Commission, testimony of Mr. Jarvis, 138-142. 552 APPENDIX only to fall fifty per cent in 1884; they are pushed up by a new reorganisation at the close of 1884 to the same figure as in 1883, to fall once more fifty per cent in 1885 ; they are pushed up by another combination in the early part of 1887 only to fall fifty per cent at the close of the year; they are pushed up in 1888 only to fall more than fifty per cent in 1889. Fluctuations of this extravagant character continue until the organisation of the American Spirits Manufacturing Com- pany in 1895, when the business came into the hands of direc- tors who had learned that prices could not by combination be maintained immoderately above a reasonable profit. Since then exaggerated fluctuations have disappeared, and the trust has become continuously prosperous. As regards the Standard Oil trust, the Moloch among trusts, whose power as regards prices is deemed to be such that it is commonly stated that the directors meet every morning to fix, according to their caprice, the price that is to rule over the en- tire civilised world, — if we glance over the table of prices of crude and refined oil we shall find exactly the same forces oper- ating as have been already pointed out in connection with the other trusts. There is the general decline of prices ; there is the first loose combination of 1872 raising prices momenta- rily, but these prices decline in consequence of the opening of the Butler County oil wells in 1873 and 1874. Again in 1891 and 1892 we find high prices opening up the Macdouald field, and the exceptionally high prices of 1895 bring the competition of the Pure Oil Company into the field, — a competition which exists at the present day. Trusts may keep actual competition down, may rid compe- tition of its worst features in the shape of over-production, bankruptcy, and irregularity of employment; but they have heretofore always operated under the menace of competition, and this menace seems up to the present day to have kept prices from permanently becoming extortionate. Whether potential competition can continue to do this will be considered in the summary with which this Appendix closes. APPENDIX 553 III. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION It has been already pointed out in this volume that the an- archy which attended the decay of the Roman empire came to an end, not through the sword of Charlemagne or the genius of Hildebrand, but through the combinations of industrious artisans who profited by the quarrels of Church and Crown to organise themselves into combinations, guilds, and corporations. These combinations were the application of intelligence and art to industry. They undertook to adjust production to demand by limiting the persons admitted to every trade; and they un- dertook also to secure a high standard of excellence by the careful education of every candidate for admission. Unre- stricted competition was by this system eliminated and con- fined within the limits which every guild determined for itself. The prosperity which attended the great guilds of the Middle Ages, and the control they acquired of municipal government, bear witness not only to the judgment of the men who governed these guilds, but to the guild principle itself; that is to say, to the application of intelligence to the adjustment of production to demand. It has also been shown how the guilds abused their power, so that the tyranny of the corporation became as intolerable as that of the throne. The close of the eighteenth century is marked by a revolt agamst economic as well as against political despotism. The obvious remedy for economic despotism was liberty of con- tract; liberty of contract was preached by the physiocrats, received the Aveighty support of Adam Smith in England, and became the fetich of the Manchester School. But no sooner had the Assemblee Nationale in France enacted a law not only suppressing guilds, but actually forbidding all associ- ations of persons in the same employment, and even punish- ing such associations by imprisonment, than we see such associations, notwithstanding, springing up all over France. These associations took the form in France of associations of employers in the same trade for the purpose of protecting the interests of the trade ; and as these employers' associations 554 APPENDIX put the employers at a great advantage over the employees, employers' associations gave rise to employees' associations, which took the form of benefit societies, though in fact they were organised for the purpose of resistance. In England the opposite takes place, — that is to say, it is the workmen who combine first to resist the Iron Law ; and the employers, having more or less successfully at first used Parlia- ment to prevent trade unions, but at last failed, were bound to organise themselves in order successfully to resist the grow- ing power of the unions. Thus in England we see daily growing in power employers' associations confronted by trade unions until at last the two combine in a common agreement, the employers not to employ any workmen save those forming part of the trade unions, and the workmen agreeing not to work for any employer save those who belong to the em- ployers' association. These combinations of employer and em- ployee are known as Trade Alliances in Birmingham, and have succeeded in crushing out competition as effectually and practi- cally as the mediaeval guild ; and so after a century of so-called progress industry has returned to the point from which it started. Liberty of contract seems therefore to be impossible under the competitive system. Free competition drives the weak to combine against the strong; and combination of one element in the industrial field obliges combination of the element against which the first combination is made. Moreover, the principle of the survival of the fittest, upon which the competitive system is based, favours these combinations, for in the struggle it is the combination most intelligently adapted to its end which survives. Now in the economic field competition sets two elements of society against one another: the effort of the purchaser is to get most goods for least money, whereas it is the interest of the producer to give least goods for most money ; competition, how- ever, is on the side of the purchaser, and tends to force the producer to give more and more for less and less. This per- petual tendency can be successfully met only by reducing the cost of production to the utmost; and cost of production can APPENDIX 555 be diminished only by eliminating competition through such combinations as we are here studying under the name of trusts. Unless the foregoing study of trusts is altogether wrong, the extent to which combination prevails in a country is a direct measure of its intelligence and art. It is because competition is more keen and intelligent in France than in Spain that we see in France the combinations that are known under the name of " comptoirs ; " it is because competition is still more keen and intelligent in Germany than in France that we have com- binations still more prevalent in Germany under the name of " kartels ; " it is because competition is equally keen and mtelli- gent in England that we have such organisations as the Borax Consolidated, The Yorkshire Wool Combers, Bradford Dyers' Association, Calico Printers' Association, etc. ; ^ and it is because competition is more intelligent and more keen in the United States than in any country in the world that we have combination brought to its highest expression in the trusts that we are here examining. But we have up to this point examined trusts only in their intranational aspect, — that is to say, as to their working within the nation; we have not considered the effect of trusts upon international relations, — that is to say, as to their working be- yond national limits. Here, perhaps, we have to encounter a grave danger. Competition is no longer confined within national lines; the United States and England compete as consciously and delib- erately in such industries as the building of railroads, bridges, ships, and engines, as the " Bon Marche " and the " Louvre " in Paris, Whiteley's and Peter Robinson in London, and Macy and Wanamaker in New York. And in the struggle for busi- ness it is the national industry which is organised in a manner to produce with the greatest economy that must in the end pre- vail. It is because production of iron and steel in the United States is better organised than in England that, in spite of 1 An article by Robert Donald in the "Review of Reviews " for Novem- ber, 1900, gives an excellent account of the extent to which combination is replacing competition in British industry. 556 APPENDIX higher wages in America, the United States can successfully compete with England in the markets of the world. So long as international as well as intranational competition, whether in esse or in posse, stands guard to prevent prices from rising beyond reasonable limits, it is reasonable to suppose that not only do trusts eliminate the waste of competition without the public losing its advantages, but the necessary forces at work in the economic field seem of a character to promote the organisa- tion of trusts with a view to producing a maximum of effi- ciency over the whole industrial field, or over that part of it to which such combinations as trusts are applicable. Unfortunately the public is not protected by the assurance that international competition Avill always stand guard over its interests, for trusts have already stretched beyond national boundaries to organise international combinations as to the danger of which the public cannot too soon become alive. In order properly to appreciate this danger it will be neces- sary to examine more critically just what this potential compe- tition is that constitutes a public safeguard against high prices. We have seen that it is twofold ; namely, competition within national boundaries, and competition without national bounda- ries. As regards the first it has been shown that, so far in the United States, competition, whether actual or potential, has succeeded in preventing permanently high prices. But it does not follow that it will always hereafter be as successful: or that because it has been successful in the United States it will be equally successful in other countries. Competition against such accumulated and organised forces as present themselves in trusts requires great courage — nay, audacity — as well as judg- ment and perseverance. These qualities so combined are rare. The United States so far has found them when occasion offered; but it may not always find them; indeed, the tendency of trusts to destroy individual initiative is likely to make these qualities more and more rare. Again, while these qualities so combined have been found in the United States, it is by no means sure that they are likely to be found in other countries. In France notably there is a reaction to-day against great commercial enterprises. The failure of the Panama Canal pro- APPENDIX 557 ject, failure, too, in late attempts to open mines, have created in France a strong indisposition to commercial undertakings that are attended by heavy risk. For example, although the Anglo-American syndicate that controls copper has pushed the price of copper to an extremely profitable figure, financiers in France, though clearly alive to the large profits offered to the openers of new mines, for the most part decline to undertake the struggle with the syndicate which they think such opening would involve. It is true that the absence of the enterprise necessary to fight trusts probably involves also an absence of the enterprise necessary to create them. " Comptoirs " exist in France in but few industries, and then only in such as particularly lend themselves to such combinations. But the absence of the enterprise in France necessary to fight trusts may have a bearing on the trust problem in America when we study the second class of competition which has heretofore constituted a safeguard against high prices ; namely, competition abroad. Foreign competition has doubtless exercised a powerful influence in preventing permanent high prices in the United States. Intranational competition, such as that of the Pure Oil Company, doubtless exerts a salutary influence on Standard Oil prices, but its influence can probably be neglected by the side of the competition of Bakou. The sugar trust is doubt- less protected by a high tariff, but at any rate the tariff represents a limit to prices beyond which the sugar trust cannot go so long as it has to compete with the refineries of Europe. What, however, would happen were the Standard Oil to combine with the oil-producers of Bakou ? And should our government, convinced by the probably erroneous theory that the tariff is the parent of trusts, in obedience to the present outcry against trusts, suppress the tariff on sugar, would such suppression not inevitably lead to a combination of American with European refiners by the side of which the present sugar trust would in power be as a child 1 There are no insurmountable difficulties in the way of such a combina- tion. The petroleum business of Europe is practically in the hands of two firms; an understanding between three men — 558 APPENDIX Eockefeller, Kobel, and Eothschild — would put an end to inter- national competition in petroleum. The same is true, though in a less degree, of sugar; in France, Germany, and England, prices of refined sugar are determined by comparatively few men. Nor are we to-day without examples of international trusts, as, for example, the Anglo-American Cotton-Thread trust and the Anglo-American syndicate which practically con- trols the production of