iJif-^w^iW,
 
 ^r^fe^^l 
 
 ***:^!

 
 Muiual Banking. 
 
 SHOWING THE 
 
 iRadical iDcficiei)cy 
 
 OF THE 
 
 PRESENT CIRCULATINCt MEDIUM 
 
 AND THE ADVANTAGES OF 
 
 B^ Free Carfci)cy. 
 
 BY 
 
 WILLIAM B. GREENE. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY THE ANTI-INTEREST LEAGUE.
 
 SRLF 
 
 URL M^ 
 
 EDITOR'S PREFACE. 
 
 The payment of interest lias been opposed by great thinkers in all 
 ages. Philosophers have demonstrated that it has no reason for being. 
 Ethical writers have shown that justice does not countenance it. Econ- 
 omists have proved it an unnecessary evil. Among its greatest oppo- 
 nents we find Aristotle, Berkeley and Proudhon. These three mighty 
 thinkers, though living at different times and in different countries, 
 neither using the same methods of research, or making deductions from 
 the same data, yet, from their various standpoints, reached the conclu- 
 sion that interest is neither wise, just or necessary. Not all the argu- 
 ments which any one of these writers employs are used, or would be ac- 
 cepted by either of the others, but to a considerable extent the three 
 reason -identically, so that we find Berkeley, the Christian, agreeing 
 with the Pagan, Aristotle, and confirmed by Proudhon, the Rationalist. 
 Of this trio, however, Proudhon alone pointed out that interest could be 
 made to disappear, not by curtailing individual liberty, but only by ex- 
 tending it. 
 
 In the main the author of this work follows in Proudhon's path, de- 
 parting from it in some important particulars, but in general only so 
 modifying his master's work in finance, both critical and constructive, 
 as to make it applicable to the monetary system and economic methods 
 prevailing in the United States. His assault is upon the system of state 
 banks that was in existence when he wrote (nearly half a century ago), 
 and the system of mutual banks by which he proposed to replace it is 
 an adjustment to American routine of the essential principles embodied 
 in Proudhon's "Bank of the People." The reader will have little diffi- 
 culty in readjusting the arguments to the new conditions resulting from 
 the displacement of the state batiks by the national banks. 
 
 Analytical examination of Greene's work will show that it is written 
 in elucidation and illumination of the discovery that, considered as a 
 whole, interest payment, as it exists in modern times, is not wliat it is 
 professed to be, the price paid for the use of borrowed capital, Ijut the 
 premium paid for the insurance of credit. Paying interest is generally 
 accepted as equitable because it is looked upon as a reimbursement of 
 the holder of capital for foregoing the advantage of using his capital 
 himself. Though the so-called borrower really needs capital, and ulti- 
 uKitely gets it as a result of the transaction between himself and the 
 so-called lender, this tiansaction is really not one of borrowing and 
 lending, but simply a temporary exchange of well-known credit for 
 credit less well known, but equally good, and the interest paid is the 
 price of the insurance which the latter credit receives through the ex- 
 change. This, under a system of free competition in banking, would 
 fall to cost, or less than 1 per cent per annum. It is now maintained at 
 varying rates, averaging 5 or 6 per cent by giving a monopoly of this ex- 
 change of credits to banks, which, in addition to the perfectly sufficient 
 insurance afforded by the centralization of their customers' cnMlit, 
 furnish a supposed extra security by pledging, in a prescribed form. 
 
 2V^^'^A^^
 
 IV. MUTUAL BxVNKING. 
 
 capital belonging to themselves, thus enabling these banks to offer a 
 pretext for charging an exorbitant premium, the power to exact which 
 depends in reality solely upon this monopoly. This book aims at the 
 destruction of their monopoly by allowing perfect freedom in banking, 
 giving to all credit instruments the liberty of such circulation as they 
 can command upon their merits, and thereby enabling producers to 
 monetize their credit directly and at cost, instead of through the media- 
 tion of a prescribed and privileged commodity and at an exorbitant 
 price, as well as to increase the circulating power of their credit by 
 methods of organization and insurance similar to that which the author 
 proposes under the name of mutual banking. 
 
 Tlie long-standing feud between the hard-money advocates and the 
 fiatists has been possible only because each has persisted in looking at 
 only one side of the shield. The former demand a safe currency; the 
 latter desire the benefits of paper money, and each party ignores the 
 other's arguments. This feud the author brings to an end, by proposing 
 a paper currency secured by real property, thus combining the safety of 
 coin with the advantages of paper, and eliminating the evils of botli. 
 Whenever a theory of financial reform is broached that involves tlie issue 
 of paper money, the failures of paper money experiments in the past are 
 brought up as a warning. But the experiments that failed after a fair 
 trial were characterized by one or more of three features which almost 
 inevitably bring disaster, and whicli mutual banking excludes: 
 
 1. The issue of money by a government, or under an exclusive priv- 
 ilege granted by one. 
 
 2. The legal tender privilege. 
 
 3. Redemption on demand. 
 
 When the power to issue money is confined to privileged banks, the 
 control of the volume of currency and the rate of interest resides in a 
 cabal, which will .sooner or later use its power to drive producers into 
 bankruptcy. When the power to issue money is confined to government 
 itself, losses ultimately ruinous will be suffered through maladministra- 
 tion by incompetence, or by fniud, two factors whose oi)er:it ions, in com- 
 bination or in alternation, constitute the history of almost all govern- 
 mental undertakings. 
 
 The legal tender privilege adds no virtue to good money, and re- 
 moves the only effective cure for bad money— the right to reject it. To 
 force bad money on people is as surely disastrous as to force bad food on 
 tliem. But to dwell at U-rigtli on this point and on tlie redemption of 
 notes on demand would anticipate the author's argument. 
 
 Within the last three years all the political parties have sliown ten- 
 dencies toward the ideas advocated in tlie following pages. The Popu- 
 lists, in the "sub-treasury plan," have adopti'd the author's economic 
 theory that money sliould be based on real wealth. The Democrats, in 
 professing to favor the repeal of the 10 per cent tax, incline to his polit- 
 ical theory that tliere should be no restrictions on banks of issue. Mr. 
 Hepburn, who was comptroller of the currency under President Harri- 
 son, is the author of the "Baltimore Plan," which provides for the I.ssuo 
 of money based on the nninipaircd capital of national banks. This plan 
 has been received with niucli favor by many Ki-|)ubllcans. Tin; Popu- 
 lists fall short in not allowing all forms of property to serve as a basis of 
 currenc-y. The Democrats, in not demanding the removal of state re- 
 strictions as well as federal, and in not enforcing their demand when 
 they have the power; and Mr. Hepburn In not placing the unimpaired
 
 EDITOR'S PREFACE. V. 
 
 capital of the bank's customers on an equality witli tliat of tlie bank 
 itself. 
 
 All these theories are in opposition to the orthodox economy; the 
 first denies that interest cannot be lowered by changes in the currency, 
 the second denies monopoly, and the third denies the necessity of a 
 metallic basis. 
 
 It is gratifying to observe these tendencies, and in the hope that they 
 
 may soon become more marked, and to help carry them to tiieir logical 
 
 conclusion, this work is republished. 
 
 HENRY COHEN. 
 Denver, Colo., December 1, 1895.
 
 MUTUAL BARKIEIG. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE USCRY LAWS. 
 
 All vsury laws appear to be arbitrary and uujust. Rent 
 paid for the use of all lands and houses is freely determined in the 
 contract betv.een the landlord and tenant: freight is settled by the 
 contract between the shipowner, and the person hiring of hjm; 
 profit is determined in the contract of purchase and sale. But, when 
 we come to interest on money, principles suddenly change: here 
 the government intervenes and says to the capitalist, "You shall in 
 no case take more than 6 per cent interest on the amount of prin- 
 cipal you loan. If competition among capitalists brings down the 
 rate of interest to 3, 2, or 1 per cent, you have no remedy; but if. on 
 the other hand, competition among borrowers forces that rate up 
 to 7, 8 or 9 per cent, you are prohibited, under severe penalties, from 
 taking any advantage of the rise." Where is the morality of this 
 restriction? So long as the competition of the market is permitted 
 to operate without legislative interference, the charge for the use 
 of capital in all or any of its forms will be properly determined by 
 the contracts between capitalists and the persons with whom they 
 deal. If the capitalist charges too much, the borrower obtains 
 money at the proper rate from some other person; if the borrower 
 is unreasonable, the capitalist refuses to part with his money. If 
 lands, houses, bridges, canals, boats, wagons, are abundant in pro- 
 portion to the demand for them, the charge for the use of them will 
 be proportionally low; if they are scarce, it will be proportionally 
 high. Upon what ground can you justify the legislature in making 
 laws to restrict a particular class of capitalists, depriving them in- 
 vidiously of the benefit which they would naturally derive from a 
 system of unrestricted competition? If a man owns a sum of 
 money, he must not lend it for more than 6 per cent interest, but he 
 may buy houses, ships, lands, wagons, with it, and these he may 
 freely let out at 50 per cent, if ho can lind any person willing to pay 
 at that rate. Is not the distinction drawn by the legislature arbi- 
 trary, and therefore unjust? A man wishes to obtain certain lands, 
 
 *Tliis work is a compilation of a series of newspaper articles, hence 
 they are sonu'what disconnected, and an occasional repetition will be 
 found.— Editor.
 
 8 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 wagons, etc., and applies to j'ou for money to buy them with; you 
 can lend the money for 6 per cent interest, and no more; but you 
 can purchase the articles the man desires, and let them out to him 
 at any rate of remuneration upon which you mutually agree. 
 Every sound argument in favor of the intervention of the legisla- 
 ture to fix by law the charge for the use of money bears with equal 
 force in favor of legislative intervention to fix by law the rent of 
 lands and houses, the freight of ships, the hire of horses and car- 
 riages, or the profit on merchandise sold. Legislative interference, 
 fixing the rate of interest by law, appears, therefore, to be both im- 
 politic and unjust. 
 
 EFFECT OF THE REPEAT. OF THE USURY LAWS. 
 
 But let logic have her perfect work. Suppose the usury laws 
 were repealed today, would justice prevail tomorrow? By no 
 means. The government says to yon: "I leave you and your 
 neighbor to compete with each other; fight out your battles 
 between yourselves; I will have nothing more to do with your quar- 
 rels." You act upon this hint of the legislature: yon enter into 
 competition with your neighbor. But you find the government has 
 lied to you; you find the legislature has no intention of letting you 
 and your neighbor settle your quarrels between yourselves. Far 
 from it; when the struggle attains its height, behold! the govern- 
 ment quietly steps up to your antagonist, and furnishes him with a 
 bowie knife and a revolver. IIow can you, an unarmed man, con- 
 tend with one to whom the legislature sees fit to furnisli bowie 
 knives and revolvers? In fact, you enter the market with your 
 silver dollar, while another man enters the market with his silver 
 dollar. Your dollar is a plain silver dollar, nothing more or noth- 
 ing less; but his dollar is something very different, for, by permission 
 of the legislature, he can issue bank-l)ills to the amount of ILS.^ 
 and loan money to the extent of double his or your capital. You tel 
 your customer that you can afford to lend your dollar, if he wil 
 return it after a cei'tain time, with four cents for the use of it, but 
 that you cannot h^nd it for anything less. Your neighbor comea 
 between you and your customer, and says to him, "I can do better 
 by you than that. Don't take his dollar on any such terms, for I 
 will lend you a dollar and charge you only three cents for the use 
 of it." Thus he gets your customer away from you; the worst of 
 It is that he still retains another dollar to seduce away the next 
 customer to whom you apply. Nay, more, when he has loaned out 
 his two dollars, he still has 25 cents in specie in his pocket to fall 
 back u[)on and ciirry t(i Texas in case of accident, while you, if you 
 succeed in lending your dollar, must go without money till your 
 debtor pays it back. Yet you and he entered the market, each with 
 a silver flollar; how is it that he thus obtains the advantage over 
 you in every transaction? Th<? h.v.nki.no i'iuvileoe which the gov- 
 ernment has given him, is a murderous weapon against which you 
 cannot contend.
 
 THE USURY LAWS. 
 
 THE USURY LAWS ARE NECESSARY UNDER PRESENT CIRCUMSTANCES. 
 
 A just balance and just weights! Very well; but if we have an 
 unjust balance, is it not necessary that the weights should be un- 
 just also? A just balance and unjust weights give false measure, 
 and just weights with an unjust balance give false measure in like 
 manner, but an unjust balance and unjust weights* may be so ad- 
 JUST-ed as to give true measure. Under our present system, the 
 lender who is not connected with the banks may be oppressed, but 
 the usury laws (unjust as they are when considered without rela- 
 tion to the false system under which we live) afford some protec- 
 tion, at least to the borrower. They are the unjust weights, which, 
 to a certain extent, justify the false balance. It would be well to 
 have a just balance and just weights; that is, it would be well to re- 
 peal the usury laws, and to abolish, not only the banking privilege, 
 but also, as we shall proceed to show, the exclusively specie basis of 
 the currency; but it will not do to put new wine into old bottles, nor 
 to mend old garments with new cloth. When the bank lends two do\- 
 lars, while it owns only one, it gets twice the interest it is actually 
 entitled to. Insist, if you will, upon retaining your peculiar priv- 
 ileges; but consent in the name of moderation and justice, to let me 
 protect myself by the usury laws; for they are not very severe 
 against you after all. The usury laws confine you to 6 per cent in- 
 terest on whatever you loan, but, as the banking laws enable you 
 to loan twice as much as you actually possess, you obtain 12 per 
 cent interest on all the capital you really own. You cannot com- 
 plain that in your case the usury laws violate, and without due 
 compensation, the right of property; for you only own one dollar, 
 and yet receive interest and transact business, as though you owned 
 two dollars. The usury laws are necessary, not to interfere in your 
 right to your own property, but to limit you in the abuse of the un- 
 just and exclusive privileges granted you by the legislature. The 
 antagonism between the usury and the banking laws is like the 
 division of Satan against Satan; and, through their internal con- 
 flict and opposition, the modern Hebrew kingdom may one day be 
 brought to destruction. 
 
 ARGUMENT IN FAVOR OF THE REPEAL OF THE USURY LAWS. 
 
 But let US now examine the great argument in favor of the 
 immediate repeal of the usury laws— an argument which, according 
 to those who adduce it, is in every way unanswerable. It is saidthat 
 all the above considerations, though important and certainly to the 
 point, ought to have very little weight in our minds, and that for 
 the following reason: Men do, notwithstanding the present laws, 
 take exorbitant interest; and whatever usury laws may be passed, 
 they will continue so to do. If it be acknowledged that it is wrong 
 to take too high interest, that acknowledgement will not help the 
 
 *Take the steelyard for example.
 
 10 MUTUAL BA^^KING. 
 
 matter, for, though we acknowledge the wrong, we are impotent to 
 prevent it. The usury laws merely add a new evil to one that was 
 bad enough when it was alone. Without a usury law, men will 
 take too high interest; for they have the power to do it as credit is 
 now organized, and no legislation can prevent them; with a usury 
 law they will continue to take unjust interest, and will have re- 
 course to expedients of questionable morality to evade the law. If 
 the taking of too high interest be an evil, is it not still a greater 
 evil for the community to demoralize itself by evading the laws; to 
 demoralize itself by allowing individuals to have recourse to sub- 
 terranean methods to accomplish an end they are determined to ac- 
 complish at all events — an end which they cannot accomplish in the 
 light of day, because of the terror of the law? Thus argue the ad- 
 vocates of immediate repeal, and with much show of reason. There 
 are a hundred ways in which the usury laws may be evaded. 
 
 POWER OF CAPITAL IN THE COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS. 
 
 We think few persons are aware of the power of capital in this 
 Commonwealth. According to a pamphlet quoted by Mr. Kellogg, 
 containing a list of the wealthy men of Boston, and an estimate of 
 the value of their property, there are 224 individuals in this city who 
 are worth, in the aggregate, ?71,85.").0(X); the average wealth of 
 these individuals would be 8331,781. In this book, no estimate 
 is made of the wealth of any individual whose property is supposed 
 to amount to less than S^KKJ.CKX). Let us be moderate in our estim- 
 ates, and suppose that there are, in all the towns and counties in 
 the state, (including Boston), 3,000 other individuals who are worth 
 $30,000 each, their aggregate wealth would amount to S<tO.O()0.()00. 
 Add to this the $71,85.).U00 owned by the 3~'4 men, and we have SlGl,- 
 8.55,000. These estimates are more or less incorrect, but they give 
 the nearest approximation to the truth that we can obtain at the 
 present time. The assessors' valuation of the property in the Stale 
 of Massachusetts in 1840* was «2!»'.».880,338. We find, therefore, by 
 the above estimates, that 3.:ii.'4 individuals own more tlian half of 
 all the property in the State. If we suppose each of these 3,~:.'4 per- 
 sons to be the head of a family of live persons, we shall have in all 
 ir).l:.'0 individuals. In 1S40 thi- State contained a population of 737,- 
 7CXJ. Thus 1(),1:.'0 persons own more property than the remaining 
 721, .580; that is, three persons out of every hundred own more prop- 
 erly than the remaining ninety-seven. To be certain that we are 
 wirhin the truth, let us say that six out of every hundred own more 
 pro|>erty than the remaining ninety-four. These wealthy persons 
 are connected with each other, for th<^ banks are the organization 
 of their mutual relation, and we think, liuman naturi>, being wiiat it 
 is, that their weight would be brought to bear still more powerfully 
 
 •This was written before the valuation for Ik.50 was taken. As the 
 the f|uestion Is one (if prinfiplcs ratlier than of figures, we have not con- 
 ceived It necessary to rewrilo tin; paragriipli.
 
 THE USURY LAWS. 11 
 
 upon the community if the usury laws were repealed. These per- 
 sons might easily obtain complete control over the banks. They 
 might easily so arrange matters as to allow very little money to be 
 loaned by the banks to any but themselves, and thus they would 
 obtain the power over the money market which a monopoly always 
 gives to those who wield It— that is, they would be able to ask and 
 to obtain pretty much what interest they pleased for their money. 
 Then there would be no remedy; the indignation of the community 
 would be of no avail. What good would it do you to be indig- 
 nant? You would go indignantly, and pay exorbitant interest, 
 because you would be hard pushed for money. You would get no 
 money at the bank, because it would be all taken up by the heavy 
 capitalists who control those institutions, or by their friends. 
 These would all get money at 6 per cent interest or less, and they 
 would get from you precisely that interest which your necessities 
 might enable them to exact. The usury laws furnish you with 
 some remedy for these evils; for, under those laws, the power of 
 demanding and obtaining illegal interest will be possible only 
 so long as public opinion sees fit to sanction evasions of the statute. 
 As long as the weight of the system is not intolerable to the com- 
 munity, every thing will move quietly; but as soon as the burden of 
 illegal interest becomes intolerable, the laws will be put in force in 
 obedience to the demand of the public, and the evil will be abated 
 to a certain extent. We confess that it is hard for the borrower 
 to be obliged to pay the broker, to pay also for the wear and tear of 
 the lender's conscience, but we think it would be worse for him if a 
 few lenders should obtain a monopoly of the market. And when 
 the usury laws are repealed, what earthly power will exist capable 
 of preventing them from exercising this monopoly? But liere an in- 
 teresting question presents itself: '"What is the limit of the power 
 of the lender over the borrower? 
 
 ACTUAL VALUE AND LEGAL VALUE. 
 
 Let us first explain thedifference between legal value and actual 
 value.* It is evident, that, if every bank-bill in the country should 
 suddenly be destroyed, no actual value would be destroyed, except 
 perhaps to the extent of the value of so much waste paper. The 
 holders of the bills would lose their money, but the banks would 
 gain the same amount, because thoy would no longer be liable to be 
 called upon to reuccMn their bills in specie. Legal value is the legal 
 claim which one man has upon property in the hands of another. 
 No matter how much legal value you destroy, you cannot by that 
 process banish a single dollar's worth of actual value, though you 
 may do a great injustice to individuals. lUit if you destroy the sil- 
 ver dollars in the banks, you indict a great loss on the community 
 for an importation of specie would have to be made to meet the exi 
 
 J » 
 
 *The reader is requested to notice this distliictioii between actual and 
 legal value, as we shall have occasion to refer to it again.
 
 12 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 gencies of the currency, and this importation would have to be paid 
 for in goods and commodities which are of actual value. When a 
 ship goes down at sea with her cargo on board, so much actual value 
 is lost. But, on the other hana, when an owner loses his ship in 
 some unfortunate speculation, so that the ownership passes from 
 his hands into the hands of some other person, there may be no loss 
 of actual value, as in the case of shipwreck, for the loss may be a 
 mere change of ownership. 
 
 The national debt of England exceeds 84.000,000,000. If there 
 were enough gold sovereigns in the world to pay this debt, and these 
 sovereigns should be laid beside each other, touching each other, 
 and in a straight line, the line thus formed would be much more 
 than long enough to furnish a belt of gold extending around the 
 earth. Yet all this debt is mere legal value. If all the obligations 
 by which this debt is held were destroyed, the holders of the debt 
 would become poorer by the amount of legal value destroyed; but 
 those who are bound by the obligations (the tax-paying people of 
 England) would gain to tlie same amount. Destroy all this legal 
 value, and England would be as rich after the destruction as it was 
 before; because no actual value would have been affected. The 
 destruction of the legal value would merely cause a vast change in 
 the ownership of property; making some classes richer, and. of 
 course, others poorer to precisely the same extent; but if you should 
 destroy actual value to. the amount of this debt you would destroy 
 about thirteen times as much actual value (machinery, houses, im- 
 provements, products, etc.) as exist at present in the state of Mas- 
 sachusetts. Tiie sudden destruction of §4,000,000.000 worth of actual 
 value would turn the British Islands into a desert. Many persons 
 are unable to account for the vitality of the English government. 
 The secret is partly as follows: The whole property of England is 
 taxed yearly, say three per cent, to pay the interest of the public 
 debt. The amount raised for this purpose is paid over to those who 
 own the obligations which constitute this legal value. The people 
 of England are thus divided into classes, one class is taxed and pays 
 the interest on tlie debt, the other class receives the interest and 
 lives upon it. The class which receives the interest knows very 
 well that a revolution would be followed by either a repudiation of 
 the national debt, or its immediate payment by means of a ruinous 
 tax on property. This class knows that the nation would bo no 
 poorer if the debt were repudiated or paid. It knows that a large 
 portion of tin; people Inok upon the debt as being the result of aris- 
 tocratic obstinacy in carrying on aristocratic wars for the accom- 
 plishment of aristocratic purposes. When, therefore, the govern- 
 ment wants votes, it looks to this privileged class; wher) it wants 
 orators and writers, it looks to this same class; when it wants spe- 
 cial constables to put down insurrection, it applies to this same 
 class. The people of England pay yearly *l:-'0.(K»0.000 (the interest 
 of the debt) to strengthen the hands of a conservative class, whose
 
 THE USURY LAWS. 13 
 
 function it is to prevent all change, and therefore all improvement 
 in the condition of the empire. The owners of the public debt, the 
 pensioners, the holders of sinecure offices, the nobility, and the 
 functionaries of the Established Church, are the Spartans who 
 rule over the English Laconians, Helots, and Slaves. When such 
 powerful support is enlisted in favor of an iniquitous social order, 
 there is very little prospect left of any amelioration in the condition 
 of the people. 
 
 THE MATTER BROUGHT NEARER HOME. 
 
 But let us bring the matter nearer home. The assessors' valua- 
 tion of the property in the state of INIassachusetts in 1790 was §44,- 
 024,349. In 1840 it was 8299,880,33a The increase, therefore, during 
 fifty years, was $255,855,989. This is the increase of actual value. 
 If, now, the §44,024,349 which the state possessed in 1790 had been 
 owned by a class, and had been loaned to the community on six 
 mouths' notes, regularly renewed, at six per cent interest per an- 
 num, and the interest, as it fell due, had itself been continually put 
 out at interest on the same terms, that accumulated interest would 
 have amounted in flfty years to 8885,.524,246. This is the increase of 
 the legal value. A simple comparison will show us that the legal 
 value would have increased three times as fast as the actual value 
 has increased. 
 
 Suppose 5,000 men to own $30,000 each; suppose these men to 
 move, with their families, to some desolate place in the state, 
 where there is no opportunity for the profitable pursuit of the occu- 
 pations either of commerce, agriculture, or manufacturing. The 
 united capital of these 5,000 men would be $150,000,000. Suppose, 
 now, this capital to be safely invested in different parts of the 
 state; suppose these men to be, each of them, heads of families, 
 comprising, on an average, five persons each, this would give us, in 
 all. 25.000 individuals. A servant to each family would give us 
 5,000 persons more, and these added to the above number would 
 give us 30.000 in all. Suppose, now, that 5,000 mechanics— shoe- 
 makers, bakers, butchers, etc.— should settle with their families in 
 the neighborhood of these capitalists, in order to avail themselves 
 of their custom. Allowing five to a family, as before, we have 25,- 
 000 to add to the above number. We have, therefore, in all, a city 
 of 55,000 individuals, established in the most desolate part of the 
 state. The people in the rest of the state would have to pay to the 
 capitalists of this city six per cent on $150,000,000 every year; for 
 these capitalists have, by the sui)position, this amount out at inter- 
 est on bond and mortgage, or otherwise. The yearly interest on 
 fl50.tKK).f)(X), at six per cent, is $9.(KX),0()0. These wealthy individuals 
 may do no useful work whatever, and. nevertheless, they levy a tax 
 of $9,000,000 per annum on the industry of the state. The tax would 
 be paid in this way. Some money would be brought to tlie new 
 city, and much produce; the produce would be sold for money to
 
 14 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 the capitalists, and with the money thus obtained, added to the 
 other, the debtors would pay the interest due. The capitalists 
 would have their choice of the best the state produces, and the 
 mechanics of the city, who receive money from the capitalists, the 
 next choice. Now, how would all this be looked upon by the people 
 of the commonwealth? There would be a general rejoicing over 
 the excellent market for produce which had grown up in so unex- 
 pected a place, and the people would suppose the existence of this 
 city of financial horse- leeches to be one of the main pillars of the 
 prosperity of the state. 
 
 Each of these capitalists would receive yearly S1.800, the inter- 
 est on $30,000, on which to live. Suppose he lives on .?fKX), the half 
 of his income, and lays the other half by to portion off his children 
 as they come to marriageable age, that they may start also with 
 S30,00() capital, even as he did. This SlKX) which he lays by every 
 year would have to be invested. Themen of business, the men of 
 talent, in the state, would see it well invested for him. Some intel- 
 ligent man would discover that a new railroad, canal, or other pub- 
 lic work was needed; he would survey the ground, draw a plan of 
 the work, and make an estimate of the expenses; then ho would go 
 to this new city and interest the capitalists in the matter. The capi- 
 talists would furnish money, the people of the state would furnish 
 labor; the people would dig the dirt, hew the wood, and draw the 
 water. The intelligent man who devised the plan would receive a 
 salary for superintending the work, the people would receive day's 
 wages, and the capitalists would own the whole; for did they not 
 furnish the money that paid for the construction? Taking a scien- 
 tific view of the matter, we may suppose the capitalists not to work 
 at all; for th(! mere fact of their controlling the money would insure 
 all these results. V\'e suppose them, therefore, not to work at ail; 
 we suppose them to receive, each of them. $1,800 a year; we suppose 
 them to live on one-half of this, or SIWO, and to lay up the other 
 half for thi;ir children. We suppose new-married couples to spring 
 up, in their proper season, out of these families, and that these new 
 coup'es start, also, each with a capital of .?3(),(M)(J. We ask now. is 
 there no danger of this new city's absorbing unto itself the greater 
 portion of the wealth of the state? 
 
 'J'liere is n<i city in this commonwealth that comes fully up to 
 this kli'/d\ of li /'(tine a fit and i)arasite city ; but there is no city in the 
 state in which this ideal is not more or less completely embodied. 
 
 Suppose, when Virginia was settled in lilOT, Knglaud had sold 
 the whole territory of the United States to the first settlcMS for 
 11,000, and had taken a mortgage for this sum on the whohi i)rop- 
 erty. $1,0(K) at seven per cent per annum, on iialf-yearly notes, tl:e 
 interest collected and rcloaned as it f(^ll due, would amount, in the 
 interval between 1G()7 and 18.50, to ?10,777,21().000. All the property 
 in the IJnitfcl States, scjveral times ovisr, would not pay this debt. 
 
 If the reader is intercisted in this matter of the comparative
 
 THE USURY LAWS. 15 
 
 rate of increase of actual and legal value, let him consult the 
 treatise of Edward Kellogg on "Labor and Other Capital," where 
 he will find abundant information on all these points. 
 
 How many farmers are there who can give six per cent interest 
 and ultimately pay for a farm they have bought on credit? 
 
 THE ANSWER. 
 
 What answer, then, shall we return to the question relating to 
 the power of the lender over the borrower? We are forced to an- 
 swer, that the borrowing community is, under the existing system 
 of credit, virtually, according to appearances, in the complete 
 control of the lending community. A considerable time must elapse# 
 before this control is actually as well as virtually established, but 
 as the ship in the eddy of the mtelstrom is bound to be ultimately 
 ingulfed, so the producer of actual value (if no change is introduced 
 in the system) is bound to be brought into ultimate complete sub- 
 jection to the holder of legal value.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE CUKRENCY. 
 
 Gold and silver are peculiarly adapted to act as a circulating 
 medium. They are: 1. Admitted hy common consent to serve for 
 •that purpose. 2. They contain within themselves actual intrinsic 
 value, equivalent to the sum for which they circulate, as security 
 against the withdrawal of this consent, or of the public estimation. 
 3. They lose less by the wear and tear and by theeffect of time, than 
 almost any other commodities; and, 4. They are divisible into all 
 and any of the fractional parts into which value may be, or neces- 
 sarily is, divided. There is no occasion to notice particularly in this 
 place the many other advantages possessed by the precious metals. 
 But we must romomber that when we exchange anything for specie 
 we barter one commodity for another. By the adoption of a circu- 
 lating medium we have facilitated barter, but we have not done 
 away with it— we have not destroyed it. Specie is a valuable com- 
 modity and its adoption by society as a medium of e.xchange does 
 not destroy its character as a purchasable and salable article. 
 Let Peter own a horse; let James own a cow and a pig; let James's 
 cow and pig, taken together, be worth precisely as much as Peter's 
 horse; let Peter and James desire to make an exchange; now, what 
 shall prevent them from making the exchange by direct barter? 
 AgainI let Peter own the horse; let James own the cow; and let 
 John own the pig. Peter cannot exchange his horse for the cow, 
 because he would lose by the transaction; neither— and for the 
 samereason— can he exchange it for the pig. The division of the 
 horse would result in the destruction of its value. The hide, it is 
 true, poscsses an intrinsic value; and a dead horse makes excellent 
 manun; for a graj)evine; nevertheless, the division of a horse re- 
 sults in the destruction of its value as a living animal. But if 
 Peter barters his horse with Paul for an equivalent in wheat, what 
 shall prevent liini from so dividing his wheat as to qualify himself 
 to offer to James an equivalent for his cow and to John an equiv- 
 alent for his pig? If Peter trades thus with James and John the 
 transaction is still barter, though tin; vvhi^at .serves as currency and 
 obviates the dilTiculty in making change. Now, if Paul has gold 
 and silver to dispose of instead of wheat, the gold and silver are 
 still commodities posessing intrinsic value, and every exchange 
 which Paul makes of these for other commodities is always a 
 trati'iaction in barter. There is a great deal of mystification con- 
 nected with the ■subject of the currency; but if we remember that, 
 whi'U vvf <i'\\ a in thing for specie, we buy the specie, and that when
 
 THE CURRENCY. 17 
 
 we buy anything with specie, we sell the specie— our ideas will 
 grow wonderfully clear. 
 
 THE DISADVANTAGES OF A SPECIE CURRENCY. 
 
 The governments of the different nations have made gold and 
 silver a legal tender In the payment of debts. Does this legislation 
 change the nature of the transactions where gold and silver are 
 exchanged for other desirable commodities? Not at all. Does it 
 transform the exchange into something other than barter? By no 
 means. But the exchangeable value of any article depends upon 
 its utility, and the difficulty of obtaining it. Now, the legislatures, 
 by making the precious metals a legal tender enhance their utility 
 in a remarkable manner. It is not their absolute utility, indeed, that 
 is enhanced, but their relative utility in the transactions of trade. 
 As soon as gold and silver are adopted as the legal tender, they are 
 invested with an altogether new utility. By means of this new 
 utility, whoever monopolizes the gold and silver of any country — 
 and the currency, as we shall soon discover, is more easily monop- 
 olized than any other commodity— obtains control thenceforth,. over 
 the business of that country; for no man can pay his debts without 
 the permission of the party who monopolizes the article of legal 
 tender. Thus, since the courts recognize nothing as money in the 
 payment of debts except the article of legal tender, this party is 
 enabled to levy a tax on all transactions except such as take place 
 without the intervention of credit. 
 
 When a man is obliged to barter his commodity for money, in 
 order to have money to barter for such other commodities as he 
 may desire, he at once becomes subject to the impositions which 
 moneyed men know how to practice on one who wants and must 
 have money for the commodity he offers for sale. When a man is 
 called upon suddenly to raise money to pay a debt, the case is still 
 harder. Men whose property far exceeds the amount of their debts 
 in value— men who have much more owing to thom than they owe 
 to others— are daily distressed for the want of money; for the want 
 of that intervening medium, which, even when it is obtained in 
 sufficient quantity for the present purposes, acts only as a mere in- 
 strument of exchange. 
 
 By adopting the precious metals as the legal tender in the pay- 
 ment of debts, society confers a new value upon them, which new 
 value is not inherent in the metals themselves. This new value 
 becomes a marketable commodity. Thus gold and silver become 
 a marketable commodity as (groAD) a meditm of exchange. 
 This ought not so to be. This new value has no natural meastire, 
 because it is not a natural, but a social value. This new social 
 value is inestimable, it is incommensurable with any other known 
 value whatever. Thus money, instead of retaining its proper 
 relative position, becomes a superior species of commodity— super- 
 ior not in degree, but in kind. Thus money becomes the absolute
 
 18 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 king and the demigod of commodities.* Hence follow great social 
 and political evils. The medium of exchange was not established 
 for the purpose of creating a new, Inestimable, marketable commo- 
 dity, but for the single end or purpose of facilitating exchanges. 
 Society established gold and silver as an instrument to mediate be- 
 tween marketable commodities; but what new instrument shall it 
 create to mediate between the old marketable commodities, and the 
 new commodity which it has itself called into being? And if it suc- 
 ceed in creating such new instrument, what mediator can it find for 
 this new instrument itself, etc.? Here the gulf yawns! No bridge 
 save that of usury has been thrown, as yet, over this gulf. Our 
 exposition is evidently on the brink of the infinite series; we are 
 marching rapidly forward to the abyss of absurdity. The logicians 
 know well what the sudden appearance of the infinite series in an 
 investigation signifies; it signifies the recognition of a phenomenon 
 and the assigning to it of a mere concomitant, to stand to it in the 
 place of cause. The phenomenon we here recognize is circulation 
 or exchange, and we ignore its cause, for we endeavor to account 
 for it by the movement of specie; which movement is neither circu- 
 lation nor the cause of circulation. But more of this hereafter. Let 
 us return to the subject with which wc are more immediately con- 
 cerned; noting, meanwhile, that a specie currency is an absurdity. 
 
 THE EVILS OF A SPECIE CURKENCY— USURY. 
 
 Society established gold and silver as a circulating medium, in 
 order that exchanges of commodities might be facilitated; but 
 society made a mistake in so doing; for by this very act it gave to a 
 certain class of men the power of saying what exchanges shall, and 
 what exchan[,2s shall not, be facilitated by means of this very 
 circulating medium. The monopolizers of the precious metals have 
 an undue power over the community; they can say whether money 
 shall, or shall not, be permitted to exercise its legitimate functions. 
 These men have a veto on the action of money, and therefore on 
 exchanges of commodity; and they will not take o(T their veto un- 
 til they have received usury, or, as it is more politely termed, inter- 
 est on their money. Here is the great objection to the present cur- 
 rency. Behold the manner in which the absurdity inherent in a 
 specie currency— or, what is still worse, in a currency of paper 
 based upon specie— manifests itself in actual operation! The me- 
 diating value which society hoped would facilitate exclianges be- 
 comes an absolute marketable commodity, its<'lf transcending all 
 roach of mediation. Tlie great natural diiliculty which originally 
 .stood in the way of exchang(!S is now thi; privati! property of a 
 class, and this class cultivate this diiliculty, and make money out 
 of it, ev(?n as a farmer cultivates his farm and makes moiKiy by nis 
 labor. But there is a difference between the farmer and the usurer; 
 
 •Money 1^ mprfiiiiiKlIsc .just like jiny other merchandise, precisely as 
 thi' TiirMi' !•< .1 card .just, like any other card.
 
 THE CURRENCY. 19 
 
 for the farmer benefits the community as well as himself, while 
 every dollar made by the usurer Is a dollar taken from the pocket 
 of some other individual, since the usurer cultivates nothing but an 
 actual obstruction. 
 
 THE MONOPOLY OF THK CURRENCY. 
 
 The exigencies of our exposition render it necessary that we 
 should state here three distinct points, as a basis for certain re- 
 marks that we propose to submit to the reader: 
 
 1. Let us suppose, in order to make a thorough estimate of the 
 amount of money circulating in Massachusetts, that each individ- 
 ual in the state — man, woman, or child — posesses $10 in specie, or in 
 the bills of specie-paying banks. The population of the state was, 
 in the year 1850. about 1.000,000. Our estimate will give us, there- 
 fore, about $10,000,000 as the total amount of the circulating medi- 
 um of the state. This is perhaps a very extravagant supposition: 
 but we desire to make a high estimate, as the greater the amount 
 of the circulating medium, the less will be the force of our objec- 
 tions against the existing currency. Now, since children seldom 
 control any money, our hypothesis apportions to each fall-grown 
 person an average of $30 — for the children constitute at least one- 
 half of the community; and since women, who constitute one-half 
 of the grown population, generally leave their money with their 
 husbands or fathers, it apportions to each full-grown man an aver- 
 age of $40. We feel confident that the reader will confess, after 
 consulting his pocket-book, that our estimate marks as high as the 
 circumstances of the case will warrant. But to be certain that we 
 do not fall below the truth, let us double the total sum and say that 
 the amount of money circulating in Massachusetts is, on an aver- 
 age. $20.(X)0.000. This is our first point. 
 
 2. The valuation of the taxable property existing in the state 
 of Massachusetts, was, for the year IS.'SO, about $()00,000.000— or an 
 average of about $600 for every man, woman and child in the state: 
 or an average of about $2,400 for every family of four persons — no 
 contemptiiile fortune for a workingmanl Now, every person of 
 ordinary observation will recognize that this valuation is too high. 
 We are willing to confess that the wealth of the state is unjustly 
 distributed; but we are not willing to confess that the distribution 
 is of the absolutely flagrant character indicated by the valuation: 
 for if a man posessing a, more average amount of wealth, owns prop- 
 erty to the value of $()00 and a like amount in addition for his wife 
 and for each of his children, where is the immense mass of wealth 
 which the average would apportion to those who actually own loss 
 than $600; yes, to those who actually own nothing? We conceive 
 that it is not altogether impossible to penetrate the motives which 
 induced the Valuation Committee to mark the wealth of the State 
 as high as $6(K),(X)0,000. Indeed we may take occasion as we proceed 
 with our observations to indicate those motives. But let us grant.
 
 20 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 for the sake of argument, that the people of Massachusetts, taken as 
 a whole, do actually own property to the value of -S()00, 000.000. Esti- 
 mating as we have done, the total value of the circulating medium 
 at .*20.000.000, it would follow that there is one dollar of currency 
 for every thirty dollars of taxable property. This is our second 
 point. 
 
 3. If Mr. Kellogg's statements are worthy of confidence, there 
 are in the city of Boston 234 individuals who are worth, in the ag- 
 gregate. S71. 85.5,000. or property to the value of about three and 
 one-half times the amount of the whole circulating medium of the 
 commonwealth. This is our third point. 
 
 Having stated the three points upon which our reasoning is to 
 turn, we will now suppose that these individuals in Boston, or 224 
 other persons of equal wealth, residing either in Boston or in other 
 towns or cities in the state, see fit to combine together for the pur- 
 pose of bringing the whole property of the state (SGOO.000.000) into 
 their own possession. They may accomplish their object by the 
 following simple process: Let them gradually buy up desirable 
 real estate situated in various parts of the commonwealth, to the 
 value of 640.000,000— double the total amount of the circulating 
 medium. Then let them sell this real estate to different persons, 
 taking mortgages for half of its value on the property, and stipu- 
 lating that the payments on the mortgages shall be made, all of 
 them, on a certain specified day. Here is the whole story: for mark 
 the consequences! As the day for payment on the mortgages ap- 
 proaches, money will grow scarce, for the reason that the purchas- 
 ers of the real estate will be preparing themselves to meet the 
 claims upon them; money will, by consequence, rise rapidly in val- 
 ue; trade v/ill be gradually blocked up: and men of undoubted 
 wealth will be closely pressed. If — and they probably will not— but 
 IF the purchasers of the real estate actually pay their debts when 
 the day comes round, then the 224 confederates will have all the 
 money of the state in their hands. Meanwhile the other ordinary 
 debts of the comiuuiiity— debts which arise; naturally— will have to 
 be paid also; and mon<'y, the only legal tender, will be required in 
 order to effect their payment. But as no money will he obtainable, 
 the.se last debtors will fail and their property will be sold under the 
 hammer at a fraction of its true value to satisfy their creditors. But 
 who will buy this properly? Who besides the 224 confederates will 
 have any available funds? Tiiese 224 individuals, by their opera- 
 tion, notwithstanding the los.ses they will inevitably meetwilh^ 
 will thus obtain control, by means of their Mj,0<)0,0(K)— a little less 
 than one-half of their aggregate property— of the greater part of 
 the propf'rly of the state. There is no danger that so e.xtensive an 
 operation will ever lake place, for transactions like this would con- 
 vulse soci<!ty to its foundations, and would necessarily be accom- 
 panied by repudiation, revolution and bloodshed. But similar 
 operations on a smaller scale are taking place every day. It is
 
 THE CURRE^^CY. 21 
 
 stated ill the reports published by the Valuation Committee that 
 the money loaned out at interest and returned as such to the 
 assessors for the year 1850, amounted in the single county of 
 Worcester, to more than ?r).000,000— more than one-fourth of the 
 whole circulating medium of the commonwealth. What must have 
 been the consequence if all these debts had happened to fall due at 
 nearly the same time? 
 
 You cannot monopolize corn, iron and other commodities, as 
 you can money: for to do so. you would be obliged to stipulate in 
 your sales that payment shall be made to you in those commodities. 
 What a commotion would exist in the community if a company of 
 capitalists should attempt permanently to monopolize all the corn! 
 But money, by the nature of the case, since it is the oxly legal 
 TENDER, is ALWAYS monopolized. This fact is the' foundation of 
 the right of society to limit the rate of interest. 
 
 We conclude, therefore, that gold and silver do not furnish a 
 perfect medium of circulation: that they do not furnish facilities 
 for the exchange of all commodities. Gold and silver have a value 
 as money: a value which is artificial, and created unintention- 
 ally by the act of society establishing the precious metals as a 
 legal tender. This new artificial value overrides all intrinsic actu- 
 al values, and suffers no mediation between itself and them. Now, 
 money, so far forth as it is mere money, ought to have no value; 
 and the objection to the use of the precious metals as currency is, 
 that as soon as they are adopted by society as a legal tender, there is 
 superadded to their natural value this new, artificial and unnatural 
 value. Gold and silver cannot facilitate the purchase of this new 
 value which is added to themselves; "a mediator is not a mediator 
 of one." USURY is the characteristic fact of the present system 
 of civilization; and usury depends for its existence upon this super- 
 added, social, unnatural value, which is given artificially to the 
 material of the circulating medium. Destroy the value of this 
 material as money (not its utility or availability in exchange) and 
 you destroy the possibility of usury. Can this be done so long as 
 material is gold or silver? No. 
 
 Whatever is adopted as the medium of exchange should be free 
 from the above-named objections. It should serve the purpose of 
 facilitating ^\LL exchanges: it should have no value as money: it 
 should be of such a nature as to permit nothing marketable, noth- 
 ing that can be bought or sold, to transcend the sphere of its 
 mediation. It should exist in such quantity as to effect all ex- 
 changes which may be desirable. It should be co-existent in time 
 and place with such property as is destined for the market. It 
 should be sufficiently abundant and easy of acquirement, to answer 
 all the legitimate purposes of money. It should be capable of being 
 expanded to any extent that may be demanded by the wants of the 
 community: for if the currency be not suflficiently abundant, it re- 
 tards instead of facilitating exchanges. On the other hand, this
 
 22 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 medium of exchange should be sufficiently difficult of acquirement 
 to keep it within just limits. 
 
 Can a currency be devised which shall fulfill all these condi- 
 tions? Can a currency be adopted which shall keep money always 
 just plenty enough, without suffering it ever to become too plenty? 
 Can such a currency be established on a firm, scientific foundation, so 
 that we may know beforehand that it will work well from the very 
 first moment of its establishment? Can a species of money be 
 found which shall posess every quality which it is desirable that 
 money should have, while it posesses no quality which it is desir- 
 able that money should not have? To all these questions we 
 answer, emphatically, YES!
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE currency: ITS EVII.S AND THEIR REMEDY. 
 
 Bank-bills are doubly guaranteed. On one side there is the 
 capital of the bank, which is liable for the redemption of the bills 
 in circulation; on the other side are the notes of the debtors of the 
 bank, which notes are (or ought to be, if the bank officers exercise 
 due caution and discretion) a sufficient guaranty for all the bills: for 
 no bills are issued by any bank, except upon notes whereby some re- 
 sponsible person is bound to restore to the bank, after a certain 
 lapse of time, money to the amount borne on the face of the bills. 
 If the notes given by the receivers of the bills are good, then the 
 bills themselves are also good. If we reflect a moment upon these 
 facts, we shall see that a bank of discount and circulation is in 
 reality, two banks in one. There is one bank which does business 
 on the specie capital really paid in; there is another and a v-ery 
 different bank, which does business by issuing bills in exchange for 
 notes whereby the receivers of the bills give security that there 
 shall be paid back by a certain time, money to the amount of the 
 bills issued. Let us now investigate the nature of these two differ- 
 ent banks. 
 
 THE BUSINESS OF BANKING. 
 
 Peter goes into the banking business with one dollar capital, 
 and immediately issues bills to the amount of one dollar and 
 twenty-five cents. Let us say that he issues five bills, each of 
 which is to circulate for the amount of twenty-five cents. James 
 comes to the bank with four of Peter's bills, and says: "Here are 
 four of your new twenty-five cent notes which purport to be payable 
 on demand, and I will thank you to givemea silver dollar forthem." 
 Peter redeems the bills and in so doing pays out his whole capital. 
 Afterward comes John, with the fifth note, and makes a demand 
 similar to that lately made by James. Peter answers, slowly and 
 hesitatingly: "I regret— exceedingly— the force of present circum- 
 stances; but— I — just paid— out my whole capital— to James. I am 
 — under — the painful necessity — of requesting you — to wait a little 
 longer for your money." John at once becomes indignant and 
 says: "Yonr bills state on their face that you will pay twenty-five 
 cents upon each one of them whenever they are presented. I present 
 one NOW. Give me the money, therefore, without more words, for 
 my business is urgent this morning." Peter answers: "I shall be 
 in a condition to redeem my bills by the day after tomorrow; but 
 for the meanwhile, my regard for the interest of the public forces 
 me unwillingly to suspend specie payments." "Suspend specie pay- 
 ments!" says John. "What other kind of payment, under Heaven,
 
 24 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 could you suspend? You agree to pay specie; for specie is the only 
 legal tender and when you don't pay that, you don't pay anything. 
 When you don't pay that you break. Why don't you own up at 
 once? But while I am about it I will give you a piece of ray mind; 
 this extra note which you have issued beyond your capital is a vain 
 phantom, a hollow humbug and a fraud. And as for your bank, 
 you would better take in your sign; for you have broken." "These 
 be very bitter words," as said the hostess of the Boar's Head 
 Tavern at Eastcheap. 
 
 John is right. Peter's capital is all gone and the note for 
 twenty- Ave cents, which professes to represent specie in Peter's 
 vaults, represent the tangibility of an empty vision, the shadow of 
 a vacuum. But which bank is it that is broken? Is it the bank 
 that does business on a specie capital, or the bank which does 
 business on the notes of the debtors to the bank? Evidently it is 
 the bank that does business on the specie capital that is broken; it 
 is the specie- paying bank that has ceased to exist. 
 
 John understands this very well notwithstanding his violent 
 language a moment since, he knows that his is the only bill which 
 Peter has in circulation, and that Peter owes, consequently, only 
 twenty-five cents; he knows also that the bank has owing to it one 
 dollar and twenty-five cents. Peter owes twenty-tive cents and 
 has owing to him a dollar and twenty-five cents. John feels, 
 therefore, perfectly safe. What is John's security? Is it the spe- 
 cie capital? Not at all. James has taken the whole of that. He 
 has for his security the debts which are owing to the bank. Peter's 
 bank begins now to be placed in a sound, philosophical condition. 
 At first he promised to pay one dollar and twenty-tive cents in 
 specie, while he actually posessed only one dollar with which to meet 
 the demands that might be made upon him. How could he have 
 made a more unreasonable promise, even if he had tried? Now 
 that he has suspended specie payments, he has escaped from the 
 nnphilosophical situation in which he so rashly placed himself. 
 Peter's bank is still in operation— it is by no means broken; hi.s bills 
 are good, guaranteed, and worthy of considerable confidence; only 
 his bank is now a simple and not a complex bank, being no longer 
 two banks in one, for the specie-paying element has vanished in in- 
 finite darkness. 
 
 CURRKNCV. 
 
 And here we may notice that Peter has solved, after a rough 
 manner indeed, one of the most difficult questions in political 
 fcoiiomy. His bill for twenty-five cents is curkkncy, and yet it is 
 not based upon specie, iiur directly connected in any way with 
 specie. We would request the reader to be patient with us and not 
 make up his mind in regard lo our statements until he has read to 
 the end of the chapter; it shall not be very long. Light bn^aks on 
 »js here, which we would endeavor to impart to the reader. The 
 security for the bill is legal value, the security in actual value hav-
 
 THE CURRENCY: ITS EVILS— THEIR REMEDY. 25 
 
 ing been carried away by James— that is, the security for the bill is 
 the legal claim which the bank has upon the property of its debt- 
 ors. We see. therefore, that legal value may be made a basis for 
 the issue of notes to serve as currency; we see, therefore, the faint 
 indication of a means whereby we may perhaps emancipate our- 
 selves from the bondage of hard money, and the worse bondage of 
 paper which pretends to bo a represpntalive of hard money. 
 
 Let the reader not be alarmed. We abominate banks that sus- 
 pend specie payment as much as he does. The run of our argu- 
 ment leads us through this desolate valley; but we shall soon 
 emerge into the clear day. Good may come out of this dark region, 
 although we never expected to find it here. For our part, how- 
 ever, we will freely confess, in private to the reader, that we have 
 lately been so accustomed to see good come out of Nazareth that 
 we have acquired the habit of never expecting it from any other 
 quarter. Let us spend a moment, therefore, in exploring this bank- 
 ing Nazareth. 
 
 We may notice in considering a bank that has suspended specie 
 payments: 1. The bank officers, who are servants of the stock- 
 HOLDEKS; 2. The BILLS which are issued by the bank- officers, and 
 which circulate in the community as money: and, 3. The notes of 
 the debtors of the bank, binding these debtors, which notes, depos- 
 ited in the safe, are security for the bills issued. Let us now take 
 for Illustration, a non-specie-paying bank that shall be "perfect 
 after its kind;" that is a bank whose capital shall be, in actual 
 value, literally=0. Suppose there are 100 stockholders; suppose 
 flOO.OOO worth of bills to be in circulation and that ?100,000 legal 
 value is secured to the bank by notes given by the bank's debtors. 
 These stockholders will be remarkable individuals, doing business 
 after a very singular fashion. For example: The stockholders 
 own stock in this bank; but as the whole joint stock equals zero, 
 each stock-holder evidently owns only the one-hundredth part of 
 nothing — a species of property that counts much or little, according 
 to the skillfulness with which it is administored. The stockholders, 
 through the agency of the bank-officers, issue their paper, bearing 
 NO interest; exchanging it for other paper, furnished by those 
 who receive the bills, bearing interest at the r.\te of six 
 PER cent per annum. The paper received by the bank binds the 
 debtor to the bank to pay interest: while the paper issued by the 
 bank puts it under no obligation to pay any interest at all. Thus 
 the stockholders doing business with no capital whatever, make six 
 per cent per annum on a pretended .?100.0(X) of actual value which 
 does not existl Yet, meanwhile, these stockholders furnish the 
 community with an available currency: this fact ought always to 
 be borne in mind. Non-specie-paying banks, of course, make div- 
 idends. I)\iring the suspension of 1837 and 1838. all the banks of 
 Pennsylvania made dividends, although it was prohibited in the 
 charters of most of them. After the suspension which took place
 
 26 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 in Philadelphia in October, 1839, most of the banks of that city re- 
 solved not to declare dividends until the pleasure of the legislature 
 could be known. By an act authorizing the continuance of the 
 suspension until the 15th of January, 1841, permission was granted 
 to make dividends, contrary to every principle of justice and equity. 
 We do not know why we speak especially of the Pennsylvania 
 banks in this connection; as we have yet to hear of the first bank, 
 either in Pennsylvania or in any other Slate, that has had the deli- 
 cacy to suspend the declaration of dividends merely because it sus- 
 pended specie payments. 
 
 THE MUTUAL BANK. 
 
 Our non-specie-paying bank being in the interesting position 
 described, let us inquire whether it is not in the process of bringing 
 forth something which shall be entirely different from itself. We 
 ask tirst, why a non-specie-paying bank should be permitted to 
 make dividends. Its bills are perfectly good, whether the bank 
 have any capital or not, provided the officers exercise due discre- 
 tion in discounting notes; audit is evident that the stockholders 
 have no riglit to ask to be paid for the use of their capital, since the 
 capital in qui'Stion ought to be specie, wiiich tiiey confess, by sus- 
 pending specie payments, that they do not furnish. Hut if no div- 
 idends are to be declared, what are we to do with the immense 
 amount of interest-money tliat will accumulate in the bank. Our 
 answer to this question is so simple that we are almost ashamed to 
 siate it. Justice requires that all the interest-money accumulated 
 — so much only excepted as is required to pay the expenses of the 
 institution and the average of loss by bad debts — should be paid 
 back to the borrowers in the proportion of the business which they 
 have individually done with the bank. But since it would be by no 
 means easy, practically, to thus pay the extra interest-money back, 
 it would be better for the bank to turn the difficulty by lending its 
 money at i)recisely that rate of interest and no more, say one per 
 cent per annum, which would suffice to pay the expenses of the in- 
 stitution, including the average loss by bad debts. A bank of this 
 character would be a MuTu.vi. Bank. This is not the institution 
 we advocate and of which we propose to submit a plan to the 
 reader; but it will serve in this place for tlie purposes of illustra- 
 tion. A bank that suspends specie payments may present two evi- 
 dent advantages to tlie community— first, it may furnish a cur- 
 rency: second, it may loan out its bills at one per cent interest per 
 annum. Tliat such a bank may furnish currency is proved by 
 abundant experience, for suspending banks go right on with their 
 business, and that their money circulat(>s well is proved by the fact 
 that such hanks have liitherto seldom failed to declare good divi- 
 dends. That they may loan their money at one per cent interest 
 per annum is shown by the fact that the old hanks do not pay more 
 than one |)er cent per annum for their exi)enses, including losses by 
 bad debts, and that liif guaranty of the new bills consists In the
 
 THE CURRENCY: ITS EVILS— THEIR REMEDY. 27 
 
 excellence of the notes furnished by the borrower, so that, 
 if there is anything to be paid for this guaranty, it ought to 
 be paid to the borrower himself, and not to any other person. 
 We will not prolong this exposition, since a multiplicity of words 
 would serve only to darken the subject. We invite the reader to 
 reflect for himself upon the matter and to form his own conclu- 
 sions. AVe repeat that we do not advocate a bank of the nature 
 here described, since we conceive that such an institution would be 
 eminently unsafe and dangerous, and for a hundred reasons among 
 which may be counted the inordinate power that would be con- 
 ferred on the bank's oflficers; but, as we said before, it may serve 
 for illustration. Neither do we propose this plan as a theoretical 
 solution of the difficulties noticed in the preceeding chapters as 
 inseparable from the existing currency. We reserve our own plan, 
 and shall submit it to the reader at the end of the next chapter.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 In the title-page of a book on "Money and Banking,*" pub- 
 lisliod at Cincinnati, tlie name of William Beck appears, not as 
 antlior, but as publisher; yet there is internal evidence in the book 
 sufficient to prove that Mr. Beck is the author. But who was or is 
 Mr. Beck? What were his experience and history? Is he still liv- 
 ing? No one appears to know. He seems to stand like one of 
 Ossian's heroes, surrounded with clouds, solitude and mystery. In 
 the [)ages of Froudhon, socialism appears as an avenging fury, 
 clothed in garments dipped in the sulphur of the bottomless pit and 
 armed for the punishment of imbeciles, liars, scoundrels, cowards 
 and tyrants; in those of Mr. Beck, she presents herself as a con- 
 structive and beneficent genius, the rays of her heavenly glory 
 intercepted by a double veil of simplicity and modesty. Mr. Beck's 
 style has none of the infernal tire and i>rofanity which cause the 
 reader of the "Contradictions Economiques" to shudder; you seek in 
 vain in his sentences for the vigor and intense self-consciousness of 
 Proudhon; yet the thoughts of Proudhon are there. One wovild 
 suppose from the naturalness of his manner, that he was altogether 
 ignorant of the novelty and true magnitude of his ideas. 
 
 MR. beck's bank. 
 
 In Mr. Beck's plan for a Mutual Bank — which consists in a 
 simple generalization of the system of credit in account that is well 
 described in the following extract from J. Stuart Mill's "Political 
 Economy" — there isone fault only; buttliat fault is fatal; it is that 
 the people can never be induced to adopt the complicated method 
 of accounts which would be rendered necessary: 
 
 "A mode of making credit answer the purposes of moncsy, by 
 which, when carried far enough, money may be very completely su- 
 perseded, consists in making payments by checks. The custom of 
 keeping the span; cash reserved for immediate use or against con- 
 tingent demands, in the liands of a banker and making all pay- 
 ments, except small ones, by orders on bankers, is in tliis country 
 spreading to a continually larger portion of tlie |)ublic. If the i)er- 
 son making the payment and the person receiving it kept their 
 money with the same banker, the payment would take place witii- 
 out any intervention of money, by tin; mere transfer of its amount 
 
 •"Money and R.'inkiiin, or Tlielr Nature jind Effects ("onsidcriHl; To- 
 RCther With a Plan for tlie Universal nifTiisioii of Tlieir Lcj^'itimato 
 Benefits WItlioutTlieir Evils." Hy A Citizen of Oliio. Cincinnati: Pub- 
 lished by William Keck, IKJl).: Ifinio, pp.212.
 
 MUTUAL BANKING. 29 
 
 in the banker's books from the credit of the payer to that of the re- 
 ceiver. If all persons in London kept their cash at the same bank- 
 er's and made all their payments by means of checks, no money 
 would be required or used for any transactions beginning and ter- 
 minating in London. This ideal limit is almost attained in fact, so 
 far as regards transactions between dealers. It is chiefly in the re- 
 tail transactions between dealers and consumers, and in the pay- 
 ment of wages, that money or bank-notes now pass and then only 
 when the amounts are small. In London, even shop-keepers of any 
 amount of capital, or extent of business, have generally an account 
 with a banker; which, besides the safety and convenience of the 
 practice, is to their advantage in another respect, by giving them 
 an understood claim to have their bills discounted in cases where 
 they could not otherwise expect it. As for the merchants and 
 larger dealers, they habitually make all payments in the course of 
 their business, by checks. They do not, however, all deal with the 
 same banker; and when A gives a check to B, B usually pays it, not 
 into the same, but into another bank. But the convenience of busi- 
 ness has given birth to an arrangement which makes all the bank- 
 ing-houses of the City of London, for certain purposes, virtually one 
 establishment. A banker does not send the checks which are paid 
 into his banking-house to the banks on which they are drawn and 
 demand money for them. There is a building called the Clearing 
 House, to which every city banker sends each afternoon, all the 
 checks on other bankers which he has received during the day; and 
 they are there exchanged for the checks on him which have come 
 into the hands of other bankers, the balances only being paid iu 
 money. By this contrivance, all the business transactions of the 
 City of London during that day amounting often to millions of 
 pounds and a vast amount besides of country transactions, repre- 
 sented by bills which country bankers have drawn upon their Lon- 
 don correspondents, all liquidated by payments not exceeding, on 
 the average, £20(X000."— (Vol. ii., p. 47). 
 
 "Money," says Mr. Beck, "follows in the track of claim. Its 
 progress is the discharge and satisfaction of claim. The payment 
 of money is effectually the discharge of the debtor; but it is not 
 equally effectual in satisfaction of the creditor. Though it releases 
 the debtor, it still leaves the creditor to seek the real object of his 
 desire. It does not put him in possession of it, but of something 
 which enables him to obtain it. He must exchange this money by 
 purchase for the article he wants before that object is attained. In 
 payment of debts, it passes from claimant to claimant, discharging 
 and paying claims as it goes. Money follows claim; both contin- 
 ually revolving through all classics of society in repeated and per- 
 petual circles, constantly returning to their several stations, drawn 
 thither by operations of industry or of business. 
 
 "In the possession of money every one has his turn. It comes 
 to him in the shape of payment for his sales or his industry and
 
 30 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 passes from him in the shape of payment or expenditure, again to 
 return at its proper time and on a proper occasion to serve the same 
 purposes as before. 
 
 "Now, I contend that as the progress of money lies in a circular 
 route, a certain system of account may be made to supply its place, 
 where its track and extent can, in that circle, be included and dis- 
 tinguished. 
 
 '"By a CIRCLE, I mean that range of society which includes the 
 whole circulating movement of money, with the accompanying 
 causes and effects of its progress; viz, claims, debts and payments; 
 so that, if we wish to trace its path, every point of that path will be 
 contained within it. Such is the great circle of society. This con- 
 tains the whole body of debtors and the whole body of creditors. It 
 contains all the debtors to the creditors and all the creditors to 
 the debtors. All would be included in the jurisdiction of a power 
 that by any possibility could preside over the whole. Creditors are 
 sellers; debtors are buyers. But no man continually sells without 
 sometimes buying, nor does any man continually buy without some- 
 times selling. The creditor who receives money from his debtor, 
 again expends this money upon others, who thereby, in their turns, 
 become creditors and receive their money back again. All these 
 movements are within the range of the one circle of society. Now, 
 it is evident that If an account were kept by a presiding power, the 
 goods which any person receives, being of equal value, would pay 
 for those which he had previously delivered; would replace him in 
 his original assests ana cancel the obligation to him without the 
 aid of money. Hence, after the whole process, it would seem that 
 the intermediate passage and return of money were superfluous. 
 If the dealings are not directly backward and forward— that is, 
 between one creditor and his debtor and back again from the same 
 debtor to the same creditor— the effect will be the same; for as this 
 whole circle includes every creditor, every debtor and in fact every 
 individual in that society, so it contains every account to which the 
 claims of any creditor would apply, and every account to which the 
 same creditor would be indebted. The agency of the presiding 
 power would render it pro forma, the representative to every cred- 
 itor of his individual debtor; and to every debtor, the representa- 
 tive of his individual creditor. It would form a common center for 
 all claims by every creditor on his debtor. It would form the chan- 
 nel for the discharge of his debts and tli<! recei|)t of his claims. It 
 would show the state of his account with society, and the balance, 
 if in favor, would Ije available as so much cash. 
 
 "This is what is meant by a cikci.k. Such is the great circle of 
 society, the only one which is complete and perfect, and such are 
 the- advantages contained in it. 
 
 "Hence the plan I propose is adapted to this circle, to exhibit 
 the revolving track of money within it; to contain the several 
 points of its progress; and. at each of these points, to pi-rform its
 
 MUTUAL BANKING. 31 
 
 duty and supply its place by the revolution of debits and credits in 
 account, instead of the revolutions of the actual material money." 
 There are many practical processes by which the business- 
 world make credit perform the functions of money, among which 
 may be especially noticed— first, that by credit in account; and sec- 
 ond, that by bills of exchange. Mr, Beck thought out a Mutual 
 Bank by generalizing credit in account: Proudhon, by generalizing 
 the bill of exchange. 
 
 BILLS OF EXCHANGE. 
 
 Let it be supposed that there are ten shoe-manufacturers in Lynn, 
 who sell their shoes to ten shopkeepers in Boston; let it be supposed, 
 also, that there are ten wholesale grocers in Boston who furnish 
 goods to ten retail grocers in Lynn. If the value of the shoes equals 
 the value of the groceries, the ten retail grocers in Lynn would 
 have no occasion to send money to Boston to pay their indebted- 
 ness to the wholesale grocers; neither would the ten shopkeepers 
 in Boston have occasion to send money to Lynn to discharge their 
 debt to the ten shoe manufacturers; for the Lynn retail grocers 
 might pay the money to the the Lynn shoe-maufacturers; these 
 shoe-manufacturers writing to the Boston shopkeepers, who are 
 their debtors, requesting them to pay the Boston wholesale grocers, 
 who are the creditors of the Lynn retail grocers. It is very possi- 
 ble that the transactions of all these persons with each other might 
 be settled in this way without the transmission of any money either 
 from Boston to Lynn, or from Lynn to Boston. The transfer of 
 debts in the process here indicated gives rise to what are called, in 
 mercantile language, drafts, or bills of exchange; though regular 
 bills of exchange are seldom drawn in this country, except against 
 foreign account. A bill of exchange reads generally somewhat as 
 follows: 
 
 "To Mr. E. F. days after sight, on this my first bill of ex- 
 change (second and third of the same date and tenor not paid) pay to 
 
 A. B., without further advice from me, dollars, value received. 
 
 and charge the same to account of your obedient servant, C. D." 
 
 This form evidently implies that the bill is made out in tripli- 
 cates. The bill must also, of course be dated. A draft is a bill of 
 exchange drawn up with the omission of some of the solemnity and 
 particularity of the regular bill. 
 
 Bills of exchange are useful, not only for the payment of debts 
 at distant places without transportation of the precious metals, 
 but also as a means by which a debt due from one person may be 
 made available for outainixo credit from iniother. It is usual in 
 every trade to give a certain length of crctiit for goods bought— 
 ninety days, six months, eight months, or a longer time, as may be 
 determined by the convenience of the parties, or by the cii>toin of 
 the paitieular trade and place. If a num has sold gooils to another 
 on six month's credit, he may draw a bill upon his debtor, payable 
 in six months, get his bill discounted at the bank and thus qualify
 
 32 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 himself to purchase such things as he may require in his .usiness, 
 without .vaiting for the six months to expire. But bills of exchange 
 do more than this. They not only obviate, upon occasions, the 
 necessity for ready money; they not only enable a man to com- 
 mand ready money before the debts due to him arrive at maturity; 
 they often actually take place and perform the functions of mcjney 
 itself. J. Stuart Mill, quoting from Mr, Thornton, says: "Let us 
 imagine a farmer in the country to discharge a debt of £10 to his 
 neighboring grocer, by giving him a bill for that sum, drawn on his 
 corn-factor in London, for grain sold in the metropolis; and the 
 grocer to transmit the bill— ho having previously indorsed it— to a 
 neighboring sugar-baker in discharge of a like debt; and the sugar- 
 baker to send it when again indorsed, to a West India merchant in 
 an outport; and the West India merchant to deliver it to his coun- 
 try banker, who also indorses it and sends it into further circula- 
 lalion. The bill will in this case have effected live payments, ex- 
 actly as if it were a £10 note payable to bearer on demand. A mul- 
 titude of bills pass between trader and trader in the country in the 
 manner which has been described, and they evidently form in the 
 strictest sense, a part of the circulating medium of the kingdom." 
 Mr. Mill adds: "Many bills, both domestic and foreign, are at 
 last |)resented for payment quite covered with indorsements, each 
 of which represents either a fresh discounting, or a pecuniary 
 transaction in which the bill has performed the functions of money. 
 Up to twenty years ago, the circulating medium of Lancashire for 
 sums above £5 was ahnost entirely composed of such bills." 
 
 In our exiilanation of the system of banking which results from 
 a generalization of the bill of exchange, we will let the master 
 speak for himself: 
 
 proudhon's i?.\nk. 
 
 "We must destroy the royalty of trold: we must republicanize 
 specie, by making every product of labor ready money. 
 
 "Let no one be frightened beforehand. I by no means propose 
 to reproduce under a rrjuvenatcd form, the old ideas of paper 
 money, money of paper, assignats, bank-bills, etc., etc.; for all these 
 palliatives have been known, tried and rejected long ago. These 
 representations on pafx-r, by which men liave believed themselves 
 able to replac(! the absent god, are, all of them, nothing other than 
 a homage paid to metal — an adoration of metal, which has been 
 always present to men's minds, and which has always been taken 
 by them as the measure or evaluator of products. 
 
 "Everybody knows what a bill of exchange is. The cieditor 
 r«:-.'iuests the debtor to pay to him, or t(» his order, at such a place, 
 at such a date, such a sum of money. 
 
 "The promissory note is the bill of exchange inverted; the 
 debtor |)romises the creditor that he will pay, etc. 
 
 " 'The bill of exciiange,' says the statute, 'is drawn from on<; 
 place on another. It is dated. It announces the sum to be paid;
 
 MUTUAL BANKING. 33 
 
 the time and place where the payment is to be made; the value to 
 be furnished in specie, in merchandise, in account, or in other form. 
 It is to the order of a third person, or to the order of the drawer 
 himself. If it is by 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc., it must be so stated.' 
 
 "The bill of exchange supposes, therefore, exchange, provision 
 and acceptance; that is to say, a value created and delivered by 
 the drawer; the existence, in the hands of the drawee, of the funds 
 destined to acquit the bill, and the promise on the part of the 
 drawee, to acquit it. When the bill of exchange is clothed with all 
 these formalities; when it represents a real service actually ren- 
 dered, or merchandise delivered; when the drawer and drawee are 
 known and solvent; when, in a word, it is clothed with all the 
 conditions necessary to guarantee the accomplishment of the obli- 
 gation, the bill of exchange is considered good; it circulates in the 
 mercantile world like bank-paper, like specie. No one objects to 
 receiving it under pretext that a bill of exchange is nothing but 
 a piece of paper. Only — since, at the end of its circulation, the bill 
 of exchange, before being destroyed, must be exchanged for specie- 
 it pays to specie a sort of seigniorial duty, called discount. 
 
 "That which, in general, renders the bill of exchange insecure, 
 is precisely this promise of final conversion into specie; and thus 
 the idea of metal, like a corrupting royalty, infects even the bill of 
 exchange and takes from it its certainty. 
 
 "Now, the whole problem of the circulation consists in general- 
 izing the bill of exchange; that is to say, in making of it an anony- 
 mous title, exchangeable forever, and redeemable at sight, but only 
 in merchandise and services. 
 
 "Or, to speak a language more comprehensible to financial 
 adepts, the problem of the circulation consists in basing bank- 
 paper, not upon specie, nor bullion, nor immovable property, which 
 can never produce anything but a miserable oscillation between 
 usury and bankruptcy, between the five-franc piece and the as- 
 signat; but by basing it upon phoducts. 
 
 "I conceive this generalization of the bill of exchange as fol- 
 lows: 
 
 "A hundred thousand manufacturers, miners, merchants, com- 
 missioners, public carriers, agriculturists, etc., throughout BYance, 
 unite with each other in obedience to the summons of the the gov- 
 ernment and by simple authentic declaration, inserted in the 'Mon- 
 iteur' newspaper, bind themselves respectively and reciprocally to 
 adhere to the statutes of the Bank of Exchange; which shall bi> 
 no other than the Bank of France itself, with its constitution and 
 attributes modified on the following basis: 
 
 "1st. The Bank of France, become the Bank of Exchange, is 
 an institution of public interest. It is placed under the guardian- 
 ship of the state and is directed by delegates from all the branches 
 of industry. 
 
 "2nd. Every subscriber shall have an account open at the
 
 34 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 Bank of Exchange for the discount of his business paper; and 
 he shall be served to the same extent as he would have been under 
 the conditions of discount in specie; that is, in the known measure 
 of his faculties, the business he does, the positive guarantees he 
 offers, the real credit he might reasonably have enjoyed under the 
 old system. 
 
 "3rd. The discount of ordinary commercial paper, whether of 
 drafts, orders, bills of exchange, notes on demand, will be made in 
 bills of the Bank of Exchange, of denominations of 3.5, .50, 100 and 
 1.000 francs. 
 
 "Specie will be used in making change only. 
 
 "4th. The rate of discount will be fixed at per cent, com- 
 mission included, no matter how long the paper has to run. With 
 the Bank of Exchange all business will be finished on the spot. 
 
 '•.5th. Every subscriber binds himself to receive in all payments, 
 from whomsoever it inay be and at par, the paper of the Bank of 
 Exchange. 
 
 "6th. Provisionally and by way of transition, gold and silver 
 coin will be received in exchange for the paper of the bank, and at 
 their nominal value. 
 
 "Is this a paper currency? 
 
 "I answer unhesitatingly, Nol It is neither paper-money, nor 
 money of paper; it is neither government checks, nor even bank- 
 bills; it is not of the nature of anything that has been hitherto in- 
 vented to make up for the scarcity of the specie. It is the bill of 
 exchange generalized. 
 
 "The essence of the bill of exchange is constituted — first, by its 
 being drawn from one place on another; second, by its representing 
 a real value equal to the sum it expresses; third, by the promise or 
 obligation on the part of the drawee to pay it when it falls due. 
 
 "In three words, that which constitutes the bill of exchange is 
 exchange, provision, acceptance. 
 
 "As to the date of issue, or of falling due; as to the designation 
 of the places, persons, object — these are particular circumstances 
 which do not relate to the essence of the title, but which serve 
 merely to give it a determinate personal and local actuality. 
 
 "Now, what is the bank-paper I jjropose to create? 
 
 "It is the bi'l of exchange stripped of the circumstantial quali- 
 ties of date, place, person, object, term of maturity, and reduced to 
 its essential qualities— exchange, acceptance, provision. 
 
 "It is, to explain myself still more clearly, tlic bill of exchange, 
 payable at sight and forever, drawn from every place in France 
 upon every other place in France, made, by 1(K),(XK) drawers, guaran- 
 le(;(l l»y KMMKK) indorsc-rs, accepti'd by the ](M),0(K) siibscribers drawn 
 upon; having provision made for its payment in the 100.(K)0 work- 
 shops, manufactories, stores, etc., of the same 100,000 subscribers. 
 
 "I say, therefore, that such a tith^ unites evc^ry condition of 
 solidity and .security and that it is susceptible of no depreciation.
 
 MUTUAL BANK INC. 35 
 
 "It is eminently solid: since on one side it represents the ordi- 
 nary, local, personal, actual paper of exchange, determined in its 
 object and representing a real value, a service renderedj merchan- 
 dise delivered, or whose delivery is guaranteed and certain; while 
 on the other side it is guaranteed by the contract, in so/ido, of 100,- 
 000 exchangers, who, by their mass, their independence, and at the 
 same time by the unity and connection of their operations, offer 
 millions of millions of probability of payment against one of non- 
 payment. Gold is a thousand times less sure. 
 