copper throughout the entire world. The power, social and political, which such international trusts would wield, would be unexampled in history. Already the millionaires who endow our universities are exerting their influence on higher education. They cannot be expected to look with favour on professors who recommend their overthrow ; many resignations have therefore of late been demanded, and one of the most distinguished of our economists kept his chair only by demonstrating that his teaching deprecated socialism rather than encouraged it. And if millionaires already have laid their hands on our higher education, it is not unreasonable to suppose that they will next turn their attention to our public schools ; if not to destroy education as once the Church did, at least to pervert it as do the Jesuits to-day. It is not necessary to indulge at once in needless alarm on this subject. The day is probably far off when trusts will be powerful enough to attack our public-school system. But the measures suggested as a remedy for trust abuses may be the very ones to accelerate the coming of the evil day. Un- doubtedly the most obvious and perhaps at the present time the most reasonable remedy proposed is publicity and surveil- lance. Unfortunately neither can be enforced except through the government. Our legislatures must pass laws requir- ing them, and officials must administer the laws when enacted. The effect of the present demand for publicity and surveillance can be stated beforehand : it will compel the trust to control the government. How easily it can do this was illustrated in the United States Senate during Cleveland's administration; and it is important to note that corruption, as commonly under- stood, had little to do with this control. The Senate voted measures favourable to the sugar trust because it was com- APPENDIX 559 posed of men who were affiliated socially as well as financially with the trust managers; because a turn could be made on the stock market by patriotic protection of an American industry; because the money power which endows churches, hospitals, and universities must be held up ; because intelligence, culture, refinement, and the highest conceptions of " social justice " are leagued against the principles of disorder preached by the selfish and discontented opposition.^ And then, if there be required a more substantial argument, if there be a needy senator still unconvinced, a single trust — the Standard Oil Company — is in possession of a fund for convincing him, of $48,000,000 a year!^ And if these things are done in the green tree, what will be done in the dry, — when international trusts will be as much more powerful than the Standard Oil Company to-day, as the Standard Oil Company to-day is more powerful than Rockefeller, Andrews, and Teacher in 1870, with a puny capital of $1,000,000, and a pitiful production of 600 barrels a day? It is very much to be feared that the more government attempts to control trusts, the more powerful trusts will become, for the attempt will leave trusts no alternative but to control the government. It is interesting to observe that the more trusts have been attacked, the more they have been compelled by these attacks to consolidate, and every step in consolidation has been an advance in strength. The first com- bination of sugar-refineries was the one that gave rise to the name of trust; it did not involve loss of identity for the refiners in the combination ; but when the system of creating a voting trust was declared illegal by the courts they were driven to reorganise, and by successive steps have at last abandoned the principle of maintaining the identity of the combining refineries and assumed in fact as well as in form ^ Read on this subject the unqualified approval of the competitive system expressed by Dr. WiUoughby in his recent book on Social Justice, p. 304. 2 The Standard Oil Company declared a dividend of thirty per cent on a stock capital of $100,000,000 in 1898, of thirty-three per cent in 1899, and of forty-eight per cent in 1900. 560 APPENDIX the organisation of a single corporation. Such, too, has heen the effect of anti-trust legislation. Every attack has compelled trusts to become more formidable. "What, then, is the last word to be said about trusts 1 Trusts and trade alliances furnish evidence to show that men are too clearly alive to the evils that attend competition any longer to tolerate these evils. Trade alliances are not likely to survive ; they involve the exercise of too much self-control in the presence of too great a temptation. Already the bedstead combination — ■ the classic instance of trade alliances — has broken up. The very necessity, however, which tends to break up trade alliances tends to promote trusts — the necessity of economical production. International competition will favour the national industry which is the most economically organised. Trusts tend, therefore, to become more and more powerful through international competition iintil at last they take the final step, and, by overstepping national boundaries, destroy the international safeguard against high prices. The power which highly organised international trusts would exercise cannot to-day be named or even, perhaps, imagined. It may be far off, but development has lately been of startling rapidity. The first combination effected by Eockefeller in 1870 had a capital of $1,000,000; the Standard Oil Company to-day is paying a dividend of forty-eight per cent on $100,000,000. Every effort by government to control trusts will compel trusts to own the government. Humanity has decided to es- cape from the evils of competition. It can do so in one of two ways, — economically through trusts, or politically through collectivism. ** Under which king, Byzantine ? " I INDEX 1. GOVERNMENT, OR HUMAN EVOLUTION 2. JUSTICE 3. INDIVIDUALISM AND COLLECTIVISM A BrLITY", Character of the Ability capable of profiting by the oppor- tunities of wealth, i. 98. Accumulation. Collectivism, Elimination of private property, the accumulation of which could control the services of others, ii. 263, 372, 373, 412. Dividend Coupon and Labour Cheque System, ii. 333, 334, 417. Instinct of, in Animals, ii. 89. Acquired Traits, Transmission by inheritance, Theories of. Brown-Se'quard's Experiments, i. 63. Cope-Osboru, i. 60, 61, 64. Lamarck, i. 58. Weismann, i. 60, 62, 63. Act of Justice. (See Justice.) Adaptation of Function to Environment, Darwinian and Lamarckian Theories, i. 58-65. Adulteration, Falsehood of fact induced by competition, ii. 135. Advertising, Economy that would result from the elimination of com- petition, ii. 276, 546. Agnosticism, ii. 464, 472, 502. Agriculture, Position of, during the stage of Partial Collectivism, ii. 422. Amiens, Struggle for self-government, ii. 62, 63. Anarchy. Definition, ii. 70. Eousseau's teaching on Natural Rights resulting in Anarchism, i. 26. Ancestor Worship, i. 183, 186. Anglican Church, Attitude towards Faith, ii. 471, note. 36 562 INDEX Animals. Accumulation, Instinct of, ii. 89. Instinct, i. 346. Man differentiated from Animals. Additional central nervous system, ii. 193. Effort, Capacity for, i. 357. Habit, Power to resist, i. 347 ; ii. 473. Eeligion, i. 82, 84. Property, Recognition of, ii. 372. Habits of social and unsocial animals contrasted, ii. 90, 91. Punishment of Theft, ii. 18.3, tiote, 223. Reasoning Power, Dr. Thorndike's Experiments, i. 166. Self-restraint, Capacity for, i. 116. (See also titles Caknivoka and Heebivora, Competition, Pbeda- TORT System, etc.) Ant Communities, i. 82, note. Competition without and co-operation within, ii. 182. Private Property, Sense of, obliterated, ii. 90. Sexual Jealousy, i. 110, 187. Anthracite Trust, History of, showing evil of over-production, ii. 533. Apprenticeship. Guilds, Medieval, ii. 104. Trade Unions, Apprenticeship an unsolved problem, ii. 138. Arab Individualism, ii. 21. Architecture, Necessity for State Intervention, ii. 377. Aristotle. Forms of Government, Classification, i. 253, note. Justice, Definition, i. 317. Virtue, Definition, ii. 496. Art, Influence of commercialism and objection that collectivism would be prejudicial to Art, ii. 374. Power outside of Nature. Confusion the result of not distinguishing Art from Nature, i. 37, 49. Nature distinguished from the conscious effort of Man. (See Effort.) Artificial Human Environment. (See Environment, Human Arti- ficial Environment.) Arts, Advance in, causing development of one race at the expense of another, i. 142. Association, Law of, i. 247, 264. (See also Government.) Athenian Civilisation, Development of. (See Greece and Rome, Development of Civilisation.) Australia, South, Transport and Sale of farm produce through the agency of the State, ii. 242. INDEX 563 "DACILLI of Disease, Struggle for Life between Man and Micro- organisms, i. 96. Bacon and the Greek Notion of Nature, i. 43. Bankers, Work of, in a Collectivist State, ii. 281. Bankruptcies, Percentage of, in new business ventures, ii. 124. Bees. " Queen Bee," Error in the use of the word " queen," i. 212, note. Sexual Jealousy, i. 110, 187, 276. Begging, Penalties for, in the 16th Century, ii. 108. Benefit Societies in France after the Suppression of the Guilds, ii. 5.54. Beudant's Experiments on the Adaptation of Animal Organisms to New Environments, i. 158. Birmingham Alliances, ii. 215, 216, note, 554. Folly of free contract theory, Birmingham Alliances demonstrating, ii. 161. Reproducing the essential features of the Guild, ii. 150, 151. Birth, Social classification by, superseded by wealth classification, i. 194, 197; ii. 96. Bishops, Age of, ii. 56. Boot and Shoe Trade, Attempted exclusion of boys, ii. 140. Booth, Mr. C, On Cheap Labour as the cause of Expansion in certain Trades, ii. 145. Bounties, Expedient for escaping pressure of competition, ii. 161. Boy Labour, Attempted exclusion of, ii. 140. Brokers, Abolition of, in a Collectivist State, ii. 281. Brown- S 6 guard's Experiments on the Transmission of Acquired Traits, i. 63. Burke on Chivalry, ii. 76. Business and Pohtics, Corruption resulting from alliance between, ii. 162, 166, 234. Buying Cheaply — Is it wrong? ii. 113, 114. /~*APITAL. Cheek on, through the alleged freedom of the labour contract, i. 291. Distribution of capital, not its accumulation, from which injustice re- sults, ii. 112. Fluidity, Movement of capital from one industry to another main- taining the normal rate of profit, ii. 132. Income from investment, Injustice of System, ii. 116, 125, 478. Tyranny of, ii. Ill, 230. Capitalists. Capitalist not responsible for the evils attending capital, ii. Ill, 112, 487. Improving condition of workingmen. Possibility of, under existing industrial conditions, Hypothetical illustration, ii. 113, 116, 125. 564 INDEX Capitalists (continued). luventions, Capitalists' interest in suppressing, li. 288. Oppression of the Market upon the Capitalist, Enlightenment of the workiugmau, ii. 230. Camivora and Herbivora. Characteristics and conditions of life, i. 77. Human Artificial Environment, Effect of, as compared with that of Nature, i. 100, 332. Man blending in himseK the characteristics of both orders, i. 78, 79. Institution of private property eliminating the opposing instincts of ferocity and servility, ii. 94. Ceylon, Wood Veddaps of, ii. 217. Character, i. 76, note. Charlemagne's Ecclesiastical Policy, ii. 56. Chaucer's Description of a Knight, ii. 78. Chinese. Commercial Competition, Danger of, ii. 130, 136, note, 150. Destruction of variability owing to uniformity of thought and environ- ment, i. 219. Chivalry, vol. ii., bk. i., ch. ii., pp. 75-86. Burke on, ii. 76. Decay of the idea of Chivalry, ii. 82. Freeman, Prof., on, ii. 76. Honour, Code of, ii. 85. Knighthood, ii. 78. Love. Code of Love, ii. 82. Hound Table, Law of, ii. 79. "Woman, Eole of, enhanced by Chivalry, ii. 84. Love of woman substituted for the Love of God, ii. 81. Cholesbury Parish, Pauperism in, in 1833, ii. 109. Christian Church. Anglican Church, Attitude towards Faith, ii. 471, note. Bishops, Age of, ii. 56. Characteristics distinguishing, in spite of corruption by compromise with paganism, ii. 48. Charlemagne's Ecclesiastical Policy, ii. 56. Christ's Conception of the Churcli, Realisation of, in her position under her most ilkistrious prelates, ii. 45. Crusades and the Church, ii. 60. Guizot on, ii. 46. Organisation and differences on belief. Conflicts arising from, ii. 40. Papal Power, Rise of, ii. 56. Private Property and the Church, ii. 1 70. Roman Empire and the Churcli, Alliance between, i. 201, 204,207, 232. Saving force preserving wholesomeness of the Church throughout every corrupting environment, ii. 57, 58. INDEX 565 Christian Church (continued). Science and the Church, Conflict between, ii. 464, 490. Social and Political Keform, Power of the Church to-day, ii. 59, note. Temporal Power, ii. 42, 45, 49, 55. Unchristian character of, ii. 59. Wealth, Corrupting influence of, ii. 99. Christian Science, Modern form of Miracle, ii. 29, 31. Christianity. Constantine adopting, ii. 49, 51. Foreign Missions, Attitude towards, i. 320, 322. Greece and Eome, Morality of, compared with, ii. 204. Hypocrisy a characteristically Christian Vice, ii. 52. Justin Martyr's Description, ii. 39. Mohammedanism and Christianity compared, ii. 20, 38, 48. Political Results, i. 230. Profession of, serving purposes of Ambition and Avarice, ii. 41, 49, 50, 55. Socialising force of, ii. 43. City Republics, Rise of, in Italy, ii. 73, 100. Civilisation. Faith as a controlling force. Difference between the civilisation of to-day and that of the Middle Ages, ii. 54. Patriarchal System the origin of human Civilisation, Sir H. Maine's Theory, i. 186, 187. Religion a social Factor in early Civilisation, i. 183. Clark, Prof., on " Static " Price, ii. 548. Climate. Equalisation of Men, Climate an obstacle, i. 309. Man's ability to resist climatic obstacles by artificial environment, i. 91, 93. Natural Selection by, i. 89, 95. Nature adapting function to environment, i. 89, 92. Clubs in Favour of Good Government, Organisation of, in New York, i. vi ; ii. 164. •* Coercive Philanthropy," Spencer's Denunciation, i. 242. Coin as Medium of Exchange. Elimination of Corruption by substitution of Labour Cheques, ii. 419. Objections to, in a Collectivist State, ii. 416, Collectivism, vol. ii., bk. ii., pp. 241, ef seq. Accumulation of private property which could control the services of others, Elimination of, ii. 263,372, 373, 412. Dividend Coupon and Labour Cheque System, ii. 333, 334, 417. Administration, Machinery of, ii. 322. E.xternal Policy, ii. 328. Internal Policy, ii. 324. Party System, ii. 326. 