 "In fact, if in the ordinary conditions of commerce, we may say 
 that a bill of exchange made by a known merchant offers two 
 chances of payment against one of non-payment, the same bill of 
 exchange, if it is indorsed by another known merchant, will offer 
 four chances of payment against one. If it is indorsed by three, 
 four or a greater number of merchants equally well known, there 
 will be eight, sixteen, thirty-two, etc., to wager against one that 
 three, four, five, etc., known merchants will not fail at the same 
 time, since the favorable chances increase in geometrical propor- 
 tion with the number of indorsers. What, then, ought to be the 
 certainty of a bill of exchange made by lOO.OOa well-known sub- 
 scribers, who are all of them interested to promote its circulation? 
 
 "I add that this title is susceptible of no depreciation. The 
 reason for this is found, first, in the perfect solidity of a mass of 
 100,000 signers. But there exists another reason, more direct, and if 
 possible, more reassuring; it is that the issues of the new paper can 
 never be exaggerated like those of ordinary bank-bills, treasury 
 notes, paper money, assignats, etc., for the issues take place against 
 good, commercial paper only, and in the regular, necessarily lim- 
 ited, measured and proportionate process of discounting. 
 
 "In the combination I propose, the paper (at once sign of credit 
 and instrument of circulation) grows out of the best business- 
 paper, which itself represents products delivered, and by no means 
 merchandise unsold. This paper, I affirm, can never be refused in 
 payment, since it is subscribed beforehand by the mass of pro- 
 ducers. 
 
 "This paper offers so much the more security and convenience, 
 inasmuch as it may be tried on a small scale, and with as few per- 
 sons as you see fit, and that without the least violence, without the 
 least peril. 
 
 "Suppose the IJank of Exchange to start at first on a basis of 
 1,000 subscribers instead of 100,000; the amount of paper it would 
 issue would be in proportion to the business of these 1.000 subscrib- 
 ers, and negotiable only among themselves. Afterwards, according 
 as other persons should adhere to the bank, the proportion of bills 
 would be as 5.000, 10,(XX), 50,000, etc., and their circulation would 
 grow with the number of subscribers, as a money peculiar to them. 
 Then, when the whole of France should have adhered to the stat-
 
 36 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 utes of the new bank, the issue of paper would be equal, at every 
 instant, to the the totality of circulating values. 
 
 "I do not conceive it necessary to insist longer. Men acquainted 
 with banking will understand me without difficulty, and will sup- 
 ply from their own minds the details of execution. 
 
 "As for the vulgar, who judge of all things by the material aspect, 
 nothing for them is so similar to an assignat as a bill of the Bank of 
 Exchange. For the economist, who searches the idea to the bot- 
 tom, nothing is so different. They are two titles, which, under the 
 same matter, the same form, the same denomination, are diamet- 
 rically opposed to each other." — [Organization du Credit de la 
 Circulation — Banque d'Exchange; p. 23). 
 
 REMARKS. 
 
 We have several objections to Proudhon's bank. We propose 
 them with diffidence, as Proudhon has undoubtedly prepared an 
 adequate answer to them. Nevertheless, as he has not given that 
 answer in his writings, we have a right to state them. They are as 
 follows: 
 
 1st. We ask M. Proudhon how he would punish arbitrary con- 
 duct, partiality, favoritism and self-sufficiency, on the part of the 
 officers of his bank. When we go to the mutual bank to borrow 
 money, we desire to be treated politely and to receive fair play. 
 
 2nd. We ask him how he would prevent intriguing members 
 from caballing to obtain control of the direction; or how he would 
 prevent such intrigues from bringing forth evil results. 
 
 3rd. We ask him how he would prevent the same property, 
 through the operation of successive sales, from being represented, 
 at the same time, by several different bills of exchange, all of 
 which are liable to be presented for discount. For example: Sup- 
 pose Peter sells John $100 worth of pork at six months credit and 
 takes a bill at six months for it; and that John sells afterward this 
 same pork to James at a like credit, taking a like bill; whatshall 
 prevent both Peter and John from presenting their bills for dis- 
 count? Both bills are real bills, resulting from sales actually 
 effected. NcMthor of them can be characterized as fictitious paper, 
 and meanwhile, only one represents actual property. The same 
 barrel of pork, by being sold and resold at credit one hundred times 
 will give rise to one hundred real bills. lUit is it not absurd to 
 say that the bank is safe in discounting all this paper, for the rea- 
 son that it is entinily composed of real bills, when wv. know only 
 one of them represents the barrel of pork? It follows, therefore, 
 that not every real bill is adequately guaranteed. How, then, can 
 Proudhon be certain that his issues of l)ank-paper "will never be 
 exaggerated?" 
 
 4th. We ask him how he would caus<^ his bank to operate to 
 the decentralization of the money power. 
 
 For ourselves, we submit (and for the reason that it is necessary 
 to have some systfm that obviates the foregoing objections) that
 
 MUTUAL BA:NK1IsG. 37 
 
 the issues of mutual money ought— at least, here in New England, 
 the theory of Froudhon to the contrary notwithstanding— to be re- 
 lated to a basis of determinate actual property. 
 
 Our plan for a Mutual Bank is as follows: 
 
 1st. Any person, by pledging actual property to tlie bank, may 
 become a member of the INIutual Banking Company. 
 
 2nd. Any member may borrow the paper money of the bank on 
 his own note running to maturity (without indorsement) to an 
 amount not to exceed one-half of the value of the property by him- 
 self pledged. 
 
 3rd. Each member binds himself in legal form, on admission, 
 to receive in all payments, from whomsoever it may be and at par, 
 the paper of the Mutual Bank. 
 
 4th. The rate of interest at which said money shall be loaned 
 shall be determined by, and shall if possible, just meet and cover, 
 the bare expenses of the institution. As for interest in the com- 
 mon acceptation of the word, its rate shall be at the Mutual Bank 
 precisely 0. 
 
 5tii. No money shall be loaned to any persons who are not 
 members of the company; that is, no money shall be loaned, ex- 
 cept on a pledge of actual property. 
 
 6th. Any member, by paying his debts to the bank, may have 
 his property released from pledge, and be himself released from all 
 obligations to the bank, or to the holders of the bank's money, as 
 such. 
 
 7th. As for the bank, it shall never redeem any of its notes in 
 specie; nor shall it ever receive specie in payments, or the bills of 
 specie-paying banks, except at a discount of one-half of one per 
 cent. 
 
 Ships and houses that are insured, machinery, in short, anything 
 that may be sold under the hammer, may be made a basis for the 
 issue of mutual money. Mutual Banking opens the way to no 
 monopoly; for it simply elevates every species of property to the 
 rank which has hitherto been exclusively occupied by gold and sil- 
 ver. It may be well (we think it will be necessary) to begin with 
 real estate; we do not say it would be well to end there!
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 PETITION FOR A GENERAL MUTUAL BANKING LAW. 
 
 To the Honorable the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
 Commonwealth of Massachusetts. 
 
 This prayer of your petitioners humbly showeth, that the 
 farmers, mechanics and other actual producers, whose names are 
 hereunto subscribed, believe the present organization of the cur- 
 rency to be unjust and oppressive. They, therefore, respectfully 
 request your honorable body to republicanize gold, silver and bank- 
 bills, by the enactment of a General Mutual Banking Laav. 
 
 A law, embracing the following provisions, would be eminently 
 satisfactory to your petitioners: 
 
 1. The inhabitants or any portion of the inhabitants, of any 
 town or city in the Commonwealth may organize themselves into a 
 Mutual Banking Company. 
 
 2. Any person may become a member of the Mutual Banking 
 Company of any particular town, by pledging real estate situ- 
 ated in that town, or in its immediate neighborhood, to the Mutual 
 Bank of that town. 
 
 3. The Mutual Bank of any town may issue paper-money to 
 circulate as currency among persons willing to employ it as such. 
 
 4. Every member of a Mutual Banking Company shall bind 
 himself, and be bound, in due legal form, on admission, to receive 
 in payment of debts, at par, and from all persons, the bills issued, 
 and to be issued, by the particular Mutual Bank to which he may 
 belong; but no member shall be obliged to receive, or have in pos- 
 session, bills of said Mutual Bank to an amount exceeding the 
 wliole value of the proi)erty pledged by him. 
 
 f>. Any member may borrow the paper money of the bank to 
 which he belongs, on his own note running to maturity (without 
 indorsement), to an amount not to exceed one-half of the value of 
 the property pledged by him. 
 
 G. The rate of interest at which said money shall be loaned by 
 the bank, shall be determiuf^d by, and shall, if possible, just meet 
 and cover the bare expenses of the institution. 
 
 7. No money shall be loaned by the bank to persons who do 
 not become members of the company by pledging real estate to the 
 bank. 
 
 8. Any member, by paying his debts to the Mutual Bank to 
 which he belongs, may have his property released from pledge, and 
 bf! liimself released from all obligations to said Mutual IJank, and 
 to h(jl(l(;rs of tli(! Mutual-Bank money, as such.
 
 PETITION FOR A MUTUAL BANKING LAW. 39 
 
 9. No Mutual Bank shall receive other than Mutual-Bank 
 paper-money in payment of debts due to it, except at a discount of 
 one-half of one per cent. 
 
 10. The Mutual Banks of the several counties in the Common- 
 wealth shall be authorized to enter into such arrangements with 
 each other as shall enable them to receive each other's bills in pay- 
 ments of debts; so that, for example, a Fitchburg man may pay his 
 debts to the Barre Bank in Oxford money, or in such other Worces- 
 ter-county money as may suit his convenience. 
 
 REMARKS. 
 
 Let A, B, C, D and E take a mortgage upon real estate owned 
 by F, to cover a value of, say,?600; in consideration of which 
 mortgage, let A, B, C, D and E, who are timber-dealers, hardware 
 merchants, carpenters, masons, painters, etc., furnish planks, 
 boards, shingles, nails, hinges, locks, carpenters' and masons' labor, 
 etc., to the value of $(500, to F, who is building a house. Let the 
 mortgage have six months to run. A, B, C, D and E are perfectly safe; 
 for either F pays at the end of the six months, and then the whole 
 transaction is closed; or F does not pay, and then they sell the real 
 estate mortgaged by him, which is worth much more than ?600, and 
 pay themselves, thus closing the transaction. This transaction, 
 generalized, gives the Mutual Bank, and furnishes a currency 
 based upon products and services, entirely independent of hard 
 money, or paper based on hard money. B^or A, B, C, D and E may 
 give to F, instead of boards, nails, shingles, etc., 600 certificates of 
 his mortgage, said certificates being receivable by them for services 
 and products, each one in lieu of a silver dollar; each certificate 
 being, therefore, in all purchases from them, equivalent to a one- 
 dollar bill. If A, B, C, D and E agree to receive these certificates, 
 each one in lieu of a silver dollar, for the redemption of the mort- 
 gage; if, moreover, they agree to receive them, ca.ch one in lieu of a 
 silver dollar, from whomsoever it may be, in all payments— then A, 
 B, C, D and E are a banking company that issues mutual money; 
 and as they never issue money except upon a mortgage of property of 
 double the value of the money issued, their transactions are always 
 absolutely safe, and their money is always absolutely good. 
 
 Any community that embraces members of all trades and pro- 
 fessions may totally abolish the use of hard money, and of paper 
 based on hard money, substituting mutual money in its stead; and 
 they may always substitute mutual money in the stead of hard 
 money and bank bills, to the precise extent of their ability to live 
 within themselves on their own resources. 
 
 THE RATE OF INTEREST. 
 
 As interest-money charged by Mutual Banks covers nothing 
 but the expenses of the institutions, such banks may lend money, at 
 
 A R.VTE OF I.KSS THAN ONE PER CENT PER ANNU.M, to persons offer- 
 
 ng good security.
 
 40 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 ADVANTAGES OF MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 It may be asked "What advantage does mutual banking hold 
 out to individuals who have no real estate to offer in pledge?" We 
 answer this question by another: What advantage do the existing 
 banks hold out to individuals who desire to borrow, but are unable 
 to offer adequate security? If we knew of a plan whereby, through 
 an act of the legislature, every member of the community might be 
 made rich, we would destroy this petition, and draw up another 
 embodying that plan. Meanwhile, we affirm that no system was 
 ever devised so beneficial to the poor as the system of mutual bank- 
 ing; for if a man having nothing to offer in pledge, has a friend who 
 is a farmer, or other holder of real estate, and that friend is willing 
 to furnish security for him, he can borrow money at the mutual 
 bank at a rate of 1 per cent interest a year; whereas, if he should 
 borrow at the existing banks, he would be obliged to pay 6 per cent. 
 Again, as mutual banking will make money exceedingly plenty, it 
 will cause a rise in the rate of wages, thus benefiting the man who 
 has no property but his bodily strength; and it will not cause a 
 proportionate increase in the price of the necessaries of life: for the 
 price of provisions, etc., depends on supply and demand; and 
 mutual banking operates, not directly on supply and demand, but 
 to the diminution of the rate of interest on the medium of exchange. 
 Mutual banking will indeed cause a certain rise in the price of com- 
 modities by creating a new demand; for, with mutual money, the 
 poorer classes will be able to purchase articles which, under the 
 present currency, they never dream of buying. 
 
 But certain mechanics and farmers say, "We borrow no money, 
 and therefore pay no interest. How, then, does this thing concern 
 us?" Hearken, my friends I let us reason together. I have an im- 
 pression on my mind that it is precisely the class who have no deal- 
 ings with the banks, and derive no advantages from them, that 
 ultimately pay all the interest money that is paid. When a manu- 
 facturer borrows money to carry on his business, he counts the in- 
 terest he pays as a partof his expenses, and therefore adds the amount 
 of interest to the price of his goods. The consumer who buys the 
 goods pays the interest when he pays for the goods; and who is the 
 consumer, if not the mechanic and the farmer? If a manufacturer 
 could borrow money at 1 percent, he could afford to undersell all his 
 competitors, to the manifest advantageof the farmer and mechanic. 
 The manufacturer would neither gain nor lose; the farmer and 
 mechanic, who have no dealings with the bank, would gain the 
 whole difference; and the bank— which, were it not for the compe- 
 tition of the Mutual Itank, would have loaned the money at (j per 
 cent interest— would lose the whole difference. It is the indirect 
 relation of the bank to the farmer and mechanic, and not its direct 
 relation to the manufactunir and merchant, that enables it to nuike 
 money. When foreign competition prevents tlie manufacturer from 
 keeping up the price of his goods, the farmer and mechanic, who
 
 PETITION FOR A MUTUAL BANKING LAW. 41 
 
 are consumers, do not pay the interest-money: but still the interest 
 is paid by the class that derive no benefit from the banks; for, in 
 this case, the manufacturer will save himself from loss by cutting 
 down the wages of his workmen who are producers. Wages fluc- 
 tuate, rising and falling (other things being equal) as the rate of 
 interest fails or rises. If the farmer, mechanic and operative are 
 not interested in the matter of banking, we know not who is. 
 
 MUTUAL MONEY IS GENERALLY COMPETENT TO FORCE ITS OWN 
 WAY INTO GENERAL CIRCULATION. 
 
 Let us suppose the Mutual Bank to be at first established in a 
 single town, and its circulation to be confined within the limits of 
 that town. The trader who sells the produce of that town in the 
 city and buys there such commodities— tea, coffee, sugar, calico, 
 etc.— as are required for the consumption of his neighbors, sells and 
 buys on credit. He does not pay the farmer cash for his produce; 
 he does not sell that produce for cash in the city; neither does he 
 buy his groceries, etc., for cash from the city merchant: but he 
 buys of the farmer at, say, eight months' credit; and he sells to 
 the city merchant at, say, six months' credit. He finds, more- 
 over, as a general thing, that the exports of the town which pass 
 through his hands very nearly balance the imports that he brings 
 into the town for sale; so that, in reality, the exports — butter, 
 cheese, pork, beef, eggs, etc.— pay for the imports— coffee, sugar, 
 etc. And how. indeed, could it be otherwise? It is not to be sup- 
 posed that the town has silver mines and a mint; and, if the people 
 pay for their imports in money, it will be because they have be- 
 come enabled so to do by selling their produce for money. It fol- 
 lows, therefore, that the people in a country town do not make ihe 
 money, whereby they pay for store-goods, off each other, but that 
 they make it by selling their produce out of the town. There are, 
 therefore, two kinds of trading going on at the same time in the 
 town— one trade of the inhabitants with each other; and another 
 of the inhabitants, through the store, with individuals living out of 
 town. And these two kinds of trade are perfectly distinct from 
 each other. The mutual money would serve all the purposes of the 
 internal trade; leaving the hard money, and paper based on hard 
 money, to serve exclusively for the purposes of trade that reaches 
 out of the town. The mutual money will not prevent a single dol- 
 lar of hard money, or paper based on hard money, from coming 
 into the town; for such hard money comes into the town, not in 
 consequence of exchanges made between the inhabitants them- 
 selves, but in consequence of produce sold abroad.* So long as 
 produce is sold out of the town, so long will the inhabitants be able 
 to buy commodities that are produced out of the town; and they 
 
 *Tbese remarks may be generalized, and applied to the commerce 
 which is carried on between nations.
 
 42 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 will be able to make purchases to the precise extent that they are 
 able to make sales. The mutual money will therefore prove to 
 them an unmixed benefit; it will be entirely independent of the old 
 money, and will open to them a new trade entirely independent of 
 the old trade. So far as it can be made available, it will unques- 
 tionably prove itself to be a good thing; and, where it cannot be 
 made available, the inhabitants will only be deprived of a benefit 
 that they could not have enjoyed — mutual money or no mutual 
 money. Besides, the comparative cost of the mutual money is al- 
 most nothing; for it can be issued to any amount on good security, 
 at the mere cost of printing, and the expense of looking after the 
 safety of the mortgages. If the mutual money should happen, at 
 any particular time, not to be issued to any great extent, it would 
 not be as though an immense mass of value was remaining idle; for 
 interest on the mutual money is precisely 0. The mutual money is 
 not itself actual value, but a mere medium for the exchange of act- 
 ual values— a mere medium for the facilitation of barter. 
 
 We have remarked, that when the trader, who does the out-of- 
 town business of the inhabitants, buys coffee, sugar, etc., he does 
 not pay cash for them, but buys them at, say, six months' credit. 
 Now, the existing system of credit causes, by its very nature, peri- 
 odical crises in commercial aflfairs. When one of these crises oc- 
 curs, the trader will say to the city merchant, "1 owe you so much 
 for groceries; but 1 have no money, for times are hard: I will give 
 you, however, my note for the debt. Now, we leave it to the reader, 
 would not the city merchant prefer to take the mutual money of 
 the town to which the trader belongs, money that holds real estate 
 and produce in that town, rather than the private note of a trader 
 who may fail within a week? 
 
 If, under the existing system, all transactions were settled on 
 the spot in cash, things might be different; but as almost all trans- 
 actions are conducted on the credit system, and as the credit system 
 necessarily involves periodical commercial crises, the mutual 
 money will find very little diihculty in ultimately forcing itself into 
 general circulation. The Mutual Bank is like the stone cut from 
 the mountain without hands, for let it be once established in a sin- 
 gle village, no mattc^r how obscure, and it will grow till it covers 
 the whole earth. Nevertheless, it would be better to obviate all 
 difTiculty by starting the Mutual Bank on a sufficiently extensive 
 scale at the very beginning. 
 
 TIIK MKA8URE OF VALUE. 
 
 The bill of a Mutual Hank is not a standard of value, since it 
 is itself measured and determined in value by the silver dollar. If 
 the dollar rises in value, the bill of the Mutual Bank rises also, 
 since it is receivable in lieu of a silver dollar. The bills of a Mutual 
 Bank are not standards of value, but mere instruments of exchange; 
 and as the value of mutual money is determined, not by the demand 
 and supply of mutual money, but by the demand and supply of the
 
 PETITION FOR A MUTUAL BANKIXG LAW. 43 
 
 precious metals, the Mutual Bank may issue bills to any extent, and 
 those bills will not be liable to any depreciation from excess of supply. 
 And, for like reasons, mutual money will not be liable to rise in 
 value if it happens at any time to be scarce in the market. The 
 issues of mutual money are therefore susceptible of any contrac- 
 tion or expansion which may be necessary to meet the wants of the 
 community, and such contraction or expansion cannot by any pos- 
 sibility be attended with any evil consequence whatever: for the 
 silver dollar, which is the standard of value, will remain through- 
 out at the natural valuation determined for it by the general de- 
 mand and supply of gold and silver throughout the whole world. 
 
 The bills of Mutual Banks act merely as a medium of ex- 
 change: they do not and cannot pretend to be measures or stand- 
 ards of value. The medium of exchange is one thing; the 
 measure of value is another; and the standard of value still an- 
 other. Tlie dollar is the measure of value. Silver and gold, at a 
 certain degree of fineness, are the standard of value. The bill of a 
 Mutual Bank is a bill of exchange, drawn by all the members of the 
 mutual banking company upon themselves, indorsed and accepted 
 by themselves, payable at sight, but only in services and products. 
 The members of the company bind themselves to receive their own 
 money at par; that is, in lieu of as many silver dollars as are de- 
 noted by the denomination on the face of the bill. Services and 
 products are to be estimated in dollars, and exchanged for each 
 other without the intervention of specie.* 
 
 Mutual money, which neither is nor can be merchandise, es- 
 capes the law of supply and demand, which is applicable to mer- 
 chandise only. 
 
 THE REGULATOR OF VALUE. 
 
 The utility of an article is one thing; its exchangeable value 
 is another; and the cost of its production is still another. But the 
 amount of labor expended in production, though not the measure, 
 is, in the long run, the regulator of value; for every new invention 
 wBich abridges labor, and enables an individual or company to 
 offer an increased supply of valuable articles in the market brings 
 with it an increase of competition. For, supposing that one dollar 
 constitutes a fair day's wages, and that one man by a certain pro- 
 cess can produce an article valued in the market at one 
 
 *"I now undertake to afiirm ijositively, and without the least fear 
 that I can be answered, what heretofore I have but suggested— that a 
 paper Issued by the government, with the simple promise to receive it in 
 all Its dues, leaving its creditors to take it or gold and silver at their 
 option, would, to the extent that it would circulate, form a perfect 
 paper-circulation, which could not bo abused by the government; that 
 it would be as steady and uniform in value as the metals themselves; 
 and that, if by possibility, it should depreciate, the loss would fall, not 
 on the people, but on the government Itself," etc.— .1. C. Calhodn: 
 Speech in reply to Mr. Webster on the Sub-Treasury Bill, March 22, 1838.
 
 44 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 dollar in half a day's labor, other men will take ad- 
 vantage of the same process, and undersell the first man, 
 in order to get possession of the market. Thus, by the effect 
 of competition, the price of the article will probably be ultimately 
 reduced to fifty cents. Labor is the true regulator of value; for 
 every laboring man who comes into competition with others in- 
 creases the supply of the products of labor, and thus diminishes 
 their value; while at the same time, and because he is a living 
 man, he increases the demand for those products to precisely the 
 same extent, and thus restores the balance: for the laborer must be 
 housed, clothed and subsisted by the products of his labor. Thus 
 the addition of a laboring man, or of any number of laboring men, 
 to the mass of producers, ought to have no efiect either upon the 
 price of labor, or upon that of commodities; since, if the laborer by 
 his presence increases the productive power, he at the same lime 
 increases the demand for consumption. We know that things do 
 not always fall out thus in practice; but the irregularity is ex- 
 plained by the fact that the laborer, who ought himself to have the 
 produce of his labor, or its equivalent in exchange, has, by the 
 present false organization of credit, his wages abstracted from him. 
 Want and over-production arise sometimes from mistakes in the di- 
 rection of labor, but generally from that false organization of 
 credit which now obtains throughout the civilized world. There is 
 a market price of commodities, depending on supply and demand, 
 and a natural price, depending on the cost of production; and the 
 market price is in a state of continual oscillation, being sometimes 
 above, and sometimes below, the natural price: but in the long run, 
 the average of a series of years being taken, it coincides with it. It 
 is probable that, under a true organization of credit, the natural 
 price and market price would coincide at every moment.* Under 
 the present system, there are no articles whose market and natural 
 prices coincide so nearly and so constantly as those of the precious 
 metals; and it is for this reason that they have been adopted by the 
 various nations as standards of value. 
 
 When Adam .Smith and Malthust say that labor is a measure of 
 
 *The theory tlial the laborer should receive sufficient wages to buy 
 back liis product, and thus prevent over-production, was discovered ;il- 
 most .simultaneously by a number of writers about fifty years ago. The 
 value of this discovery to economics is as great as Newton's was to 
 physics, or Darwin's to biology.— Editor. 
 
 tMalthus says (we quote the sub.stance, and very possibly the exact 
 words, though we have not tlio book by us): "If a man Is born into a 
 world already occupied, and his family Is not able to support him, or if 
 society has no demand for his lubor, t hat man has no right to claim uny 
 nourishment whatever; he Is really one too miiny on the earth. At the; 
 great banquet of nature there Is no plate laid for him. Nature com- 
 mands him to take liimself away; and she will by no means delay In 
 putting her own order into execution."
 
 PETITION FOR A MUTUAL BANKING LAW. 45 
 
 value, they speak, not of the labor which an article cost, or ought to 
 have cost, in its production, but of the quantity of labor which the 
 article may purchase or command. It is very well, for those who 
 mistake the philosophy of speculation on human misfortune and 
 necessities for social science, to assume for measure of value the 
 amount of labor which different commodities can command. Con- 
 sidered from this point of view, the price of commodities is regu- 
 lated, not in the labor expended in their production, but by the 
 distress and want of the laboring class. There is no device of the 
 political economists so infernal as the one which ranks labor as a 
 commodity, varying in value according to supply and demand. 
 Neither is there any device so unphilosophical; since the ratio of 
 the supply of labor to the demand for it is unvarying: for every 
 producer is also a consumer, and rightfully, to the precise extent of 
 the amount of his products; the laborer who saves up his wages 
 being, so far as society is concerned, and in the long run, a consum- 
 er of those wages. The supply and demand for labor is virtually 
 unvarying; and its price ought, therefore, to be constant. Labor 
 is said to be value, not because it is itself merchandise, but because 
 of the values it contains, as it were, in solution, or, to use the.cor- 
 rect metaphysical term, in potentia. The value of labor is a 
 figurative expression, and a fiction, like the productiveness of cap- 
 ital. Labor, like liberty, love, ambition, genius, is something 
 vague and indeterminate in its nature, and is rendered definite by 
 its object only; misdirected labor produces no value. Labor is said 
 to be valuable, not because it can itself be valued, but because tlie 
 products of labor may be truly valuable. When we say "John's 
 labor is worth a dollar a day," it is as though we said, "The daily 
 product of John's labor is worth a dollar." To speak of labor as 
 merchandise is treason; for such speech denies the true dignity of 
 man, who is the king of the earth. Where labor is merchandise in 
 fact (not by a mere inaccuracy of language) there man is merchan- 
 dise also, whether it be in England or South Carolina. 
 
 THE WAY IN WHICH THE AFFAIRS OF THE MUTUAL BANK MAY BE 
 
 CLOSED. 
 
 When the company votes to issue no more money, the bills it 
 has already issued will bo returned upon it; for, since the bills 
 were issued in discounting notes running to maturity, the debtors 
 of the bank, as their notes mature, will pay in the bills they have 
 received. When the debtors have paid their debts to t^ie bank, 
 then the bills are all in, every debtor has discharged his mortgage, 
 and the affairs of the bank are closed. If any debtor fails to pay. 
 the bank sells the property mortgaged, and pays itself. Tiie bank 
 lends at a rate of interest that covers its bare expenses: it makes, 
 therefore, no profits, and, consequently, eau declare no dividends. 
 It is by its nature incapable of owing anything: it lias, therefore. 
 no debts to settle. When the bank's debtors have paid their delits
 
 46 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 to the bank, then nobody owes anything to the bank, and the bank 
 owes nothing to anybody. 
 
 In case some of the debtors of the bank redeem their notes, not 
 in bills of the Mutual Bank, but in bills of specie-paying banks, 
 then those bills of specie-paying banks will be at once presented for 
 redemption at the institutions that issued them; and an amount of 
 specie will come into the hands of the Mutual Bank, precisely 
 equal to the amount of its own bills still in circulation; for since 
 the Mutual Bank never issues money, except in discounting notes 
 running to maturity, the notes of the debtors to the bank precisely 
 cover the amount of the bank's money in circulation. When this 
 specie comes into the hands of the bank, it deposits it at once in 
 some other institution; which institution assumes the responsibility 
 of redeeming at sight such of the bills of the closed bank as may be 
 at any time thereafter presented for redemption. And such institu- 
 tion will gladly assume this responsibility, since it is probable that 
 many of the bills will be lost or destroyed, and therefore never pre- 
 sented for redemption; and such loss or destruction will be a clear 
 gain to the institution assuming the responsibility, since it has spe- 
 cie turned over to it for the redemption of every one of the bills 
 that remains out. 
 
 Finally: let us conceive, for a moment, of the manifold imper- 
 fections of the existing system of banking. In Massachusetts, the 
 banks had out, in the year 1849, nine and one-half dollars of paper* 
 for every one dollar of specie in their vaults wherewith to redeem 
 them. Can any thing be more absurd than the solemn promise made 
 by the banks to redeem nine and one-half paper-dollars with one 
 dollar in specie? They may get along very well with this promise 
 in a time of profound calm; but what would they do on occasions of 
 panic'?t 
 
 The paper issued under the existing system is an article of mer- 
 chandise, varying in price with the variations of supply and de- 
 mand: it is, therefore, unlit to serve as a medium of exchange. 
 
 The banks depend on the merchants; so that, when the mer- 
 chant is poor, it falls out that the bank is always still poorer. Of 
 what use is the bank, if it calls in its issues in hard times— the very 
 occasions when increased issues are demanded by the wants of the 
 community? 
 
 The existing bank reproduces the aristocratic organizations; it 
 has its Spartan element of privileged stockholders, its Laconian 
 element of obsequious speculators, and, on the outside, a multitude 
 of Helots who are excluded from its advantages. Answer us, read- 
 
 ♦Countlng, of course, the certificates of deposit wliich are convertible 
 Into specie on demand. 
 
 tNotwlthstanding the fact that this work was written in criticism of 
 the banking system In vogue In IH.'jO, most pi'oi)le jjorslst In calling: it a 
 "revival of the old wild-cat banks that e.xisted before the war."— Editor
 
 PETITION FOR A MUTUAL BANKING LAW. 47 
 
 er: If we are able, at this time, to bring forward the existing bank- 
 ing system as a new thing, and should recommend its adoption, would 
 you not laugh in our face, and characterize our proposition as ridic- 
 ulous? Yet the existing system has an actual and practical being, 
 in spite of all its imperfections: nay, more, it is the ruling element 
 of the present civilization of the Christian world; it has substituted 
 itself, or is now substituting itself, in the place of monarchies and 
 nobilities. Who is the noble of the present day, if not the man who 
 lends money at interest? Who is the emperor, if not Pereire or 
 Baron Rothschild? Now, if the present system of banking is capa- 
 ble of actual existence, how much more capable of actual existence 
 is the system of mutual banking! Mutual banking combines all 
 the good elements of the method now in operation, and is capable 
 of securing a thousand beneflts which the present method cannot 
 compass, and is, moreover, free from all its disadvantages!
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE PROVINCIAL LAND BANK.* 
 
 "In the year 1714," says Governor Hutchinson, in his "His- 
 tory of Massachusetts," a certain "party had projected a private 
 bank; or, rather, had taken up a project published in London in 
 the year 1684; but this not being generally known in America, a 
 merchant of Boston was the reputed father of it. There was noth- 
 ing more in it than Issuing bills of credit, which all the members of 
 the company promised to receive as money, but at no certain value 
 compared with silver and gold; and real estate to a sufficient value 
 were to be bound as a security that the company should perform 
 their engagements. They were soliciting the sanction of the Gen- 
 eral Court, and an act of government to incorporate them. This 
 party generally consisted of persons in difficult or involved circum- 
 stances in trade; or such as were possessed of real estates; but had 
 little or no ready money at command; or men of no substance at all; 
 and we may well enough suppose the party to be very numerous. 
 Some, no doubt, joined them from mistaken principles, and an ap- 
 prehension that it was a scheme beneficial to the public; and some 
 for party's sake and public applause. 
 
 "Three of the representatives from Boston — Mr. Cooke; Mr. 
 Noyes, a gentlemen in great esteem with the inhabitants in gen- 
 eral; and Mr. Payne— were the supporters of the party. Mr. 
 Hutchinson, the other (an attempt to leave him out of the House 
 not succeeding), was sent from the House to the Council, where his 
 opposition would be of less consequence. The governor was no 
 favorer of the scheme; but the lieutenant-governor — a gentleman 
 of no great fortune, and whose stipend from the government was 
 trifling— engaged in the cause with great zeal. 
 
 "A third party, though very opposite to the private bank, yet 
 were no enemies to bills of credit. They were in favor of loan-bills 
 from the government to any of the inhabitants who would mort- 
 gage their estates as a security for the repayment of the bills with 
 interest in a term of years: the interest to be paid annually, and 
 applied to the support of government. This was an easy 
 way of paying public charges; which, no doubt, they won- 
 dered that in so many ages the wisdom of other govern- 
 ments had never discovered. The principal men of the 
 Council were in favor of it; and, it being thought by the first 
 
 *It is worthy of note tli.'il tho prosent-day liistorliins, wlio take such 
 pains to sliow their intirn<alo knowledKn of tlio financJEil plans of remote 
 times, studiously avoid mentioning this one.— Editor.
 
 THE PROVINCIAL LAND BANK. ^ 
 
 party the least of two evils, they fell in with the scheme; and, after 
 that, the country was divided between the public and private bank. 
 The House of Eepresentatives was nearly equally divided, but 
 rather favorers of the private bank, from the great influence of the 
 Boston members In the House, and a great number of persons of the 
 town out of it. The controversy had a universal spread, and di- 
 vided towns, parishes, and particular families. 
 
 "At length, after a long struggle, the party for the public bank 
 prevailed in the General Court for a loan of £.50.000 in bills of credit, 
 which were put into the hands of trustees, and let for five years 
 only, to any of the inhabitants, at 5 per cent interest, one-fifth part 
 of the principal to be paid annually. This lessened the number of 
 the party for the private bank; but it increased the zeal, and raised 
 a strong resentment, in those that remained."— (Thomas Hutchin- 
 son: "History of Massachusetts," vol. ii., p 188). 
 
 It is utterly inconceivable that any company of sane men should 
 have seriously proposed to issue paper money destitute of all fixed 
 and determinate value as compared with gold and silver, imagining 
 that such money would circulate as currency. If paper money has 
 "no certain value compared with silver and gold," it has no certain 
 value compared with any commodity whatever; that is, it has no 
 certain value at all: for, since gold and silver have a determinate 
 value as compared with exchangeable commodities, all paper money 
 that may be estimated in terms of marketable commodities, may be 
 estimated in terms of silver and gold. Our author will permit us to 
 suspect that his uncompromising hostility, not only to the land- 
 bank, but also to everything else of a democratic tendency, blinded 
 his eyes to the true nature of the institution he describes. Our sus- 
 picion is strengthened when we read that the paper money in ques- 
 tion was to have a determinate value, since it was to have been se- 
 cured by a pledge of "real estate to a sufficient value." The pro- 
 jectors of the scheme probably Intended that the members of the 
 company should redeem their bills from the bill-holders by receiv- 
 ing them, in all payments, in lieu of determinate and specified 
 amounts of gold and silver; and such a method of redemption 
 would have given the bills "a certain value as compared with sil- 
 ver and gold."* 
 
 In view of this extract from Governor Hutchinson's history, we 
 
 *"North Carolina, just after the Revolution, issued a large amount 
 of paper, which was made receivable in dues to her. It was also made a 
 legal tender; which, of course, was not obligatory after the adoption of 
 the Federal Constitution. A large amount, say between four and five 
 hundred thousand dollars, remained in circulation afttrthat period, and 
 continued to circulate for more than twenty years, at par with gold and 
 silver duringthe whole time, with no otiier ad vantage than being received 
 in the revenue of the State, whicli was much less than one hundred thou- 
 sand dollars per annum."— John C. Calhoun: Speech on the bill author- 
 izing an issue of treasury notes. Sent. 19. isar.
 
 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 abandon all claims to novelty or originality as regards our own 
 scheme for a Mutual Bank. We think it very probable that our 
 theory dates back to "the project published in London in the year 
 1684:" but we affirm nothing positively on this head, since we are 
 altogether ignorant of the details, not only of the provincial project, 
 but also of the original London plan. We have no information in 
 regard to these matters, except that which is now submitted to the 
 reader. 
 
 Our author says, on a subsequent page: 
 
 "In 1739, a great part of the Province was disposed to favor 
 what was called the land bank or manufactory scheme; which was 
 begun, or rather revived, in this year, and produced such great and 
 lasting mischiefs, th.at a particular relation of the rise, progress 
 and overthrow of it may be of use to discourage any attempts of the 
 like nature in future ages."— ("History of Massachusetts," vol. ii., 
 352). 
 
 It appears that after an interval of twenty-five years, the land- 
 bank scheme rose once again above the surface of the political and 
 financial waters. Governor Hutchinson says that this scheme pro- 
 duced "great and lasting mischiefs." Let us see what these "mis- 
 chiefs" were: 
 
 "The project of the bank of 1714 was revived. The projector of 
 that bank now put himself at the head of seven or eight hundred 
 persons, some few of rank and good estate, but generally of low 
 condition among the plebeians, and of small estate, and many of 
 them perhaps insolvent. This notable company were to give credit 
 to £1.50,000 lawful money, to be issued in bills; each person to mort- 
 gage a real estate in proportion to the sums he subscribed and took 
 out, or to give bond with two sureties: but personal security was 
 not to be taken for more than £100 from any one person. Ten direc- 
 tors and a treasurer were to be chosen by the company. Every 
 subscriber or partner was to pay 3 p(>r cent interest [per annum] 
 for the sum taken out, and .'5 per cent of the principal;* and he that 
 did not pay bills might pay the produce and manufacture of the 
 Province at such rates as the directors from time to time should 
 set: and they [the billsj should commonly pass in lawful money. 
 The pretence was, that, by thus furnishing a medium and instru- 
 ment of trade, not only the inhabitants in general would be better 
 able to procure the Province bills of credit for their taxes, but 
 trade, foreign and inland, would revive and flourish. The fate of 
 the project was thought to depend on the opinion which the (len- 
 eral Court should form of it. It was necessary, therefore, to have a 
 house of representatives well disposed. Besides the 800 persons 
 subscribers, the needy part of the Province in general favored the 
 scheme. One of their votes will go as far in elections as one of the 
 most opulent. The former are most numerous; and it appeared 
 
 •Thus the whole principal would be paid up in twenty years.
 