566 INDEX Collectivism (continued). Agriculture, Position of, ii. 422. Aim of, ii. 242, 255. Aspects of Collectivism studied in the present work, ii. v, 454. Attitude of mind necessary to a fair estimate of Collectivism, ii. 248. Character of Collectivist programme differing in each nation, and differing for the same nation in different phases of its existence, ii. 511. Classification of Persons, Difference in consideration attached to various functions in the State, ii. 265, 299, 300. Collectivism Proper, ii. 401. Summary, ii. 427. Common Table Proposal, Injustice of, ii. 487. Conditions upon which a Co-operative scheme of society might be combined with the competitive plan, ii. 448. Corruption, Elimination of, by substituting Labour Cheques for Coin, ii. 419. Currency. Coin, Objections to, as a medium of exchange, ii. 416. Dividend Coupons, ii. 331, 334, 336, 402, and 7iote. State Orders, Transferable orders on public stores expressed in money, ii. 396. Voluntary Labour Cheques, ii. 332, 335, 410, 417, 419. Definition, ii. 4. Schaffle's Definition, ii. 250. Domestic Service, Question of, ii. 424. Economy of, vol. ii., bk. ii., ch. ii., pp. 273-288. Business that could be dispensed with, ii. 279. Co.st of Administration, ii. 292. Distribution, ii. 273. Production, ii. 284. Foreigners, Exclusion from permanent residence, ii. 324. Franchise, ii. 325. Ideal Collectivism, ii. vi, 429. Proposed Form of, ii. 253, 255, 256, 258. Immorality, Diminution in, ii. 345. Income of the Community. Distribution in proportion to the utility of members not an essen- tial feature of Collectivism, ii. 251, 256, 257, 298. Extra Services to the State receiving extra compensation, ii. 299. Rise of wages of manual labourer owing to increase of economy, ii. 409. Individualism and Collectivism. Alternative adoption of, ii. 4. Rival Economic and Political Theories, ii. 3, 14. INDEX 567 Collectivism {continued). Industrial Conditions. Foreign Trade, ii. 337. Internal Industrial Conditions, ii. 331 . Invention. Removal of all stimulus, alleged, ii. 288. Tendency of invention to replace work involving drudgery by machinery, ii. 290, 426. Labour. (See sub-heading Work.) Land. State Acquisition, Methods of, ii. 420. Tenure of, ii. 243, 420. Leisure secured by, ii. 303. Liberty, Interference with. Objection to Collectivism, ii. 348. Individualist views, " A Plea for Liberty," ii. 352, 355. Marriage, Hostility of some partisans of Collectivism, ii. 341. Marx, Karl, and the Fabians, Theories of, ii. 385. Meanings of the word, ii. v. Mistaken Notions regarding Collectivism, ii. 243. Money, Elimination of. Substituting Service, ii. 270. Moral responsibility, limitation of, ii. 329, 479. Moral view of, ii. 267, 461, 482. Movement towards Collectivism already begun, ii. 244, 383. National Ownership and Administration, Extension of, ii. 393. Natural and Social Needs of Man provided for by the form of Col- lectivism proposed, ii. 259. Naturalisation, Granting, for extraordinary services only, ii. 325. Objections to Collectivism discussed, vol. ii., bk. ii., ch. iv., pp. 339- 382. Accumulation, Same Opportunity for, as under Existing System, ii. 333, 334. Art, Prejudicial Influence on, ii. 374. Artificial or contrary to Nature, ii. 371. Cost of Administration, ii. 292. Home Life, Break-up of, ii. 341, 346. Impracticability, ii. 228, 245, 259. Invention, Removal of all Stimulus, ii. 288. Liberty, Interference with, ii. 348. Nature, Objections imposed by, ii. 447. Over-population, Promotion of, ii. 339. State and Official, Objections suggested by the terms, ii. 251, 263. Stimulus to exertion insufficient, ii. 270, 365. Obstacles to Collectivism. Extravagant hopes which it has raised, ii. vii. False notions of liberty, ii. 203, 228. 568 INDEX Collectivism (continued). Ignorance, ii. 305, 307, 308, 319. Unwealthy Majority, Belief of, that the uneducated are as fit for public office as the educated, ii. 308, 311. "Vested Interests, ii. 384. Official, Position of, contrasted with the position of an Official under the Competitive System, ii. 264, 266, 292. Partial Collectivism. Choice of occupation, Conditions regulating, ii. 406. Hypothetical development of, in the United States, ii. 387. Practicability of, ii. 455. Summary, ii. 427. Pauperism and Crime, Problem of, Intelligent treatment of the waste of population, ii. 294. Voluntary and Involuntary Colonies, ii. 399, 400. Political View of, ii. 505. Population, Proposed Check on, ii. 339. Practicability of, ii. 452. Practical Working, vol. ii., bk. ii., ch. v., pp. 383-432. Summary, ii. 427. Preparedness of different countries for Collectivism, — Europe and the United States, ii. 1, 384. Present Political Conditions rendering a CoUectivist programme es- sential, ii. 455. Private Enterprise, Scope for, ii. 392, 409. Limits of State and Individual Enterprise, ii. 412. Private Property. Abolition of, in the sources of production, ii. 242, 262. Division of, amongst the people, Mistaken notion regarding Collectivism, ii. 243. Prostitution, Disappearance of, ii. 343. State employment a solution of the economic problem, ii. 400. Public Office, Danger of filling by favour rather than by merit, ii. 311. Radicalism not an essential feature of a CoUectivist programme, ii. 514.1 Rational View, ii. 449. Religion, Sanction of, ii. 485, 504. Selfishness, Collectivism in connection with, ii. 260. Time not a consideration in the effort to fit people for Collectivism, ii. 457. Trade Union Congresses, Attitude of, ii. 523, note. United States, Hypothetical development of Collectivism in, ii. 388. Value and Exchange Value, ii. 330. Variability of Offspring, Effect of Collectivism, would not be such as to limit activities, ii. 327. INDEX 569 Collectivism (continued). Violence iu introducing Collectivism, Danger of, ii. 460. Wealth, No diminution of, involved by Collectivism, ii. 374. Woman Suffrage, Possibility of, ii. 325, note. Work. Choice of occupation, Determination of, ii. 405. Control of, ii. 263. Diversity of Work, Rotation of Tasks, ii. 320. Distribution of, ii. 298. Equalisation and rotation of tasks, Rodbertus Method, ii. 268, 271. Hours of Labour, Reduction of, ii. 272, 293. Occupations which cannot conveniently be distributed. Arrange- ments for leisure, ii. 321. Piece-work System, ii. 269. Unskilled Work, Performance of, ii. 298, 301. Colonisation, Over-production stimulating, owing to the necessity for creating new markets, ii. 129, 149, 159, 232. Combination. (See titles Trusts, Trade Combinatioks, and Trade Unions.) Command, Power of. Force in constituting Government, i. 224. Inequality amongst men, ii. 185. Commercial Competition. (See Competition.) Commercial Travellers. Economy which would be effected by the elimination of Competition, ii. 274, 546. Practice of lying, ii. 134. Communes, Development of, in Prance, ii. 62, 72. Communism, Failure of, in Sparta, i. 200. Community Life. Ants, i. 82, note, 110, 187; ii. 90, 182. Bees, i. 110, 187, 276. Government. (See that title.) Herbivora, i. 77. Men, i. 79, 84, 108; ii. 219. Men and Societies of other living organisms. Difference in develop- ment, i. 246 ; ii. 443, 446. Natural Evolution in Community Life, i. 276, 284. Contrasted with Human Evolution, i. 285; ii. 187. Power and Willingness to fulfil the obligations of Community Life, Difference between Communities of Men and Animals, ii. 91. Qualities essential to success, i. 188. Religion. Primitive Civilisation, Religion a Social Factor in, i. 183. Value of, in Social Life, ii. 500. 570 INDEX Community life (continued). Sexual Jealousy and Sexual Relations. (See those titles.) Social Mind, i. 176 ; ii. 175. Temporary Association of Animals for a special purpose, i. 77, note ; ii. 179, 181. Compensation. Emerson's Essay on, Confusion of the Laws of Nature with those of Man, i. 277. Morality of Compensation, ii. 475, 503, Vested Interests. Capricious Action of the British Parliament, ii. 508 and note. United States Constitution, Clause protecting Vested Interests, ii. 509. Competition, Industrial and Commercial. Art, Prejudicial Influence of Commercialism, ii. 375. Business Ventures, Percentage of Failures, ii. 124. Capital, Check on, through the alleged freedom of the Lahour Con- tract, i. 291. Consequences of Commercial Competition, Summary, ii. 131. Co-operation, Possibility of substituting, for Competition, ii. 440. Democracy under the Competitive System, ii. 313. Economic Equilibrium maintained by the fluidity of Capital, ii. 132. Elimination of Devices for escaping pressure of Competition, ii. 161. Medireval Guilds, ii. 105, 107. Political V. Commercial Methods, ii. 2. Trusts. (See that title.) Foreign Competition. Great Britain and Foreign Competition, ii. 149. Limitations of Trade Unions, ii. 136, 149. " Yellow Peril," Danger of Chinese Competition, ii. 130, 136, note, 150. Morality of Compensation, ii. 475, 503. Natural and Commercial Com])etition, Similarity of, ii. 124, 153. Over-production. (See that title.) Prices, Contention that Competition keeps prices at a reasonable figure, ii. 547, 550. Stimulus to exertion, Evil of Over-Stimulation, ii. 365, 437. Sweating, ii. 145. Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount not consistent with the Competitive System, ii. 474. Type, Effect on, i. 150; ii. 447, 521. Wages, Competition by tending to lower prices tends to lower wages, ii. 113 and note, 135. Possibility of imj)roving condition of Workingmen under existing industrial system, Hypothetical Illustration, ii. 113, 116, 125. INDEX 571 Competition (continued). Women, Reduction of "Wages resulting in Prostitution, ii. 135. Waste of Population, Treatment of, under the Competitive System. (See Pauperism and Crime.) Wastefulness attending Competitive System, ii. 274. Distribution, ii. 278. Production, ii. 284. Workingmen's Ignorance of Political Problems, Forces contributing to prevent acquisition of knowledge, ii. 304, 312. Competition, Predatory Law of Nature. Commercial Competition, Similarity to Nature's Scheme, ii. 124, 153. Defiuition, i. 89. Different Species, Competition between, i. 89. Man and the Lower Animals, i. 96. Same Species, Competition of Individuals with one another, i. 89. Man and Man, Competition in (a) Same Community, i. 101, (6) Different Communities, i. 102. Sexual Selection, i. 90. Summary, i. 172. Conscience, Habits of heart or mind distinguishing Social Qualities of Man from those of Animals, ii. 496, 497. Conscious Effort. (See Effort.) Consciousness of Kind, ii. 180. Constantino, Adoption of Christianity, ii. 49, 51. Christians in the Service of the State, i. 202. Favours conferred on the Christian Church, ii. 42. Construction and Growth. (See Growth and Construction.) Consumption. Advancement of the Race, Effect on, i. 97. Medical Science, Progress in dealing with Consumption attended by increase in Constitutional Diseases, i. 98. Conviction and Faith, Difference between, ii. 468. Co-operation. Co-operative Scheme of Society. (See Collectivism.) Movement in England gradually dispersing the ignorance which be- lieves the uneducated as fit for public office as the educated, ii. 312. Nature, Principle of co-operation in. (See Community Life.) Politics, Duty of co-operation and of substituting intellectual for accidental methods, ii. 491. Coopers, Trade Union Dictation in Dublin, ii. 213. Cope-Osbom and Weismann Schools, Issue between, on the subject of Evolution, i. 60. Corporations, Mediaeval. (See Guilds.) Corruption. Alliance between business and politics. Corruption resulting from, ii. 160, 161, 234. 