 THE PROVINCIAL LAND BA^'K. 51 
 
 that by far the majority of representatives for 1740 were subscrib- 
 ers to or favorers of the scheme, and they have ever since been dis- 
 tinguished by the name of the Land-Bank House. 
 
 "Men of estates and the principal merchants of the Province 
 abhorred the project, and refused to receive the bills; but great 
 numbers of shop-keepers who had lived for a long time on the 
 fraud of a depreciating currency, and many small traders, gave 
 credit to the bills. The directors, it was said, by a vote of the com- 
 pany, became traders,* and issued just such bills as they thought 
 proper, without any fund or security for their ever being redeemed. 
 They purchased every sort of commodity, ever so much a drug, for 
 the sake of pushing off their bills; and, by one means or other, a 
 large sum— perhaps fifty or sixty thousand pounds— was floated. 
 To lessen the temptation to receive the bills, a company of mer- 
 chants agreed to issue their notes, or bills, redeemable in silver and 
 gold at distant periods, much like the scheme in 1733, and attended 
 with no better effect. The governor exerted himself to blast this 
 fraudulent undertaking— the land-bank. Not only such civil and 
 military officers as were directors or partners, but all who received 
 or paid any of the bills were displaced. The governor negatived the 
 person chosen speaker of the House, being a director of the bank; 
 and afterwards negatived thirteen of the newly elected counsellors, 
 who were directors or partners in, or favorers of, the scheme. But 
 all was insufficient to suppress it. Perhaps the major part in num- 
 ber of the inhabitants of the Province openly or secretly, were well- 
 wishers of it. One of the directors afterwards acknowledged to me 
 that, although he entered into the company with a view to the 
 public interest, yet, when he found what power and influence they 
 had in all public concerns, he was convinced it was more than be- 
 longed to them, more than they could make a good use of, and 
 therefore unwarrantable. Many of the more sensible, discreet per- 
 sons of the Province saw a general confusion at hand. The author- 
 ity of the Parliament to control all public and private persons and 
 proceedings in the Colonies, was at that day questioned by nobody. 
 Application was therefore made to I'arliament for an act to sup- 
 press the company; which, notwithstanding the opposition made by 
 their agent, was very easily obtained, and therein it was declared 
 that the act of the Sixth of King (Jeorge I., chapter xviii., did, 
 does and shall extend to the colonies and plantations of America. 
 It was said the act of George I., when it was passed, had no relation 
 to America; but another act, twenty years after, gave it force, even 
 from the passing it, which it never could have had without. This 
 was said to be an instance of the transcendent power of Parlia- 
 ment. Although the company was dissolved, yet the act of Parlia- 
 ment gave the possessors of the bills a right of action against every 
 
 •See foregoing paragraph where It is said that debts to the bank 
 might be paid in manufactures and produce.
 
 52 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 partner or director for the sums expressed, with interest. The 
 company was in a maze. At a general meeting, some, it is said, 
 were for running all hazards, although the act subjected them to a 
 pramunire; but the directors had more prudence, and advised them 
 to declare that they considered themselves dissolved, and meet only 
 to consult upon some method of redeeming their bills of the posses- 
 sors, which every man engaged to endeavor in proportion to his in- 
 terest, and to pay in to the directors, or some of them, to burn or 
 destroy. Had the company issued their bills at the value expressed 
 on the face of them, they would have had no reason to complain at 
 being obliged to redeem them at the same rate, but as this was not 
 the case in general, and many of the possessors of the bills had ac- 
 quired them for half their value, as expressed equity could not 
 be done; and, so far as respected the company, perhaps, the Parlia- 
 ment was not very anxious; the loss they sustained being but a just 
 penalty for their unwarrantable undertaking, if it had been proper- 
 ly applied. Had not the Parliament interposed, the Province 
 would have been in the utmost confusion, and the authority of 
 government entirely in the Land-Bank Company."— (p. 353.) 
 
 The "miscliiefs" occasioned by this land-bank seems to have 
 been political, rather than economical, for our author nowhere 
 aflfirms that the bill holders, not members of the company lost any- 
 thing by the institution. We would remark that there are certain 
 "mischiefs" which are regarded not without indulgence by poster- 
 ity. Governor Hutchinson ought to have explained more in detail 
 the nature of the evils he complains of; and also to have told us 
 why he, a declared enemy of popular institutions, opposed the ad- 
 vocates of the bank so uncompromisingly. Mutualism operates, by 
 its very nature, to render political government founded on arbi- 
 trary force, superfluous; that is, it operates to the decentralization 
 of the political power, and to the transformation of the state, by 
 substituting self-government in the stead of government ab extra* 
 The Land-Bank of 1740, which embodied the mutual principle, op- 
 erated vigorously in opposition to the government. Can we wonder 
 that it had to be killed by an arbitrary stretch "of the supreme 
 power of Parliament," and by an ex post facto law bearing 
 outrageously on the individual members of the company? For our 
 part, we admire the energy — the confidence in the princii)lo of mu- 
 tualism—of those memb(!rs who proposed to go on in spite of 
 Parliament, "although the act subjected them to a pro'iuunire." 
 If thi-y had gone on, they would simply have anticipated the Amer- 
 ican Rev(jlution by some thirty years. 
 
 But wliere is tlie warning to future ages? According to Gov- 
 ernor Hutchinson's own statement, the fault of the bank was, that 
 it would have succt^eded too well if it had had a fair trial; nay, 
 
 *Tlils Is also ProiuUion's flioory; wliicli lu^ felicitously c;ill<'(l "t lio 
 dissolution of goveniuiciit in the economic organism." — EDrrOH.
 
 THE PROVINCIAL LAND BANK. 5X 
 
 that it would have succeeded in spite of ail obstacles had it not 
 been for the exertion of "the transcendent power of Parliament." 
 Where is the bank of these degenerate days that has shown any- 
 thing like the same power of endurance? Someof the existing banks 
 find it diflBcult to live with the power of government exerted in 
 their favor! 
 
 The attempt of the Land-Bank Company to republicanize gold 
 and silver, and to make all commodities circulate as ready money 
 was, without question, premature. But our author misapprehends 
 the matter, mistaking a transformation of the circulating medium for 
 a mercantile scheme. The "vote of the company whereby the direc- 
 tors became traders," was an act for transforming the currency. 
 We do not justify it altogether; for it put the welfare of the cause 
 at too great hazard; but it was, nevertheless, not totally out of 
 harmony with the general system. We remark in conclusion, that 
 the depreciation in the provincial currency was occasioned, not by 
 "land-bank," that is, by mutual paper— which the Parliament 
 forced the issuers, by an arbitrary, vindictive, and tyrannical law, 
 to redeem with interest — but it was occasioned by government 
 paper, "professing to be ultimately redeemable in gold and silver."* 
 All arguments, therefore, against mutual money, derived from the 
 colonial currency, are foreign to the purpose. 
 
 The main objections against mutual banking are as follows: 1. 
 It is a novelty, and therefore a chimera of the inventor's brain; 2. 
 It is an old story, borrowed from provincial history, and therefore 
 of no account! 
 
 How would you have us answer objections like these? Things 
 new or old may be either good or evil. Every financial scheme 
 should stand or fall by its own intrinsic merits, and not be judged 
 from extraneous considerations. 
 
 *"We are told that there is no instance of a government paper that 
 did not depreciate. In reply I affirm that there is none assumiusthe 
 form I propose (notes receivable by government in payment of dues) 
 that ever did depreciate. Whenever a paper roroivable in the dues of 
 government had anything like a fair trial, it has succeeded. Instance 
 the case of North Carolina referred to in my opening remarks. The 
 drafts of the treasury at this moment, with all their incumbrance, are 
 nearly at par with gold and silver; and I migiit add the Instance 
 alluded to by the distinguished senator from Kentucky, in which he 
 admits, that as soon as tiio excess of the issues of tlie t'ommonwealth 
 Bank of Kentucky were reduced to the proper point, its notes rose to par. 
 The case of Russia might also be mentioned. In 1827 she had a fixed 
 paper-circulation in the form of bank-notes, but which were Incon- 
 vertible, of upward of S120,000,000, estimated in the metallic ruble, and 
 which liad for years remained witliout fluctuation; having notliingto 
 sustain it but that it was received in tlio dues of government, and 
 that, too, with a revenue of only about S".)0,000,000 annually."— .Tohn C. 
 Calhoun: Speech on his amendment to separate the government from 
 the banks, Oct. 3, 1837.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 MONEY. 
 
 The most concise and expressive definition of the term "capi- 
 tal," which we have seen in the writings of the political econo- 
 mists, is the one furnished by J. Stuart Mill, in his table of con- 
 tents. He says: "Capital is wealth appropriated to reproductive 
 employment." There is, indeed, a certain ambiguity attached to 
 the word wealth; but let that pass; we accept the definition. A 
 tailor has $5 in money, which he proposes to employ in his business. 
 This money is unquestionably capital, since it is wealth approjiri- 
 ated to reproductive employment: but it may be expended in the 
 purchase of cloth, in the payment of journeymen's wages, or in a 
 hundred other ways; what kind of capital, then, is it? It is evi- 
 dently, disengaged capital. Let us say that the tailor takes his 
 money and expends it for cloth; this cloth is also devoted to repro- 
 ductive employment, and is therefore still capital; but what kind of 
 capital? Evidently, engaged capital. He makes this cloth into a 
 coat; which coat is more valuable ihan the cloth, since it is the re- 
 sult of human labor bestowed upon the cloth. But the coat is no 
 longer capital; for it is no longer (so far, at least, as the occupation 
 of the tailor is concerned), capable of being appropriated to repro- 
 ductive employment; what is it, then? It is that for the creation 
 of which the capital was originally appropriated: it is product. 
 The tailor takes this coat and sells it in the market for ^8; which 
 dollars become to him a new disengaged capital. The circle is com- 
 plete; the coat becomes engaged capital to the purchaser; and the 
 money is disengaged capital, with which the tailor may commence 
 another operation. Money is disengaged capital, and disengaged 
 capital is money. Capital passes, therefore, through various forms; 
 first it is disengaged capital, then it becomes engaged capital, then 
 it becomes product, afterwards it is transformed again into disen- 
 gaged capital, thus recommencing its circular progress. 
 
 The community is liappy and prosperous when all professions 
 of men easily exchange with each other the products of their labor; 
 that is, the community is hai)py and prosperous when money circu- 
 lates freely, and each man is able with facility to transform his 
 product into disengaged capital, for with disengaged capital, or 
 money, men may command such of tlie products of labor as they 
 desire, to the extent, at least, of the purchasing power of their 
 money. 
 
 The community is unhappy, unprosperous, miserable, when 
 money is scarce, when exchanges are effected with difliculty. For 
 notice, that, in the present state of the world, there is never real 
 over-production to any appreciable extent; for, whenever the baker
 
 MOJ^EY. 55 
 
 has too much bread, there are always laborers who could produce 
 that of which the baker has too little, and who are themselves in 
 want of bread. It is when the tailor and baker cannot exchange, 
 that there is want and over-production on both sides. Whatever, 
 therefore, has power to withdraw the currency from circulation, 
 has power, also, to cause trade to stagnate; power to overwhelm 
 the community with misery; power to carry want, and its correla- 
 tive, over-production, into every artisan's house and workshop. 
 For the transformation of product into disengaged capital, is one of 
 the regular steps of production; and whatever withdraws the dis- 
 engaged capital, or money, from circulation, at once renders this 
 step impossible, and thus puts a drag on all production. 
 
 THERE ARE VARIOUS KINDS OF MONEY. 
 
 But all money is not the same money. There is one money of 
 gold, another of silver, another of brass, another of leather, and 
 another of paper: and there is a difference in the glory of these 
 different kinds of money. There is one money that is a commodity, 
 having its exchangeable value determined by the law of supply and 
 demand, which money may be called (though somevvhat barbarous- 
 ly) merchandise-money; as for instance, gold, silver, brass, bank- 
 bills, etc.; there is another money, which is not a commodity, 
 whose exchangeable value is altogether independent of the law of 
 supply and demand, and which may be called mutual money. 
 
 Mr. Edward Kellogg says: '"Money becomes worthless when- 
 ever it ceases to be capable of accumulating an income which can 
 be exchanged for articles of actual value. The value of money as 
 much depends upon its power of being loaned for an income, as the 
 value of a farm depends upon its natural power to produce." And 
 again: ''Money is valuable in proportion to its power to accum- 
 ulate value by interest."* Mr. Kellogg is mistaken. Money 
 is a commodity in a twofold way, and has therefore a twofold val- 
 ue and a twofold price — one value as an article that can be ex- 
 changed for other commodities, and another value as an article 
 that can be loaned out at interest; one price which is determined 
 by the supply and demand of the precious metals, and another 
 price (the rate of interest) which is determined by the distress of 
 the borrowing community. Mr. Kellogg speaks as though this last 
 value and last price were the only ones deserving consideration; 
 but this is by no means the case: for this last value and price are so 
 far from being essential to the nature' of money, that the Mutual 
 Bank will one day utterly abolish them. The natural value of the 
 silver dollar depends upon the demand and supply of the metal of 
 which it is composed and not upon its artiticial power to accumu- 
 late value by interest. Legislation has created usury; and the 
 
 ♦People who raise the cry of "clieap money" fall into the same error; 
 money that circulates freely at par, whether interest-bearing or not, Is 
 neither cheap or dear.— Editor.
 
 56 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 Mutual Bank can destroy it. Usury is a result of the legislation 
 which establishes a particular commodity as the sole article of 
 legal tender; and, when all commodities are made to be ready 
 money through the operation of mutual banking, usury will vanish. 
 
 CONVERTIBLE PAPER-MONEY RENDERS THE STANDARD OF VALUE 
 
 UNCERTAIN. 
 
 To show the efifect of variations in the volume of the existing 
 circulating medium, not only on foreign commerce, but also on the 
 private interests of each individual member of the community, 
 we will, at the risk of being tedious, have recourse to an illustra- 
 tion. Let us suppose that the whole number of dollars (either in 
 specie or convertible paper) in circulation, at a particular time, is 
 equal to Y; and that the sum of all these dollars will buy a certain 
 determinate quantity of land, means of transportation, merchan- 
 dise, etc, which may bo represented by x; for, if money may be 
 taken as the measure and standard of value for commodities, then 
 conversely, commodities may be taken as the standard and measure 
 of value for money. Let us say, therefore, that the whole mass of 
 the circulating medium is equal to Y; and that its value, estimated 
 in terms of land, ships, houses, merchandise, etc., is equal to x. If, 
 now, the quantity of specie and convertible paper we have sup- 
 posed to be in circulation be suddenly doubled, so that the whole 
 mass becomes equal in volume to 2Y, the value of the whole mass 
 will undergo no change, but will still be equal to -t, neither 
 more nor less. This is truly wonderful! Some young mathema- 
 tician, fresh from his algebra, will hasten to contradict us, and say 
 that the value of the whole mass will be equal to 2.r, or perhaps to 
 X divided by 2, but it is the young mathematician who is in error, as 
 may easily be made manifest. The multiplication of the whole 
 number of dollars by 2 causes money to bo twice as easy to be ob- 
 tained as it was before. Such multiplication causes, therefore, 
 each individual dollar to fall to one-half its former value; and this 
 for the simple reason that the price of silver dollars, or their equiv- 
 alents in convertible paper, depends upon the ratio of the supply of 
 such dollars to the demand for them, and that every increase in the 
 supply causes therefore a proportionate decrease in the price. The 
 variation in the volume docs not cause a variation in the value of 
 the volume, but causes a variation in the price of the individual 
 dollar. Again, if one-half the money in circulation bo suddenly 
 withdrawn, so that the whole volume shall equal XY, the value of 
 the new voluine will b(i exactly Cijual to .r, for the reason that the 
 dilliculty in procuring money will be doubled, since the supply will 
 be diminished one-half, causing each individual dollar to rise to 
 double its former value. The value; of the whole, mass in circula- 
 tion is independent of the variations of the volume; for every in- 
 crease in the volume causes a proportionate decrease in the value 
 of the iiulividual dollar, and every decrease in the volume causes 
 proportionate increase in the value of the individual dollar. If the
 
 MONEY. 57 
 
 mass of our existing circulating medium v;ere increased a hundred- 
 fold, the multiplication would have no effect other than that of 
 reducing the value of the individual dollar to that of the existing 
 individual cent. If gold were as plenty as Iron, it would command 
 no higher price than iron. If our money were composed of iron, we 
 should be obliged to hire an ox-cart for the transportation of SlOO; 
 and it would be asdifficult, under such conditions, to obtain a cart- 
 load of iron, as it is now to obtain its value in our present currency. 
 
 A fall or rise in the price of money, and a rise or fall in the 
 price of all other commodities besides money, are precisely the same 
 economical phenomenon. 
 
 The effect of a change in the volume of the currency is there- 
 fore not a change in the value of the whole volume, but a change in 
 the value of the individual silver dollar, this change being indi- 
 cated by a variation in the price of commodities; a fall in the price 
 of the silver dollar being indicated by a rise in the price of commo- 
 dities, and a rise in the price of the dollar being indicated by 
 a fall in the price of commodities. "The value of money," says J. 
 Stuart Mill, other things being the same, "varies inversely as its 
 quantity; every increase of quantity lowering its value, and every 
 diminution raising it in a ratio exactly equivalent. That an increase 
 of the quantity of money raises prices, and a diminution lowers 
 them, is the most elementary proposition in the theory of the cur- 
 rency; and, without it, we should have no key to any of the others." 
 
 Let us use this key for the purpose of unlocking the practical 
 mysteries attached to variations in the volume of the existing cur- 
 rency. The banks, since they exercise control over the volume of 
 the currency by means of the power they possess of increasing or 
 diminishing, at pleasure, the amount of paper money in circula- 
 tion, exercise control also over the value of every individual dollar 
 in every private man's pocket. They make great issues, and money 
 becomes plenty; that is to say, every other commodity becomes 
 dear. The capitalist sells what he has to sell while prices are high. 
 The banks draw in their issues, and money becomes scarce; that is, 
 all other commodities become cheap. The community is distressed 
 for money. Individuals are forced to sell property to raise money 
 to pay their debts, and to sell at a loss on account of the state of 
 the market. Then the capitalist buys what he desires to buy while 
 prices are low. These operations are the upper and the nether mill- 
 stones, between which the hopes of the people are ground to pow- 
 der. THE EVILS OP CONVERTIBLE PAPER MONEY. 
 
 Paper professing to be convertible into silver and gold, by over- 
 stocking the home-market with money, makes specie to be in less 
 demand in this country than it is abroad, and renders prolitable an 
 undue exportation of gold and silver; thus occasioning a chronic 
 drain of the precious metals.* 
 
 "Persons of little foresight rejoice in the IukIi price of conimodi-
 
 58 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 It increases the volume of the currency, and therefore decreases 
 the value of the individual silver dollar; thus causing an enhance- 
 ment in the price of all domestic commodities; giving an unnatural 
 advantage in our own markets to foreign manufacturers, who live 
 in the enjoyment of a more valuable currency and presenting irre- 
 sistible inducements to our own merchants to purchase abroad 
 rather than at home. 
 
 It operates to give control over the currency to certain organ- 
 ized bodies of men, enabling them to exercise partiality, and loan 
 capital to their relatives and favorites; thus encouraging incapac- 
 ity, and depressing merit; and therefore demoralizing the people 
 who are led to believe that legitimate business, which should be 
 founded altogether upon capital, industry and talent, partakes of 
 the nature of court-favor and gambling. 
 
 It operates to eucourage unwise speculation; and, by furnishing 
 artificial facilities to rash, scheming and incompetent persons, in- 
 duces the burying of immense masses of capital in unremunerative 
 enterprises. 
 
 It reduces the value of our own currency below the level of the 
 value of money throughout the world, rendering over-importation 
 inevitable, causing our markets to be overstocked with foreign 
 goods, and thus making the ordinary production of the country to 
 present all the calamitous effects of over-production. 
 
 It operates inevitably to involve the country and individuals 
 doing business in the country, in foreign debts. It operates also, by 
 blinding the people to the true nature of money, and encouraging 
 them to raise funds for the commencement and completion of haz- 
 ardous enterprises by the sale of scrip and bonds abroad, to mort- 
 gage the country, and the produce of its industry, to foreign hold- 
 ers of obligations against us, etc. 
 
 ADVANTAGES OF A MUTUAL CURRENCY. 
 
 Mutual Banks would furnish an adequate currency; for whether 
 money were hard or easy, all legitimate paper would be discounted 
 by them. At present, banks draw in their issues when money is 
 scarce (the very time when a large issue is desirable), because they 
 are afraid there will be a run upon them for specie; but Mutual 
 Banks, having no fear of a run upon them— as they have no metal- 
 lic capital, and never pretend to pay specie for their bills— can al- 
 ways discount good paper. 
 
 It may appear to some readers, notwithstanding the explana- 
 
 tles— tliat Is, In the low price or plcntlfulness of money— not reflecting 
 that, when money is too plenty, the sap and vitality of the country How 
 forth In a constant stream to enrich forclKn lands. An excessive supply 
 of money causes a deceitful appearance of prosperity, and favors tempo- 
 rarily a few manufacturers, traders and mechanics; but It Is always a 
 source of unnumbered calamities to the whole country.
 
 MOJsEY. 59 
 
 tions already given*, that we go altogether farther than we are 
 warranted when we affirm that the creation of an immense mass of 
 mutual money would produce no depreciation in the price of the sil- 
 ver dollar. The difficulty experienced in understanding this matter 
 results from incorrect notions respecting the standard of value, the 
 measure of value, and the nature of money. This may be made 
 evident by illustration. The yard is a measure of length; and a 
 piece of wood, or a rod of glass or metal, is a corresponding stand- 
 ard of length. The yard, or measure, being ideal, is unvarying; but 
 all the standards we have mentioned contract or expand by heat or 
 cold, so that they vary (to an almost imperceptible degree, perhaps) 
 at every moment. It is almost impossible to measure off a yard, or 
 any other given length, with mathematical accuracy. The meas- 
 ure of value is the dollar; the standard of value, as fixed by law, is 
 silver or gold at a certain degree of fineness. Corn, land, or any 
 other merchantable commodity might serve as a standard of value, 
 but silver and gold form a more perfect standard, on account of 
 their being less liable to variation; and they have accordingly been 
 adopted, by the common consent of all nations, to serve as such. 
 The dollar, as simple measure of value, has— like the yard, which is 
 a measure of length— an ideal existence only. In Naples, the ducat 
 is the measure of value; but the Neapolitans have no specific coin 
 of that denomination. Now, it is evident that the bill of a Mutual 
 Bank is like a note of hand, or like an ordinary bank bill, neither a 
 measure, nor a standard of value. It is (1) not a measure; for, un- 
 like all measures, it has an actual, and not a merely ideal existence. 
 The bill of a Mutual Bank, being receivable in lieu of a specified 
 number of silver dollars presupposes the existence of the silver dol- 
 lar as measure of value, and acknowledges itself as amenable to 
 that measure. The silver dollar differs from a bill of a Mutual 
 Bank receivable in lieu of a silver dollar, as the measure differs 
 from the thing measured. The bill of a Mutual Bank is (2) not a 
 standard of value, because it has in itself no intrinsic value, like 
 silver and gold; its value being legal, and not actual. A stick has 
 actual length, and therefore may serve as a standard of length; 
 silver has actual intrinsic value, and may therefore serve as a 
 standard of value; but the bill of a Mutual Bank, having a legal 
 value only, and not an actual one, cannot serve as a standard of 
 value, but is referred, on the contrary, to silver and gold as that 
 standard, without which it would itself be utterly unintelligible. 
 
 If ordinary bank bills represented specie actually existing in 
 the vaults of the banks, no mere issue or withdrawal of them 
 could effect a fall or rise in the value of money; for every issue of a 
 dollar-bill would correspond to the locking up of a specie dollar in 
 
 ♦Perhaps on account of those explanations. As hc:it melts wax, and 
 hardens clay, so the same general principles, as applied to merchandise 
 money and to mutual money, give opposite results.
 
 60 MUTUAL BANKI^^G 
 
 the bank's vaults; and every cancelling of a dollar-bill would cor- 
 respond to the issue by the banks of a specie dollar. It is by the ex- 
 ercise of banking privileges — that is, by the issue of bills purporting 
 to be, but which are not, convertible — that the banks effect a de- 
 preciation in the price of the silver dollar. It is this fiction (by 
 which legal value is assimilated to, and becomes, to all business in- 
 tents and purposes, actual value) that enables bank-notes to depre- 
 ciate the silver dollar. Substitute verity in the place of fiction, 
 either by permitting the banks to issue no more paper than they 
 have specie in their vaults, or by effecting an entire divorce between 
 bank-paper and its pretended specie basis, and the power of paper 
 to depreciate specie is at an end. So long as the fiction is kept up, 
 the silver dollar is depreciated, and tends to emigrate for the pur- 
 pose of traveling in foreign parts; but the moment the fiction is de- 
 stroyed, the power of paper over metal ceases. By its intrinsic 
 nature specie is merchandise, having its value determined, as such, 
 by supply and demand; but on the contrary, paper-money is, by its 
 intrinsic nature, not merchandise, but the means whereby merchan- 
 dise is exchanged, and as such ought always to be commensurate in 
 quantity with the amount of merchandise to be exchanged, be that 
 amount great or small. Mutual money is measured by specie, but 
 is in no way assimilated to it; and therefore its issue can have no 
 effect whatever to cause a rise or fall in the price of the precious 
 metals.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 CREDIT. 
 
 We are obliged to make a supposition by no means flattering 
 to the individual presented to the reader. Let us suppose, there- 
 fore, that some miserable mortal, who is utterly devoid of any per- 
 sonal good quality to recommend him, makes his advent on the 
 stage of action, and demands credit. Are there circumstances 
 under which he can obtain it? Most certainly. Though he pos- 
 sesses neither energy, morality nor business capacity, yet if he 
 owns a farm worth $3,000, which he is willing to mortgage as secur- 
 ity for $1,500 that he desires to borrow, he will be considered as 
 eminently deserving of credit. He is neither industrious, punctual, 
 capable, nor virtuous; but he owns a farm clear of debt worth 
 $2,000 and verily he shall raise the $1,500! 
 
 Personal credit is one thing; real credit is another and a very 
 different thing. In one case, it is the man who receives credit; in 
 the other, it is the property, the thing. Personal credit is in the 
 nature of partnership; real credit is in the nature of a sale, with a 
 reserved right of repurchase under conditions. By personal credit, 
 two men or more are brought into voluntary mutual relations; by real 
 credit, a certain amount of fixed property is transformed, under 
 certain conditions and for a certain time, into circulating medium; 
 that is, a certain amount of engaged capital is temporarily trans- 
 formed into disengaged capital. 
 
 THE USURY LAWS. 
 
 We have already spoken of the absurdity of the usury laws. 
 But let that pass; we will speak of it again. 
 
 A young man goes to a capitalist, saying: "If you will lend rae 
 $100, I will go into a certain business, and make $1,500 in the course 
 of the present year; and my profits will thus enable me to pay you 
 back the money you lend me, and another $100 for the use of it. In- 
 deed it is nothing more than fair that I should pay you as much as 
 I offer; for, after all, there is a great risk in the business, and you 
 do me a greater favor than I do you." The capitalist answers: "I 
 cannot lend you money on such terms; for the transaction would 
 be illegal; nevertheless, I am willing to help you all I can, if I can 
 devise a way. What do you say to my buying such rooms and 
 machinery as you require, and letting them to you on the terms you 
 propose? For, though I cannot charge more than 6 per cent on 
 money loaned, I can let buildings, whose total value is only $100, at 
 a rate of $1(X) per annum, and violate no law. Or, again, as I shall 
 be obliged to furnish you with the raw material consiimed in your
 
 62 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 business, what do you say to our entering into a partnership, so ar- 
 ranging the terms of agreement that the profits will be divided in 
 fact, as they would be in the case that I loaned you SlOO at 100 per cent 
 interest per annum?" The young man will probably permit the cap- 
 italist to arrange the transaction in any form he pleases, provided 
 the money is actually forthcoming. If the usury laws speak any 
 intelligible language to the capitalist, it is this: "The legislature 
 does not intend that you shall lend money to any young man to 
 help in his business, where the insurance upon the money you trust 
 in his hands, and which is subjected to the risk of his transactions, 
 amounts to more than 6 per cent per annum on the amount loaned." 
 And, in this speech, the deep wisdom of the legislature is mani- 
 fested! Why six, rather than five or seven? Why any restriction 
 at all? 
 
 Now for the other side (for we have thus'far spoken of the 
 usury laws as they bear on mere personal credit): If a man bor- 
 rows $1,500 on the mortgage of a farm, worth, in the estimation of 
 the creditor himself, $2,000, why should he pay 6 per cent interest on 
 the money borrowed? What does this interest cover? Insurance? 
 Not at all; for the money is perfectly safe, as the security given is 
 confessedly ample; the insurance is 0. Does the interest cover the 
 damage which the creditor suffers by being kept out of his money 
 for the time specified in the contract? This cannot be the fact — for 
 the damage is also 0— since a man who lends out money at interest, 
 on perfect security, counts the total amount of interest as clear 
 gain, and would much prefer letting the money at }>i per cent to 
 permitting it to remain idle. The rate of interest upon money lent 
 on perfect security is commensurate, not with the risk the creditor 
 runs of losing his money— for that risk is 0; not to the inconven- 
 ience to which the creditor is put by letting the money go out of his 
 hands — for that inconvenience is also 0,* since the creditor lends 
 only such money as he himself does not wish to use; but it is com- 
 mensurate with the distress of the borrower. One per cent per 
 annum interest on money lent on perfect security is, therefore, too 
 high a rate; and all levying of interest-money on perfect security 
 is profoundedly immoral, + since such interest-money is the fruit of 
 the speculation of one man upon the misfortune of another. Yet 
 the legislature permits one citizen to speculate upon the misfortune 
 of another to the amount of six-hundredths per annum of the ex- 
 tent to which he gets him into his power! This is the morality of 
 the usury laws in their bearing on real credit. 
 
 *If, liow(!v«!r, tlio incoiivunicnco is iinytliiiip, llio lender ouRlit to be 
 Indemnilied; but such iiuU-mriificiitioii is nut proporly inturust. 
 
 tPerhaps, we ought rather to say, "would be profoundly Immoral in a 
 morf perfect social order." Wo suppose tliat must l)o considered ri^lit, 
 iti our present chaotic state, wliicli is best on t lie wljolo, or wliich— tailing 
 men's passion as tliey are— Is unavoidable.
 
 CREDIT. 63 
 
 LEGITIMATE CREDIT. 
 
 All the questions connected with credit, the usury laws, etc., 
 may be forever set at rest by the establishment of Mutual Banks. 
 Whoever goes to the mutual bank, and offers real property in 
 pledge, may always obtain money; for the Mutual Bank can issue 
 money to any extent; and that money will always be good, since it 
 is all of it based on actual property, that may be sold under the 
 hammer. The interest will always be at a less rate than 1 per cent 
 per annum, since it covers, not the insurance of the money loaned, 
 there being no such insurance required, as the risk is 0; since it 
 covers, not the damage which is done the'bank by keeping it out of 
 its money, as that damage is also 0, the bank having always an un- 
 limited supply remaining on hand, so long as it has a printing-press 
 and paper; since it covers, plainly and simply, the mere expenses of 
 the institution— clerk-hire, rent, paper, printing, etc. And it is fair 
 that such expenses should be paid under the form of a rate of interest; 
 for thus each one contributes to bear the expenses of the bank, and 
 in the precise proportion of the benefits he individually experiences 
 from it. Thus the interest, properly so called, is 0; and we venture 
 to predict that the Mutual Bank will one day give all the real 
 credit that will be given; for since this bank will give such at per 
 cent interest per annum, it will be difficult for other institutions to 
 compete with it for any length of time. The day is coming when 
 everything that is bought will be paid for on the spot, and in mu- 
 tual money; when all payments will be made, all wages settled, on 
 the spot. The Mutual Bank will never, of course, give personal 
 credit; for it can issue bills only on real credit. It cannot enter 
 into partnership with anybody; for, if it issues bills where there is 
 no real guarantee furnished for their repayment, it vitiates the cur- 
 rency, and renders itself unstable. Personal credit will one day be 
 given by individuals only; that is, capitalists will one day enter 
 .into partnership with enterprising and capable men who are with- 
 out capital, and the profits will bo divided between the parties ac- 
 cording as their contract of partnership may run. Whoever, in the 
 times of the Mutual Bank, has property, will have money also; and 
 the laborer who has no property will find it very easy to get it; for 
 every capitalist will seek to secure him as a partner. All services 
 will then be paid for in ready money; and the demand for labor will 
 be increased three, four and five fold. 
 
 As for credit of the kind that is idolized by the present genera- 
 tion, credit which organizes society on feudal principles, confused 
 credit, the Mutual Bank will obliterate it from the face of the 
 earth. Money furnished under the existing system to individuals 
 and corporations is principally a[)plied to speculative purposes, ad- 
 vantageous, perhaps, to those; individuals and corporations, if the 
 speculations answer; but generally disadvantageous to the com- 
 munity, whether they answer or whether they fail. If they answer, 
 they generally end in a monopoly of trade, great or small, and in
 
 64 MUTUAL BANKING. 
 
 consequent high prices; if they fail, the loss falls on the community. 
 Under the existing system, there is little safety for the merchant. 
 The utmost degree of caution practicable in business has never 
 yet enabled a company or individual to proceed for any longtime 
 without incurring bad debts. 
 
 The existing organization of credit is the daughter of hard 
 money, begotten upon it incestuously by that insufficiency of circu- 
 lating medium which results from laws making specie the sole legal 
 tender. The immediate consequences of confused credit are want 
 of confidence, loss of time, commercial frauds, fruitless and re- 
 peated applications for payment, complicated with irregular and 
 ruinous expenses. The ultimate consequences are compositions, 
 bad debts, expensive accommodation-loans, lawsuits, insolvency, 
 bankruptcy, separation of classes, hostility, hunger, extravagance, 
 distress, riots, civil war, and, finally, revolution. The natural con- 
 sequences of mutual banking are, first of all, the creation of order, 
 and the definite establishment of due organization in the social 
 body; and, ultimately, the cure of ail the evils which flow from the 
 present incoherence and disruption in the relations of production 
 and commerce.
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 The expensive character of the existing circulating medium is 
 evident on the most superficial inspection. The assessor's valua- 
 tion for 1830, of the total taxable property then existing in the Com- 
 monwealth of Massachusetts, was $208,360,407; the valuation for 
 1840 was $299,878,329. We may safely estimate, that ihe valuation 
 for 1850 will be to that of 1840 as that of 1840 was to that of 1830. 
 Performing these calculations, we find that the total amount of tax- 
 able property possessed by the people of Massachusetts in the pres- 
 ent year, is about $431,588,724.* The excess of this last valuation 
 over that of 1840— i. e., $131,710,395— is the net gain, the clear profit, 
 of the total labor of the people in the ten years under consideration. 
 The average profit for each year was, therefore, $13,171,039. In the 
 year 1849, the banks of Massachusetts paid their tax to the state, 
 their losses on bad debts, their rents, their officers and lawyers, 
 and then made dividends of more than seven per cent on their 
 capitals. The people, must, therefore, in the course of that year 
 (1840) have paid interest money to the banks to the amount of at 
 least 10 per cent on the whole banking capital of the state. At the 
 close of the year 1848, the banking capital in the state amounted to 
 $32,683,330. Ten per cent on $32,683,330 is $3,268,333— the amount the 
 people paid, during the year 1849, for the use of a currency. If the 
 material of the currency had been iron, $3,268,333 would probably 
 have paid the expenses of the carting and counting. What, then, is 
 the utility of our present paper money? We have estimated the 
 total profits of the whole labor of the people of the Commonwealth 
 for the year 1849, at $13,171,039. It appears, therefore, that the total 
 profits of nearly one-fourth part of the whole population of the 
 state were devoted to the single purpose of paying for the use of a 
 currency. 
 
 Mutual Banks would have furnished a much better currency at 
 less than one-tenth of this expense. 
 
 The bills of a Mutual Bank cannot reasonably pretend to be 
 standards or measures of value; and this fact is put forth as a 
 recommendation of the mutual money to favorable consideration. 
 The silver dollar is the measure and standard of value; and the 
 bills of a Mutual Bank recognize the prior existence of this meas- 
 ure, since they are receivable in lieu of so many silver dollars. The 
 bill of a Mutual Bank is not a measure of value, since it is itself 
 measured and determined in value by the silver dollar. If the 
 dollar rises in value, the bill of the Mutual Bank rises also, 
 since it is receivable in lieu of a silver dollar. The bills 
 
 ♦According to tlie report of the Valuation Coinnilttee, it appears to 
 have been (In the year 1850) $600,000,000— a much larger sum.
 
 66 MUTUAL BANKI:NG. 
 
 of a Mutual Bank are not measures of value, but mere instruments 
 of exchange; and, as the value of the mutual money is determined, 
 not by the demand and supply of the mutual money, but by the de- 
 mand and supply of the precious metals, the Mutual Bank may is- 
 sue bills to any extent, and those bills will not be liable to any de- 
 preciation from excess of supply. And for like reasons, the mutual 
 money will not be liable to rise in value if it happens at any time to 
 be scarce in the market. The issues of said mutual money are 
 therefore susceptible of any contraction or expansion which may be 
 necessary to meet the wants of the community; and such contrac- 
 tion or expansion cannot, by any possibility, be attended with any 
 evil consequence whatever; for the silver dollar, which is the 
 standard of value, will remain throughout at the natural valuation 
 determined for it by the general demand and supply of gold and 
 silver throughout the whole world. 
 
 In order that the silver dollar, which is the standard and meas- 
 ure of value, may not be driven out of circulation, the Mutual 
 Bank— which has no vault for specie other than the pockets of the 
 people — ought to issue no bill of a denomination less than tive 
 dollars. 
 
 THE KXD.
 
 No. lo. COMMONWEALTH LIBRARY. April, 1S96. 
 
 Monthly, $1 yearly. Commonweallh Co., 28 Lafayette Place, N.Y. 
 
 AN APPEAL TO THE YOUNG. 
 
 By peter KROPOTKIN. 
 
 New Edition. Translated by H. M. Hyndman. 
 
 It is to the young that I wish to address myself 
 to-day. Let the old — I mean, of course, the old in 
 heart and mind — lay the pamphlet down, therefore, 
 without tiring their eyes in reading what will tell 
 them nothing. 
 
 I assume that you are about eighteen or twenty 
 years of age ; that you have finished your appren- 
 ticeship or your studies; that you are just entering 
 on life. I take it for granted that you have a mind 
 free from the superstition which your teachers have 
 sought to force upon you ; that you do not fear the 
 devil, and that you do not go to hear ministers rant. 
 More, that you are not one of the fops, sad products 
 of a society in decay, who display their well-cut 
 trousers and their monkey faces in the park, and 
 who even at their early age have only an insatiable 
 longing for pleasure at any price. ... I assume, 
 on the contrary, that you have a warm heart, and 
 for this reason I talk to you. 
 
 A first question, I know, occurs to you — you have 
 often asked yourself, " What am I going to be ?" 
 In fact, when a man is young he understands that 
 after having studied a trade or a science for several 
 years — at the cost of society, mark — he has not done 
 this in order that he should make use of his acquire- 
 ments as instruments of plunder for his own gain, 
 and he must be depraved indeed, and utterl}^ cank- 
 ered by vice, who has not dreamed that one day he 
 would apply his intelligence, his abilities, his knowl- 
 edge, to help on the enfranchisement of those who 
 to-day grovel in misery and in ignorance. 
 
 You are one of those who have had such a vision. 
 
 Price, Five Cents.
 
 2 An Appeal to the Young. 
 
 are you not ? Very well, let us see what you must 
 do to make your dream a reality. 
 
 I do not know in what rank 3^ou were born. Per- 
 haps, favored by fortune, you have turned your atten- 
 tion to the study of science ; you are to be a doctor, a 
 lawyer, a man of letters, or a scientific man ; a wide 
 field opens before you ; you enter upon life with ex- 
 tensive knowledge, a trained intelligence. Or, on the 
 other hand, you are, perhaps, only an honest artisan, 
 whose knowledge of science is limited by the little 
 you have learned at school ; but you have had the 
 advantage of learning at first hand what a life of ex- 
 hausting toil is the lot of the worker of our time. 
 
 I stop at the first supposition, to return afterward 
 to the second ; I assume, then, that you have received 
 a scientific education. Let us suppose you intend to 
 be a doctor. 
 
 To-morrow a man in corduroys will come to take 
 you to see a sick woman. He will lead 3'ou into one 
 of those alle3^s where the opposite neighbors can 
 almost shake hands over the heads of the passers-by; 
 you ascend into a foul atmosphere by the flickering 
 light of a little ill-trimmed lamp; you climb two, 
 three, four, five flights of filthy stairs, and in a dark, 
 cold room you find the sick woman, lying on a pallet 
 covered with dirty rags. Pale, livid children, shiver- 
 ing under their scanty garments, gaze at you with 
 their big eyes wide open. The husband has worked 
 all his life twelve or thirteen hours a day at no 
 matter what; now he has been out of work for three 
 months. To be out of employ is not rare in his trade ; 
 it happens every year, periodically. But, formerly, 
 when he was out of work his wife went out as a 
 charwoman — perhaps to wash your shirts — at the 
 rate of fifteen-pence a day ; now she has been bed- 
 ridden for two months, and misery glares upon the 
 family in all its squalid hideousness. 
 
 What will you prescribe for the sick woman, doc- 
 tor ? you who have seen at a glance that the cause
 
 All Appeal to the Young. 3 
 
 of her illness is general anaemia, want of good food, 
 lack of fresh air ? Say a good beefsteak every day, 
 a little exercise in the country, a dry and well-venti- 
 lated bedroom ? What irony ! If she could have 
 afforded it this would have been done long since 
 without waiting for your advice ! 
 
 If you have a good heart, a frank address, an hon- 
 est face, the family will tell you many things. The}'- 
 will tell you that the woman on the other side of the 
 partition, who coughs a cough which tears your 
 heart, is a poor ironer ; that a flight of stairs lower 
 down all the children have the fever ; that the washer- 
 woman who occupies the ground floor will not live 
 to see the spring; and that in the house next door 
 things are still worse. 
 
 What will you say to these sick people ? Recom- 
 mend them generous diet, change of air, less exhaust- 
 ing toil? . . . You only wish you could, but you 
 dare not, and you go out heartbroken with a curse 
 on your lips. 
 
 The next day, as you still brood over the fate of 
 the dwellers in this dog-hutch, your partner tells you 
 that yesterday a footman came to take him, this time 
 in a carriage. It was for the owner of a fine house, 
 for a lady worn out with sleepless nights, who devotes 
 all her life to dressing, visits, balls, and squabbles 
 with a stupid husband. Your friend has prescribed 
 for her a less preposterous habit of life, a less heating 
 diet, walks in the fresh air, and even temperament, 
 and, in order to make up in some measure for the 
 want of useful work, a little gymnastic exercise in 
 her bedroom. 
 
 The one is dvino; because she has never had enough 
 food nor rest in her whole life ; the other pines be- 
 cause she has never known what work is since she 
 was born. 
 
 If you are one of those miserable natures who adapt 
 themselves to anything, who at the sight of the most 
 revolting spectacles console themselves with a gentle
 
 4 A7i Appeal to the Yojing. 
 
 sigh and a glass of sherry, then you will gradually 
 become used to these contrasts, and, the nature of 
 the beast favoring your endeavors, your sole idea 
 will be to lift yourself into the ranks of the pleasure- 
 seekers, so that you may never again find yourself 
 among the wretched. But if you are a man, if every 
 sentiment is translated in your case into an action of 
 the will ; if, in you, the beast has not crushed the in- 
 telligent being, then you will return home one day 
 saying to yourself, "No, it is unjust; this must not 
 go on so any longer. It is not enough to cure dis- 
 eases: we must prevent them. A little good living 
 and intellectual development would score off our lists 
 half the patients and half the diseases. Throw physic 
 to the dogs ? Air, good diet, less crushing toil — that 
 is how we must begin. Without this, the whole 
 profession of a doctor is nothing but trickery and 
 humbug." 
 
 That very day you will understand socialism. You 
 will wish to know it thoroughly, and if altruism is 
 not a word devoid of significance for you, if you apply 
 to the study of the social question the rigid induction 
 of the natural philosopher, you will end by finding 
 yourself in our ranks, and you will work, as we work, 
 to bring about the social revolution. 
 
 But perhaps you will say, " Mere practical business 
 may go to the devil ! I will devote myself to pure 
 science; I will be an astronomer, a physiologist, a 
 chemist. Such work as that always bears fruit, if 
 only for future generations." 
 
 Let us first try to understand what you seek in de- 
 voting yourself to science. Is it only the pleasure — 
 doubtless immense — which we derive from the study 
 of nature and the exercise of our intellectual facul- 
 ties? In that case I ask you in what respect does 
 the philosopher, who pursues science in order that 
 he may pass life pleasantly to himself, difTer from 
 the drunkard, who only seeks the immediate gratifi- 
 cation that gin affords him ? The philosopher has,
 
 An Appeal to the Young. 5 
 
 past all question, chosen his enjoyment more wisely, 
 since it affords him a pleasure far deeper and more 
 lasting than that of the toper. But that is all ! 
 Both one and the other have the same selfish end in 
 view — personal gratification. 
 
 But, no ; you have no wish to lead this selfish life. 
 By working at science you mean to work for hu- 
 manity, and that is the idea which will guide you in 
 your investigations. 
 
 A charming illusion ! Which of us has not hugged 
 it for a moment when giving himself up for the first 
 time to science ? 
 
 But, then, if you are really thinking about human- 
 ity, if you look to the good of mankind in your 
 studies, a formidable question arises before you; 
 for, however little you may have of the critical spirit, 
 you must at once note that in our society of to-day 
 science is only an appendage to luxury which serves 
 to render life pleasanter for the few, but remains 
 absolutely inaccessible to the bulk of mankind. 
 
 More than a century has passed since science laid 
 down sound propositions as to the origin of the uni- 
 verse, but how many have mastered them or possess 
 the really scientific spirit of criticism ? A few thou- 
 sands at the outside, who are lost in the midst of 
 hundreds of millions still steeped in prejudices and 
 superstitions worthy of savages, who are conse- 
 quently ever ready to serve as puppets for religious 
 impostors. 
 
 Or, to go a step further, let us glance at what 
 science has done to establish rational foundations 
 for physical and moral health. Science tells us how 
 we ought to live in order to preserve the health of 
 our own bodies, how to maintain in good conditions 
 of existence the crowded masses of our population. 
 But does not all the vast amount of work done in 
 these two directions remain a dead letter in our 
 books? We know it does. And why? Because 
 science to-day exists only for a handful of privileged
 
 6 An Appeal to the Young. 
 
 persons; because social inequality, which divides 
 society into two classes — the wage-slaves and the 
 grabbers of capital — renders all its teachings as to 
 the conditions of a rational existence only the bitter- 
 est irony to nine-tenths of mankind. 
 
 I could give plenty more examples, but I stop 
 short: only go outside Faust's closet, whose win- 
 dows, darkened by dust, scarce let the light of heaven 
 glimmer on its shelves full of books; look round, 
 and at each step you will find fresh proof in support 
 of this view. 
 
 It is now no longer a question of accumulating 
 scientific truths and discoveries. We need above 
 everything to spread the truths already mastered by 
 science, to make them part of our daily life, to ren- 
 der them common property. We have to order 
 things so that all, so that the mass of mankind, may 
 be capable of understanding and applying them ; we 
 have to make science no longer a luxury, but the 
 foundation of every man's life. This is what justice 
 demands. 
 
 I go further : I say that the interests of science 
 itself lie in the same direction. Science only makes 
 real progress when a new truth finds a soil already 
 prepared to receive it. The theory of the mechani- 
 cal origin of heat, though enunciated in the last cen- 
 tury in the same terms that Hirn and Clausius 
 formulate it to-day, remained for eighty years buried 
 in the Academical Records until such time as knowl- 
 edge of physics had spread widely enough to create 
 a public capable of accepting it. Three generations 
 had to go by before the ideas of Erasmus Darwin on 
 the variation of species could be favorably received 
 from his grandson and admitted by academical phi- 
 losophers, and not without pressure from public 
 opinion even then. The philosopher, like the poet 
 or artist, is always the product of the society in 
 which he moves and teaches.
 
 An Appeal to the Young. y 
 
 But, if you are imbued with these ideas, you will 
 understand that it is above all important to bring 
 about a radical chanofe in this state of affairs which 
 to-day condemns the philosopher to be crammed with 
 scientific truths, and almost the whole of the rest of 
 human beings to remain what they were five or ten 
 centuries ago ; that is to say, in the state of slaves 
 and machines, incapable of mastering established 
 truths. And the day when you are imbued with 
 wide, deep, humane, and profoundly scientific truth, 
 that day you will lose your taste for science only. 
 You will set to work to find out the means to effect 
 this transformation, and if you bring to your investi- 
 gations the impartiality which has guided you in 
 5'-our scientific researches you will of necessity adopt 
 the cause of socialism ; you will make an end of soph- 
 isms and you will come among us. Weary of working 
 to procure pleasures for this small group, which 
 already has a large share of them, you will place 
 your information and devotion at the service of the 
 oppressed. 
 
 And be sure that, the feeling of duty accomplished 
 and of a real accord established between your senti- 
 ments and your actions, you will then find powers in 
 yourself of whose existence you never even dreamed. 
 When, too, one day — it is not so far distant in any 
 case, saving the presence of our professors — when, 
 one day, I say, the change for which you are working 
 shall have been brought about, then, deriving new 
 forces from collective scientific work, and from the 
 powerful help of armies of laborers who will come to 
 place their energies at its service, science will take a 
 new bound forward, in comparison with which the 
 slow progress of to-day will appear the simple exer- 
 cises of tyros. 
 
 Then you will enjoy science; that pleasure will be 
 a pleasure for all. 
 
 If you have finished reading law and are about to 
 be called to the bar, perhaps you, too, have some illu-
 
 8 Aji Appeal to the Young. 
 
 sions as to your future activity — I assume that you 
 are one of the nobler spirits, that you know what 
 altruism means. Perhaps you think, "To devote my 
 life to an unceasing and vigorous struggle against 
 all injustice! To apply my whole faculties to bring- 
 ing about the triumph of law, the public expression 
 of supreme justice — can any career be nobler ? " You 
 begin the real work of life confident in yourself and 
 in the profession you have chosen. 
 
 Very well: let us turn to any page of the Law 
 Reports and see what actual life will tell you. 
 
 Here we have a rich landowner ; he demands the 
 eviction of a cotter tenant who has not paid his rent. 
 From a legal point of view the case is beyond dispute : 
 since the poor farmer cannot pay, out he must go. 
 But if we look into the facts we shall learn something 
 like this: The landlord has squandered his rents 
 persistently in rollicking pleasure; the tenant has 
 worked hard all day and ever}' day. The landlord 
 has done nothing to improve his estate. Neverthe- 
 less its value has trebled in fifty years, owing to a 
 rise in price of land due to the construction of a rail- 
 way, to the making of new highroads, to the draining 
 of a marsh, to the enclosure and cultivation of waste 
 lands. But the tenant who has contributed largely 
 toward this increase has ruined himself; he fell into 
 the hands of usurers, and, head over ears in debt, he 
 can no longer pay the landlord. The law, always on 
 the side of property, is quite clear : the landlord is in 
 the right. I3ut you, whose feeling of justice has not 
 yet been stifled by legal fictions, what will you do? 
 Will you contend that the farmer ought to be turned 
 out upon the high roads ? — for that is what the law 
 ordains — or will you urge that the landlord should pay 
 back to the fanner the whole of the increase or value 
 in his property which is due to the farmer's labor? — 
 this is what equity decrees. Which side will you 
 take? For the law and against justice or for justice 
 and against the law ?
 
 An Appeal to the Young. 9 
 
 Or, when workmen have gone out on strike against 
 a master without notice, whicli side will you take? 
 The side of tlie law, that is to say, the part of the 
 master who, taking advantage of a period of crisis, 
 has made outrageous profits, or against the law, but 
 on the side of the workers who received during the 
 whole time only fifty cents a day as wages, and saw 
 their wives and children fade away before their eyes? 
 Will you stand up for that piece of chicanery which 
 consists in affirming "freedom of contract"? Or 
 will you uphold equity, according to which a contract 
 entered into between a man who has dined well and 
 the man who sells his labor for bare subsistence, be- 
 tween the strong and the weak, is not a contract 
 at all? 
 
 Take another case : A man was loitering near a 
 butcher's shop. He stole a beefsteak and ran off 
 with it. Arrested and questioned, it turns out that 
 he is an artisan out of work, and that he and his 
 family have had nothing to eat for four days. The 
 butcher is asked to let the man off, but he is all for 
 the triumph of justice! He prosecutes, and the man 
 is sentenced to six months' imprisonment. Blind 
 Themis so wills it ! Does not your conscience revolt 
 against the law and against society when you hear 
 similar judgments pronounced every day? 
 
 Or, again, will you call for the enforcement of the 
 law against this man who, badly brought up and ill- 
 used from his childhood, has arrived at man's estate 
 without having heard one sympathetic word, and 
 completes his career by murdering his neighbor in 
 order to rob him of twenty-five cents? Will you de- 
 mand his execution, or — worse still — that he should 
 be imprisoned for twenty years, when you know very 
 well that he is rather a madman than a criminal, 
 and, in any case, that his crime is the fault of our 
 entire societv? . . . 
 
 If you reason instead of repeating what is taught
 
 lo An Appeal to the Youtig. 
 
 you ; if you analyze the law and strip off those cloudy 
 fictions with which it has been draped in order to 
 conceal its real origin, which is the right of the 
 stronger, and its substance, which has ever been the 
 consecration of all the tyrannies handed down to 
 mankind through its long and bloody history ; when 
 you have comprehended this, your contempt for the 
 law will be profound indeed. You will understand 
 that to remain the servant of the written law is to 
 place yourself every day in opposition to the law of 
 conscience, and to make a bargain on the wrong 
 side; and, since this struggle cannot go on forever, 
 you will either silence your conscience and become 
 a scoundrel, or you will break with tradition, and 
 vou will work with us for the utter destruction of 
 all this injustice, economical, social, and political. 
 
 But then you will be a socialist, you will be a rev- 
 olutionist. 
 
 And you, young engineer, you who dream of im- 
 proving the lot of the workeis by the application of 
 science to industry — what a sad disappointment, 
 what terrible disillusions await you ! You devote 
 the useful energy of your mind to working out the 
 scheme of a railway which, running along the brink 
 of precipices and burrowing into the ver}' heart of 
 mountains of granite, will ' bind together two coun- 
 tries which nature has separated. But, once at work, 
 you see whole regiments of workers decimated by 
 privations and sickness in this dark tunnel ; you see 
 others of them returning home, carrying with them, 
 may be, a few cents and the undoubted seeds of con- 
 sumption ; you see human corpses — the results of a 
 groveling greed — as landmarks along each yard of 
 your road; and, when the railroad is finished, you 
 see, lastly, that it becomes the highway for the artil- 
 lery of an invading army. . . . 
 
 You have given up the prime of your youth to per- 
 fect an invention which will facilitate production.
 
 A71 Appeal to tJic Young. II 
 
 and, after many experiments, many sleepless nights, 
 you are at length master of this valuable discovery. 
 You make use of it, and the result surpasses your 
 expectations. Ten, twenty thousand "hands" are 
 thrown out upon the streets ! Those who remain, 
 most of them children, will be reduced to mere ma- 
 chines ! Three, four, ten masters will make their 
 fortunes and will drink deep on the strength of it. . . . 
 Is this your dream ? 
 
 Finally, you study recent industrial advances, and 
 you see that the seamstress has gained nothing, abso- 
 lutely nothing, by the invention of the sewing ma- 
 chine; that the laborer in the St. Gothard tunnel 
 dies of anchylosis, notwithstanding diamond drills ; 
 that the mason and the day laborer are out of work 
 just as before at the foot of the Giffard lifts. If you 
 discuss social problems with the same independence 
 of spirit which has guided you in your mechanical 
 investigations, you necessarily come to the conclusion 
 that under the domination of private property and 
 wage-slavery, every new invention, far from increas- 
 ing the well-being of the w^orker, only makes his 
 slavery heavier, his labor more degrading, the periods 
 of slack work more frequent, the crisis sharper, and 
 that the man who already has every conceivable 
 pleasure for himself is the only one who profits by it. 
 
 What will you do when you have once come to this 
 conclusion ? Either you will begin by silencing your 
 conscience by sophisms ; then one fine day you will 
 bid farewell to the honest dreams of your youth and 
 you will try to obtain, for yourself, what commands 
 pleasure and enjoyment — you will then go over to 
 the camp of the exploiters. Or if you have a tender 
 heart you will say to yourself, " No, this is not the 
 time for inventions. Let us work first to transform 
 the domain of production. When private property 
 is put an end to, then each new advance in industry 
 will be made for the benefit of all mankind ; and this
 
 12 An Appeal to the Young. 
 
 mass of workers, mere machines as they are to-day, 
 will then become thinking beings who apply to in- 
 dustry their intelligence, strengthened by study and 
 skilled in inanual labor, and thus mechanical prog- 
 ress will take a bound forward which Vv^ill carry out in 
 fifty years what now-a-days we cannot even dream of." 
 
 And what shall I say to the schoolmaster — not to 
 the man who looks upon his profession as a wearisome 
 business, but to him who, when surrounded by a joy- 
 ous band of children, feels exhilarated by their cheery 
 looks and in the midst of their happy laughter, to him 
 who tries to plant in their little heads those ideas of 
 humanity which he cherished himself when he was 
 young. 
 
 Often I see that you are sad, and I know what it 
 is that makes you knit your brows. This very day, 
 your favorite pupil, who is not very well up in Latin, 
 it is true, but who has none the less an excellent 
 heart, recited the story of William Tell with so much 
 vigor ! His eyes sparkled ; he seemed to wish to stab 
 all tyrants there and then ; he gave with such fire 
 the passionate lines of Schiller: 
 
 Before the slave when he breaks his chain, 
 Before the free man tremble not. 
 
 But when he returned home, his mother, his father, 
 his uncle, sharply rebuked him for want of respect 
 to the minister or the rural policeman ; they held 
 forth to him by the hour on "prudence, respect for 
 authority, submission to his betters," till he put 
 Schiller aside in order to read " Self-Help." 
 
 And then only yesterday you were told that your 
 best pupils have all turned out badly. One does 
 nothing but dream of becoming an officer; another 
 in league with his master robs the workers of their 
 slender wages ; and you, who had such hopes of 
 these young people, you now brood over the sad 
 contrast between your ideal and life as it is.
 
 An Appeal to the Yomig. 13 
 
 You still brood over it ? Then I foresee that in two 
 ^'ears at the outside, after having suffered disappoint- 
 ment after disappointment, you will lay your favorite 
 authors on the shelf, and you will end by saying that 
 Tell was no doubt a very honest fellow, but after all 
 a trifle cracked ; that poetry is a first-rate thing for 
 the fiieside, especially when a man has been teach- 
 ing the rule-of-three all day long, but still poets are 
 always in the clouds and their views have nothing 
 to do with the life of to-dav, nor with the next visit 
 of Ibo inspector of schools. . . . 
 
 Or, on the other hand, the dreams of your youth 
 will become the firm convictions of your mature age. 
 You will wish to have wide, human education for all, 
 in school and out of school ; and, seeing that this is 
 impossible in existing conditions, you will attack the 
 very foundations of bourgeois society. Then, dis- 
 charged as you will be by the education department, 
 you will leave your school and come among us and be 
 of us ; you will tell men of riper years but of smaller 
 attainments than yourself how enticing knowledge 
 is, what mankind ought to be, nay, what we could be. 
 You will come and work with socialists for the com- 
 plete transformation of the existing system, will 
 strive side by side with us to attain true equality, 
 real fraternity, never-ending liberty for the world. 
 
 Lastly, you, young artist, sculptor, painter, poet, 
 musician, do you not observe that the sacred fire 
 which inspired your predecessors is wanting in the 
 men of to-day? that art is commonplace and medi- 
 ocrity reigns supreme ? 
 
 Could it be otherwise ? The delight of having re- 
 discovered the ancient world, of having bathed afresh 
 in the springs of nature which created the master- 
 pieces of the Renaissance no longer exists for the art 
 of our time ; the revolutionary ideal has left it cold 
 until now, and, failing an ideal, our art fancies that 
 it has found one in realism when it painfully photo-
 
 14 An Appeal to the Young. 
 
 graphs in colors the dewdrop on the leaf of a plant, 
 imitates the muscle in the leg of a cow, or describes 
 minutely in prose and in verse the suffocating filth of 
 a sewer, the boudoir of a prostitute of high degree. 
 
 " But, if this is so, what is to be done?" you say. 
 If, I reply, the sacred fire that you say you possess 
 is nothing better than a smouldering wick, then you 
 will go on doing as 3^ou have done, and your art will 
 speedily degenerate into the trade of decorator of 
 tradesmen's shops, of a purveyor of libretti to third- 
 rate operettas and tales for Christmas annuals — 
 most of you are already running down that grade 
 with a fine head of steam on. . . . 
 
 But, if your heart really beats in unison with that 
 of humanity, if like a true poet you have an ear for 
 life, then, gazing out upon this sea of sorrow whose 
 tide sweeps up around you, face to face with these 
 people dying of hunger, in the presence of these 
 corpses piled up in the mines, and these mutilated 
 bodies lying in heaps on the barricades looking on 
 these long lines of exiles who are going to bury them- 
 selves in the snows of Siberia and in the marshes of 
 tropical islands, in full view of this desperate battle 
 which is being fought, amid the cries of pain from 
 the conquered and the orgies of the victors, of heroism 
 in conflict with cowardice, of noble determination 
 face to face with contemptible cunning — you cannot 
 remain neutral: you will come and take the side of 
 the oppressed because you know that the beautiful, 
 the sublime, the spirit of life itself are on the side of 
 those who fight for light, for humanity, for justice! 
 
 You stop me at last ! 
 
 " What the devil ! " 3''ou say. " If abstract science 
 is a luxury and practice of medicine mere chicane ; 
 if law spells injustice, and mechanical invention is 
 but a means of robbery; if the school, at variance 
 with the wisdom of the ' practical man,' is sure to be 
 overcome, and art without the revolutionary idea can
 
 An Appeal to the Voting. 1 5 
 
 onlv degenerate, what remains for me to do - " 
 
 Well, I will tell you : 
 
 A vast and most enthralling task ; a work in which 
 your actions will be in complete harmony with your 
 conscience, an undertaking capable of rousing the 
 noblest and most vigorous natures. 
 
 What work ? — I will now tell you. 
 
 It rests with you either to palter continually with 
 your conscience, and in the end to say one fine da}', 
 " Perish humanity, provided I can have plenty of 
 pleasures and enjoy them to the full, so long as the 
 people are foolish enough to let me," Or, once more 
 the inevitable alternative, to take part with the so- 
 cialists and work with them for the complete trans- 
 formation of society. Such is the irrefragable con- 
 sequence of the analysis we have gone through. That 
 is the logical conclusion which every intelligent man 
 must perforce arrive at, provided that he reasons 
 honestly about what passes around him, and discards 
 the sophisms which his bourgeois education and the 
 interested views of those about him whisper in his ear. 
 
 This conclusion once arrived at, the question, 
 "What is to be done?" is naturally put. 
 
 The answer is easv. 
 
 Leave this environment in which you are placed 
 and where it is the fashion to say that the people 
 are nothing but a lot of brutes, come among these 
 people — and the answer will come of itself. 
 
 You will see that everywhere, in England as well 
 as in France, in Germany as well as in Italy, in 
 Russia as well as in the United States, everywhere 
 where there is a privileged and an oppressed class, 
 there is a tremendous work going on in the midst of 
 the working-class, whose object is to break down for- 
 ever the slavery enforced by the capitalist feudality 
 and to lay the foundation of a society established on 
 the basis of justice and equality. It is no longer 
 enough for the man of the people to-day to pour
 
 1 6 Alt Appeal to the Young. 
 
 forth his complaints in one of those songs whose 
 melody breaks your heart, such as were sung by the 
 serfs of the eleventh century, and are still sung by 
 the Slav peasant ; he labors with his fellow-toilers 
 for his enfranchisement, with the knowledge of what 
 he is doing and against every obstacle put in his wa}-. 
 
 His thoughts are constantly exercised in consider- 
 ing what should be done in order that life, instead 
 of being a curse for three-fourths of mankind, may 
 be a real enjoyment for all. He takes up the hard- 
 est problems of sociology and tries to solve them by 
 his good sense, his spirit of observation, his hard 
 experience. In order to come to an understanding 
 with others as miserable as himself, he seeks to form 
 groups, to organize. He forms societies, maintained 
 with difficulty by small contributions; he tries to 
 make terms with his fellows beyond the frontier; 
 and he prepares the days when wars between peo- 
 ples shall be impossible far better than the frothy 
 philanthropists who now potter with the fad of uni- 
 versal peace. In order to know what his brothers 
 are doing, to have a closer connection with them, to 
 elaborate his ideas and pass them round, he main- 
 tains — but at the price of what privations, what 
 ceaseless efforts ! — his working press. . . . 
 
 What an unending series of efforts! What an 
 incessant struggle ! What toil perpetually begun 
 afresh; sometimes to fill up the gaps occasioned by 
 desertion — the result of weariness, corruption, pros- 
 ecutions ; sometimes to rally the broken forces deci- 
 mated by fusilades and cold-blooded butchery! at 
 another time to recommence the studies sternly 
 broken off by wholesale slaughter. 
 
 The newspapers are set on foot by men who have 
 been obliged to force from society scraps of knowl- 
 edge by depriving themselves of sleep and food ; the 
 agitation is kept up by halfpence deducted from the 
 amount needed to get the barest necessaries of life ;
 
 An Appeal to the Youjig. 17 
 
 and all this under the constant dread of seeing his 
 family reduced to the most fearful misery, as soon 
 as the master learns that "his workman, his slave, 
 is tainted with socialism." 
 
 This is what you will see if you go among the 
 people. 
 
 And in this endless struggle how often has not 
 the toiler vainly asked as he stumbled under the 
 weiofht of his burden: 
 
 " Where, then, are these young people who have 
 been taught at our expense ? these youths whom we 
 fed and clothed while they studied? Where are 
 those for whom, our backs bent double beneath our 
 burdens and our stomachs empty, we have built 
 these houses, these colleges, these lecture rooms, 
 these museums? Where are the men for whose 
 benefit we, with our pale, worn faces, have printed 
 these fine books, most of which we cannot even 
 read ? Where are they, these professors who claim 
 to possess the science of mankind, and for whom 
 humanity itself is not worth a rare caterpillar? 
 Where are the men who are ever speaking in praise 
 of liberty, and never think to champion our free- 
 dom, trampled as it is each day beneath their feet? 
 Where are they, these writers and poets, these 
 painters and sculptors ? Where, in a word, is the 
 whole gang of hypocrites who speak of the People 
 with tears in their eyes, but who never, by any 
 chance, find themselves among us helping us in our 
 laborious work ? "
 
 i8 An Appeal to the Young. 
 
 Where are they, indeed ? Why, some are taking 
 their ease with the most cowardly indifference ; 
 others, the majority, despise the " dirty mob," and 
 are ready to pounce upon them if they dare touch 
 one of t]icir privileges. 
 
 Now and then, it is true, a young man comes 
 among us who dreams of drums and barricades, and 
 seeks sensational scenes; but he deserts the cause 
 of the people as soon as he perceives that the road 
 to the barricade is long, that the w-ork is heavy, and 
 that the crowns of laurel to be won in this campaign 
 are intermingled with thorns. Generally these are 
 ambitious schemers out of work, who, having failed 
 in their first efforts, try in this way to cajole people 
 out of their votes, but who a little later will be the 
 first to denounce them when the people wish to apply 
 the principles which they themselves have professed ; 
 perhaps will even be ready to turn artillery and gat- 
 lings upon them if they dare to move before they, 
 the heads of the movement, give the signal. 
 
 Add mean insult, haughty contempt, cowardly 
 calumny from the great majority, and you know what 
 the people may expect now-a-days from most of the 
 youth of the upper and middle classes in the way of 
 help toward the social evolution. 
 
 But then you ask, " What shall we do?" When 
 there is everything to be done ! When a whole army 
 of young people would find plenty to employ the en- 
 tire vigor of their youthful energy, the full force of 
 their intelligence and their talents, to help the people 
 in the vast enterprise they have undertaken! 
 
 What shall we do? Listen: 
 
 You lovers of pure science, if you are imbued with 
 the principles of socialism, if you have understood 
 the real meaning of the revolution which is even now 
 knocking at the door, do you not see that all science 
 has to be recast in order to place it in harmony with 
 the new principles; that it is your business to ac- 
 complish in this field a revolution far greater than
 
 An Appeal to the Young. 19 
 
 that which was accomplished in every branch of 
 science during the eighteenth century ? Do you not 
 understand that history — which to-day is an old wife's 
 tale about great kings, great statesmen and great 
 parliaments — that history itself has to be written 
 from the point of view of the people, from the point 
 of view of work done by the masses in the long evo- 
 lution of mankind? That social economy — which to- 
 day is merely the sanctification of capitalist robbery 
 — has to be worked out afresh in its fundamental 
 principles as well as in its innumerable applications ? 
 That anthropology, sociology, ethics, must be com- 
 pletely recast, and that the very natural sciences 
 themselves, regarded from another point of view, 
 must undergo a profound modification, alike in re- 
 gard to the conception of natural phenomena and 
 with respect to the method of exposition ? 
 
 Very well, then. Set to work ! Place your abili- 
 ties at the command of the good cause. Especially 
 help us with your clear logic to combat prejudice 
 and to lay by your synthesis the foundations of a 
 better organization ; yet more, teach us to apply in 
 our daily arguments the fearlessness of true scientific 
 investigation, and show us, as j-our predecessors did, 
 how men dare sacrifice even life itself for the triumph 
 of the truth. 
 
 . You, doctors, who have learned socialism by a bitter 
 experience, never weary of telling us to-day, to- 
 morrow, in season and out of season, that humanity 
 itself hurries onward to decay if men remain in the 
 present conditions of existence and work; that all 
 your medicaments must be powerless against disease 
 while the majority of mankind vegetate in conditions 
 absolutely contrary to those which science tells us are 
 healthful; convince the people that it is the causes 
 of disease which must be uprooted, and show us all 
 what is necessary to remove them. 
 
 Come with your scalpel and dissect for us with an 
 unerring hand this society of ours hastening to putre-
 
 20 An Appeal to the Young. 
 
 faction. Tell us what a rational existence should 
 and might be. Insist, as true surgeons, that a gan- 
 grenous limb must be amputated when it will poison 
 the whole body. 
 
 You, who have worked at the application of science 
 to industry, come and tell us frankly what has been 
 the outcome of your discoveries. Convince those 
 who dare not march boldly toward the future what 
 new inventions the knowledge we have already ac- 
 quired carries in its womb, what industry could do 
 under better conditions, what man might easily pro- 
 duce if he produced always with a view to enhance 
 his own production. 
 
 You poets, painters, sculptors, musicians, if you 
 understand your true mission and the very interests 
 of art itself, come with us. Place your pen, your 
 pencil, your chisel, your ideas, at the service of the 
 revolution. Figure forth to us, in your eloquent 
 style, or your impressive pictures, the heroic struggles 
 of the people against their oppressors ; fire the hearts 
 of our youth with that glorious revolutionary en- 
 thusiasm which inflamed the souls of our ancestors ; 
 tell women what a noble career is that of a husband 
 who devotes his life to the great cause of social 
 emancipation ! Show the people how hideous is 
 their actual life, and place your hand on the causes 
 of its ugliness ; tell us what a rational life would be 
 if it did not encounter at every step the follies and 
 the ignominies of our present social order. 
 
 Lastly, all of you who possess knowledge, talent, 
 capacity, industry, if you have a spark of sympathy 
 in your nature, come, you and your companions, come 
 and place your services at the disposal of those who 
 most need them. And remember, if you do come, 
 that you come not as masters, but as comrades in 
 the struggle ; that you come not to govern but to 
 gain strength for yourselves in a new life which 
 sweeps upward to the conquest of the future; that 
 you come less to teach than to grasp the aspirations
 
 An Appeal to the Young. 21 
 
 of the many: to divine them, to give them shape, 
 and then to work, without rest and without haste, 
 witli all the fire of youth and all the judgment of 
 age, to realize them in actual life. Then and then 
 only will you lead a complete, a noble, a rational ex- 
 istence. Then you will see that your every effort on 
 this path bears with it fruit in abundance, and this 
 sublime harmony once established between your ac- 
 tions and the dictates of your conscience will give 
 you powers you never dreamed lay dormant in your- 
 selves. 
 
 The never-ceasing struggle for truth, justice and 
 equality among the people, whose gratitude you will 
 earn — what nobler career can the youth of all na- 
 tions desire than this? 
 
 It has taken me long to show you of the well-to- 
 do classes that, in view of the dilemma which life 
 presents to you, you will be forced, if courageous 
 and sincere, to come and work side by side with the 
 socialists, and champion in their ranks the cause of 
 the social revolution. And yet how simple this 
 truth is, after all ! But when one is speaking to 
 those who have suffered from the effects of bourgeois 
 surroundings, how many sophisms must be com- 
 bated, how many prejudices overcome, how many 
 interested objections put aside ! 
 
 It is easy to be brief to-day in addressing you, the 
 youth of the people. The very pressure of events 
 impels you to become socialists, however little 3'-ou 
 may have the courage to reason and to act. 
 
 To rise from the ranks of the working people, and 
 not devote one's self to bringing about the triumph 
 of socialism, is to misconceive the real interests at 
 stake, to give up the cause and the true historic 
 mission. 
 
 Do you remember the time, when still a mere lad, 
 you went down one winter's day to play in your dark 
 court ? The cold nipped your shoulders through 
 your thin clothes, and the mud worked into your
 
 22 Afi Appeal to the Youjig. 
 
 worn-out shoes. Even then, when you saw chubby 
 children richly clad pass in the distance, looking at 
 you with an air of contempt, you knew right well 
 that these extravagantly dressed imps were not the 
 equals of yourself and your comrades, either in intel- 
 ligence, common-sense, or energy. But, later, when 
 you were forced to shut yourself up in a filthy fac- 
 tory from five or six o'clock in the morning, to remain 
 twelve hours standing close to a whirling machine, 
 and, a machine yourself, were forced to follow, day 
 after day for whole years in succession, its relent- 
 less, throbbing movements — during all this time the 
 others were going quietly to be taught at fine schools, 
 at academies, at the universities. And now these 
 same children, less intelligent, but better taught 
 than you, have become your masters, are enjoying 
 all the pleasures of life and all the advantages of 
 civilization. And you ? What sort of lot awaits you ? 
 
 You return to little, dark, damp lodgings, where 
 five or six human being^s herd together within a few 
 square feet ; where your mother, sick of life, aged by 
 care rather than years, offers you dry bread and pota- 
 toes as your only food, washed down by a blackish 
 fluid called, in irony, tea; and to distract your 
 thoughts you have ever the same never-ending ques- 
 tion, " How shall I be able to pay the baker to- 
 morrow, and the landlord the day after?" 
 
 What ! must you drag on the same weary exist- 
 ence that your father and mother did for thirty and 
 forty years? Must you toil your life long to procure 
 for others all the pleasures of well-being, of knowl- 
 edge, of art, and keep for yourself only the eternal 
 anxiety as to whether you can get a bit of bread? 
 Will you forever give up all that makes life so beau- 
 tiful to devote yourself to providing every luxury for 
 a handful of idlers? Will you wear yourself out 
 with toil and have in return onlv trouble, if not mis- 
 ery, when hard times — the fearful hard times — come 
 upon you ? Is this what you long for in life ?
 