572 INDEX Corruption (continued). Elimination of, in a CoUectivist State by substituting Labour Cheques for Coin, ii. 419. "Cosmos" and "Cosmic," Use of, with reference to Evolution, to include Nature, Art, and Spirit, ii. 434, note. Creator. Eestriction of Meaning to denote creating power outside of Nature, 1.35. Science offering no explanation of, ii. 462. Crime and Pauperism. (See Paupekism and Crime.) Crusades. Political Effect of, ii. 61, 72, 73. Power of the Church, Evidence of the Crusades, ii. 60. Currency in proposed CoUectivist State. Coin, Objections to, as a medium of exchange, ii. 416. Dividend Coupons, ii. 331, 334, 336, 402, note. State Orders, Transferable Orders ou public stores expressed in Money, ii. 396. Voluntary Labour Cheques, ii. 332, 335, 410, 417, 419. Custom, i. 265 ; ii. 9. T^ALLLNGEK'S, Dr., Experiments on the Adaptation of Animal Organ- isms to New Environments, i. 159. Darwinian and Lamarckian Theories of Evolution, i. 58-64. De Varigny's Experiments on the Adaptation of Animal Organisms to New Environments, i. 159. Degeneration, Idea of, included in Evolution, i. 66. Demand. Effectual Demand, Definition as desire to possess a thing coupled with ability to purchase, ii. 127. Tyranny of the Market, ii. Ill, 230. Democracy under the Competitive System, ii. 313. Democratic Force of Private Property by overthrowing Aristocracy of Birth, ii. 96. Democratic Institutions, Definition, i. 169, note. Department Stores, ii. 396, note. Development. Education and Heredity, Relative Roles, i. 164. Evolution and Development. Difference between Evolution and Development, i. 66, 67, 75. Spencer's Teaching, i. 244. Physiological Meaning of Progress, i. 67. Simi)le and Complex Forms of Life, Difference in fertility and capacity, i. 68. Societies of Men and Societies of other living organisms. Difference in Development, i. 246 ; ii. 443, 446. INDEX 673 Diplomacy a demoralising agent in international morality, i. 145. Disease. Bacilli of, Struggle for Life between Man and Micro-organisms, i. 96. Power of the idea in disease, ii. 29. Distribution. Collectivism, Economy of, ii. 273, 392. Spencer, Encomiums on the Competitive System, ii. 285, note. Trusts, Economies resulting from, ii. 545. Dividend Coupons, ii. 331, 336. Exchange Value of Commodities, Determination of, expressed in Dividend Coupons, ii. 402. Non-transferable, and valid for a limited period only, ii. 334. State Order and Dividend Coupon, Difference between, ii. 402, note. Domestic Service, Question of, in a CoUectivist State, ii. 424. Dublin, Coopers in. Trade Union Dictation, ii. 213. ■pCONOMIC Liberty, ii. 227. Collectivism interfering with, alleged, ii. 348. Definition, ii. 239. Economy. Collectivism, Economy of, ii. 273-288, 292. Trusts, Economies in Production and Distribution resulting from, ii. 544. Waste Products, Manufacture of, ii. 543. Education. Forces moulding Society outside of Government, i. 266. Free Education creating an environment favourable to progressive types, i. 221. Guilds, System for securing the highest class of work, ii. 104. Habits, Formation by Education, i. 180, 181. Heredity and Education, Kelative roles in the development of man and animals, i. 165. Inconsistencies arising from failure to take into account the dual character of the mind, ii. 196. Knighthood, Education of candidates for, ii. 79. Marriage, Education giving no special preparation, i. 127, 129. "Wealth, Effect on Type, i. 154. Effort, Conscious Effort of Man. Capacity for Effort. Devices bolstering, i. 358. Man differentiated from Animals by, i. 357. Climate, Man by Art adapting Environment to Function, i. 91, 93. Discouragement of effort, Tendency of Science and Religion, ii. 526. Government, Purposive element in human government, i. 213. Natural contrasted with Human Evolution, i. 122. Natural Evolutional Improvement, Effort a possible factor, i. 70. 574 INDEX Effort {continued). Nature distinguished from, i. 40, 42, 48 ; ii. 433, and note, 472. Description of Nature apart from the moral action of Man, i. 44. Use of words " Nature " and " Natural " as opposed to (a) " Art " and " Artificial," i. 36, (b) " Spirit" and " Spiritual," i. 39. Soul, Defined for the purpose of political discussion as faculty of con^ scions effort, i. 250, note. Virtue, Element of Effort in, i. 355, 356 ; ii. 495. Elmira Reformatory, A model of the way a Collectivist State would deal with criminals, ii. 297. Ely, Prof. Invention, Tendency of, in a Collectivist State, to replace work in- volving drudgery, ii. 290. Over-production, Quotations showing evil of, ii. 286. Emerson's Essay on Compensation, Confusion of the laws of nature with those of man, i. 277. Employers. Combination among, ii. 214. Mardret, Oppression of, upon employers, Enlightenment of the work- ingman, ii. 230. (See also Capitalists.) Employment. Irregularity of, due to partial over-production, ii. 126, 132. Ends and Means, Tendency to confuse one with the other, ii. 449. Energy. Distracting tendency of selfishness, ii. 23. Forces concentrating, ii. 26. England. Municipal government in, Process of growth compared with that of construction, i. 258. United States and England, Impossibility of adapting a single Col- lectivist prograinme to both countries, ii. 511. Environment. Adaptation of animal organisms to new environments, i. 157. Climate, i. 91. Competition. (See that title.) Human Artificial Environment. Actual and Ideal Environment, Difference between, i. 335. Characteri.stics, i. 147. Effect of, as compared with that of Nature. Lower Animals, i. 332. Man, i. 332; ii. 187. Forces of which artificial environment is the resultant, ii. 435. Forces outside of tlie field of legislation, ii. 8. Government constituting that part of artificial environment which is expressed in laws, or in social and economic institu- tions protected by laws, ii. 7. INDEX 575 Environment (continued). Justice, Task of, under Proposed Definition, i. 360 ; ii. 5. Primary or National Enviroumeut, i. 141. Qualities ia Man which have as direct resultant the artificial en- vironment created by each community for itself, i. 139. Secondary or International Environment, i. 141. Effect of, on National Morality, i. 144, 145. Natural and International Environment, Similarity between, i. 143. Summary, i. 171. (See also titles Education, Wealth, etc.) Natural and Artificial Environment, Struggle for Life in. Difference, i. 334. Similarity, i. 334. Nature and Art, Impossibility of distinguishing the proportion of each that goes to the making of environment, i. 148. Esterlings in London, Religious spirit of the laws governing the com- munity, ii. 101. Europe. Forces at work during the Middle Ages. Similarity to those operating in the Moslem Empire, ii. 47. United States and Europe, Relative preparedness for Collectivism, ii. 1, 384. Evolution. Analysis of Human Evolution, i. 87. " Cosmic " Evolution, Use of term to avoid suggestion of discon- tinuity between Nature, Art, and Spirit, ii. 434, 7wte. Darwinian and Lamarckian Theories. Darwinian Theory, i. 58, 59. Improvement, Notion of, not necessarily involved in either Theory, i. 66. Lamarckian Theory, i. 58, 59. Organic Selection, Theory of, i. 64. Points in the two Theories that are universally recognized as true, i. 66. Welsraann and Cope, Osborn Schools, Issue between, i. 60. (See also titles Natural Selection, Vakiability of Off- spring, etc.) Definition, i. 69. Spencer's Definition, i. 67, 245. Development and Evolution. Difference between, i. 66, 67, 75, Spencer's Teaching, i. 244. History, Light thrown by, on human development, ii. 521. Improvement. Darwinian and Lamarckian Theories not necessarily involving notion of improvement, i. 66. 576 INDEX Evolution (continued). Effort a possible Factor, i. 70. Improvemeut by Selection, Essential Conditions, i. 70. Man's interference with Nature, Effect on Type, i. 287, 296. Morality, Scientific explanation of, as a blind and mechanical pro- cess of Evolution, ii. 461. Natural and Human Evolution. Contrasts between Natural Social Evolution and Human Social Evolution, i. 285. Effort constituting the essential Difference, i. 122. Nature, Law of Nature and Evolution, Summary of Conclusions arrived at, and connection between the terms, i. 70. Process of Evolution, Failure of attempts to generalise on the char- acter of the process, i. 68. Records of the Story. Human Foetus, i. 57. Rocks, Testimony of, i. 56. Social Evolution forming part of evolution in general, Heresy aris- ing from Spencer's Analogy between Society and an Organism, i. 244. Virtue, Evolution of, i. 344 ; ii. 238. Working of the Law of Evolution in a state of nature, and the work- ing of it subject to the influence of man, i. 73. (For discussion of particular subjects, e. g., Time, Predatory System, etc., see these headings.) Example, Effect on Type, Character acquired by constant regard for "Wealth, i. 152, 155. Exchange Value, ii. 330. Commodities, Determination of Exchange Value expressed in Divi- dend Coupons, ii. 402. Expediency. Expediency equivalent to Justice in the making of laws, J. S. Mill's contention, i. 317. Substituting the word " Wisdom " for " expediency " in reference to legislation, i. 318. ■pABIAN Theory of Collectivism, ii. 386. Failures, Percentage of, in new business ventures, ii. 124. Faith, vol. ii., bk. ii., ch. vi., pp. 466-475. Age of Faith, Preponderating role of the religious idea in the Middle Ages, ii. 18, 29, 46, 54. Conditions resulting from the attitude of the Anglican Church, ii. 471, note. Conviction and Faith, Difference between, ii. 468. Definition, ii. 466. Political Science, Definition of Faith in, ii. 471. Religious Faith, ii. 499. INDEX 577 Faith {continued). Influence of faith ceasing to be paramount, Struggle of the towns for self-government in the 11th and succeeding centuries, ii. 64. Submission, Element of, Authority of the Church succeeded by that of the Bible, ii. 466. Summary, ii. 502. Value of, in political science, ii. 469. Family and the Stake, Differences between, i. 225. Family ReUgions, i. 183, 186. Farm Colonies for Paupers and Criminals, Dutch method, ii. 296, 399. Flint, Prof., on disappearance of foreign trade in a Collectivist State, ii. 337. Foetus, Human, Stages of, as evidence that man has developed in com- pliance with evolutional law, i. 57. Food Products, Treatment of Waste, ii. 154. Foreign Competition. (See Competition.) Foreign Missions, Attitude of Morality, i. 320, 322. Foreign Trade. Collectivist Community, ii. 337. Over-production stimulating search for foreign markets, ii. 129, 131, 149, 159, 231. Industrial Commission Report, ii. 542. Fornication, alternative to extinction of the race, i. 131. France. Amiens, Struggle for self-government, ii. 62, 63. Commercial Competition, Absence of enterprise necessary to fight trusts, ii. 557. Communes, Development of, ii. 62, 72. Employers' and Employees' Associations, ii. 553. Guilds, Tyranny of, Louis XVI. proclaiming the " inalienable right to work," ii. 105. Municipal Government, Stages of growth and of construction, i. 262. Franchise, Form of, in a Collectivist State, ii. 325. Free Trade, and Quesnay's teaching on Natural Rights, i. 27. Freedom. (See Liberty.) Freeman, Prof., on Chivalry, ii. 76. r^ARBAGE, ii. 154, 155, note. Gas Supply, Tramways, etc., Municipalisation of Arguments for and against, i. 1. Collectivism, Hypothetical development of, in the United States, ii. 390. Giddings, Prof. Consciousness of kind, ii. 180. Development of defined sexual relations, i. 111. 37 578 INDEX God, or Creating Power outside of Nature, i. 34, 48. "Good Government Clubs," Organisation of, in New York, i. vi; ii. 164. Government. Aim of Government, i. 340, 341 ; ii. 446. Science and religion, Difference of opinion, ii. 518. Scientific World, Difference of opinion between different groups ii. 519. Animal and Insect Communities, Unwritten Code, i. 211. Association, Law of, i. 264. Best-governed Nation is that which is governed least, Doctrine of, i. 3; ii. 11, 12, 519. Rousseau and Quesnay, Similarity in teaching, i. 26. " Coercive Philanthropy," Spencer's Denunciation, i. 242. Collectivism. (See that title.) Command, Power of, i. 224. Inequality amongst men, ii. 185. Community life, a step in self-restraint rendering government possi- ble, i. 225. Conscious and unconscious forces in operation, ii. 67, 92. Corruption resulting from the alliance between business and politics, Measures for escaping the pressure of competition, ii. 160, 161, 234. Definition, ii. 446. Democracy under the competitive system, ii. 313. Description, Provisional Descriptions of what government is, i. 235. Educating Influences which escape control, i. 266. Family and the State, Difference between, i. 225. Forms of Government, Classification. Aristotle, i. 253, note. Seeley, Sir J. R., i. 253. Greece and Rome, Development of civilisation, i. 191. Habit, Force of, perpetuating unwritten code of government in savage races and animal communities, i. 212. Hypocrisy of, by profession of Christian faith, ii. 51. Individual Element in, Each Step in the development of govern- ment associated with the name of some one man, i. 214, 222. Individualism. (See that title.) Justice and Government, Government constituting that part of arti- ficial environment which is expressed in laws, or in social and eco- nomic institutions protected by laws, ii. 7. Legislation under an absolute monarchy and under a popular govern- ment. Difference in conditions, ii. 507. Limitations, i. 271, 272, 338, 341, 342. Monogamy, A first step in self-restraint, i. 213. Moral View of, ii. 461. Summary, ii. 502. INDEX 579 Government (continued). Municipal Governmeut. (See that title.) Object of the present work and method of procedure, i. 8. Points of view from which government may be studied, i. 53 ; ii. 9, 527. Standpoints from which political students approach the subject, i. 7. Primitive human government, Growth of. Summary of conclusions, i. 233. Public Office, Tendency to fill by favour rather than by merit, ii. 3 1 0. Purposive Element in Human Government, i. 213. Religion an instrument in perpetuating government for the benefit of the governing class, i. 214. Eespect for government, Value of the standard of reverence set by religion, ii. 501. Scope of Government, Arguments for and against increasing, i. 2 ; ii. 2. Summary, ii. 516. Trusts, Administration by the State. Hypothetical development of collectivism in the United States, ii. 394. Impossibility of, under existing conditions, ii. 559. Tyranny of different ages. General tendency to substitute for com- pulsory tyranny one which is consented to, ii. 67, 206. Workingmen, Dangerous notion that governmeut requires no special experience or qualifications, ii. 308, 311. Greece and Rome, Development of Civilisation, i. 191. Defensor urbls, Institution of the office in Rome, i. 203. Fall of the Roman Empire, ii. 16. Individualism characteristic of Roman and Greek civilisation, ii. 94. Individuals in Political Reforms, i. 191, note, 216. Internal Policy or the struggle for Wealth and Political power, i. 223, 228. Law. . Exclusiveness and Artificialness of Roman Law, i. 22. Mistaken Theory of Natural Law, i. 20, 21. "Live according to Nature," Teaching of Roman philosophers, ii. 17. Oppression the predominating note of the whole epoch, i. 193, 197, 199. Religion. Cliristian Church and the Roman Empire, Alliance between, i. 201, 204, 207, 232. Christian Morality compared to the morality of Greece and Rome, i. 204. Family religion exercising an anti-social tendency, i. 183. Law and Religion, Connection between, i. 21. Reforms creating a wider religion within which to include the domestic religions,!. 