 An Appeal to the Young. 23 
 
 Perhaps you will give up. Seeing no way out of 
 your condition whatever, maybe you say to yourself, 
 '* Whole generations have undergone the same lot, 
 and I, who can alter nothing in the matter, I must 
 submit also. Let us work on, then, and endeavor to 
 live as well as we can ! " 
 
 Very well. In that case life itself will take pains 
 to enlighten you. 
 
 One day a crisis comes, one of those crises which 
 are no longer mere passing phenomena, as they were 
 a while ago, but a crisis which destroys a whole in- 
 dustry, which plunges thousands of workers into 
 misery, which crushes whole families. You struggle 
 like the rest against the calamity. But you will soon 
 see how your wife, your child, your friend, little by 
 little, succumb to privations, fade away under your 
 very eyes. For sheer want of food, for lack of care 
 and of medical assistance, they end their days on the 
 pauper's stretcher, while the life of the rich sweeps 
 past in joyous crowds through the streets of the 
 great city gleaming in the sunlight— utterly careless 
 and indifferent to the dying cries of those who perish. 
 
 Then you will understand how utterly revolting 
 this society is; you will reflect upon the causes of 
 this crisis, and your examination will go to the very 
 depths of this abomination which puts millions of 
 human beings at the mercy of the brutal greed of a 
 handful of useless triflers ; then you will understand 
 that socialists are right when they say that our 
 present society can be, tliat it must be, reorganized 
 from top to bottom. 
 
 To pass from general crises to your particular case. 
 One day when 3'our master tries by a new reduction 
 of wages to squeeze out of you a few more cents in 
 order to increase his fortune still further you will pro- 
 test; but he will haughtily answer, "Go and eat grass, 
 if you will not work at the price I offer." Then you 
 will understand that your master not only tries to 
 shear you like a sheep, but that he looks upon you
 
 24 An Appeal to the Young. 
 
 as an inferior kind of animal altogether; that not 
 content with holding you in his relentless grip by 
 means of the wage-system, he is further anxious to 
 make you a slave in every respect. Then you will 
 either bow down before him, you will give up the 
 feeling of human dignity, and you will end by suffer- 
 ing every possible humiliation; or the blood will 
 rush to your head, you shudder at the hideous slope 
 on which you are slipping down, you will retort, and, 
 turned out workless on the street, you will under- 
 stand how right socialists are when they say "Revolt ! 
 rise against this economic slavery! " Then you will 
 come and take your place in the ranks of the social- 
 ists, and you will work with them for the complete 
 destruction of all slavery — economic, social, and 
 political. 
 
 Some day again you will learn the story of that 
 charming young girl whose brisk gait, frank manners, 
 and cheerful conversation you so lovingly admired. 
 After having struggled for years and years against 
 misery, she left her native village for the metropolis. 
 There she knew right well that the struggle for ex- 
 istence must be hard, but she hoped at least to be 
 able to gain her living honestly. Well, now you 
 know what has been her fate. Courted by the son 
 of some capitalist she allowed herself to be enticed 
 by his fine words, she gave herself up to him with 
 all the passion of youth, only to see herself aban- 
 doned with a baby in her arms. Ever courageous, 
 she never ceased to struggle on ; but she broke down 
 in this unequal strife against cold and hunger, and 
 she ended her days in one of the hospitals, no one 
 knows which. . . . 
 
 What will you do? Once more there are two 
 courses open to you. Either you will push aside the 
 whole unpleasant reminiscence with some stupid 
 phrase: "vShe was not the first and will not be the 
 last," you will say; perhaps, some evening, you will 
 be heard in a public room, in company with other
 
 An Appeal to the Young. 25 
 
 beasts like yourself, outraging the young girl's mem- 
 ory by some dirty stories; or, on tlie other hand, 
 your remembrance of the past will touch your heart ; 
 you will try to meet the seducer to denounce him to 
 his face ; you will reflect upon the causes of these 
 events that recur every day, and you will comprehend 
 that they will never cease so long as societ}' is divided 
 into two camps : on one side the wretched and on the 
 other the lazy — the jugglers with fine phrases and 
 bestial lusts. You will understand that it is high 
 time to bridge over this gulf of separation, and you 
 will rush to place yourself among the socialists. 
 
 And you, woman of the people, has this left you 
 cold and unmoved ? While caressing the pretty head 
 of that child who nestles close to you, do you never 
 think about the lot that awaits him, if the present 
 social conditions are not changed. Do you never 
 reflect on the future awaiting your young sister, and 
 all your own children ? Do you wish that your sons 
 should vegetate as your father vegetated, with no 
 other care than how to get his daily bread, with no 
 other pleasure than that of the gin-palace ? Do you 
 want your husband, your boys, to be ever at the 
 mercy of the first comer who has inherited from his 
 father a capital to exploit them with ? Are you 
 anxious that they should remain slaves for a master, 
 food for powder, mere dung wherewith to manure 
 the pasture-lands of the rich expropriator ? 
 
 Nay, never; a thousand times no! I know right 
 well that your blood has boiled when you have heard 
 that your husbands, after they entered on a strike 
 full of fire and determination, have ended by accept- 
 ing, cap in hand, the conditions dictated by the 
 bloated bourgeois in a tone of haughty contempt ! 
 I know that you have admired those Spanish women 
 who in a popular rising presented their breasts to the 
 bayonets of the soldiery in the front ranks of the in- 
 surrectionists. I am certain that you mention with 
 reverence the name of the woman who lodged a
 
 26 An Appeal to the Young. 
 
 bullet in the chest of that ruffianly official who dared 
 to outrag-e a socialist prisoner in her cell. And I am 
 confident that 3'our heart beats faster when 3'ou 
 read how the women of the people in Paris gathered 
 under a rain of shells to encourage "their men" to 
 heroic action. 
 
 Every one of 5'ou, then, honest young folks, men 
 and women, peasants, laborers, artisans and soldiers, 
 you will understand what are your rights and you 
 will come along with us; you will come in order to 
 work with your brethren in the preparation of that 
 revolution which, sweeping away every vestige of 
 slavery, tearing the fetters asunder, breaking with 
 the old worn-out traditions and opening to all man- 
 kind a new and wider scope of J03-0US existence, shall 
 at length establish true liberty, real equality, un- 
 grudging fraternity throughout human society; work 
 with all, work for all — the full enjoyment of the 
 fruits of their labor, the complete development of all 
 their faculties ; a rational, human and happy life ! 
 
 Don't let anyone tell us that we — but a vsmall 
 band — are too weak to attain unto the magnificent 
 end at which we aim. 
 
 Count and see how many of us there are who 
 suffer this injustice. 
 
 We peasants who work for others and who mumble 
 the straw while our master eats the wheat, we by our- 
 selves are millions of men. 
 
 We workers who weave silks and velvets in order 
 that we may be clothed in rags, we, too, are a great 
 multitude ; and when the clang of the factories per- 
 mits us a moment's repose, we overflow the streets 
 and squares like the sea in a spring tide. 
 
 We soldiers who are driven along to the word of 
 command, or by blows; we who receive the bullets 
 for which our officers get crosses and pensions ; we, 
 too, poor fools who have hitherto known no l)etter 
 than to shoot our brothers — why, we have only to 
 make a right-about-face toward these plumed and
 
 Ati Appeal to the Young. 27 
 
 decorated personages who are so good as to com- 
 mand us, to see a ghastly pallor overspread their faces. 
 
 Ay, all of us together, we who suffer and are in- 
 sulted daily, we are a multitude whom no man can 
 number, we are the ocean that can embrace and 
 swallow up all else. 
 
 When we have but the will to do it, that very 
 moment will justice be done : that very instant the 
 tyrants of the earth shall bite the dust. 
 
 "An Appeal to the Young," per dozen, 40c. ; per hundred, $2.50. 
 Entered at the New York Postoffice as second-class matter. 
 
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 28 Lafayette Place, New York.
 
 HERBERT SPENCER'S 
 SYNTHETIC PHDLOSOPHY 
 
 BY 
 
 BENJAMIN F. UNDERWOOD
 
 COLLATERAL READINGS SUGGESTED: . 
 
 Spencer's First Principles, Principles of Biology, Principles of Psy- 
 chology, Principles of Sociology, Data of Ethics, and Chapters on Jus- 
 tice, in Popular Science Monthly ; Fiske's Cosmic Philosophy ; Thomp- 
 son's A System of Psychology ; Cazelles's Evolution Philosophy ; E, L. 
 Youmans's Lecture on Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution, 
 in Gazelles.
 
 HERBERT SPENCER'S SYNTHETIC 
 PHILOSOPHY.* 
 
 By B. F. Undeewood. 
 
 The movement imparted to philosophy by the applica- 
 tion of the " Newtonian method " to philosophical problems 
 gave rise to that form of sensationalism which originated 
 with Locke and culminated with Hume. Its motto was : 
 Nihil est in intellectu quod non fuerit in sensii. 
 
 Before this movement was started philosophical tenets 
 were principally deduced from "innate ideas." Descartes 
 had appealed to the innate idea of God as ens realissimum^ 
 as supreme truth, with which all philosophy had to con- 
 form ; and to Leibnitz innate ideas afforded the main prem- 
 ises for philosophical deductions. But, of course, if there 
 is nothing in mind but what enters into it through the 
 senses, there can not be any innate ideas, such, for instance, 
 as an innate idea of " God " or of " immortal soul." All 
 knowledge must, then, be derived from sensorial experience. 
 
 The negative or destructive phase of the sensation phi- 
 losophy resulted consistently in the annihilation of all ideas 
 not sense-derived. Its positive or constructive phase con- 
 sisted in the attempt to build up knowledge out of sensorial 
 data alone. 
 
 Berkeley dissipated the idea of the " extended substance," 
 or matter as externally subsisting, by showing that the sen- 
 sorial elements entering into the idea of matter — its primary 
 qualities, such as extension, form, etc., as well as its second- 
 ary qualities, such as hardness, color, etc. — that all these 
 elements, without exception, are subjective, mere modes of 
 feeling; that the belief that there exists an extended, 
 formed, hard, and colored substance outside the perceiving 
 mind is an illusion. Berkeley made use of this way of rea- 
 soning to combat materialism, and to glorify the idea of 
 God and of the immortality of man. With him it was God 
 who awakened the sensorial perceptions in us, and our im- 
 mortal soul that perceived them. 
 
 * This lecture is intended not merely as an exposition of the Synthetic Philoso- 
 phy, but also as a history of its origin, and its relation to other systems, especially 
 to those of Huuie and Kant.
 
 86 Herhert Spencer's Syiithetic Philosophy. 
 
 Hume, following Berkeley's manner of reasoning, aimed 
 to show that our belief in the " thinking substance " or soul 
 is just as much an illusion as our belief in the extended 
 substance or matter ; and that no sensorial experience can 
 bring us any knowledge of supreme being awakening per- 
 ceptions in us. The sensation philosophy had thus run out 
 in complete nihilism — a godless, soulless, matterless world, 
 consisting of nothing but sensorial elements more or less 
 closely connected by mental links, so as to form a somewhat 
 consistent experience. 
 
 Amid these nihilistic implications of the sensation phi- 
 losophy it remained clear beyond doctrinal cavil that the 
 sensorial particulars leave faint copies behind them in mem- 
 ory; and that these faint copies, called ideas, enter into 
 manifold combinations among themselves, and also with the 
 direct or vivid sensorial feelings. The question concerning 
 the nature of the bond of connection between experiential 
 data became from now on the principal question in philoso- 
 phy. Ilume had rendered it evident that the connection 
 between the direct, vivid, matter-of-fact data is of an essen- 
 tially different kind from that between the faint remem- 
 bered copies of them — different, above all, from mere logical 
 connection. 
 
 In modern philosophy, through the influence of Descartes 
 and Leibnitz, the method of acquiring knowledge was held 
 to be exclusively that of deduction, as taught by formal 
 logic ; the ancient and current method of syllogistic reason- 
 ing from universals to particulars. 
 
 Hume's argumentation left no doubt that direct matter-of- 
 fact knowledge is derived in an opposite manner — namely, 
 by beginning with particular sensorial feelings, whose con- 
 nection is not ascertained by a process of thought, but is 
 entirely given in direct sensorial experience. Not because 
 I originally have the general idea that fire bums do I know 
 that this particular fire will burn when I touch it : but be- 
 cause I have numbers of times experienced tiiat particular 
 fires burn, have I formed the general idea that all fires burn. 
 This means that the logical connection found to exist in 
 the realm of ideas is secondary to the real connection found 
 to exist in tlie realm of sensorial experience. The connec- 
 tion between natural events or matter-of-fact occurrences 
 can be derived solely through sensorial experience, and can 
 not be arrived at by purely logical or mental processes. 
 Causal connection differs tutu generc from logical connection.
 
 Herbert Spe7icer^s Synthetic Philosophy. 87 
 
 The relation of cause and effect consists merely in the 
 succession of our impressions and ideas. The sequence is 
 ideal and its order has become established by a habit of ex- 
 pectation derived from many and frequent experiences of a 
 definite succession of impressions. Thus the sight of a flame 
 having been uniformly followed by the feeling of heat, this 
 feeling will always in the future arise vividly whenever and 
 wherever a flame is seen. The connection of cause and effect 
 is therefore only ideal, having no relation to an invariable 
 permanent objective order, being only a subjective bond be- 
 tween the transitory particulars of sense and their reflected 
 remembrance. 
 
 Besides the fundamental distinction between causal con- 
 nection and logical connection implied in Hume's argumen- 
 tation, the derivation of all ideas from sensorial experience 
 — purely experiential links forming the connection between 
 these data of knowledge — gave rise to wdiat is known as 
 English experientialism, or the association philosophy. The 
 aim of this ishilosophical method is to discover the general 
 laws that govern the association of ideas experientially de- 
 rived, and to show that all our complex ideas are formed by 
 association of experienced i^articulars, in accordance with 
 those general laws. 
 
 It was Hume's elucidation of the process of matter-of-fact 
 experience that awakened Kant from the " dogmatic slum- 
 ber " into which he had been rocked by the purely logical 
 or deductive philosophy of the Leibnitz- Wolffian school, 
 " leading him," as Dr. Edmund JMontgomery says, " to dis- 
 cover the enchanted path traveled by so many since, on 
 which the charmed wanderer is carried, far away from real 
 nature, to the mystic realm of transcendental idealism." By 
 this school of thought it has been taken for granted incon- 
 testably that the general ideas or so-called concepts, found 
 ready-made in our mind when we begin to philosophize, are 
 eternal and universal verities implanted in us independently 
 of all external experience, and that our understanding of 
 truth is arrived at solely by deriving it from these pre-exist- 
 ing concepts by means of syllogistic reasoning. 
 
 Kant was the first fully to appreciate the" important im- 
 plications involved in Hume's experiential derivation of all 
 knowledge ; for if there is really no other way of arriving 
 at the knowledge of truth than that of accepting it as it 
 comes to us in sensorial experience, and if the knowledge of 
 such truth consists simply in au exiierienced connection of
 
 88 Herbert Spencer^ s Syjithetic P1iUoso2)liy. 
 
 sensorial and therefore wholly natural data, then all meta- 
 physical conceptions out of which philosophy had been 
 hitherto constructed could be nothing but idle illusions, and 
 all existing metaphysics nothing but a baseless dream, a mere 
 castle in the air. 
 
 Kant's life-long and most earnest endeavor was to extricate 
 philosophy from these God and soul eliminating implications 
 of sensorial experientialism. With him the problem assumed 
 the following form : Is our mind endowed or not endowed 
 with a faculty of forming a priori synthetical propositions ? 
 Or, in other words, is it or is it not capable of forming 
 knowledge of some kind without the existence of sensorial 
 experience ? If not, then the cause of metaphysical philoso- 
 phy is hopeless. 
 
 Kant believed that in pure mathematics he had discovered 
 a kind of knowledge constructed wholly from a 2}riori data 
 by the mind without the aid of sensorial experience. That 
 the truths of pure mathematics consist of such a j^riori syn- 
 thetical propositions is the fundamental assertion upon 
 which the entire Kantian philosophy is grounded. To make 
 good his case, he had first to show that space and time, in 
 which all mathematical constructions take form, are them- 
 selves a priori possessions of the mind, and he had further- 
 more to show that the synthetic power — the power wliich 
 combines particular data into systematic knowledge — is like- 
 wise an a priori possession of the mind. 
 
 Philosophers in Germany before Kant had looked upon 
 perception, or the manifold of experience which appears ii^ 
 time and space, as merely an indistinct kind of apprehen- 
 sion, whose clear -and distinct knowledge they held to con- 
 sist exclusively in concepts. Kant now declared perceptual 
 sensibility to be a fundamental faculty of the mind alto- 
 gether distinct from its conceptual apprehension. Accord- 
 ing to him, this original or pure perceptual sensibility of the 
 mind consists in the empty forms of space and time, which 
 he calls the outer and the inner sense, respectively. Into 
 these a priori forms of our sensibility all sense-derived ma- 
 terial, all a posteriori or externally imparted sensorial data, 
 are received. I'his occurs in a purely receptive manner 
 without the active part of our nature coming into play. 
 The active part of our nature Kant declares to be intelligence 
 exclusively. In liis view sensibility is an entirely passive 
 faculty, all activity being exclusively a matter of intellect. 
 
 It is this lodging of all activity, of all combining and ap-
 
 Eerhert Spencerh Synthetic Pliilosophy. 89 
 
 pretending power in nature, in a special facnlty called in- 
 telligence, and believed to constitute mind proper, that 
 inevitably leads to pure transcendental idealism, such as was 
 taught by the late Thomas Hill Green, and is taught at 
 present in many of the universities ; for, if our knowledge 
 is in fact out and out, and through and through, a synthe- 
 tized compound, it follows that — intelligence being declared 
 the only synthetical power extant — our knowledge must be 
 out and out, and through and through, a product of intelli- 
 gence. And this means that thought and being are identi- 
 cal, that the world consists of nothing but thought. 
 
 Kant himself abhorred pure idealism. He firmly believed 
 that sense-material is given to sensibility from outside ; that 
 there exists actually a realm of things in themselves, of the 
 true nature of which, however, he was positive that we can 
 know nothing, and this because space and time, the forms 
 in which the sense-given material appears to us, and the 
 different modes of combination, the so-called categories, 
 through which this raw material is elaborated into system- 
 atic knowledge, are faculties belonging to our own mental 
 nature. 
 
 Moreover, though Kant believed that pure mathematics 
 is constructed a priori by force of our seusorially unaided 
 mental endowments, he came to the final conclusion that 
 our combining faculty, in order to constitute real knowl- 
 edge, requires imperatively sense-given material to work 
 upon ; that constructions formed of any other material are 
 baseless. It is, however, important to notice that Kant be- 
 lieved the combining categories or synthetical functions of 
 the intellect to inhere in an intelligible Ego, belonging to a 
 supernatural sphere of existence. In spite of his complete 
 overthrow of the old metaphysical idols by force of his 
 theoretical speculations, Kant had in reserve a loop-hole 
 through which he was convinced he could more effectively 
 than ever establish connection Avith the intelligible world, 
 the real existence of which he had never doubted. God and 
 the immortal soul of man, as intelligible or supernatural 
 existences, were to him primordial verities, attested beyond 
 contention by the moral law, in obedience to which our own 
 intelligible nature has power to determine the course of 
 nature by means of free volitional causation. 
 
 Leibnitz, having become acquainted with Locke's sensa- 
 tionalism, modified considerably his view of innate ideas. 
 He changed, however, the motto of the sensation philosophy
 
 90 Herbert Spencer^s Synthetic Pliilosophy. 
 
 by adding a clause to it, wbicli made it read : Nihil est in in- 
 tellectu quod non fuerit in sensu, nisi ipse intellectus. 
 Thus changed, it became the motto of Kant's transcend- 
 ental idealism, and this view of innate faculties^ instead of 
 innate ideas, distinguishes the Kantian view, on the one 
 hand, from the old Leibnitz- Wolffian philosophy that rested 
 entirely on innate ideas, and on the other hand from Hume's 
 sensorial experientialism, which denies the existence of any 
 sort of innate possession, whether in the form of ready-made 
 ideas or of mere potential faculties. Kant undertakes to 
 show that the mind brings with it certain elements of a 
 priori knowledge in which no empirical influence, personal 
 or ancestral, is traceable. " Experience," he says, " consists 
 of intuitions which are entirely the work of the understand- 
 ing." " Experience consists in the synthetical connections 
 of phenomena (perceptions) in consciousness, so far as 
 the connection is necessary " (Prolegomena 1, sec. 23, 23). 
 " The reader had probably been long accustomed to consider 
 experience a mere empirical synthesis of perception, and 
 hence not to reflect that it goes much further than these ex- 
 tend, as it gives empirical judgments universal validity, and 
 for that presupposes pure unity of the understanding which 
 precedes a pyHori^^ (ibid., sec. 26, MahafEy's translation). 
 " It is the matter of all phenomena that is given to us a 
 posteriori; the form must be ready a priori for them in the 
 mind." 
 
 " Before objects are given to me, that is a priori, I must 
 presuppose in myself laws of the undcrstai^ding which are 
 expressed in conceptions a priori. To these conceptions all 
 objects of experience must necessarily conform" (Preface 
 to second edition of Kritik). We are affected by objects, 
 he argued, only by intuition, which is always sensuous. 
 The faculty of thinking the object of sensuous intuition is 
 the understanding. " Understanding can not intuit, the 
 sensibility can not think. In no other way than from tlio 
 united operation of both can knowledge arise." 
 
 Thus Kant maintains that before sensuous impressions 
 can be changed into experience tliey must be molded by 
 the mutual forms of sensible intuition and logical concep- 
 tion. It is universally admitted amoTig tliinkers tliat Kant 
 tried to hold positions that are contradictory ; but on this 
 point I can not dwell liere. 
 
 The post-Kantiun pliildsophcrs aimed to overcome the 
 new dualism implied by Kant's contention that not only
 
 Herlert Spencer^s Syntlietic Philosophy. 91 
 
 sensations as such, but also space and time, the very media 
 in which they appeared, and their whole synthesis in con- 
 sciousness, are products of the feeling and thinking indi- 
 vidual, and by his insisting on the existence of an outside 
 realm of things-in-themselves affecting the individual's sen- 
 sibility. Fichte tried to prove the synthetical power of the 
 individual to create the objective world ; Hegel, by identi- 
 fying thought with being, and subjective thought with uni- 
 versal thought (transcendental idealism) ; Schelling, by 
 making the subjective and objective both inhere in one and 
 the same all-comprising hyper-subjective and hyper-object- 
 ive substance or subject-object (transcendental realism). 
 Fichte, Hegel, Schelling, Schopenhauer, all founded their 
 systems on Kant's a piiori elements in knowledge. The 
 main line of descent from Hume in England was repre- 
 sented by Hartley, James Mill, and John Stuart Mill ; and 
 none of them were able to reconcile with their experiential 
 philosophy the fact of a jiriori forms of intuition on which 
 Kant had rightly insisted. 
 
 It remained for Herbert Spencer to apply the principle 
 of evolution to mind and to show that Kant's " forms of 
 thought," although a priori in the individual, are experi- 
 ential in the race — in other words, were acquired in the 
 evolutionary process. Long before Spencer, instincts were 
 regarded as acquired mental habitudes that had become 
 organically fixed. Conscious experience and conscious 
 memory of it were thus held to pass, by means of organic 
 fixation and subsequent transmission of the modified sti'uct- 
 ure, into organized experience and memory. This concep- 
 tion forms the nucleus of Spencer's mental philosophy. 
 Thus Herbert Spencer, " our great philosopher " — as Darwin 
 called him — in his Principles of Psychology, published be- 
 fore Darwin's Origin of Species had appeared, assuming the 
 truth of organic evolution, endeavored to show how man's 
 mental constitution was acquired. Spencer, recognizing the 
 existence of the subjective forms, with a grasp of thought 
 and philosophic insight never surpassed, shows that while 
 in the iudividual they are a priori, in the race they are ex- 
 periential, since they are constant, universal experiences or- 
 ganized as tendencies and transmitted, like any of the phys- 
 ical organs, as a heritage ; that thus such a priori forms as 
 those of space, time, causality, etc., must have had their 
 origin in experience. Says Dr. Carpenter : " No physiolo- 
 gist can deem it improbable that the intuitions which we
 
 92 Herlert Spencerh Synthetic Philosophy. 
 
 recoo-nize in our mental constitution have been acquired by 
 a process of gradual development in the race corresponding 
 to that which we trace by observation in the individual. . . . 
 The doctrine that the intellectual and moral intuitions of 
 any one generation are the embodiment in its mental con- 
 stitution of the experience of the race was first explicitly 
 put forth by ]\Ir. Herbert Spencer, in whose philosophical 
 treatises it will be found most ably developed." 
 
 Lewes remarks : " Such is one of the many profouud con- 
 ceptions with which this great thinker has enriched philoso- 
 phy, and it ought to have finally closed the debate between 
 the a priori and the experiential schools, in so far as both 
 admit a common ground of biological interpretation, though, 
 of course, it leaves the metempirical hypothesis untouched." 
 
 Spencer saw that this conception affords a solution of the 
 problems of sensorial experience and innate faculties, and is 
 a compromise between Locke's and Kant's school of thought ; 
 between the sensation philosophy and transcendental ideal- 
 ism. With Hume, and against Kant, this view maintains 
 that all knowledge is derived from sensorial experience. 
 But with Kant, and against Hume, it asserts that we are, 
 nevertheless, born with predisposed faculties of thought, 
 which necessarily constitute a preformed recipient and 
 norm for all new experience. 
 
 As regards the inseparable bond of connection between 
 experiential particulars, it holds that it is, indeed, estab- 
 lished through habit, but by means of generical inherit- 
 ance, and not merely during individual life; that it is, how- 
 ever, certainly not established through the functional play 
 of faculties inherent in mind prior to all experience, indi- 
 vidual or ancestral. 
 
 Hume ignored completely the existence of anything be- 
 yond consciousness. He does not assume powers outside of 
 us awakening our sensations. He takes account of nothing 
 but vivid aTid faint ideas and their combinations. Spencer, 
 on the contrary, assumes with Kant the existence of a realm 
 external to us that has power to affect our sensibility. But, 
 unlike Kant, who allows these affections to fall chaotically 
 into empty .space and time, and to receive all their signifi- 
 cance solely from the combining, systematizing, and appre- 
 hending power of the intellect, Spencer teaches that the or- 
 der found obtaining among conscious states has been estab- 
 lished by vital and organic adjustment to a corrcsi)onding 
 order obtaining among the forces that constitute existence
 
 Herbert Spencer^s Synthetic Philosophy. 93 
 
 outside of consciousness. Life, with all its mental as well 
 as vital manifestations, consists with him in the adjustment 
 of internal or subjective relations to external or objective 
 relations. 
 
 The psychological fact is that the forms are connate, 
 therefore a priori; the psychogenetical fact is that the 
 forms are products of ancestral experience, and therefore 
 a posteriori. Locke was right in claiming that all knowl- 
 edge is ultimately derived from experience, from intercourse 
 between organism and its medium. Kant was right in rec- 
 ognizing the fact that there are definite tendencies or pre- 
 dispositions in the individual at birth. Locke was wrong in 
 denying that there is any element in mind a p)riori to the 
 individual. Kant was wrong in ignoring the results in the 
 individual mind of ancestral experiences. 
 
 Says Mr. John Fiske : " Though Kant was one of the 
 chief pioneers of the doctrine of evolution, having been 
 the first to propose and to elaborate in detail the theory of 
 the nebular origin of planetary systems, yet the conce23tion 
 of a continuous development of life in all its modes, physi- 
 cal and psychical, was not sufficiently advanced in Kant's 
 day to be adopted into philosophy. Hence, in his treatment 
 of mind, as regards both intelligence and emotion, Kant 
 took what may be called a statical view of the subject ; and 
 finding in the adult, civilized mind, upon the study of which 
 his systems of psychology and ethics were founded, a num- 
 ber of organized moral intuitions and an organized moral 
 sense, which urges men to seek the right and shun the wrong, 
 irrespective of utilitarian considerations of pleasure and pain, 
 he proceeded to deal with these moral intuitions and this 
 moral sense as if they were ultimate facts, incapable of be- 
 ing analyzed into simpler emotional elements. ... So long 
 as the subject is contemplated from a statical point of view, 
 so long as individual experience is studied without reference 
 to ancestral experience, the follower of Katit can always 
 hold his ground against the followers of Locke in ethics as 
 well as in psychology. AVhen the Kantian asserts that the 
 intuitions of right and wrong, as well as the intuitions 
 of time and space, are independent of experience, he occu- 
 pies a position which is impregnable so long as the organi- 
 zation of experiences through successive generations is left 
 out of the discussion. . . . Admitting the truth of the 
 Kantian position that there exists in us a moral sense for 
 analyzing which our individual experience does not afford
 
 94 Herhert Spencer^s Synthetic PliilosojpJiy. 
 
 the requisite data, and which must therefore be regarded as 
 ultimate for each individual, it is, nevertheless, open to us 
 to inquire into the emotional antecedents of this organized 
 moral sense as indicated in ancestral types of physical life. 
 The inquiry Avill result in the conviction that the moral 
 sense is not ultimate, but derivative, and that it has been 
 built up out of slowly organized experiences of pleasures 
 and pains." 
 
 Says Dr. Edmund Montgomery, learned in all the schools 
 of philosophic thought : " Philosophy, after twenty-four 
 centuries of most diversified trials, had failed to discover 
 the ways of knowledge. In no manner could it be ade- 
 quately extracted from reason, and just as little could it be 
 fully derived from the senses. Nor had any compromise at 
 all succeeded. Nativism and empiricism remained funda- 
 mentally irreconcilable. Suddenly, however, liglit began to 
 pierce the hitherto immovable darkness. It was Mr. Her- 
 bert Spencer who caught one of those rare revealing glimpses 
 that initiate a new epoch in the history of thought. He 
 saw that the evolution hypothesis furnishes a solution of 
 the controversy between the disciples of Locke and Kant. 
 To us younger thinkers, into whose serious meditations 
 Darwinism entered from the beginning as a potent solvent 
 of many an ancient mystery, this reconciliation of trans- 
 cendentalism and experientialism may have consistently 
 presented itself as an evident corollary from the laws of 
 heredity. But what an achievement for a solitary thinker, 
 aided by no other light than the penetration of his own 
 genius, before Darwinism was current, to discover this 
 deeply hidden secret of nature, which with one stroke dis- 
 closed the true relation of innate and acquired faculties, an 
 enigma over which so many generations of philosophers had 
 pondered in vain ! " 
 
 Du Bois-Eeymond disputes the priority of this foreshadow- 
 ing insiglit. In his lecture on The Physiology of Exercise he 
 says: " With Mr. Herbert Spencer meeting me in the same 
 thought, which I believe, however, I have more sharply 
 grasped, I deduced on a former occasion how, in such trans- 
 missibility of educationally derived aj^titude, possibly lies 
 the reconciliation of the great antithesis of the theory of 
 knowledge — of the empirical and the innate views." 
 
 I am not able to Judge as to the justice of Du Bois-Eey- 
 mond's claim, but evidently he had no clear conception of 
 the subject such as alone could have enabled him to make
 
 Herlert Spencer^s Synthetic Pliilosopliy, 95 
 
 the discovery a consistent part of a scientific theory or a 
 philosophical system. 
 
 As regards the intimate nature of the ultimate reality 
 represented in consciousness, Spencer, like Kunt, professes 
 complete ignorance. He holds it to be wholly unknowable. 
 Yet, unlike Kant, who derives his God from the existence 
 of the moral law, he concludes that the noumenal power be- 
 hind phenomena, though unknowable, is an all-efBcient 
 Absolute, a First Cause or Supreme Power, from which all 
 natural jjhenomena proceed, they being manifestations of 
 the same. 
 
 Spencer maintains, with Kant substantially, that external 
 things are known to us only as states of consciousness, alike 
 in their so-called primary and secondary qualities. What 
 things are in themselves can not be represented by feeling. 
 Matter, space, motion, force, all our fundamental ideas are 
 derived from generalizing and abstracting our experiences 
 of resistance — the ultimate material of knowledge — " the 
 primordial, universal, ever-present constituent of conscious- 
 ness." To us, matter is a congeries of qualities — weight, 
 resistance, extension, etc. ; and these are names for different 
 ways in which our consciousness is affected. If we were 
 destitute of sight, touch, smell, taste, and hearing, these 
 qualities would cease to exist, although the external reality 
 which causes these groups of sensations would still exist. 
 To beings organized differently from ourselves — so differ- 
 ently that their mode of being could not be conceived by 
 us — the objective reality might give rise to states of which 
 the word " matter " would to our minds convey no idea. 
 Nevertheless, the fact that we have sensations that come and 
 go independently of our volitions is evidence of something 
 that determines them. The doctrine of the relativity of 
 knowledge necessitates the postulation of an unknowable 
 existence beyond consciousness. 
 
 Aerial vibrations communicated to the acoustic nerve 
 give rise to the sensation known as sound. Without a nerve 
 of hearing there can be no sound ; for sound is a sensible 
 phenomenon and not something external to the hearer. 
 Color is also a subjective affection; and particular colors 
 depend upon the particular velocities of the waves of atten- 
 uated matter gathered together by the optical apparatus of 
 the eye, and which impinge upon the retina, affecting the 
 optic nerve and giving rise to what appear objectively as 
 colors — blue, green, violet, etc. — but which are known to be
 
 96 Herlert Spe7ice7'''s Synthetic Pliilosophy. 
 
 sensations or conscious states. In some persons, vibrations 
 as different in velocity as those which commonly cause red- 
 ness and greenness awaken identical sensations. Luminous- 
 ness is a sensation produced by the action of waves of ether 
 upon the retina and fibers of the optic nerve. This sensa- 
 tion may also be produced by a blow or by electricity, which, 
 singularly enough, while it causes luminous phenomena 
 through the eye, brought in contact with other parts 
 gives rise to quite different sensations — sounds in the ear, 
 taste in the mouth, ticklings in the tactile nerves. That 
 tastes and odors are not intrinsic in things with which we 
 associate them is very evident. The sweetness of sugar 
 and the fragrance of the rose are sensations in us caused by 
 these objects, the one appreciated by the sense of taste, the 
 other by the sense of smell. Heat, too, is a sensation, and 
 is conceivable objectively only as a mode of motion. 
 
 Another quality which we ascribe to things is hardness ; 
 but hardness can not be intelligently conceived except as a 
 feeling. When we say that a stone is hard we mean that, 
 if we press against it, we experience a sensation of touch, 
 a feeling of resistance, which is designated by the word 
 " hardness." To illustrate that both hardness and form be- 
 long to the groups of our conscious states which we call 
 sensations of sight and touch Huxley observes : " If the sur- 
 face of the cornea were cylindrical we should have a very 
 different notion of a round body from that which we possess 
 now ; and if the strength of the fabric and the force of the 
 muscles of the body were increased a hundredfold, our mar- 
 ble would seem to be as soft as a pellet of bread crumbs." 
 What we call impenetrability is the consciousness of exten- 
 sion and the consciousness of resistance constantly accom- 
 panying one another. What we call extension is a con- 
 sciousness of relation between two or more coexistent states 
 produced through the sense of sight or the sense of touch. 
 Even the conception of vibrations among particles of mat- 
 ter, mentioned above as objective factors in the i)roduction 
 of sound and color, is but an inference from states of con- 
 sciousness caused in us by vibrations which have been ap- 
 preciated by the optic or tactile nerves ; in other words, by 
 subjective experiences produced in us by some unknown 
 cause. 
 
 Thus, what are popularly believed to be qualities and 
 states of matter — sound, color, odor, taste, hardness, exten- 
 sion, and motion — are names for different ways in which
 
 Herlert Spencer^s Synthetic Pliilosopliy. 97 
 
 our consciousness is affected; and, were "we destitute of 
 hearing, sight, smell, taste, and touch, the supposed quali- 
 ties of matter would not, so far as we can know or conceive, 
 have any existence whatever, for by psychological analysis 
 they are reducible to states of consciousness. 
 
 As to space and time, whether we regard them with Kant 
 as forms of sensibility belonging to the subject and not to 
 the object, or adopt Spencer's theory that space is the ab- 
 stract of all relations of position among coexistent states of 
 consciousness or the blank form of all these relations, and 
 that time is the abstract of all relations of position among 
 successive states of consciousness or the blank form in which 
 they are presented and represented, and that both classes of 
 relations are predetermined in the individual, so far as the 
 inherited organization is developed, when it comes into 
 acti^^ty, while both have been developed in the race and are 
 resolvable into relations, coexistent and sequent, between sub- 
 ject and object as disclosed by the act of touch — whichever 
 of these theories we adopt or whatever theory be affirmed, 
 still we know sj^ace and time only as subjective forms, not 
 as external realities. Both space relations and time rela- 
 tions vary with structural organization, position, vital activ- 
 ity, mental development, and condition. 
 
 How great in childhood seemed the height and mass of 
 buildings which now seem small or of but moderate size ! 
 How long the days seemed when we were young ! How 
 short now! How rapidly time passes in agreeable company, 
 how slowly in waiting for a delayed train ! That there is 
 equality or likeness between our differently estimated 
 lengths of distance or duration — but so many variations of 
 subjective relations — and any nexus of external things there 
 is no reason to believe. 
 
 Inability to banish from the mind the idea of space illus- 
 trates Spencer's prime test of truth — viz., the inconceiva- 
 bility of the negation of a proposition. " If space be an 
 universal form of the non-cfjo, it must produce some corre- 
 sponding universal form of the ego — a form which, as being 
 the constant element of all impressions presented in experi- 
 ence, and therefore of all im]n'essions rej)resented in thought, 
 is independent of every jjcniicular impression ; and conse- 
 quently remains when every particular impression is as far 
 as possible banished." Space intuitions are " the fixed func- 
 tions of fixed structures that have become molded into corre- 
 S2)ondence with fixed outer relations " pre-established so far 
 8
 
 98 Herhert Spencefs Synthetic PJiilosophy. 
 
 as the inherited organization is developed at the time it 
 comes into activity. Thus the consciousness of space is 
 reached through a process of evolution. 
 
 But does not the mind possess a synthetic power by which 
 it can put together the materials furnished by the senses, 
 and thus enable us to realize and understand the objective 
 world as it actually exists? Is there not in the mind a 
 faculty by which we can discover relations as they are be- 
 yond consciousness ? If we do not know the nature of nou- 
 menal existence, we can not know anything about its rela- 
 tions. Kant dwelt upon this subject for years ; and, although 
 he believed in an existence transcending sense and under- 
 standing, the conclusion of his years of laborious thought 
 was that we can only put together the materials furnished 
 by the senses, and that we can know nothing of the world 
 as it exists, unmodified by and independent of conscious- 
 ness. To the same conclusion, after years of profound 
 thought, came Herbert Spencer. 
 
 Mr. Spencer holds that things in themselves are not per- 
 ceived, yet that they correspond with perceptions, and are 
 known symbolically only ; that " there exist beyond con- 
 sciousness conditions of objective manifestation which are 
 symbolized by relations as we conceive them." The object- 
 ive existences and conditions which remain as the final 
 necessity of thought arc tlie correlatives of our feelings and 
 the relations between them. There is no valid reason for the 
 belief that the objective existence is what it appears to be, 
 nor for the belief that the connections among its modes are 
 what they seem in consciousness. There is congruity, but not 
 resemblance, between the external and the internal order. 
 
 " Inner thoughts," says Spencer, " answer to outer things 
 in such wise that cohesions in the one correspond to persist- 
 ences in the other," but this correspondence is only sym- 
 bolical. Such, briefly stated, is the view which, in distinc- 
 tion to crude realism and idealism, is called Transfigured 
 Realism. " It recognizes," to quote again from the great 
 thinker, "an external, independent existence which is the 
 cause of changes in consciousness, while the effects it works 
 in consciousness constitute the perception of it ; and the 
 inference is that tlie knowledge constituted by these effects 
 can not be a knowledge of that which causes them, but can 
 only imply its existence. May it not be said that in thus in- 
 terpreting itself subjective existence makes definite that dif- 
 ferentiation from objective existence which has been going
 
 Herbert Spencerh Synthetic Philosophy. 99 
 
 on from the beginning of evolution ? " (Spencer's Principles 
 of Psychology, vol. ii, p. 555.) 
 
 What may be called, with propriety, Relationism, the doc- 
 trine that we know objective relations as they actually exist, 
 belongs to crude realism, and it has no philosophical basis 
 whatever. The theory that the intellect alone constitutes 
 relations, that we intellectually reconstitute and therefore 
 understand the relations making up the noumenal constitu- 
 tion of things, is an old conception, sometimes put forward 
 in these later days as original, in a phraseology which at 
 first makes difficult the immediate discovery of its identity 
 with a system that has been weighed in the balance and 
 found wanting. One of these relational philosophers main- 
 tains that space relations belong to the noumenal world. 
 But these are relations constituted by the facts of sensibility, 
 and the theorist referred to does not allow sensibility to 
 contribute to knowledge. He can not, therefore, consist- 
 ently maintain that space relations are knowingly apper- 
 ceived by us. 
 
 Although there seems to be almost a complete unanimity 
 among the great thinkers of the world that we can form no 
 conception of the objective world apart from the conditions 
 imposed upon it by our intelligence, and that changes of 
 consciousness are the materials out of which our knowledge 
 is entirely built, let no one hastily conclude that there is 
 anything in this position inimical to, or inconsistent with, 
 what is called " objective science." Prof. Huxley, one of 
 the greatest of living scientists and a philosophic thinker 
 of no mean ability, pursuing the " scientific method " with 
 which he is supposed to be well acquainted, comes to the 
 conclusion " that all the phenomena are, in tlieir ultimate 
 analysis, known to us only as facts of consciousness." 
 
 George Henry Lewes, eminent as a physiologist and psy- 
 chologist, as well as a remarkably acute analytical thinker, 
 declares, in his Problems of Life and Mind : " Wliether we 
 affirm the objective existence of something distinct from the 
 affections of consciousness or affirm that this object is simply 
 a reflection from consciousness, in either case we declare 
 that the objective world is to each man the sum of his vis- 
 ionary experience — an existence bounded on all sides by 
 wliat he feels and thinks — a form sliaped by the reaction of 
 his organism. The world is the sum total of phenomena, 
 and phenomena are affections of consciousness with exter- 
 nal signs " (vol. i, p. 183).
 
 100 Herlert Speiicer^s Synthetic PliilosopJiy. 
 
 Dr. Maudsley, the distinguished physiologist, who is no 
 more than Spencer or Lewes a subjectivist or idealist — who, 
 indeed, is commonly regarded as a materialist — says : "After 
 all, the world which we apprehend when we are aAvake may 
 have as little resemblance or relation to the external world, 
 of which we can have no manner of apprehension through 
 our senses, as the dream-world has to the world with which 
 our senses make us acquainted ; nay, perhaps less, since 
 there is some resemblance in the latter case, and there may 
 be none whatever in the former. . . . The external world 
 as it is in itself may not be in the least what we conceive 
 it through our forms of perception and modes of thought. 
 No prior experience of it has ever been so much as possible ; 
 and therefore the analogy of the dreamer is altogether de- 
 fective in that respect" (Body and AVill, p. 51). 
 
 Now Mr. Spencer's conclusions from relativity are in or- 
 der. He says : " If, after finding that the same tepid water 
 may feel warm to one hand and cold to another, it is in- 
 ferred that warmth is relative to our nature and our own 
 state, the inference is valid, only supposing the activity to 
 which these different sensations are referred is an activity 
 out of ourselves, which has not been modified by our own 
 activities. 
 
 " When we are taught that a piece of matter, regarded by 
 us as existing externally, can not be really known, but that 
 we can know only certain impressions produced on us, we 
 are yet, by the relativity of our thought, compelled to think 
 of a positive cause. The notion of a real existence which 
 generated these impressions becomes nascent. The momen- 
 tum of thought inevitably carries us beyond conditioned 
 existence to unconditioned existence ; and this ever persists 
 in us as the body of a thought to which we can give no 
 shape. ... At the same time that, by the laws of thought, 
 we are rigorously prevented from forming a conception of 
 absolute existence, we are, by the laws of thought, prevent- 
 ed from ridding ourselves of the consciousness of absolute 
 existence, this unconsciousness being, as we see, the obverse 
 of absolute existence" (First Principles, p. 390). 
 
 The absolute existence, then, can be known only as it is 
 manifested in consciousness, only as it is colored and modi- 
 fied, so to speak, by the conditions of the organism. It can 
 not be identified with what we call matter, for tliat we know 
 only as a series of ])henomenal manifestations, or, psycho- 
 logically speaking, only as the coexistent states of conscious-
 
 Herlert S_penccr''s Synthetic Philosophy. 101 
 
 ness, whicli "we call resistance, extension, color, sound, or 
 odor. It can not be identified with mind, for that we know 
 only as the series of our own states of consciousness. 
 
 Says Spencer : " If I am asked to frame a notion of mind, 
 divested of all those structural traits under which alone I 
 am conscious of mind in myself, I can not do it. . . . If, 
 then, I have to conceive evolution as caused by an ' originat- 
 ing mind,' I must conceive this mind as having attributes 
 akin to those of the only mind I know, and without which 
 I can not conceive mind at all. ... I can not think of a 
 single series of states of consciousness as causing even the 
 relatively small groups of action going on over the earth's 
 surface. . . . How, then, is it possible for me to conceive 
 an ' original mind,' which I must represent to myself as a 
 single series of states of consciousness, working the infinitely 
 multiplied sets of changes simultaneously going on in worlds 
 too numerous to count, dispersed throughout a space that 
 baffles imagination? If to account for this infinitude of 
 changes evervwhere going on ' mind ' must be conceived as 
 there under the guise of simple dynamics, then the reply is 
 that, to be so conceived, mind must be divested of all attri- 
 butes by which it is distinguished, and that when thus 
 divested of its distinguishing attributes the conception dis- 
 appears, the word ' mind ' stands for a blank." 
 
 According to Spencer, force, matter, space, time, motion, 
 are but forms which the indeterminate substance assumes 
 in consciousness. But matter and movement he reduces — 
 as is sufficiently evident from the foregoing — to manifesta- 
 tions of force ; and space and time are cohesions — one of 
 coexistence, the other of succession — in the manifestations 
 of force. Force then remains the primary datum, but that 
 we know only as states of consciousness — in other words, as 
 the changes in us produced by an absolute reality of which 
 in itself we know nothing. 
 
 It may be well to illustrate a little more fully that, ac- 
 cording to Spencer, we know matter only as co-existent states 
 of consciousness : " A Avhiff of ammonia coming in contact 
 with the eyes produces a smart, getting into the nostrils 
 excites the consciousness we described as an intolerably 
 strong odor, being condensed on the tongue generates an 
 acrid taste, while ammonia applied in solution to a tender 
 part of the skin makes it burn, as we say." This illustra- 
 tion from Spencer's Principles of Psychology shows that 
 one and the same external agency produces in us different
 
 103 Herlert Spencer's Synthetic Pliilosophy, 
 
 sensations, according to the avenues through which it affects 
 our consciousness. Which of these feelings, so widely dif- 
 ferent, does the external cause resemble ? Probably none 
 of them. What it is, independently of consciousness, we 
 never can know, owing to limitations imposed by the very 
 constitution of the human mind. 
 
 The effects produced on our consciousness — different feel- 
 ings — can be compared and classified ; but how can we com- 
 pare and classify that of which nothing can be known ? 
 
 Knowledge consists in the classification of experiences. 
 We observe distinctions existing between phenomena, and 
 group together those that are similar. Anything newly dis- 
 covered is known only when it can be classed with some 
 other thing which is known ; in other words, only when the 
 impressions it produces can be recognized as belonging to 
 an existing group of impressions. " Whence it is manifest 
 that a thing is perfectly known when it is in all respects 
 like certain things previously observed ; that in proportion 
 to the number of respects in which it is unlike them is the 
 extent to which it is unknown ; and that hence, when it has 
 absolutely no attribute in common with anything else, it 
 must be absolutely beyond the bounds of knowledge." With- 
 out distinction, which implies limitation, of course, knowl- 
 edge would be impossible. All that we can compare and 
 classify are phenomena, between which are distinguishable 
 various degrees of likeness and unlikeness. These phenom- 
 ena are effects produced in us by that which is manifested 
 objectively as matter and force, and subjectively as feeling 
 and thought. We can think of matter only in terms of 
 mind, as, indeed, we can think of mind only in terms of 
 matter. I^hat of which both are manifestations can not be 
 known. " The antithesis of subject and object," says Spen- 
 cer, " never to be transcended while consciousness lasts, ren- 
 ders impossible all knowledge of that ultimate reality in 
 which subject and object are united." 
 
 There are those who, after making use of the doctrine of 
 the relativity of knowledge to prove that we know only our 
 conscious states, deny or question the existence of any ob- 
 jective reality that produces these states. But relativity 
 Implies object as well as subject, and it would have no 
 meaning unless there were existence, known only as it affects 
 us and unknown as pure object. The statement that a 
 house of a certain size, form, color, etc., is what it is con- 
 ceived to be only in relation to consciousness, implies that
 
 Herbert Spencer^s SyntTietic Philosophy. 103 
 
 there is something beyond consciousness that exists per se, 
 and that, as such, it is unknown. The statement that knowl- 
 edge is relative involves the statement that there is absolute 
 existence — existence that does not depend upon our con- 
 sciousness, and of which we know only its effects upon us. 
 If, in asserting the relativity of knowledge, we do not postu- 
 late absolute existence, the relative itself becomes absolute ; 
 and that involves a contradiction of the doctrine of rela- 
 tivity — the very indisputable doctrine by which the so-called 
 qualities of matter are shown to be sensible phenomena. 
 
 An oyster is conceived as having some vague sort of con- 
 sciousness of its environment. In this consciousness man 
 is not included. If we conceive the oyster as a creature out 
 of whose consciousness we exist, is it not a trifle absurd to 
 say that there is no objective reality ; that our conception 
 of the oyster, instead of being the product of tlie co-opera- 
 tion of the mind with an external something, is only one 
 of the modifications of ourselves, uncaused by anything ex- 
 isting objectively ; and that, therefore, the oyster exists only 
 in our own minds? And other human beings than our- 
 selves can only be regarded as but so many modifications of 
 our own consciousness. The truth is that, while we know- 
 directly only our own conscious states — the material out of 
 which is woven all thought — we know by inference other 
 human beings, although, of course, relatively only; and 
 that which is not known is the reality which awakens in 
 us all similarly perceptive activity. 
 
 The conviction " that human intelligence is incapable of 
 absolute knowledge," says Spencer, " is one that has been 
 slowly gaining ground as civilization has advanced. . . . All 
 possible conceptions have been, one by one, tried and found 
 wanting ; and so the entire field of speculation has been 
 gradually exhausted without positive result, the only one 
 arrived at being the negative one above stated — that the 
 reality existing behind all appearances is, and must ever be, 
 unknown. To this conclusion almost every thinker of note 
 has subscribed. 'With the exception,' says Sir AVilliam 
 Hamilton, ' of a few late absolutist theorizers in Germany, 
 this is, perhaps, the truth of all others most harmoniously 
 re-echoed by every philosopher of every school.' " 
 
 To Herbert Spencer belongs the great credit of having 
 formulated the principles of universal evolution and shown 
 that what von Baer demonstrated to be true in the develop- 
 ment of an animal is true of worlds, of all life, of society,
 
 104 Herbert Speucer^s Synthetic PhilosopJiy. 
 
 of all thought, of language, religion, literature, government, 
 art, science, philosophy, etc, — viz., that progress is from a 
 homogeneous, indefinite, incoherent condition to the hetero- 
 geneous, definite, and coherent condition. The rhythm of 
 evolution and dissolution, completing itself during short 
 periods in small aggregates, and in the vast aggregate dis- 
 tributed through space completing itself in periods which 
 are immeasurable by human thought, is, so far as we can 
 see, universal and eternal, each alternating phase of the pro- 
 cess predominating, now in this region of space, and now in 
 that, as local conditions determine. 
 
 Von Baer, and doubtless others before Spencer, had 
 glimpses of this law beyond its application to organic de- 
 velopment, but it required the cyclopffidiac knowledge, ])hilo- 
 sophic genius, and synthetical powers of a Spencer to illus- 
 trate and prove the law of universal evolution, as it re- 
 quired a Darwin to establish the principle of natural selec- 
 tion. Von Baer, as a writer in the Encyclopa.Hlia Britannica 
 says, " prepared the way for Mr Spencer's generalization of 
 the law of organic evolution as the law of all evolution." 
 But this fact no more lessens the credit due Spencer for 
 his great contributions to thought tlian the fact that many 
 investigators prepared the way for Darwin's researches di- 
 minishes the credit to which the great naturalist is fairly 
 entitled. 
 
 " A great method is always within the perception of 
 many," says De Morgan, " before it is within the grasp of 
 one." Prof. Owen, the paleontologist, expressed himself, 
 in correspondence with the editor of the London Review, 
 80 as to convey the impression — which he afterward said 
 was not intended — that he claimed to have promulgated 
 the theory of natural selection before Darwin had done so. 
 This led Darwin to say : " As far as the mere enunciation 
 of the principle of natural selection is concerned, it is quite 
 immaterial whether or not Prof. Owen preceded me, for 
 both of us, as shown in this historical sketch, were long ago 
 preceded by Dr. Wells and Mr. iMathew." Darwin quotes 
 even from Aristotle's Physical Auscultations, and adds: 
 " We here see the princi])le of natural selection shadowed 
 forth," etc. Doubtless many had thouf;jht of the principle 
 of natural selection, but they lacked the knowledge to under- 
 stand it with its many implications, the wonderful powers 
 of patient observation and laborious experimental investiga- 
 tion necessary to the study of details, and the verification
 
 Herbert Spencer^ s Synthetic Philosophy. 105 
 
 of what "was conjectured or but dimly perceived, as well as 
 the wonderful powers of generalization required to classify 
 the multitude of facts and bring them together in a com- 
 prehensive unity so as to make clear and certain the princi- 
 ple underlying them. These qualifications were possessed 
 in an eminent degree by Darwin, and they enabled him to 
 prove what others had but imagined — to show that natural 
 selection was a great factor in evolution, and to put or- 
 ganic evolution upon an impregnable foundation. But Dar- 
 win's work would not have been possible if the labors of 
 others had not led up to them, and the acceptance of evo- 
 lution would have remained confined to but a few if the 
 scientific mind had not been, through the work of others, 
 prepared for the change. Bufion, Lamarck, Geoffroy Saint- 
 Hilaire, Goethe, Erasmus Darwin, the author of the Ves- 
 tiges, with others, are entitled to the credit of having helped 
 to prepare the way for Darwin's work and for the adoption, 
 with comparatively little ojiposition, of the doctrine of de- 
 velopment in the place of belief in special creations. Yet 
 Darwin's name will be forever identified with natural selec- 
 tion. 
 
 And as Prof. Youmans says : " The same ethical canons 
 of research . . . which gave to Copernicus the glory of the 
 heliocentric astronomy, to Newton that of the law of gravi- 
 tation, to Harvey that of the circulation of the blood, to 
 Priestley that of the discovery of oxygen, and to Darwin that 
 of natural selection, will also give to Herbert Spencer the 
 honor of having first elucidated and established the law of 
 universal evolution." 
 
 Prof. Huxley, in his Survey of Fifty Years of Progress, 
 says : " Evolution as a philosophical doctrine applicable to 
 all phenomena, whether physical or mental, whether mani- 
 fested by material atoms or by men in society, has been 
 dealt with systematically in the Synthetic Philosophy of 
 Mr. Herbert Spencer. Comment on that great undertaking 
 would not be in place here. I mention it because, so far as 
 I know, it is the first attempt to deal on scientific princi- 
 ples with modern scientific facts and speculations. For 
 the Philosophic Positive of M. Comte, with which Mr. 
 Spencer's system of philosophy is sometimes compared, al- 
 though it professes a similar object, is unfortunately per- 
 meated by a thoroughly unscientific spirit, and its author had 
 no adequate acquaintance with the physical science even of 
 his own time."
 
 lOG Herlert Spencer's Sijnihdid Philosophy. . 
 
 I will now endeavor to give a brief synopsis of Mr. Spen- 
 per's doctrine of evolution. 
 
 1. Under the appearances which the universe presents to 
 our senses, there persists, unchanging in quantity but ever 
 changing in form and ever transcending human knowledge 
 and conception, an unknown and unknowable power or real- 
 ity, which we are obliged to recognize as without limit in 
 space and without beginning or end in time. 
 
 Matter, motion, space, and time are forms which the un- 
 knowable reality assumes in consciousness. Matter and 
 motion are manifestations of force, and space and time are 
 cohesions — one of coexistence, the other of succession — in 
 the manifestation of force. Force, then, is the primary da- 
 tum, but that we only know as states of consciousness ; in 
 other words, as the changes in us produced by an unknow- 
 able reality, of which our conceptions of matter and mo- 
 tion are symbols. That which appears to be, outside of con- 
 sciousness, as matter and force, is the same _ as that Avhich 
 appears in consciousness as thought and feeling. In Spen- 
 cer's own language: "A power of which the nature re- 
 mains forever inconceivable, and to which no limit in time 
 and space can be imagined, works in us certain effects. 
 These effects have certain likenesses of kind, the most gen- 
 eral of which we class under the names of matter and 
 force, and between these effects there are likenesses of kind, 
 the most constant of which we class as laws of the highest 
 certainty." 
 
 2. The field of science and philosophy is in the phenome- 
 nal world. It is the function of philosophy to give to knowl- 
 edge a unity that shall comprehend the fundamental truths 
 of all the sciences, as the general definitions and proposi- 
 tions of each include all the diversified phenomena of its 
 recognized province. The sciences deal with different orders 
 of phenomena, and their formulae are those which express 
 the changes and relations of these orders respectively. Phi- 
 losophy is a synthesis of all these sciences into a universal 
 system. 
 
 3. Force is persistent, and is revealed to us under the two 
 opposite modes of attraction and expansion — in the ceaseless 
 redistribution of matter and motion, wliich extends tlirough- 
 out tiie universe, involving, on the one hand, the integra- 
 tion of matter and the dissipation of motion, and on the 
 other a disintegration of matter and aljsorption of motion. 
 
 4. Where the integration of matter and the dissipation
 
 Herhert Spencefs Synthetic Philosophy. 107 
 
 of motion predominate, there is evolution. Where there is 
 a predominant disintegration of matter and absorption of 
 motion, there is dissolution. In that portion of the universe 
 observable by us attraction predominates now, as seen in the 
 integration of matter and the evolution of forms. In other 
 regions expansion may exceed attraction, dissolution may 
 predominate over evolution. In ages inconceivably remote, 
 the elements of our system, now undergoing evolution, were 
 doubtless subject to the opposite process. Every condition 
 grows out of pre-existent conditions. 
 
 5. Of beginning there is no indication. The evolution of 
 a world from the " chaos " of star-dust involves a " begin- 
 ning " only as the formation of a crystal from the " chaos " 
 of a solution implies a beginning. There is, according to 
 Spencer's philosophy, as little need of a " supernatural fac- 
 tor " to explain evolution as there is to explain the opposite 
 process, dissolution; and one is as little indication of a 
 " beginning " as the other, except the word " beginning " 
 be applied to certain rhythms of motion, certain manifesta- 
 tions of force, certain forms of matter, which, nevertheless, 
 were preceded by and sprang from other rhytlims, manifes- 
 tations, and forms, all due to and dependent upon self-ex- 
 istent, inscrutable power. As Spencer said, in reply to a 
 critic : " The affirmation of a universal evolution is in 
 itself the negation of an ' absolute commencement ' of 
 anything. Construed in ' terms of evolution, every kind of 
 being is conceived as a product of modifications, wrought 
 by insensible gradations on a pre-existing kind of being; 
 and this holds as fully of the supposed ' commencement of 
 organic life ' as of all subsequent development of organic 
 life." 
 
 6. When the formation of an aggregate proceeds uncom- 
 plicated by secondary processes, as in the crystallization of 
 carbon into a diamond, evolution is simple. 
 
 7. When, in tlie process of evolution, there are secondary 
 rearrangements of matter, and sufficient retained motion to 
 admit a redistribution among the parts of the body — as, for 
 instance, in the growth of an animal — there is exemplified 
 not only the integration of matter and the dissipation ofi 
 motion, the primary law of evolution, but also an increase' 
 of complexity. When this is accompanied with increased 
 coherence, definiteness, and mutual dependence of parts, and 
 the subordination of the parts to the movements of the 
 whole structure, there is progress. Thus we have evolution
 
 108 Herlert Spencer's Syntlietic Pliilosophy. 
 
 as a double process— a movement toward unity as well as 
 
 diversity. -, • mi. 
 
 The following is from an article which appeared m ihe 
 Index (Boston), in 1880, in which I reviewed at consider- 
 able length Prof. Van Buren Denslow's essay on Herbert 
 Spencer, contained in his work entitled Modern Thinkers : 
 
 Prof Denslow says : " Given space, matter, force, motion, and time 
 as the factors, would all progress be found to consist in evolution of 
 forra^ organisms, motions, and activities from the homogeneous or 
 simple into the heterogeneous ? It must be conceded that the array of 
 instances in which this is true dazzles and almost bewilders the im- 
 a'-ination by its variety and beauty. ... But if it shall appear that 
 each instance he (Spencer) adduces as an illustration of differentiation 
 of the simple into the complex also illustrates a unification of previ- 
 ously differentiated and diverse elements into one simple and homo- 
 geneous entitv or substance, is it quite clear that we have made an^ 
 advance in our knowledge of the principles of universal science il 
 
 (pp. 218, 222). , ^ o . 
 
 To strengthen his objection, the author selects one of Spencer s own 
 illustrations, f urnislied bv the differentiation of the bean seed " into 
 vine, leaf, blossom, and ultimately the new fruit," and calls attention 
 to what he declares is a fact— that this process equally illustrates the 
 unification of diverse elements into one homogeneous substance. 
 
 That in the growth of the bean plant diverse elements are united in 
 one structure is verv evident ; but the correctness of characterizing as 
 a " homoo-eneous entitv" a complex production, in which several ele- 
 ments united in different proportions have produced all the variety 
 afforded by the root, vine, leaf, blossom, and fruit of a bean plant, is 
 by no means apparent. On the contrary, a bean plant is, in substance, 
 as well as in form and activitv, a very heterogeneous stracture. ihe 
 chemical differentiations produced in plants generally by rearrange- 
 ments of the chemical elements and by modification of tissues and 
 organs are well described bv Spencer. 
 
 " In plants," he observes, " the albuminous and amylaceous matters 
 •which form the substance of the embryo give origin here to a pre- 
 ponderance of chlorophvU and there to a preponderance of cellulose. 
 Over the parts that are bocorning leaf-surfaces, certain of the materials 
 are metamorphosed into wax. In this place, starch passes into one of 
 its isomeric equivalents, sugar, and in that place into another of its 
 isomeric equivalents, gum. Bv secondary changes, some of the cellu- 
 lose is modified into wood, while some of it is modified into the allied 
 substance, which in large masses we distinguish as cork. And the 
 more numerous compounds thus gradually arising initiate further un- 
 likenesses bv mingling in unlike ratios." (First Principles.) 
 
 In the inorganic world there are compound substances, like water, 
 produced bv the union of different elements, whicli to all appearances 
 are liomogeneous as to substance ; but we nnist not expect to find such 
 homogcneitv in highlv evolved organisms like the bean plant. And 
 how the integration o^ a number of diverse elements into one structure 
 diminishes the weight of Spencer's claims it is not easy to see. 
 Spencer's primary law of evolution is not, as Prof. Denslow seems to
 
 Herlert Spencer's Synthetic Pliilosojyhy. 109 
 
 think, change from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous, but the in- 
 tegration of matter and concomitant dissipation of motion, which vre 
 see exemplified in the concentration of units that form a crystal as 
 well as in the combination of elements that compose the structure of 
 a complex organism. And consider a moment how the integration of 
 matter, the combinations of several elements into one body, gives rise 
 to heterogeneity and differentiation in the inorganic as well as in the 
 organic world. Think of the different combinations and transposi- 
 tions of which the elements admit, and the multitude of substances 
 thus produced. Add a molecule of carbon to a hundred molecules of 
 iron, and a peculiar hardness is produced by the conversion of the iron 
 into steel. Carbon in variously proportioned combinations with oxy- 
 gen and nitrogen develops the several properties of wood, fruits, 
 grain, grasses, tobacco, and opium. Carbon united with oxygen as 
 carbonic-acid gas combines with molecules of the metal calcium in 
 forming lime-rocks and marbles, the bones of animals, and beautiful 
 translucent pearls. A triple alliance of molecules of hydrogen, oxygen, 
 and carbon imparts a wonderful diversity of proportion to a multi- 
 tude of organic substances, as wood, vegetable oil, animal flesh, and 
 fat. Hydrogen molecules united with oxygen are converted into acids, 
 and, combined with nitrogen, are converted into alkaloids, as in the 
 formation of ammonia. If the proportion of molecules of nitrogen 
 and oxygen in the atmosphere, composed by weight of nitrogen 
 seventy-seven and of oxygen twenty-three, be reversed to oxygen 
 seventy-seven and nitrogen twenty-three, nitric acid is developed. 
 Vinegar, burnt sugar, butter, animal fat, nutmeg oil, are all composed 
 of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen in different proportions. Opium and 
 quinine contain the same elements in different proportions. It is un- 
 necessary to multiply illustrations to show that the union of diverse 
 elements" in different proportions gives us compounds more or less 
 homogeneous in substance, but all differentiated from one another as 
 to substance as well as in form and motion. The number of such sub- 
 stances is limited only by the inconceivably immense number of com- 
 binations and varving proportions in which between sixty and seventy 
 elements may unite. So the combination of heterogeneous elements 
 in substances less heterogeneous is a process by which variety, differ- 
 entiation, and heterogeneity, in substance as well as in form, have 
 been produced. Bv this process has grown, from a nebulous mass, a 
 planet with all its variety of water, land, and sky. fitted for the habita- 
 tion of living creatures', themselves an exemplification of the same 
 process. It is the primary law of evolution, 
 
 8, In the process of evolution, increase of heterogeneity 
 results from " the multiplication of effects," for in "actions 
 and reaction of force and matter an uulikeness of either of 
 the factors necessitates an unlikeness of the effects," All 
 parts of a body can not be conditioned precisely alike with 
 reference to the en-vironment, since the parts must be sub- 
 ject to unlike forces and to different intensities of the same 
 force. Exemplifications of the instability of the homogene- 
 ous are afforded by the rusting of iron, the uneven cooling
 
 110 Herhert Spencer's Syntlietic Philosophy. 
 
 of molten lead or sulphur, and the impossibility of keeping 
 a body of water free from currents. Tlie more heterogene- 
 ous a body becomes, the more rapid the multiplication of 
 effects. Every event which involves the decomposition of 
 force into several forces produces greater complication and 
 increased heterogeneity ; and, when this process of differen- 
 tiation combines with the process of integration to make 
 the change from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous at 
 the same time as that from the indefinite to the definite, we 
 have compound evolution. Mere increase of heterogeneity 
 and multiformity of parts does not constitute progress. A 
 cancer introduces into an organism changes that make it 
 more heterogeneous, yet it may cause death. The anarchy 
 resulting from a revolution makes a state more heterogene- 
 ous, yet it may be the precursor of its dissolution. The law 
 of passage from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous is a 
 law of progress, but not the law of progress. The primary 
 law of progress (or evolution, which in his later works 
 Spencer substitutes for the word " progress ") is the inte- 
 gration of matter and the concomitant dissipation of mo- 
 tion, which is alike exhibited in the crystallization of carbon 
 into a diamond and the growth of an animal from a germ ; 
 but when, as in the field of biology, there is with continual 
 integration of matter increasing heterogeneity of form, 
 progress is possible only when there is also increasing co- 
 herence, detinitencss, and mutual dependence of parts and 
 a subordination of the various parts and manifold functions 
 to the movements of the whole structure. Cancers produce 
 differentiation ; but, as they can not be integrated in har- 
 mony with the rest of the body, they result not in progress 
 but in death. Thus it is seen that evolution is a double 
 process — a movement toward unity as well as diversity. In- 
 tegration, the primary process, under certain conditions the 
 most completely realized by organic bodies, is accompanied 
 by a complementary process from indefinite, incoherent 
 homogeneity to definite coherent heterogeneity. Variety 
 increases with the unity it accomplishes. The evolution of 
 an animal from an egg or a tree from a seed occurs by the 
 integration of various elements into a complex structure, in 
 which at the same time go on continual differentiations and 
 local integrations, making the whole a compact aggregate 
 that presents great iieterogeneity in itself and at the same 
 time a wide differentiation from all other aggregates. 
 
 9. The field of this compound evolution is among bodies
 
 Herhert Spencer^s Synthetic Pliilosopliy. Ill 
 
 of differing densities, between gases wherein the molecular 
 motion is too rapid to admit of a structural arrangement, 
 and solids in which the amount of retained motion is too 
 small to admit of molecular rearrangement. Spencer ob- 
 serves : " A large amount of secondary redistribution is possi- 
 ble only where there is a great quantity of retained motion ; 
 and, on the other hand, these distributions can have promi- 
 nence only when the contained motion has become small, 
 opposing conditions that seem to negative any large amount 
 of secondary redistribution." It is in organic bodies " that 
 these apparently contradictory conditions are reconciled," 
 for their peculiarity consists in the concentration of matter 
 in a high degree with a far larger amount of molecular mo- 
 tion tlian is found in other bodies of the same degree of 
 concentration. 
 
 10. All living forms have been evolved in accordance 
 with the above-mentioned laws. The most complex are the 
 product of modifications wrought on pre-existent animals. 
 The, evolution of species goes on, not in ascending lineal 
 series, but by continual divergence and redivergence. Com- 
 plexity of life and intelligence is correlated with complexity 
 of structure. The highest form of intelligence, the human, 
 has been reached by modifications wrought through ages 
 upon pre-existing intelligences. 
 
 11. The mental faculties of man, not less than his brain 
 and nervous system, are the product of innumerable modi- 
 fications in the evolution of the highest creatures from the 
 lowest. 
 
 Experiences registered in the nervous system produce 
 structural changes and are accompanied by mental modifi- 
 cations. The aptitudes and intuitions of the human mind 
 are the product of accumulated human experiences, trans- 
 mitted and organized in the race. Even the " a priori forms 
 of thought " have been slowly acquired. Whatever in the 
 mind transcends the experience of the individual is never- 
 theless the product of ancestral experiences. 
 
 12. Not only is it true that our highest conceptions of 
 morality have been evolved in accordance with these laws, 
 but even the moral sense has been formed by accumulated 
 and multiplied experiences, registered in the slowly evolving 
 organism and transmitted as intuition, as sensitive in some 
 persons to a moral wrong as the tactile sense is to the sting 
 of a bee. The ultimate basis of morality is the source of 
 all phenomena, " an inscrutable power," as John Fiske well
 
 112 Herlert Spencer's Sijiitlietic Philosophy. 
 
 says, " of which the properties of matter and motion necessi- 
 tating the process of evolution, with pain and wrong as its 
 concomitants, are the phenomenal manifestations." 
 
 13. The religious sentiment, equally with the moral sense, 
 has been evolved through psychical conditions represented 
 by all the stages of life below man. The object of religious 
 sentiment is the unknowable reality. The essential truth 
 of religion is involved in a recognition of an absolute upon 
 which all phenomena depend, while its fundamental error 
 begins with investing this reality with anthropomorphic 
 qualities. 
 
 14. All conceptions and systems, philosophical, ethical, 
 and religious ; language, government, poetry, art, science, 
 philosophy, and industrial pursuits; all human activities, 
 equally with animal and vegetable forms, plants, solar and 
 stellar systems — have been evolved from a homogeneous, 
 indefinite, and incoherent condition to a heterogeneous, 
 definite, and coherent state. 
 
 Such is the merest abstract, and a very imperfect one, of 
 the doctrine of evolution as maintained by Herbert Spencer. 
 
 The doctrine of the unknowable is unwelcome to theolo- 
 gians generally and to those theologically inclined, because 
 it is opposed to all systems and theories based upon the as- 
 sumption of the knowledge of God— his nature, attributes, 
 purpose, etc. It is opposed by others of anti-theological 
 views, because they think, especially when they see Unknow- 
 able printed with the initial letter a capital, that it implies 
 the existence of a God more or less like the theological 
 conception which they have renounced. Both classes may, 
 when they come to appreciate fully the reasoning by which 
 the conclusion has been reached by men like Kant and 
 Spencer, reconsider more carefully their objections, and 
 adopt the view in which are united all that is tenable m the 
 affirmation of the theist with all that is warranted m tlie 
 criticism of the atheist. ^ 
 
 One anti-theological writer characterizes Spencer s thought 
 as a " spook " philosophy ; on the other hand, an idealist, a 
 disciple of the late Prof. Thomas Hill (Jrecn, m the hitest 
 num])er of the Journal of Speculative Philosophy (date, 
 January, 1888), speaks of " the philoso])hy of scientific ma- 
 terialism and agnosticism, of which Mr. Herbert Spencer 
 is the most di.stiugiii.shod exponent," of the "full-Hedged 
 scientific materialistic i)liikjsoi)hy of Lewes and Spencer and 
 their adjutants," ignoring the fact that in Spencers phi-
 
 Herbert Sjpeyicefs Synthetic Philosophy. 113 
 
 losopliy conceptions of matter and motion are treated merely 
 as symbols of an ultimate reality which is manifested be- 
 yond consciousness as matter and motion and in conscious- 
 ness as feeling and thought. Some writers have character- 
 ized Spencer's philosophy by the word dualism, to make it 
 appear to be in opposition to what they call " monism," 
 whereas Mr, Spencer is thoroughly monistic, since, as he 
 says : " I recognize no forces within the organism or with- 
 out the organism but the variously conditional modes of 
 the universal immanent force ; and the whole process of 
 organic evolution is everywhere attributed by me to the co- 
 operation of its variously conditioned modes, internal and 
 external." 
 
 Quite a common impression is that the doctrine that all 
 knowledge is relative, that we can not know the absolute, 
 carries with it the implication somehow that there is no 
 possibility of any plane of intelligent existence except that 
 known. 
 
 There is nothing in the doctrine of the " absolute " or the 
 " unknowable," as expounded either by Kant or Spencer, 
 that is inconsistent with the continuance of life under other 
 conditions than those of the present state of being. There 
 is nothing in this doctrine which implies that man does 
 not survive physical death or that there are not higher 
 planes of existence than are known here. The philosophy 
 of the absolute or the unknowable merely teaches that all 
 knowledge is relative, that in perception there are two fac- 
 tors — the mind and the objective reality — and that, instead of 
 actually perceiving the objective reality as it absolutely is, 
 the mind perceives a phenomenon, an appearance, a repre- 
 sentation symbolical of and corresponding with, but not a 
 likeness of, the objective thing. The " substratum " of men- 
 tal phenomena is no more known tlian is that of physical 
 phenomena. As Daniel Greenleaf Thompson says : " The 
 truth is, we are forced by the laws of cognition to postulate 
 an unknown reality behind the known reality, both of mat- 
 ter and mind, a dark side of the material world and of in- 
 telligence, an imperceptible substantive being, out of which 
 somehow comes the perceptible, and into which it disap- 
 pears, a source of both material and mental phenomena, a 
 cause of their effects, a permanent in which alone change is 
 possible, a possibility for all actualities and a power which 
 transcends knowledge but which is presupposed iu all 
 knowledge. This is the meaning of the paradox." 
 9
 
 114 Herhert Spencer^s Syiithetic Philosopliy. 
 
 This philosophy does not make conceivability, much less 
 sensibility, the test of possibility. On the contrary, it recog- 
 nizes the fact that there are many motions of the universe 
 to which the dull senses of man make no response whatever. 
 There are a great number and variety of movements of 
 which sense-bound beings can take no cognizance. With 
 superior sensorial perceptions man would be able to discern 
 many of these movements which are now incognizable. 
 