192, 195, 197. 580 INDEX Greece and Rome (continued). Similarity in the development of Roman and Athenian Civilisation, i. 191, 199. Social Classification, Substituting a Wealth Basis for that of birth and religion, i. 194, 197; ii. 97. Summary, i. 234. Greek Notion of Natvire, i. 43. Green-house, Society compared to, i. 250. Grotius, Definition of Justice, i. 281. Growth and Construction, i. 257. Comparison between the process of growth and that of construction, Municipal government in England and France, i. 258. Organic and Inorganic States, Sir J. R. Seeley's Classification, i. 254. Societies of Men and societies of other living organisms. Difference in Development, i. 246 ; ii. 68, 443, 446. Society, Growth and construction in. (See Society.) Summary, i. 266. Guilds, Mediaeval, ii. 210. Birmingham Alliances reproducing essential features of the guild, ii. 151. Competition, Prevention of. Abuse of power through the process of regulation, ii. 105, 107. Education and surveillance of the artisan, ii. 104. " Inalienable right to work," Declaration of Louis XVI. against the tyranny of the Guilds, ii. 105. Journeymen Guilds, ii. 104, note. Laissez /aire, Doctrine of, Reaction towards individualism from the tyranny of the guild, i. 26, 27 ; ii. 110. Municipal Liberties, Original protectors of, i. 260. Organisation and functions of the original guilds, ii. 102. Guizot on the Christian Church, ii. 46. TTABIT. ■^ Description, i. 177. Government, Unwritten Code perpetuated in savage races and animal communities by force of habit, i. 212. Heredity and Education, Influence in formation of habits, i. 180, 181. Man and Animals, Contrast in Conduct, i. 347 ; ii. 473. Political Institutions, Force of Habit in framing early institutions, i. 180. Religion, Influence of habit, i. 181, 183. Sentiment of Justice, Habit a contributing factor, i. 290, 291. Unconscious socialising force, i. 248 ; ii. 34, 47. Hanseatic League, ii. 74. INDEX 581 Happiness. Difficulties standing in the way of favourable environment, i. 349. Perfect happiness beyond the control of political institutions, i. 315, 338, 341. Selfishness the great obstacle to human happiness, ii. 527. Herbivora and Carnivora. (See Carnivoea and Herbivora.) Heredity. Acquired Traits, Lamarckian Theory, i. 58. Issue between Darwinian and Lamarckian Schools, i. 60. Education and Heredity, Relative roles in the development of Man and Animals, i. 165. Habits, Formation of, i. 180, 181. Wealth, Effect on Type, i. 130, 150. History. Government, Historical view of, ii. 528. Human development, Light thrown on, ii. 521. Individualism in, ii. 16. Holland, Pauper Colonies in, ii. 296, 399. Home Life, Break-up of, Objection to Collectivism discussed, ii. 341, 346. Honour, Code of, ii. 85. Horde System, ii. 219. Horse, Evolution of, i. 57. Hours of Labour, Reduction of, in a Collectivist State, ii. 272, 293. Human Artificial Environment. (See Environment.) Human Laws and laws of Nature, Difference between, i. 16. Human Selection distinguished from Natural Selection. (See Natural Selection.) Humanity, Claims of. Limitation of moral responsibility, ii. 329, 479. Huxley, Prof Destructiveness of Prof. Huxley's philosophical work, i. 15. Natural and political inequalities too intimately associated to be studied apart. Theory suggested, i. 311. Predatory System, i. 45. Hypnotism proving the duality of the mind, ii. 193. Hypocrisy, a product of Compromise between Christianity and Paganism, ii. 52. Hysteria, Strength of the disorder chiefly derived from the domination of a fixed idea, ii. 30. TDEA, Power of. Disease, ii. 29. Politics, ii. 32. Religion, ii. 23. Ideal or Moral Law regarded as synonymous with Natural Law. (See Natural Law.) 582 INDEX Ideals to which the world really aspires in spite of the strangulation by Commercialism, ii. 458. Ignorance, the Enemy of Collectivism and eliminated by it, ii. 305, 319. Immigration, Prohibition of, in a Collectivist State, ii. 324. Immorality, Diminution in, in a Collectivist State, ii. 345. Imperial Expansion necessitated by over-production, ii. 129, 131, 149, 159, 231. "Inalienable right to work," Declaration by Louis XVI. against the tyranny of the guilds, ii. 105. Income from investment. Injustice of existing system, ii. 116, 125, 478. Individualism, vol. ii., bk. i., pp. 1-249. Arab Individualism, ii. 21. Best-governed nation is that which is governed least, Doctrine of, i. 3, 26; ii. 11, 12. Collectivism and Individualism. Alternative Adoption of, ii. 4, 14. Rival economic and political theories, ii. 3, 14. Definition, ii. 4. Description, i. 360; ii. 10. History, Individualism in, ii. 16. Idea of individualist government, Development of, ii. 60. Forces at work, ii. 65. Moral considerations. Individualism founded upon, ii. 12. Private Property. (See Property.) Roman and Greek civilisation characterised by individualism, ii. 94. Individualist Enterprise, Scope for, in a Collectivist Community, ii. 392, 409. Limits of State and Individual Enterprise, ii. 412. Industrial Commission, Report. Economic Advantages of Trusts, ii. 535. Foreign Markets, Over-production stimulating search for, ii. 542. Waste Products, Economy resulting from manufacture of, ii. 543. Industrial Results of Private Property, ii. 124. Industrialism. Competition. (See that title.) Conclusion that existing institutions not only work injustice, but must do so, ii. 173. Militarism and Industrialism. Comparison between, ii. 157. Militarism yielding to Industrialism, Influence of the Crusades, ii. 73, 100. Qualities distinguishing the military spirit from the Commercial ii. 75. Variation, Industrial System as a method of securing, i. 221. Inequalities amongst Men. Artificial Inequalities, i. 312, 314, 338 ; ii. 520. INDEX 583 Inequalities amongst Men (continued). Community life, Inequality in power and willingness to fulfil obliga- tions of, ii. 91. Government. Aim of, to diminish inequalities, i. 340, 341. Limitations of Government, i. 338, 341, 342 ; ii. 261. Justice, Task of, under proposed definition, i. 288, 295 ; ii. 5. Men are not " created equal," i. 306. Natural Inequalities, i. 307, 315, 337, 338. Natural and political inequalities too intimately associated to be studied apart. Theory suggested by Prof. Huxley, i. 311. Social Mind, Two kinds of, one of which enslaves the other, ii. 185. " InequaUty of Benefits," Spencer Theory, i. 281 ; ii. 5, 252, 253. Infant's Brain, Smoothness of, i. 165. Inorganic and Organic States, Sir J. R. Seeley's classification of Forms of Government, i. 253. Instinct, Constancy of an animal's conduct under the same conditions, i. 346. Insurance, Economy that would be effected by elimination of, in a Col- lectivist State, ii. 279. Intelligence. Animal Intelligence, Dr. Thorndike's Experiments, i. 166. Intelligence in the Service of Selfishness an obstacle to the attain- ment of justice, i. 302. Morality and Intelligence, Conflict between, ii. 498. Predatory System, Application of intelligence securing the best food to both predator and prey, ii. 66. Religion and Intelligence, Determining respective roles of, in evolu- tion and development, i. 85. International or Secondary Environment, i. 141. National Morality, Effect on, i. 144, 145. Natural and International Environment, Similarity between, i. 143. International Relations, Effect of Trusts, Danger of eliminating inter- national competition, ii. 555. Invention. Capitalists' interest in suppressing inventions, ii. 288. Collectivism. Objection that all stimulus to invention would be removed, ii. 288. Tendency of invention to replace work involving drudgery, by machinery, ii. 290, 426. Ireland, Recent legislation on, Embarrassment occasioned to statesmen by an aggressive minority dragging forward measures for which the community is not ripe, ii. 506. Italy. City Republics, Rise of, ii. 73, 100. Major and Minor Arts, Combination of Workingmen, ii. 100. 584 INDEX JENXS'S, Prof., Tables showing prices of Articles which had given rise to Trusts, ii. 548. Joiimeymen Guilds, ii. 104, note. Justice. Absolute Justice, Alternative doctrine of, i. 282. Act of Justice. Act of Justice distinguished from the Sentiment of it, i. 281, 288, 292. Definition, i. 350. Adam Smith, on the Exercise of Justice, i. 317. Competitive System, Impossibility of Justice, ii. 481. Definitions. Existing Definitions, i. 279, 282, 317. Lack of Definition by early Political Philosophers, i. 6. Proposed Definition, i. 288, 295, 360. Criticism of proposed definition, i. 316 ; ii. 5. Limits put to exorbitant claims of morality, i. 319. Political Debate, Discursiveness restricted, i. 324. Spencerian description of justice contrasted with proposed definition, ii. 5. Different Senses in which the word " justice" is used, i. 282, 316. Evolution of, i. 283. Expediency, J. S. Mill's Contention that justice is equivalent to expediency in the making of laws, i. 317. Government constituting that part of the artificial environment created by man, which is expressed in laws, or in. social and econo- mic institutions protected by laws, ii. 7. Natural Justice, so-called, i. 275. Obstacles to the attainment of Justice, i. 300. Inequalities amongst Men. (See that title.) Intelligence in the service of selfishness masquerading as hu- manity, i. 302. Natural Obstacles, i. 305, 330 ; ii. 474. Sentiment of Justice. Act of Justice distinguished from the Sentiment of it, i. 281, 288, 292. Definition, i. 289. Factors contributing to form our Sentiment of Justice, i. 291. Summary, i. 326 ; ii. 439. Virtue, Justice regarded as a Virtue, i. 342, 350, 359. Problems of conduct complicating the virtue of justice, i. 352. Juatin Martsrr's description of Christianity, ii. 39. TT" IDD'S, Mr., Views on the r6le of religion in social evolution, i. 83, note. Knighthood. Ceremony for the presenting of new knights, ii. 80. Chaucer's description of a knight, ii. 78. INDEX 585 Knighthood {continued). Education of candidates for, ii. 79. Lauucelot, Sir Ector's eulogy of, ii. 78. Milton on, ii. 79. Koran, verses from, ii. 20. * T ABOUR. CoUectivist State, Work in. (See Collectivism.) Condition of Workingmen, Possibility of improving, under existing industrial S3'stem, Hypothetical illustration, ii. 113, 116, 125. Government, Dangerous notion among workingmen that no special qualification or experience is required, ii. 308, 311. Ignorance of political problems, Forces contributing to prevent work- ingmen acquiring knowledge, ii. 304, 312. " Inalienable right to work," Declaration by Louis XVI. against the tyranny of the guilds, ii. 105. Liberty of Contract, ii. 209, 214. Market, Oppression of, upon Employers, Enlightenment of the workingman, ii. 230. Power of popular force if not disunited by a dividing financial doc- trine, ii. 523. Kegulation of. (See titles Guilds, Trade Combinations, and Trade Unions.) Speeding up machinery, Device to get more work out of employees without raising wages, ii. 437. Strikes, Change in Character, i. 144. Sweating System, ii. 145, 486. "Villages" free from labour regulation, Kise of, ii. 109. Labour Cheques, Voluntary, ii. 332. Advantage of, owing to limited possibility of accumulation, ii. 417. Elimination of Corruption by substituting Labour Cheques for Coin, ii. 419. Private Enterprise, Use of Labour Cheques as a medium of exchange, ii. 410. Transferable, ii. 335. Labour Commission, Report on the Change in Character of Strikes, ii. 144. Laissez faire, Doctrine of. Best-governed nation is that which is governed least, i. 3, 26; ii. 11, 12, 519. Liberty of Contract, ii. 209, 214. Quesnay's Teaching, i. 26. Reaction towards individualism from the tyranny of the Corporation, i. 26, 27; ii. 110. Spencer's Analogy between Society and an organism, Pernicious in- fluence of, i. 243. Virtue in Connection with, i. 356, 586 INDEX Lamarckian and Darwinian Theories of Evolution, i. 58-64. Land, Tenure of, under a CoUectivist form of GoYerument, ii. 243, 420. Launcelot, Sir Ector's Eulogy of, ii. 78. Law. Greece and Rome, Development of Civilisation, i. 20-22. Human laws and laws of Nature, Difference between, i. 16. Montesquieu's Definition, i. 17. Natural Law. (See that title.) Religion and Law, Connection between, in Greece and Rome, i. 21. Lawyers, Disappearance of, in a CoUectivist State, ii. 282. liegislation, under an absolute Monarchy and under a popular Govern- ment, Difference in conditions, ii. 507. Leisure. Collectivism, Leisure secured by, ii. 30.3. Competitive Sy.stem, Workingmen deprived of leisure necessary for the acquisition of knowledge, ii. 304, 312. Lex portionis. (See Predatory System.) Liberal and Conservative Parties in England, Homology between change in the Political organism and change adopted in the Dallinger Ex- periments, i. 162. Liberty, vol. ii., bk. i., ch. v., pp. 203-239. Anal3'sis of, ii. 217. Collectivism interfering with, alleged, ii. 351. Economic Liberty, ii. 348. Individualist views, "A Plea for Liberty," ii. 352, 355. Personal Liberty, ii. 352. Political Liberty, ii. 351. Divergent Notions, ii. 208. Economic Liberty, ii. 227, 348. « Definition, ii. 239. False Notions, ii. 203, 205. Geographical Theory, ii. 208. Personal Liberty, Definition, ii. 239. Political Liberty. Collectivism interfering with, alleged, ii. 351. Definition, ii. 227, 239. United States, Spencer on, ii. 351. Value of, ii. 233. Property, Right and Duty, ii. 223. Seeley, Sir J. R., on various conceptions of liberty, ii. 204. Social and Industrial conditions interfering with, ii. 207, 209, 364. Steps by which man has abandoned the license of nature for the security of law, ii. 218. Rights and Duties arising from the sacrifice of license, ii. 224. Summary, ii. 237. Summary and conclusions arrived at from the point of view of Col- lectivism, ii. 356. INDEX 587 Liberty {coiitinued). Terms used in discussing liberty, ii. 224, Three kinds of, ii. 227, 239, 356.j Liberty of Contract, ii. 209, 214. Folly of. Trusts and Birmingham alliance demonstrating, ii. 161. License, ii. 224. Local Government, Struggles of the people in the 11th and succeeding centuries, ii. 61, 72, 100. Louis XVI. proclaiming the "inalienable right to work," ii. 105. Love. Chivalry substituting love of woman for love of God, ii. 81. Code of love, ii. 82. Concentrating energy. Force of love, ii. 26. Round Table, Law of, ii. 79. Lycurgus, Political work of, i. 200. Lying, practice of, in trade, ii. 134. TV/TATNE'S, Sir H., Theory of the patriarchal origin of civilisation, "'■ -^ i. 186, 187. Major and Minor Arts, Combination of workingraen in Italy, ii. 100. Malory, Sir T., Sir Ector's eulogy of Launcelot, ii. 78. Man as a Factor in the domain of Nature, i. 36. Market, The Tyranny of Private Property, ii. 111. " Getting tiie Market." Collectivism, Economy of, ii. 273-288, 292. Trusts, Economy resulting from, ii. 546. Oppression of the Market upon employers, Enlightenment of the workingman, ii. 230. Marriage. Collectivism, Some partisans of, hostile to the institution of marriage, ii. .341. Education giving no special preparation, i. 127, 129. Equalisation of Men, Institution of Marriage an Obstacle, i. 313. Human Artificial Environment. Adaptation of function to environment. Process illustrated in the case of marriage, i. 105, 111. Operation of, in modifying the character of selection and pro- ducing an artificial type, i. 104. Monogamy. (See that title.) Motives leading to Marriage, i. 128. Natural Law, Ulpiau's Definition, i. 20. Summary, i. 135. Wealth, Operation of, on marriage and on type produced, i. 130, 150. Marsh's, Prof., discoveries revealing the development of the horse, i. 57. Marx, Theory of Collectivism, ii. 386. Means and Ends, Tendency to confuse one with the other, ii. 449. 588 INDEX Mecca, Religion an anti-social force prior to the preaching of Mohammed, ii. 21. Medical Practitioner and the Political Student, Similarity of Tasks, i. 297. Mental Science and the Modern form of miracle, ii. 29, 31. Merchants, Foreign, Harassing restrictions during the Middle Ages, ii. 101. Metoecaean Sacrifice, Institution of, i. 192. Metronymic Tribes, i. 186 ; ii. 219. Middle Ages. Forces at work in Europe, Similarity to those operating in the Moslem Empire, ii. 47. Preponderating role of the religious idea, ii. 19, 29, 46, 55, 101. Militarism, i. 80. Industrialism and Militarism. Comparison between, ii. 157. Militarism yielding to Industrialism, Influence of the Crusades, ii. 73, 100. Qualities distinguishing the military spirit from the commercial, ii. 75. Religion a Social Factor, i. 183. Mill, J. S., on Justice, i. 317. Milton on Knighthood, ii. 79. Miracle, Modern form of, ii. 29. Missions, Foreign, Attitude of Morality, i. 320, 322. Mohammedanism. Cliristiauity and Mohammedanism compared, ii. 20, 38, 48. Concentrating force of a single idea, ii. 28. Destruction of the Moslem Empire by the corrupting influence of prosperity, ii. 34, 37. Forces at work in creating the Moslem Empire, ii. 34. Loftiness of the Mohammedan idea, ii. 35. Modern exponent of, ii. 29. Personality of Mohammed contributing to his success, ii. 22. Monogamy. Peculiar to man, i. 110, 213. Price paid for monogamy, Prostitution, i. 131. Self-restraint involved, i. 127. Summary, i. 134. Monogamy among the solitary carnivora, i. 110. Monopolies, Device for escaping the pressure of competition, ii. 161. Montesquieu's definition of Law, i. 17. Moral Forces contributing factors in forming sentiment of justice, i. 291. Moral or Ideal Law regarded as synonymous with Natural Law. (See NATUitAL Law, Idkal.) Moral Qualities in Man, Development of. Evolution of virtue, i. 344 ; ii. 238. Spencer Theory of perfectibility of the race, i. 118. Variability, apparent gap in, i. 115. INDEX 589 Moral Responsibility, Limitation of, ii. 479. Collectivist principles, ii. 329. Morality. Characteristics, ii. 494. Chivalry, Idea of, ii. 75. Claims of, Limit set to exorbitant claims by the definition of Justice proposed, i. 319, 320, 323. Class morality, Code of Honour, ii. 85. Collectivism from the moral point of view, ii. 267, 461, 482. Compensation, Morality of, ii. 475, 503. Individual and the State, Code of morals differing from that which obtains between individuals, ii. 197. Intelligence and Morality. Conflict between, ii. 498. Intelligence making use of Morality to attain selfish ends, i. 302. International or Secondary Environment, Effect on National Morality, i. 144, 145. Nature, Beauty of, lies chiefly in man's moral apprehension of it, i. 47. Opposing Selfishnesses which abstain from sin except within safe limits, Kind of morality which keeps civilisation together, ii. 25. Prostitution, Attitude of Morality, i. 320. Keligion and Morality, ii. 494. Comparison of, ii. 498. Scientific explanation of morality as a blind and mechanical process of evolution, ii. 461. Teaching Morality, Neglect of, i. 127, 129. Morphological View of Government, ii. 9, 528. Municipal Government. Collectivism. Europe and the L^nited States, Kelative preparedness for col- lectivism, ii. 1, 384. Hypothetical development of, in the United States, ii. 389. Corruption resulting from the alliance between business and politics, ii. 162, 166. Gas Supply, Tramways, Telephone, etc.. Arguments for and against municipalisation, i. 1. Growth, Principle of, compared with the principle of construction, Municipal Government in England and France, i. 258. Guilds the original protectors of municipal liberties, i. 260. Middle Ages, Struggle for municipal liberties, ii. 61, 72, 100. Municipal Religion, Creation of, in Greece and Rome, i. 192, 195, 197. Myxomycetes, An unconscious association of individuals, i. 247. "M'ATIONAL, or Primary Environment, i. 141. Natural Law, or Law of Nature. Contradictory Conceptions, i. 5. 590 IXDEX Natural Law {continued). Defiuitions. Montesquieu, i. 17. Proposed Defiuitiou, i. 71. Ulpian, i. 20. Evolution. (See that title.) Human Laws and Laws of Nature, Difference between, i. 16. Ideal or Moral Law regarded as synonymous with Natural Law. Mistaken Theory of Early Jurists, i. 1 8, 20. Ritchie's, Prof., Inconsistency of Expressiou, i. 38. Predatory System. (See that title.) Quesnay's Conception of the Law of Nature, i. 28. ■Rousseau's Political Philosophy, i. 25, 27. Natural Rights. Contrast between Rights under the Law of Man and so-called Natu- ral Eights, i. 293, 311. Inconsistency and Error involved in the expression, i. 28, 29 ; ii. 434. Notion of, in Early Times, i. 20. Rousseau and Quesnay, Similarity of teaching, i. 26. Natural Selection. Climate. (See that title.) Competition. ( See that title.) Darwinian Theory, i. .59. Definition, i. 88. Human Selection distinguished from, i. 123. Summary, i. 171. (Eor discussion as to how far Natural Selection operates on Man, see titles Climate, Competition, Sexual Selection, etc.) "War. (See that title.) Naturalisation, Granting, in a CoUectivist State, ii. 325. Nature, vol. i., bk. i., ch. i., pp. 13-32. Ambiguity of Terms " Nature " and " Natural," Prof. Ritchie on, i. 14. Beauty of Nature lies mostly in Man's Moral Apprehension of it, i. 47. Collectivism. Objection that it would be Artificial or Contrary to Nature, ii. 371. Objections imposed by Nature, ii. 447. Compensation, Emerson's Essay on, i. 277. Creating Power in Nature, Substituting words " Propagating Power " for " Creator," i. 35. Definition. (See sub-heading Meanings.) Dual Aspect, i. 43. Effort, Nature distinguished from the Conscious Effort of Man. (See Effort.) INDEX 591 Nature (contimied). Greek Notiou of Nature, i. 43. Inequalities amongst Men. (See that title.) Justice, Nature an obstacle to the attainment of, i. 305, 330. Legislation, Limit set by Nature, i. 271, 272, 338. Liberty in Nature a question of physical strength, ii. 205. "Live according to Nature," Teaching of Roman Pliilosophers, ii. 17. Man as a Factor in the domain of Nature, i. 36. Meanings of the word " Nature." Definition involving acceptance of the duality of Nature, i. 48. Definition suggested for the purpose of Political Argument, i. 50. Nature distinguished from the Conscious Effort of Man. (See Effort.) Original and Derived Meanings, i. 34, 35. Predatory System. (See that title.) Summary, i. 48, 70. Nature "Worship and False Poetic Sentiment, i. 40. Neo-Darwinian and Neo-Lamarckian Schools, i. 58-64. Nervous Prostration, Condition maintained by the domination of a false idea, ii. 31. Nervous System, ii. 192. Additional Central Nervous System differentiating Man from Ani- mals, ii. 193. New Ycrk. Corruption resulting from the alliance between business and politics, ii. 163, 164, 167. Good Government Clubs, i. vi ; ii. 164. Laissez /aire Doctrine, Pernicious influence in a Club organised against Municipal Misgovernment, i. 243. Pauper Colony Bill, Rejection of, ii. 296 and 7wte. Tammany Hall, Overthrow of, in the elections of 1893, i. 152, note; ii. 165. Non-matter, Use of term to include all that is not matter, i. 120. Non-natural, Use of term for all that is not natural, i. 120. Norman Pirates, Generosity of, ii. 75. Numa Pompilius, Political Work of, i. 195. /^FFICIAL. ^^ Official and State, Objections to Collectivism suggested by the terms, ii. 263. Position of, in a Collectivist State, contrasted with the position of an official under existing conditions, ii. 264, 266. Oil Trust, History of, showing that Trusts are powerless to dictate prices, ii. 552. 592 IXDEX Organic Selection, Theory of, i. 64. Organic and Inorganic States, Sir J. R. Seeley's Classification of Forms of Government, i. 253. Osbom's, Prof., Summary of the Theory of Organic Selection, i. 64. Over-production. Colonisation stimulated by, ii. 129, 149, 159, 232. Evil of the present system and benefits of a system of Collectivism, ii. 284. Falsehood of Statement and Fact resulting from Competition, ii. 134. Foreign Markets, Over-production stimulating search for, ii. 129, 131, 149, 159, 231. Industrial Commission Report, ii. 542. Increased number of Transactions, Method of making-up for dimin- ished profits, ii. 127, 128. Irregularity of employment due to, ii. 126, 132. Partial Over-production, ii. 126 and note. Prices, Methods of restoring high prices, ii. 541. Recurring periods of general over-production, Theory of, ii. 126, note. Say, Mr. J. B., on, ii. 536. Summary of Consequences, ii. 131. Trusts, Over-production the principal cause of, ii. 536, 537. TDAN, god of hunters. Legendary suggestion of the Predatory system, i. ■*• 43. Pan- Athenian Feast, Institution of, i. 192. Pantheistic Philosophy substituting Nature for God, i. 35. Papal Power, Rise of, ii. 56. Partial Collectivism. (See Collectivism.) Party System of Government, Scope for, in a CoUectivist State, ii. 326. Patriarchal System, ii. 219. Origin of human civilisation, Sir H. Maine's Theory, i. 186, 187. Patriotism. Concentrating Energy, Force of patriotism, ii. 26. Rome, Patriotism in, ii. 16. Selfishness, Form of, ii. 25, note. Pauperism and Crime. Description of what pauperism is, ii. 154. Dutch method of dealing with paupers, Farm Colonies, ii. 296, 399. Elimination by universal practice of Charity and Sacrifice, Doctrine of, ii. 153. Guilds, Tyranny and Exclusiveness causing pauperism, ii. 108. Industrialism, Pauperism and Crime an inevitable result, ii. 154, 156. Market, Tyranny of, ii. 112. New York, Rejection of Pauper Colony Bill, ii. 296 and note. Treatment of, under the Competitive System, ii. 155, 157. Unwillingness to work, Cause and Cure of, ii. 294. INDEX 593 PerfectibUity of the Kaee. Paith. Value of, in political science, ii. 470. Spencer Theory, i. 3, 118. Personal Attractiveness, Difference in, a barrier to equality amongst men, i. 315, 338. Philanthropy, Spencer's Denunciation of " Coercive philanthropy," i. 242. Phlhppines, Annexation by the United States, Demand for new markets, ii. 131, 159. Physiological View of Government, ii. 9, 528. Physiology of the Mind, ii. 190. Pianos, Manufacture of, by Private Enterprise in a Collectivist State, ii. 410,414. Piece-work System, in connection with Collectivism, ii. 269. Poetic False Sentiment and Nature Worship, i. 40. Pohtical Institutions. Force of Habit in framing early institutions, i. 180. Political Liberty, ii. 239. Collectivism interfering with, alleged, ii. 351. Definition, ii. 227. United States, Political Liberty in, Spencer on, ii. 351. Value of, ii. 233. Political Office, Property in, ii. 529, 530. Political Science, Value of Faith in, ii. 469. Political Student and the Medical Practitioner, Similarity of Tasks, i. 297. Politics. Corruption arising from the alliance between business and politics, ii. 160, 161, 234. Debate, Discursiveness limited by the Definition of Justice proposed, i. 324. Duty of Co-operation and of substituting intellectual for accidental methods, ii. 491. Idea, Power of, ii. 32. Political Struggles, Definition as struggles between different groups of the community upon the question of property, ii. 222. Practical Politics, Elements which must concur to bring a measure within range of, ii. 505. Reform movements. Failure of, owing to collision with private inter- ests, ii. 163, 165. Science and Religion, Tendency of both to discourage effort, ii. 526, Selfishness, Action of. Enactment of those measures only which have behind them the largest political fund, ii. 507, 525. Workingmen, Attitude of, Confidence in Trade Unions shaken by the result of the engineers' strike in 1897-98, ii. 523. Poor Laws of Queen Elizabeth, Increase in Pauperism, ii. 109. 38 594 INDEX Population. Collectivism forming no check to population alleged, Proposed check, ii. 339. Increase in, under stimulus of colonisation, ii. 129. Waste of population, Treatment of, under the Competitive System, ii. 155,157. Predatory System. Community Law, i. 295. Compensation, Emerson's Essay on, i. 277. Competition. (See that title.) Definition, i. 29. Description, i. 44. Forces at work in the relation between predator and prey, ii. 66, 68. Greek notion of Nature, i. 43. Tribal conflict, i. 81. Working of the law of survival of the fittest in a state of Nature and the working of it subject to the influence of man, i. 73. Prices. Methods of restoring high prices, ii. 541. Normal, Natural, or Static Price, ii. 547. Trusts, Effect of. Fluctuations determined by the World's production. Trusts un- able to materially affect, i. 550. Jenks's, Prof., Tables, ii. 548. Lowering of prices owing to the appreciation of Currency, Trusts unable to resist the general law, ii. 549. Primary or National Environment, i. 141. Primogeniture, i. 130. Private Enterprise, Scope for, in a CoUectivist Community, ii. 392, 409. Limits of State and Individual Enterprise, ii. 412. Private Property. (See Property.) Proctor, Mr. J. R., on Over-production in the United States, ii. 159. Production. Elimination of competition, Political v. Commercial Methods, ii. 2. Over-production. (See that title.) Spencer encomiums on the Competitive System, ii. 285, note. Trusts, Economies resulting from, ii. 544. Wastefulness of the competitive system, and economy that would be effected under a CoUectivist form of government, ii. 278, 284. Productive toil. Power of, Inequality amongst men, ii. 185. Profit. Diminished profits, making up deficit by increased number of trans- actions, ii. 127, 128. Rate of profit regulating movements of Capital, ii. 132. " Progress and Poverty," Rhetorical Insincerity of certain passages, i. 31. Prohibition, Legislation exacting of the public greater self-restraint than it is capable of, i. 271. INDEX 595 Propagating Power, Substituting, for the word " Creator " to denote creat- ing power in Nature as opposed to creating power outside of Nature, i. 35. Property, Private Property, vol. ii., bk. i., ch. iii., pp. 87-174. Church and Private Property, ii. 170. Civilising force of, by promoting self-control, ii. 89. Collectivism. Abolition of the principle of private property in the sources of production, ii. 242, 262. Division of property amongst the people, Mistaken notion regard- ing Collectivism, ii. 243. Elimination of private property the accumulation of which could control the services of others, ii. 372, 373. Combination against. (See titles Trade Combinations and Trade Unions.) Curtailing the rights of private property in proportion as the degree of socialisation becomes higher, ii. 229. Definition, ii. 226. Democratic force of, by overthrowing aristocracy of birth, ii. 96. Dutij to respect property in return for the advantage of rigid in prop- erty, ii. 225. Industrial results, ii. 124. Kinds of property, ii. 529. Necessary phase through which man had to pass, ii. 444. Preservation of private property an instance of selfishness masquerad- ing as humanity, i. 302. Political struggles. Definition as struggles between different groups of the community upon the question of property, ii. 222. Recognition of Property, i. 312; ii. 225. Animals, ii. 90, 91, 183, note, 223, 372. Property of the Male in the Female, i. 108. Eights of Property. Natural contrasted with Human Law, i. 293, 311. Opportunities for oppression, ii. 225. Sentiment of Justice, Comparison of Spartan with Modern opin- ion, i. 289. Self-control. Elimination of inherited instincts of ferocity and servility through the institutions of private property, ii. 94. Men and animals solving the problem of property by exercise of, ii. 91. Sense of, involving a sense of obligation, ii. 91, 184. Social results, ii. 152, 157. Socialising force of, by association in guilds, ii. 102. Tyranny of, The Market, ii. 111. Proprietary Articles, Device for escaping pressure of competition, ii. 161- 596 INDEX Prostitution. Collectivist Society, Disappearance of Prostitution, ii. 343. State Employment a solution of the economic problem, ii. 400. Definition, ii. 343. Economic Problem, ii. 3. Morality, Attitude of, i. 320. Price paid for the institution of Marriage, i. 131. Reduced Wages, Effect of, ii. 135. Protection, Expedient for escaping from foreign competition, ii. 161. Public Enterprises, Economy of Collectivism, ii. 27G. Public Opinion, i. 271. Public Ownership of public utilities, Hypothetical development of Col- lectivism in the United States, ii. 393. Public Stores, Hypothetical development of Collectivism in the United States, ii. 395. QUESNAY and Rousseau, Similarity of teachings on Natural Rights, i. 26. ■p ABBIT, Pursuit of, by Weasel, Characteristics of herbivora and carni- ■'^ vora, i. 76. Hailroads. Economy of Collectivism, ii. 276. Sacrifice of the picturesque owing to exigencies of the Competitive System, ii. 379. Keason the great enemy of religions enthusiasm, ii. 37. Reasoning Power in Animals, Dr. Thorndike's Experiments, i. 166. Religion. Aim of, ii. 499. Ancient Religions, Appearance of being the degenerate relics of a purer religion, i. 182. Anti-social Force, Religion as. Arab Individualism, ii. 21. Greece and Rome, Family religion exercising an anti-social ten- dency, i. 183. Collectivism, Sanction of religion, ii. 485, 502. Community life, Value of religion, ii. 500. Concentrating Energy, Force of religion, ii. 26. Decay of the Religious idea, ii. 60. Definition, i. 84. Development retarded by Religion, Instance of, i. 99. Effort. Capacity for, bolstered by Religion, i. 358. Discouragement of, by exaggerating the role of Providence, ii. 526. Faith, ii. 466. Definition of, ii. 499. INDEX 597 Religion [continued). Government for the benefit of the governing class, Religion perpetu- ating, i. 214. Greece and Rome, Development of Civilisation. (See that title.) Guilds, Media;val, Preponderating role of religion, ii. 103. Habit, Influence of, i. 181, 183. Idea, Power of, in religion, ii. 23. Intelligence and Religion, Determining respective roles of, in evolu tion and development, i. 85. Kidd's, Mr., Views on role of, in social evolution, i. 83. Man differentiated from animals by the fact of religion, i. 82, 84. Methods by which religion operates upon men, ii. 27. Middle Ages, Preponderating role of the religious idea, ii. 18, 29, 46, 55, 101. Mohammedanism, ii. 20, 28. Morality and Religion, ii. 494. Comparison of, ii. 498. Place of, in the scheme of forces at work in society, ii. 71. Reason the great enemy of religious enthusiasm, ii. 37. Reverence, Gift of, conferred by Religion, ii. 501. Science and Religion. Conflict between, ii. 464, 489, 503. Difference of opinion as to the aim of government, ii. 518. Social Factor in Primitive Civilisation, i. 183. Keverence, Gift of, conferred by religion, ii. 501. Eight to a trade. Trade Union problems arising from conflicting claims, Case of Shipwrights and Joiners, ii. 141. Bights. Contrast between Rights under the Law of Man and so-called Natural Rights, i. 293, 311. Natural Rights. (See that title.) Rights of Property. (See Property.) Ritchie, Prof. Destructiveness of Prof. Ritchie's philosophical work, i. 15, 16. Nature and Natural, Animadversion on ambiguity of terms, i. 14. Nature, Confusion arising from the use of the word to include and also to exclude man, i. 37. Rochefoucauld, Definition of Justice, i. 279. Rocks, Preservation of the records of Natural Evolution, i. 56. Rodbertus, Equalisation and Rotation of tasks in a CoUectivist State, ii. 268, 271. Roman Church. (See Christian Church.) Rome and Greece, Development of Civilisation. (See Greece and Rome.) Rousseau, Political Philosophy of, i. 25. 598 INDEX OAY, Mr. J. B., on Over-production, ii. 53G. Scenery, Destruction of, owing to Industrial considerations, ii. 381. Schafile's Definition of Collectivism, ii. 250. Science. Effort, Discouragement of, by destroying hope, ii. 526. Government, Aim of, Difference of opinion between different groups in the Scientific world, ii. 519. Religion and Science, Conflict between, ii. 464, 489, 503. Difference of opinion as to the aim of Government, ii. 518. Science oifering no explanation of the force which animates the world, ii. 462. Secondary or International Environment. (See International or Secondary Environment.) Seeley, Sir J. R. Forms of Government, Classification as organic and inorganic, i. 253. Liberty, ii. 204. Society and living organisms. Resemblance between, i. 253. Self-government, Struggles of the people in the 11th and succeeding centuries, ii. 61, 72, 100. Self-restraint, Evolution of, i. 112, 120. Animals, Capacity for self-restraint, i. 116. Human Self-restraint differentiated from that observed in Animals, i. 117. Inequality in power of, amongst men, ii. 185. Monogamy, Benefit of, i. 127. Moral Qualities in Man, Development of. (See that title.) Private property. Civilising force of, by promoting self-control, ii. 89. Religious idealist's standpoint, i. 112, 117. Spencer Theory, i. 117. Selfishness. Distraction of energy occasioned by, ii. 23, 24. Doctrine that selfishness is ineradicable, Collectivism in connection with, ii. 260. Effort, Capacity for. Selfishness bolstering, i. 358. Happiness, Selfishness the great obstacle, ii. 527. Inconsistency and hopelessness of the effort to build selfish institutions upon an unselfish religious idea, ii. 37. Justice. Attainment of. Selfishness an obstacle, i. 302. Sentiment of Justice, Contention that Selfishness is a contribut- ing Factor, i. 291. Meaning for purpose of Political discussion, Selfishness which disre- gards the interest of others, ii. 25, note. Politics, Constancy of Selfishness, Enactment of those measures only which have behind them the largest Political fund, ii. 507, 525. Sentiment of Justice. (See Justice.) INDEX 599 Servants, Question of Domestic Service in a Collectivist State, ii. 424. Servius Tullius, Political work of, i. 197. Sewage Disposal, ii. 154, 155. Sexual Jealousy. Animals, i. 107, 110, 187, 276. Man, Development of recognition of Property of the Male in the Female, i. 108. Social Improvement Schemes, Failure to take due account of Sexual Jealousy, i. 133, note; ii. 347. Sexual Relations. Animals, i. 109. Defined Sexual Relations, Development of, by survival of Monogamy, i. 111. Man, i. 186, 188; ii. 219. Summary, i. 133. (See also titles Marriage and Monogamy.) Sexual Selection. Competition between individuals of the same species, i. 90. Human distinguished from Animal Selection, i. 103. Human Selection, General Tendencies, i. 126. Shaw, Mr. A., on Municipal Government in England and France, i. 258, 261. Shelley's dictum that a man who is starving is not free, ii. 205. Shipbuilding Trade, Problems arising from conflicting claims of ship- wrights and joiners, ii. 141. Single Tax, Theory of, ii. 421. Sister of Charity, Training of, a carefully devised system for destroying self-consideration, ii. 27. Slavery. Slavery consistent with Natural Law and Pioman Politics, i. 232. Social and Industrial conditions creating, ii. 207, 364. Status of a Slave, Sir J. R. Seeley's Description, ii. 205. Ulpian's Definition of the Law of Nature, i. 20. Smith, Adam, on the exercise of Justice, i. 317. Socialism, Objections to. Individualist Arguments, ii. 228. Social Classification. Collectivist State, ii. 299, 300. Substituting a wealth basis for that of birth and religion, i. 194, 197 ; ii. 96. Social Improvement Schemes, Failure to take due account of Natural Hostile Forces : — Nature herself an obstacle to the attainment of Justice, i. 305. Sexual Jealousy, i. 133 ; ii. 347. Social Mind, vol. ii., bk. i., ch. iv., pp. 175-202. Animals, i. 176; ii. 179. Character of the socialising force that brings Animals together for a common purpose has so far baffled Scientific explanation, ii. 180. 600 INDEX Social Mind (continued). Definition, ii. 177, 178, note. Inconsistencies of character arising from failure of education to take account of the duality of the mind, ii. 196. Man, ii. 184. Physiology of the Mind, ii. 190. Points of view from which the Social Mind must be studied, ii. 178. Kesponse of the Social Mind to influences about it, Extent and manner of, ii. 199. Self-consciousness, Faculty for, ii. 192. Sub-conscious Automaton within the conscious mind, ii. 190, 194. Summary, ii. 195. Society. Comparison to a green-house, i. 250. Conscious Forces engaged in moulding Society, Principle of Con- struction : — Education, i. 266. Government, Conscious forces in operation, ii. 67, 92. Heligion belonging to the Conscious forces so far as it is unper- verted by selfishness, ii. 71. Self-restraint, Faculty of, i. 248, 270. Contention that Society is an organism : — Difference not mentioned by Spencer, i. 246. Differences distinguishing Society from an organism, i. 246, 267. Seeley's, Sir J. R., Conclusions, i. 253. Society resembles an organism only in so far as it escapes the control of art, i. 263, 265. Spencer's Teaching, i. 239, 240, 242, 245. Summary, i. 267 ; ii. 441, 443. Definition, i. 264. Development of societies of men and of societies of other living organisms, Difference between, i. 246 ; ii. 68, 443, 446. Society, though not an organism, is an association of organisms. Limit to legislation, i. 271. Unconscious forces engaged in moulding Society, Principle of growth. Association, Faculty of, i. 247, 269. Custom, i. 264. Egotism, i. 266, 269. Government, Forces at work corresponding to the relation be- tween predator and prey, ii. 67, 92, Habit, i. 248 ; ii. 34, 47. Idea, Power of, in politics, ii. 32. Philanthropy, i. 266. Soil, Difference in value of, an obstacle to the equalisation of men, i. 310, 312. Solon, Political work of, i. 193. INDEX 601 Soul, Defined for the purpose of political discussion as faculty of con- scious effort, i. 250. Spanish-American War, an instance of selfishness masquerading as humanity, i. 302. Sparta, Failure of the Communistic Constitution imposed by Lycurgus, i. 200. Spencer, Mr. Herbert. Ancestor Worship, i. 186. Evolution, Definition of, i. 67, 245. Justice, Description of, i. 280. Proposed definition of justice contrasted with Spencerian philos- ophy, ii. 5. Marriage and " Adaptation of Function to Environment," 1. 104, 111. Political Liberty in the United States, ii. 351. Production and Distribution under the Competitive System, ii. 285, note. Self-restraint, "Doomed to Perfection" Theory, i. 117. Social Development forming part of Evolution in general, i. 244. Society and living organisms, Analogy between, i. 239, 240, 242, 245. Virtue, Evolution of. Factor of will ignored, i. 355. Spirit and Spiritual, Use of the words " Nature " and " Natural " as op- posed to, i. 39. Sponge, An unconscious association of individuals, i. 247 ; ii. 180. Sports, i. 114, 158, 215. State. Art, Necessity for State Intervention in some fields of art, ii. 377. Family and the State, Differences between, i. 225. Ofiicial and State, Objections to Socialism suggested by the terms, ii. 263. Relation of an individual to the State, Inconsistency of action in, ii. 197. State Orders. Dividend Coupon and State Order, Difference between, ii. 402, note. Transferable Order on public stores, expressed in money, ii. 396. Steel Trust, History of, ii. 540. Stimulus to exertion insufficient, Objection to Collectivism, discussed, ii. 365. Strikes. Character, Change in. Royal Labour Commission Report, ii. 144. Nufnber of, per annum, ii. 144. Sugar Trust. Competition, Influence in keeping prices reasonable, ii. 550. History of, showing evil of over-production, ii. 540. Suggestion, Power of, ii. 194, 345, 368. Summary of Arguments presented in vols. i. and ii., ii. 433. Survival of the Fittest. (See Pkedatort System.) 602 INDEX Sweating System, ii. 145, 486. Syphilis, i. 98. 'yAMMANY HAIjIj, Overthrow of, in the New York Elections of 1893, i. 152, note; ii. 165. Teleological View of Government, ii. 529. Temperament, i. 76, ttote. Templars, Order of, ii. 99. Theseus, Political Reforms attributed. to, i. 191. Thorndike's, Dr., Experiments on reasoning power in Animals, i. 166. Time, Element of, in Natural and in Human Evolution, i. 157, 169. Adaptation of Animal Organisms to new environments. Experi- ments, i. 158. Homology between the character of change adopted in the Dal- linger Experiments and the character of change in the political organism. Alternating ascendency of Liberal and Conserva- tive Parties in England, i. 162. Human institutions cannot profitably develop faster than individual character, i. 169. Individualism and Collectivism, Alternative adoption of, ii. 4, 14. Mind of Man differing from that of Animals in rapidity of adapta- tion to changes of intellectual environment. Dr. Thorndike's Experiments, i. 166. Towns, Struggles for self-government in the 11th and succeeding Cen- turies, ii. 61, 72, 100. Trade. Competition. (See that title.) Falsehood of statement and fact induced by Competition, ii. 134. Foreign Merchants, Harassing restrictions in the Middle Ages, ii. 101. Foreign Trade. Collectivist Community, Foreign Trade in, ii. 337. Over-production stimulating search for foreign markets, ii. 129, 131, 149,159, 231. Industrial Commission Eeport, ii. 542, note. Militarism yielding to Industrialism, Influence of the Crusades, ii. 73, 100. Trade Combinations. Alliances, Combination of Workmen and Employers, ii. 150, 151, 161, 215, 216, note, 554. Employers, ii. 214. France, Associations of Employers and Employees, ii. 553. Guilds. (See that title.) IMajor and Minor Arts, Combination of Workingmen in Italy, ii. 100. Trade Unions. Act of 1799 forbidding Combinations of Workingmen, ii. 211. Administration, Development of, ii. 315. I INDEX 603 Trade Unions (continued). Appreuticesbip Question, ii. 138. Boy Labour, Attempted Restriction, ii. 140. " Complacency " and " Contempt," Spirit of, engendered by Trade Unionism, ii. 319. Confidence of Workmen shaken by the result of the Engineers' Strike in 1897-98, Alternative of Politics, ii. 523. Legal Position, Power to use the Law Courts to discipline others without possibility of attack in return, ii. 211. Limitations, ii. 148. Political Errors corrected in Members, ii. 316. Power of compelling membership and of controlling actions of non- members, ii. 211. Eight to a Trade, Problems arising from conflicting claims, Case of Shipwrights and Joiners, ii. 141. Service rendered by Trade Unions, ii. 137. Social Lessons taught to members, ii. 317. Sweating : An unsolved problem, ii. 145. Unemployed : An unsolved problem, ii. 148. Wages. Common Rule, a universally applied rate of, ii. 142. Eoreign Competition limiting efforts to raise, ii. 136. Members of Trade Unions consenting to reduction of wages in order to raise the general level, ii. 317. Women, Attempted restriction of labour, ii. 140. Work, Restriction of, under the common rule of wages. Specimen by- laws, ii. 142. Transmutation, Lamarck Theory, i. 58-64. Tribe, Development of, i. 79, 84, 108. Truce of God, ii. 78. Trusts. Administration of, by the State. Hypothetical development of Collectivism in the United States, ii. 394. Impossibility of Government Control, Anti-Trust legislation compelling Trusts to become more powerful, ii. 559. Competition. Elimination or Diminution of, ii. 161, 548. Influence of, forcing Trusts to keep prices reasonable, ii. 547, 550. Economic Advantages of, Evidence taken by the Industrial Commis- sion, i. 535. Economy resulting from Distribution. Cross-Freights, Freedom from, i. 545. " Getting the Market," Economy effected by dispensing with advertising and commercial travellers, ii. 275, 546. 604 INDEX Trusts (continued). Production. Time saved by Manufacturing only one dimension, ii. 545. Working Factories at Maximum EfBciency, ii. 544. Extent to •which combination prevails in a country is a direct measure of its intelligence and art, ii. 555. International Eelations, Effect on, Danger of eliminating interna- tional competition, ii. 555. Over-production the principal cause of, ii. 536, 537. Prices, Effect on, ii. 549, 550. Summary, ii. 553. Types of Men, Definition of Noble and Base Types, ii. 446. T TLPIAN, Definition of Law of Nature, i. 20. Unemployed. Trade Unions unable to solve the problem of the unemployed, ii. 148. Vagabondage laws enacted in the early part of the 16th cen- tury, ii. 108. United States. Collectivism, Hypothetical Development, ii. 387. Advance from Partial Collectivism to Collectivism Proper, ii. 401. Corruption, Elimination of, by substituting Labour Cheques for Coin as Medium of Exchange, ii. 419. Currency, ii. 416. Voluntary Labour Cheques, ii. 410. Domestic Service, Question of, ii. 424. Exchange Value of Commodities, Determination of, expressed in Labour Cheques, ii. 402. Land, Ownership of, ii. 420. Limits of State and Individual Enterprise, ii. 412. Municipal Ownership and Administration, Extension of, ii. 389. National Ownership and Administration, Extension of, ii. 393. Occupation, Choice of, ii. 405. Pauperism, Prostitution, and Crime, Treatment of, Farm Colo- nies, ii. 399. Present Political Conditions, ii. 387. Public Stores, ii. 395. Corruption resulting from the alliance between business and politics, ii. 162, 167. Department Stores, ii. 396, note. England and the United States. Impossibility of adapting a single CoUectivist programme to both countries, ii. 511. Trade Competition, ii. 149. INDEX 605 United States {continued). Europe and fche United States, Eelative preparedness for Collectivism, ii. 1, 384. New York. (See that title.) Over-production and the necessity for foreign markets, Mr. J. E. Proctor on, ii. 159. Philippines, Annexation of, Demand for new markets, ii. 131, 159. Presidential Campaii^n of 1896 as an illustration of conflict between an unwealthy majority and a wealthy minority, i. 251 note; ii. 522. Vested Interests, Protection of, ii. 509. TTnselflshness created by the force of a concentrating idea, ii. 28. Unskilled Labour, Performance of, in a Collectivist State, ii. 298, 301. "YTAGABONDAGE, Penal laws enacted in the early part of the 16th century, ii. 108. Variability of Offspring. Artificial Selection tending to diminish Variability, i. 147. Collectivism, Effect of, would not be such as to limit the activities of men, ii. 327. Current account of, i. 114, Darwinian Theory, i. 59. Education, Free Education creating an environment favourable to progressive types, i. 221. Equalisation of Men, Variability an insurmountable barrier, i. 308, Industrial System as a method of securing variation, i. 221. Lamarckian hypothesis, i. 115. Methods by which the operation of variability can be consciously affected, i. 219. Moral qualities in Man, Development of, Apparent gap in Variability, i. 115. "Sports," i. 114,158, 215, Strength of Variability in spite of man substituting Artificial for Natural Selection, i. 138. Vegetarianism an example of the exaggerated demands of sentiment, i, 321. Vested interests, Compensation for disturbance. Capricious action of the British Parliament, ii, 508, and note. United States Constitution, Clause protecting vested interests, ii. 509. "Villages," free from labour regulation. Rise of, ii. 109. Vine, Sir J. R. S., on Municipal Government in England, i. 259. Virtue. Animals, Qualities corresponding to virtue in man develop out of social relations, i. 345 ; ii. 494, Classification of Virtues, i. 350. 606 INDEX Virtue (continued). Conditious to which Virtue is subject, i. 348. Conduct, Virtues complicated by problems of conduct, i. 351. Conscience, Habits of heart or mind distinguishing social qualities of man from those of animals, ii. 496, 497. Definition, i. 347. Aristotle's Definition, ii. 496. Effort. Effort an essential factor, i. 355, 356. Man's social qualities distinguished from those of animals, i. 495. Evolution of, i. 344 ; ii. 238. Justice regarded as a virtue, i. 342, 350, 359. Problems of conduct complicating the virtue of justice, i. 352. Voluntary Labour ChecLues, ii. 332, 335, 410, 417, 419. "lY-A-G-ES. Common rule. Trade Union plan, ii. 142. Competition by tending to lower prices tends to lower wages, ii. 113, note, 135. Possibility of improving condition of workingmen under exist- ing industrial system, Hypothetical illustration, ii. 113, 116, 125. Women, Eednction of wages resulting in prostitution, ii. 135. Increase in, without compelling higher prices, ii. 113, iiote, 136, )iote. Trade Unionists consenting to reduction of wages in order to raise the general level, ii. 317. Trade Unions, Efforts to raise wages limited by foreign competition, ii. 136. Women, Hindrance to maintenance of high wages, ii. 141, 145. "Wales, South, Coal Field, Trade Union Dictation to Workers, ii. 212. War. Modern Warfare, Modification of Natural Selection, i. 103. National Morality, War as a test, i. 144. Natural Selection by, i. 81, 103, 143. Over-production causing, owing to the necessity for creating new markets, ii. 158. Private warfare, llestrictions on, in the Uth century, ii. 78. Waste Products. Food Products, Disposal of, ii. 154. Manufacture of. Economy resulting from, ii. 543. Wealth. Ability, character of the ability capable of profiting by the opportu- nities of wealth, ii. 98. Church, corrupting influence of wealth, ii. 99. Collectivism not involving any diminution of, ii. 374. IXDEX ' 607 "Wealth {continued). Crusades, Influence of, ii. 73, 100. Democratising factor, Social classification on a wealth basis, i. 194, 197; ii. 97. Effect of, on type, ii. 521. Education, 1. 154. Example, i. 152, 155. Marriage, i. 130, 150. Inequality of men. Wealth as a cause of, i. 251, 314 ; ii. 520. United States Presidential Campaign of 1896, i. 251, note; ii. 522. Injustice of the present system, Rich men as helpless as poor, ii. Ill, 486. Marriage, Operation of Wealth on Marriage and on the type pro- duced, i. 130, 150. Means and Ends, Tendency to confuse with one another and to regard wealth as an end in itself, ii. 449. Morality of Compensation, ii. 475. Needs created by, Millionaire driven to the task of accumulation, ii. 232. Use of the word " Wealth " to include consideration and political power, i. 223. Weasel pursuing Rabbit, Characteristics of carnivora and herbivora, i. 76. Webb, Mr. and Mrs. S. Factory legislation varying in effectiveness according to trade union expenditure, ii. 507. Spirit of " self-complacency " and " contempt " pervading certain sec- tions of Trade Unionism, ii. 318. Weismann and Cope-Osborn Schools, Issue between, on the subject of Evolution, i. 60. Whiskey Trust, ii. 541. Inability to maintain extortionate prices, ii. 551. " Will " in Man and " Instinct " in Animals, Difference between, i. 346. Wisdom. Definition of, for the purpose of Political discussion, i. 318. Substituting, for the word " expediency " in reference to Legislation, i. 318. Wolves, Temporary association for the purpose of securing food, ii. 179, 181. Woman Suffi-age, Possibility of, in a Collectivist State, ii. 325, note. Women, Chivalry. Love of Woman substituted for the Love of God, ii. 81. R6le of Woman enhanced by Chivalry, ii. 84. Collectivism, Advantages to be derived from, ii. 340. Restriction of Labour, attempted, ii. 140. 608 INDEX ■Women (continued). Wages. Hindrances to maintenance of high wages, ii. 141, 145. Eeduction of, resulting in prostitution, ii. 135. Wood Veddahs of Ceylon, ii. 217. Wordsworth's Nature Worship and False Poetic Sentiment, i. 40. Work. (See titles Collectivism and Labour.) 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