 "Indeed," says Tyndall in the Eeade Lectures on Eadiant 
 Heat, " the domain of the senses in Nature is almost infi- 
 nitely small in comparison with the vast region accessible 
 to thought which lies beyond them. From a few observa- 
 tions of a comet when it comes within the range of his tele- 
 scope, an astronomer can calculate its path in regions which 
 no telescope can reach ; and in like manner, by means of 
 data furnished in the narrow world of the senses, we make 
 ourselves at home in other and wider worlds, which can be 
 traversed by the intellect alone." 
 
 And Lewes remarks to the same purport : " We do not 
 actually experience through feeling a tithe of what we 
 firmly believe and can demonstrate to intuition. The invisi- 
 ble is like the snow at the North Pole; no human eye has 
 beheld it, but the mind is assured of its existence ; and is, 
 moreover, convinced that if the snow exists there, it has the 
 properties found elsewhere. Nor is the invisible confined 
 to objects which have never been presented to sense, al- 
 though they may be presented on some future occasion ; it 
 also comprises objects beyond even this possible range, be- 
 yond all practicable extension of sense." 
 
 But however extended is man's knowledge, it is always 
 knowledge possessed under the conditions of knowing, 
 which include a relation between the me and the not-me, 
 and percejjtion and thought according to the mental consti- 
 tution. 
 
 As Mr. E. D. Fawcet says, Kant, who denied that the 
 mind couid know things in themselves, "expressed himself 
 favorable to the view that a world of supersensuous beings 
 environs this planet, and that tlie establishment of commu- 
 nication with such beings is only a matter of .time. Kant 
 indeed was far too acute not to see that a speculative agnos- 
 ticism (shutting out the possibility of al)solute knowledge of 
 realities) can not possibly assert that there is no plane of 
 relative or phenomenal experience except that called the 
 physical world. Contrariwise, there may be innumerable
 
 Herbert Spencer^ Synthetic Philosophy. 115 
 
 strata of materiality all alike relative to the consciousness 
 of their ' percipients.' " 
 
 The doctrine of the relativity of knowledge and of the 
 inscrutableness of the ultimate nature of things has been 
 held by nearly all the great thinkers of ancient and modern 
 times, including men of firm faith in immortality. To 
 confound this doctrine with the doctrine of materialism is 
 to betray ignorance of philosophic thought. With the 
 question whether there is or is not a future life for man I am 
 not here concerned. Spencer neither affirms belief in such a 
 life nor denies its possibility. There is nothing in his sys- 
 tem of philosophy that involves necessarily, so far as I can 
 see, either the acceptance or rejection of the doctrine of the 
 continuance of conscious existence after bodily dissolution. 
 If it could be disproved, his philosophy would not be af- 
 fected thereby ; if it could be demonstrated beyond doubt 
 to be true, the philosophy would be in no need of modifica- 
 tion, for the phenomenal world would only be extended and 
 the domain of science enlarged. One may hold to Spen- 
 cer's philosophy and yet believe with Shad worth Hodgson 
 in " an ethereal body built up during our lifetime within 
 our grosser body, destined to preserve our individuality after 
 death." The only question is, Is there proof of this theory 
 of an ethereal body? Our American psychologist and phi- 
 losopher, Mr. D. G-. Thompson, who accepts Mr. Spencer's 
 philosophy in all its essential doctrines and implications, is 
 " inclined to the opinion that the ground for the assertion 
 of post-mortem personal self-consciousness in identity with 
 ante-mortem self-consciousness is firmer than for the con- 
 trary belief." He thinks it is " no harder to understand 
 the continued existence of personal existence after death 
 than to comprehend its occultation in sleep and restoration 
 afterward." Mr. Thompson adds : " The same arguments 
 tliat support the belief in continued personal existence after 
 death tend also to prove an existence before birth. Is it 
 possible that we must return to the pre-existence doctrines 
 of the ancient philosophers'? Is it possible that we must 
 each say, I am ; therefore I always Avas and always shall be ? 
 Dios sabe ! '''' Others think that the implications of Spen- 
 cer's philosophy point to physical dissolution as the end of 
 consciousness. 
 
 A few years ago Mr. Richard A. Proctor, in conversation, 
 gave me his estimate of Herbert Spencer, which subsequent- 
 ly, by my request, be put in a form for publication, and it
 
 116 Herlert Spencer^s Synthetic Philosophy. 
 
 appeared as a contribution in a journal which I then con- 
 ducted. From that paper the following is an extract : " If 
 we compare Herbert Spencer, in any dejDartment of science, 
 with some chief master in that department, we find him at 
 once less and greater ; less in knowledge of details and in 
 mastery of facts and methods ; greater in that he sees out- 
 side and beyond the mere details of that special subject and 
 recognizes the relation of its region of inquiry to the much 
 wider domain over which his own philosophy extends. . . . 
 
 " Yet one can not but pause, when contemplating Herbert 
 Spencer's work in departments of research, to note with 
 wonder how he has been enabled, by mere clearness of in- 
 sight, to discern truths which escaped the notice of the very 
 leaders in those special subjects of inquiry. To take as- 
 tronomy, for example, a subject which, more, perhaps, than 
 any other, requires long and special study before the facts 
 with which it deals can be rightly interpreted, Spencer rea- 
 soned justly respecting the most difficult as well as the 
 highest of all subjects of astronomical research, the archi- 
 tecture of the stellar system, when the Herschels, Arago, 
 and Humboldt adopted or accepted erroneous views. In 
 this particular matter I had a noteworthy illustration of the 
 justice of a remark made (either by Youmans or Fiske, I 
 forget which) at the Spencer banquet in New York a few 
 years ago : ' In every department of inquiry even the most 
 zealous specialists must take the ideas of llerbert Spencer 
 into consideration.' After long and careful study specially 
 directed to tliat subject, I advanced in 18G9 opinions which 
 I supposed to be new respecting the architecture of the 
 heavens — opinions which Spencer liimself, in his Study of 
 Sociology, has described as ' going far to help us in conceiv- 
 ing the constitution of our own galaxy.' Yet I found that 
 twelve years before, dealing with that part of science in his 
 specially planned survey of the whole domain, he had seen 
 clearly many of the points on which I insisted later, and 
 had found in such points sufficient evidence to lead him to 
 correct views respecting the complexity and variety of the 
 sidereal system." 
 
 In conclusion, The Synthetic Philosophy, as at present con- 
 stituted, is not, of course, to be regarded as a finality. While 
 man continues to advance in knowledge, all systems, to be 
 of current value, will have to be subjected to much revision 
 and supplementation ; but I am, I think, warranted in say- 
 ing that the leading principles of the synthetic philosophy
 
 Herbert Spencer^ s Synthetic PMlosophy. 117 
 
 are likely to remain a solid and permanent contribution 
 to scientific and philosophic thought. Herbert Spencer's 
 discovery and elucidation of the experiential origin of intui- 
 tion and his consequent reconciliation of the sensation phi- 
 losophy and the intuitional school, together with his for- 
 mulation and establishment of the principles of universal 
 evolution, entitle him to rank among the most original 
 thinkers of modern times. He will easily hold his place as 
 the most profound and comprehensive philosophic mind of 
 the nineteenth century.
 
 118 Herhert Spencer's Synthetic Philosophy. 
 
 ABSTRACT OF THE DISCUSSION. 
 
 Mr. Raymond S. Peerin : 
 
 As I have listened to the lecture of the evening, I have experienced, 
 in common, I have no doubt, with a great many in this audience, an 
 impression of being overwhelmed with an avalanche of philosophic 
 terms. The speaker has impressed us with the store of knowledge 
 which he has acquired, but he has left us confused and unhappy. A 
 few simple truths clearly and properly presented would have resulted 
 in something more practical in the way of information than this ab- 
 struse philosophical discussion. I am a great admirer of Herbert 
 Spencer, who has undoubtedly given us the most remarkable philo- 
 sophical system of the present century. On its objective side its mode 
 of procedure has been scientific, and it is in effect a synthesis of all 
 the special sciences. But I am no admirer of Kant ; and in so far as 
 Spencer has borrowed from Kant, I can not accept his conclusions as 
 rational and valid. To one who is familiar with the philosophy of 
 Plato, Kant's Critique of Pure Reason is a roaring farce. Mr. Spencer 
 has apparently accepted his conclusion that there is a Ding an sich 
 behind phenomena— an absolute Being which is to us unknowable. 
 But if it is unknowable, how do we know that there is any such abso- 
 lute Being? This conclusion is not the result of scientific analysis, but 
 of metaphysical speculation. The truly scientific procedure in phi- 
 losophy would be, instead of resolving all things into an unknowable 
 substance, to discover analytically what is the common content of all 
 phenomena— those which are called mental as well as those which are 
 called physical. The only quality or principle common to all known 
 modes of being is motion. i\Iotion is a principle of life and mind as 
 well as of material things. Absence of motion would be absolute death 
 or nonentity. In the ultimate analysis we reach this principle of mo- 
 tion or life everywhere, and we are therefore justified in positing it as 
 the supreme reality in the place of the unknowable of Mr. Spencer. 
 
 Mr. William IT. Bouguton : 
 
 The comprehensive, just, judicious, and judicial paper to which we 
 have listened to-night has yielded to us all the pleasure which a model 
 review can give, and leaves nothing for criticism of matter or method. 
 
 But it may be of interest to call attention to some conclusions of Mr. 
 Spencer which he may not have established upon as firm a foundation
 
 Herbert Spencer^s Synthetic Philosophy. 119 
 
 as that upon which he has reared his doctrine of evolution. I refer to 
 his theory of an unknowable power, or ultimate force or final first 
 cause, from which all things proceed. 
 
 This conclusion can not be drawn from such unassailable premises 
 as Mr. Spencer's definition of space — viz., the abstract of all coexist- 
 ences ; nor from the character of such existences to be found in his 
 definition of matter — viz., coexistent positions which offer resistance — 
 implying, as he must imply, all of motion in that word " positions," 
 and excluding, as he must exclude therefrom, all ideas of fixity. Fi- 
 nality can not be ascribed to cause ; and with the fall of finality comes 
 the fall of its illogical conclusion — viz., that creative power which is 
 implied in Mr. Spencer's words, '" from which all things proceed." 
 
 All we know or can imagine of cause is antecedence — that one thing 
 precedes another and a different thing in time. 
 
 There is no question of a series here. The last thing is not the end 
 of cause, and the first thing does not begin it. The one is as unthink- 
 able as the other. With the demolition of finality, what becomes of 
 its creative power f There is no question here of quantity nor of qual- 
 ity. If matter is indestructible, power could not have caused it; and, 
 if power is imperishable, it can not in that respect be distinguished 
 from matter. If power has any existence, it falls under the definition 
 of matter ; if space is all existence, it can have no other meaning than 
 indefinitely extended matter, and their coexistence prevents proces- 
 sion and throws out all ideas of final cause and final antecedence. 
 
 It seems to me that Mr. Spencer's error flows from a misapplication 
 of the fact that we think in relations and can not think of a knowable 
 power except as related to an unknowable power. 
 
 This relation has nothing to do with the subject, for the reason that 
 it is not a question of the relation of a knowable whole or a knowable 
 part to an unknowable whole, for space is not a limited whole, and an 
 unlimited whole is a contradiction in terms. Space has no opposite, 
 no antithesis. Form is not its opposite. The constantly changing 
 forms which indefinitely extended matter assumes are included in 
 apace, as the shape of the apple is included in the apple. 
 
 Of course there is no time to-night to amplify the views which I 
 have expressed, nor to state them except dogmatically, and I will 
 therefore close by thanking the lecturer for his paper and the audi- 
 ence for its attention. 
 
 Dr. Robert G. Eccles : 
 
 Mr. Underwood's lecture is a very able and satisfactory exposition 
 of the sjTithetic philosophy. He had a big subject to deal with, and, 
 of course, could only be expected to present the merest outline in an
 
 120 Herbert Spencer's Synthetic PhilosojjJiy. 
 
 hour's talk. He dwelt chiefly on the psychological side rather than 
 the physical. This was almost inevitable under existing circum- 
 stances, and no doubt the best, since Mr. Spencer's contributions 
 have been more notable and original here than in the physical domain. 
 In the latter he relied more on the work of eminent biologists like 
 Darwin and Huxley. All he has done is but a continuation of the 
 work of preceding philosophers. The doctrine of evolution is itself 
 an evolution, and was only synthetized by Mr. Spencer. It is in the 
 direct line of descent of the work of the best reasoners of all ages, 
 and only became possible in its present form after the advent of mod- 
 ern science. It is really a growth of the ages and not the work of a 
 day or even a century. It owes much to Kant, Berkeley, Reid, Hume, 
 and other great thinkers who have been mentioned to-night. It has 
 found allied truths in contending schools of thought, brought them 
 together and fused them into a harmonic whole. To understand it 
 correctly requires breadth of thought, abundance of data, and persist- 
 ent, hard mental work. Without these it remains as incomprehensible 
 as the higher mathematics to the non-educated. 
 
 It is quite evident from Mr. Perrin's remarks that he has failed com- 
 pletely to grasp the basic principles of its psychology. There is a pons 
 asinorum here that he has not crossed. This surprises me very much. 
 Himself a writer on philosophical subjects of acknowledged ability, 
 one would have expected better things from him here. What he has 
 said reveals the fact that the doctrine of the " unknowable " is un- 
 known to him except in name. He neither has grasped what Spencer 
 and his disciples mean by it, nor the significance of the facts upon 
 which it rests. Its basis is wholly physiological, and as an implication 
 it is imperative. All that it involves is a correct comprehension of the 
 nature and limitations of human sense and perception. To know what 
 we know, and how we know it, is to demonstrate what Mr. Perrin 
 denies. For him to characterize Kant's Critique of Pure Reason as a 
 " farce " is only to reveal the sad limitations of his own mental grasp. 
 However much we may dissent from some of this great German's con- 
 clusions, we all must admit him to be one of the very ablest and most 
 profound reasoners the world has ever seen. Whoever attempts to 
 ignore or underestimate his work only discountenances his own prow- 
 ess. That he believed in "things in themselves" was but evidence 
 that he held the universe to be real instead of illusory. The pict- 
 ures in our brains have as causes substantial verities. Mr. Perrin 
 holds that real being is motion. " Things in themselves," he contends, 
 arc mere motions. But motions of what! Of nothing, he maintains. 
 How many of you can picture to your minds motions of nothings I 
 Reason rebels against being forced to accept such a thought. Are not
 
 Herbert Spencer^s Synthetic Philosophy. 121 
 
 such motions unknowable ? This apotheosis of motion does not help 
 philosophy in the least. It is practically telling us that the world 
 rests on the shoulders of Atlas, but fails to say what that worthy 
 stands upon for his support. 
 
 Mr. John A. Tayloe : 
 
 The essay to which we have listened this evening must be regarded, 
 I think, by all competent to judge, as one of the most candid and able 
 expositions of philosophical truth to which this association has ever 
 listened. It is indeed a large subject, and can hardly be treated in the 
 form of a popular lecture. I thiuk, however, that Mr. Underwood has 
 been remarkably successful in presenting to us a clear and correct ex- 
 position of Mr. Spencer's philosophy. If Mr. Perrin had given a little 
 more thought to the matter, he would hardly have complained, I 
 think, of the abstruse character of the essay. Surely the lecturer has 
 used no terms so technical that a philosophical student can not readily 
 grasp and understand them. It should have been left to us who make 
 no claims to philosophical distinction to make this criticism — if it is 
 to be made. But, unfamiliar as I am with Kant — whose works I have 
 tried in vain to read — and the abstruse discussions of other meta- 
 physicians, I found no difficulty in comprehending the lecturer's ex- 
 position. I regard Mr. Spencer as the foremost philosopher of our 
 time, and think the association is to be congratulated on the oppor- 
 tunity of listening to such an able presentation of his views. I would 
 move, sir, as an expression of our appreciation of the ability of the lec- 
 turer as a foremost advocate of evolution views, that Mr. Underwood 
 be elected a corresponding member of the Brooklyn Ethical Association. 
 
 (The motion being duly seconded and put to vote by the president, 
 Mr. Underwood was unanimously elected). 
 
 Mr. Underwood : 
 
 Recognizing the excellent work which this association has done, 
 with which I have long been familiar, I regard your election of myself 
 as corresponding member as a high honor, and accept it in the spirit in 
 which it has been tendered. I also thank you for the general charac- 
 ter of your criticisms. The task imposed upon me was a great one — 
 one which required a course of lectures rather than an hour's discus- 
 sion for its accomplishment. No one can be better aware than myself 
 of the imperfections of my lecture. The subject is one which neces- 
 sitates the use of philosophical terms, but I have endeavored to present 
 it as clearly and concisely as possible. The animadversions on Mr. 
 Spencer's views have been so fully answered by other speakers that I 
 will not occupy your time by a further reply.
 
 •• SOCIOLOGICAL • EVOLUTION 
 
 XIV. 
 
 Brooklyn Ethiral Associ- 
 ation Lectures. 
 
 EVOLUTION AND SOCIAL REFORM 
 III. THE ANARCHISTIC METHOD. 
 
 BY 
 
 HUGH O. PEXTECOST 
 Editor of "The Twentieth Century." 
 
 BOSTON 
 JAMES H. WEST, Publisher 
 
 196 Summer Street 
 1890
 
 \lA0^ri^ 
 
 COLLATERAL READINGS SUGGESTED. 
 
 Spencer's "Principles of Sociology," "Social Statics," and "The 
 Man versus the State"; Prudhon's "What is Property?" and 
 " Id^e Generale de la Kevolution au 19me Sifecle" ; Brown's " Stud- 
 ies in Modern Socialism" ; Sumner's "What Social Classes owe to 
 Each Other"; Mill's "On Liberty"; Lieber's "On Civil Liberty 
 and Self-Government"; Huxley's "Administrative Xihilism"; 
 Stephen's " Liberty, Equality and Fraternity"; Crosier's "Civil- 
 ization and Progress"; Thompson's "Social Progress"; James's 
 "Anarchy"; Parsons's "Anarchism: Its Philosophy and Scien- 
 tific Basis"; Bakounine's "r;odand theState"; Andrews's "The 
 Science of Society"; Tcheruichewsky's "What's to be Done?" 
 
 (302)
 
 EVOLUTION AND SOCIAL REFORM.* 
 
 III. THE ANARCHISTIC METHOD. 
 
 Those who accept tlie conclusions of Anarchism believe 
 that it is a science ; or, if you please, a philosophy sup- 
 ported by facts scientifically discovered and collated. It is 
 not a religion based upon assumptions, unwarranted or 
 contradicted by facts. It is not a S3'stem of metaphysics 
 consisting of undemonstrable speculations. They freely 
 admit that Sociology is not yet an exact science ; that, 
 strictly speaking, there is no Science of Society. But they 
 speak of Anarchism as a science because its methods of 
 investigation and accomplishment are scientific. In so far 
 as it represents conclusions they have been reached scien- 
 tifically. If Anarchists have a theory it is because they 
 believe observed facts are best explained by that theor}-. 
 If a theory does not well account for observed facts it is 
 abandoned, and a new working hypothesis is sought. They 
 do not pursue the theologic or metaphysical method in 
 formulating their postulates. 
 
 Anarchists believe there should be no government : by 
 which they mean no government by physical force ; no 
 government to prevent persons from thinking, saying or 
 doing what they should be free to think, say or do ; no 
 government for the encouragement of those who invade 
 what should be the rights of others, with the protection of 
 such invaders ; no government to authorize a few to monop- 
 olize what should be the opportunities of all ; no govern- 
 ment to compel persons to do what they should be free to 
 refuse to do, what it is not necessary for the good of all 
 that they should do ; no government in favor of one class 
 as against another class ; no government to enrich the idle 
 by impoverishing the industrious. They believe there 
 should be no government that interferes with wholesome 
 individual liberty and wealth-producing exertion. But 
 they believe in well-ordered society, in which the. wise, the 
 just, the good will rule by precepts, principles and ex- 
 amples ; in which healthful public opinion will utter and 
 •Copyright, 1890, by James H. West.
 
 304 Evolution and Social Reform: 
 
 morally enforce everything needful for restraint or encour- 
 agement. They believe in government, but not government 
 by physical force for the injury of all, or, to use a common 
 expression which means the same, for unjust purposes. 
 They believe in self-control and mutuality. 
 
 An Anarchist is not one who wishes to separate himself 
 from his kind, to live independently, to lapse into the 
 individual isolation of the Stone Age. He is an individual- 
 ist, but also a socialist, a mutualist. He understands that 
 civilized men must co-operate, that co-operation is a social 
 necessity. But he wishes to co-operate voluntarily ; to 
 have the privilege of declining to co-operate in one or more 
 or all particulars ; of resigning the benefits and obligations 
 of co-operation. He values individual freedom above all 
 other possessions, and protests against any organization of 
 society in which it is not recognized and respected. He 
 does not wish another or a majority of others to decide for 
 him what he shall or shall not do, unless he agrees before- 
 hand to such an arrangement. If he wishes to live apart 
 from others he desires to be allowed to do so. He believes 
 in society composed of individuals each of whom shall be 
 free from invasive restraints or compulsions. It should be 
 understood that Anarchists abhor the idea of using individ- 
 ual liberty for the purpose of injuring others, and they 
 believe that in society rightly constituted there would be 
 found effective methods of dealing Avith those who should 
 violate the rights or liberties of others. 
 
 It should be understood from this statement of general 
 principles that Anarchists are not bomb-throwers — dyna- 
 miters. There are some persons who call themselves 
 Anarchists who believe that circumstances might arise 
 which would justify a resort to destructive warfare, and 
 that good results would follow such a method. But, in my 
 opinion, the clearest thinkers, the most scientific among 
 the Anarchists, understand that what might be achieved 
 by physical force would be subject to reversal by physical 
 force, and would, therefore, have to be conserved by physi- 
 cal force. In my opinion, the most careful thinkers among 
 the Anarchists understand that if some transient ''tidal- 
 wave" of popular opinion, formed rapidly and by what we 
 call accident, or some sudden ujjrising of the people, in- 
 flamed by discontent but not educated in economic prin- 
 ciples, as in the case of the French Revolution, should
 
 The Anarchistic Method. 305 
 
 enable them by political methods or force of arms to secure 
 coutrol of the government, little or nothing would be 
 gained and much might be lost. So that the life of even 
 so hateful a ruler as the Czar is safe from attack by an 
 Anarchist, because it is not the Czar but Czarism that must 
 die before the people can be free ; and no Anarchist would 
 think of destroying the property or life of a monopolist, 
 for it is monopolism that is aimed at, and this can be 
 destroyed only by education. Anarchists do not fight with 
 bombs, but with books ; nor Avith pistols, but with pens. 
 They are not thugs ; they are thinkers. Not powder, but 
 persuasion, is their weapon. Not by cannon, but by con- 
 victions, do they hope to win. 
 
 Among non- Anarchists who are sufiicientlj' well informed 
 to understand all this, the objection is vxrged that Anarchism 
 is a beautiful but utterlj'- impracticable dream. The 
 realization of Anarchism, it is said, would introduce the 
 millennium ; and, strange to say, this is a reason why 
 multitudes of Christians who profess to be looking forward 
 toward the millennium with all the fervor of religious hape 
 regard Anarchists with aversion or contempt. It is quite 
 true that to reach an ideally Auarchistic social state would 
 necessitate ideall}^ perfect individuals. But Anarchists are 
 not idealists. They are the reverse of idealists. Every 
 theory has its ideal of perfect consummation. But An- 
 archists do not expect perfection. Perfection is not 
 necessary to the happy and relatively satisfactory working 
 of Anarchism. 
 
 Anarchists are not dreamers, hoAvever much they may be 
 so regarded by those Avho do not understand their beliefs 
 and aims. They regard themselves as very rational, very 
 practical persons. They believe their theories maj', in 
 many particulars, be put in practice at once 5 that some of 
 them are in ojieration ; and that wherever they are em- 
 ployed the results are more satisfactory than where opposite 
 methods are pursued. For example : Fashions are followed 
 by the Anarchistic method. Men, without governmental 
 interference, wear narrow or wide trousers, and women 
 short or long skirts. And this is a distinct advance toward 
 Anarchism, as everyone familiar with the governmental 
 regulations of clothing in the past knows. Men are not 
 governmentally compelled to lift their hats to women or 
 keep to the right on the sidewalk, but they usually do both.
 
 306 Evolution and Social Reform: 
 
 An ideal state of society in miniature may be seen in every 
 drawing-room where ladies and gentlemen, as we call well- 
 bred men and women, come together for social intercourse. 
 There is no compulsion. They talk, dance, eat and drink; 
 groups form and disperse; individuals, with freedom and 
 polite regard for the rights of others, move about, come 
 and go. And if one habitually disregards the proprieties 
 of such assemblages he is not arrested and dragged to 
 prison ; he is dealt with far more effectively ; he is not 
 invited to come, again ; he is dropped, shunned, boycotted. 
 The "four hundred" as well as the Irish peasantry know 
 the value of the boycott. 
 
 The New York Grocers' Association is an almost purely 
 Anarchistic institution, and may be used as o'lie example of 
 many. I am informed that the wholesale grocers of Xew 
 York have lost faith in the efficacy of governmental laws 
 for the collection of debts, and have formed an Association 
 which has proved very satisfactory in its results, to protect 
 themselves against loss by bad debts. They no longer 
 depend upon governmental machinery. If a debtor to any 
 grocery house in New York exhibits signs of business 
 weakness or lack of integrity he is visited by a represent- 
 ative of the Association. If this visit has no salutary 
 effect upon him it becomes impossible for him to l)uy goods, 
 except for cash, anywhere in New York. That is all tliat 
 happens to him ; but out-of-town buyers are said to be 
 much more afraid of the Grocers' Association than of the 
 government. The staid business-men of New York who 
 compose this Association would, perhaps, be shocked to 
 know that, in one particular, they are true Anarchists ; but 
 such is the fact. Their Association does not serve them 
 with ideal perfection, but it is better for them tlian the 
 system of collecting debts by physical force. And this is 
 all that Anarchists claim for their proposed arrangement 
 of society : that it is practicable, that it is better than 
 government by physical force, and tliat it is capable of 
 constantly approaching ideal perfection. 
 
 Let us now glance briefly at the economic principles of 
 Anaroliism. 
 
 Anarcliists regard poverty as the misfortune that causes 
 most of tlie unhapi)iness and crime with which tlie human 
 race is afflicted. I do not, of course, mean that poverty 
 which individuals might, under any social system, choose
 
 . . The Anarchistic Method. 307 
 
 to suffer rather than practise virtue and self-control or 
 labor for the production of wealth. I mean involuntary- 
 poverty ; that poverty which is now, in spite of the virtue, 
 self-control and industry of the poor, so prevalent. Many- 
 persons are skeptical concerning the existence of such 
 poverty. It is commonly believed that no one not intem- 
 perate or thriftless need be poor. But it is only necessary 
 to open one's eyes to see that there are millions of human 
 beings in this and all countries who labor unceasingly only 
 to find that their poverty increases. It is unnecessary to 
 dwell upon a fact so patent. Everywhere children are 
 taken from school or play to labor in factories and mines ; 
 else why the futile statutes against child-labor ? Every- 
 where is heard the hum of sewing-machines from which 
 hollow-chested women drop into the Potter's Field ; else 
 why all the kind-hearted charitable work among the 
 <' worthy poor" ? 
 
 This social disease of poverty Anarchists believe will 
 disappear when its causes are generally understood. And 
 they believe its causes are much better understood by a few 
 than the causes of small-pox or cholera are understood by 
 any ; and that they are removable. They believe that what 
 are popularly supposed to be its causes — ignorance of what 
 is taught in the schools, idleness, drunkenness and crime — 
 are its effects ; and that, hence, to attempt to remove it by 
 compulsory education in the common schools, charity- 
 organization societies, model tenement-houses and reforma- 
 tories, liowever well-meant such attempts may be and 
 undoubtedly are, is to necessarily fail. The cause of invol- 
 untary poverty, Anarchists believe, is the taking away 
 from the laboring people — the producers of Avealth — a 
 large part of what they produce. This is accomplished by 
 methods not understood Avitliout much observation and 
 reflection Init easily perceived by open-minded thinkers. 
 
 Anyone can see that there are many persons in every 
 comnumity wlio do no ju-oduotive work. Such persons 
 must be supported by what others produce, since there is 
 no other fund from which they may draw. Beggars and 
 tramps are a drain upon the wealth of the industrious. 
 Thieves break through and steal what others earn. 
 Gamblers of all kinds subsist upon what others produce ; 
 and so do the inmates of poor-houses and prisons. This is 
 plain to all. Policemen, soldiers, and higli-priced govern-
 
 308 Evolution and Social Reform: 
 
 ment-officials whose services are not worth to the com- 
 munitv what they get for them, are certainly not producers, 
 and whether they, in part, serve good purposes or not it 
 remains the same that producers are forcibly taxed for 
 their support. Workers are compelled to give up their 
 wealth to support law-makers and professional destroyers 
 of property and life. All this is evident notwithstanding 
 that part of it, however unfortunate, is inevitable in the 
 present state of social development. 
 
 But besides these are other large numbers of persons who 
 receive what they do not produce. Those whose incomes 
 are wholly or partly derived from buying and selling land 
 are regarded by Anarchists, in so far as they are dealers in 
 land, as subsisting upon wealth produced by the labor of 
 others. And to this class of persons belong all those who 
 collect rents — that is, those who receive for the use of 
 their houses, machinery or other personal effects an excess 
 of price over and above what is required to cover compul- 
 sory taxes, insurance and necessary repairs upon such 
 
 property. i i • j 
 
 Those, also, whose incomes are wholly or partly derived 
 from interest, or the rent of money, are regarded by 
 Anarchists, as appropriating Avhat others produce. And so, 
 too, are those who, in buying and selling or manufacturing 
 for sale, receive as the result of such production and 
 exchange more than what would fairly compensate them in 
 the form of Avages for their actual labor in superintending, 
 producing or exchanging. 
 
 In plain words, Anarchists regard rent-takers, or land- 
 lords, interest-takers, or what Mr. J. K. Ingalls calls lend- 
 lords, and protit-takers, or trade-lords, as social parasites. 
 Or. in other words. Anarchists believe, and think they can 
 scientifically prove, that anyone who receives in the process 
 of wealth-distribution more than what represents fair 
 wages for productive labor — that is, more than he actually 
 produces — appropriates something that should belong to 
 others, and thereby helps to bind a load of inevitable 
 poverty upon those who are thus defrauded of the iruits 
 of their industry. 
 
 Let us look, for a moment, from the Anarchistic stand- 
 point, at the grounds tor tliis belief. 
 
 Land is unproduced. It is not tlie result of human 
 labor. It is what is sometimes called a natural oppor-
 
 The Anarchistic Method. 309 
 
 tunity. It is the passive factor in the production of 
 wealth. Like air and water it is an absolute necessity of 
 human life. "When man appeared, like the open air and 
 water running in the streams or bubbling from tlie springs, 
 it was free to access by him. Anarchists believe that if, 
 from the beginning, of human exertions upon this planet, 
 each man had been content to possess and control only so 
 much land as he could productively use, the supply of land 
 free for use always would have been and now would be 
 practically as unlimited as the supply of air and running 
 water, and that, therefore, it never would have commanded 
 a price and would not now be a thing to buy and sell. 
 They believe that the practice of owning land that one 
 cannot and does not wish to use, excluding others from its 
 use, has given rise to rent, or the price of land ; or, to jnit 
 it in other words, that the monopoly of vacant or unused 
 land is the cause of rent. Rent, therefore, does not repre- 
 sent work performed or wealth produced by the rent-taker. 
 It represents wealth transferred from a jDroducer to a non- 
 producer as the price of a privilege that should be absolutely 
 free to all. It is evident that rent-takers, as such, are 
 idlers. They produce nothing. If, then, they subsist it 
 must be at the expense of those who labor. And by just 
 so much as they are rich others must necessarily be poor. 
 Rent is a tribute that public opinion permits non-producers 
 to levy upon producers by the simple contrivance of holding 
 large quantities of land out of use. 
 
 The same reasoning applies when we turn to the subject 
 of interest. Rent is the product of labor jiaid to idlers for 
 the use of land. Interest is the product of labor paid to 
 idlers for the use of money. Rent is interest for land; 
 interest is rent for money. Both are the products of 
 monopoly. IMoney is as necessary to a complicated system 
 of trade as air, water and land are to life. If the supply 
 of money were always equal to the demand for it as an 
 implement of exchange, each person would always have as 
 much of it as would represent labor directly performed or 
 products of labor surrendered by him. The only use that 
 money should have is to indicate that so much labor has 
 been directly performed or so nuich wealth surrendered by 
 the possessor of it; and its value is in that it Avill insure 
 to its ])ossessor the return of a corresponding amount of 
 service or wealth upon demand. It is not in the least
 
 310 Evolution and Social Reform : 
 
 necessary that it should possess any intrinsic valne other 
 than that of the paper on which it is written or printed and 
 the labor of writing or printing it. 
 
 If men had been sufficiently intelligent from the start, a 
 perfect system of money would have grown with the 
 growth of society, and each person always Avould have ha^ 
 precisely as much money as he deserved, because he would 
 not have parted with labor or its products without getting 
 a full representative equivalent in money, unless the 
 transaction were made by the simple process of barter, in 
 which case exchange would be made in kind. All this will 
 be more or less unintelligible to the average conservative 
 person, but it will, I think, become plain to anyone who 
 will thoughtfully read Stephen Pearl Andrews' '-Science 
 of Society," especially that portion of the work devoted 
 to the principle therein formulated as ''Cost the Limit of 
 Price," the original discovery of which Mr. Andrews 
 ascribes to Josiah Warren, with whose works I am not 
 familiar. To this book, the "Science of Society," I am 
 indebted for clear and satisfactory ideas of the true nature 
 and uses of money. 
 
 But contrary to all this men have adopted certain 
 materials for money, the supply of Avhich, relative to the 
 demand, is very limited ; and even when paper is used for 
 money a very insufficient quantity is permitted to circulate, 
 being sometimes greater and sonietimes less, but always 
 under the control of persons who make their living by 
 handling it, and by whose manipulations producers are 
 see-sawed out of their earnings. Money is monopolized. 
 It is "cornered." It frequently happens that a man has 
 much valuable property but no money. Such a man is 
 obliged to go to those Avho control the supply of money 
 and hire what he needs at rates of interest which could 
 not and would not exist if money were not monopolized. 
 
 The point is this : Anarchists believe that as rent would 
 not be a natural product of harmoniously organized soci- 
 ety, neither would interest. They clearly see that interest- 
 takers, as sucl), are non«j)roducers, and that, therefore, what 
 they subsist on must in some unjust way have been taken 
 from the industrious persons who produced it. 
 
 With regard to profits, Anarcliists believe that in a fair 
 exchange of goods for goods tliere Avill be gain to both 
 parties to tlie Isargaiu but "j)rofit" to neither. If I want
 
 The Anarchistic Method. 311 
 
 yoxir cow more than I want my own horse and you want 
 my liorse more than you want your own cow we exchange 
 beasts. We each, by the trade, gain something, but neither 
 makes a '' profit." Profit is not as easily separable from 
 wages as interest or rent, because what is called wages of 
 superintendence is an uncertain quantity ; but it may be, 
 "nevertheless, accurately defined as that portion of the 
 manufacturer's or merchant's income over and above what 
 he should receive as compensation for labor actually per- 
 formed by him. And Anarchists believe that if the land 
 and money monopolies Avere broken, profits would dis- 
 appear. This needs further explanation, but the limits of 
 this address do not admit of it. I must leave it for your 
 future reflection or stud}-, if you are not already familiar 
 with the line of thought involved. 
 
 Anarchists believe, then, that poverty results from the 
 existence of social parasites — persons who perform no 
 productive labor and who are therefore, necessarily, sup- 
 ported oiit of what laborers produce. These social para- 
 sites are thieves at liberty, criminals in prison, gamblers, 
 whether with cards, dice or stocks ; sharpers, whether 
 confidence-men or business-men ; paupers, whether abroad 
 or in poor-houses ; policemen, when in excess of actual 
 need for the protection of property and life ; soldiers, 
 unless actually necessary to repel invasion ; collectors of 
 compulsory taxes ; politicians and law-makers, unless we 
 are to reject the time-honored belief of many of the wisest 
 and best of men that government by force is, at best, a 
 "necessary evil"; rent-takers, interest-takers and profit- 
 takers, except in so far as it can be scientifically proven 
 that rent, interest and profits are the necessary outcome of 
 absolutely free contracts between persons as free as indi- 
 viduals ever can be under any possible arrangement of 
 society. 
 
 In my opinion, the most thoughtful Anarchists are 
 agreed that, in any possible arrangement of society, sporadic 
 cases of rent, interest and profits might arise, but the 
 amounts involved would be too insignificant for serious 
 consideration and the transactfons would represent no 
 injustice whatever. But as all these social parasites are 
 the products of a social arrangement that legitimates rent, 
 interest and profits, Anarchists believe that involuntary 
 poverty is the necessary outcome of, and is completely
 
 312 Evolution and Social Reform : 
 
 accounted for by, the existence of rent, interest and 
 profits. These, therefore, must disappear before the liuman 
 race can be free, wealthy and happy. With their dis- 
 appearance secondary causes of poverty Avill naturally 
 cease. 
 
 This explains the opposition of Anarchists to govern- 
 ment by physical force. They know that those bits of 
 paper by which non-users hold land vacant are legal docu- 
 ments. They know that if laborers should attempt to 
 exercise what should be their right, by taking possession of 
 vacant land for productive use, the whole machinery of 
 government by ph3"sical force would be brought to bear 
 upon them, and if nothing else would avail to drive them 
 from the vacant land they would be shot to death by gov- 
 ernment powder and balls from government guns in the 
 hands of government troops. And yet the only crime of 
 Avhich such laborers Avould be guilty would be that of 
 trying to earn an honest living and promote the happiness 
 of the world by increasing its wealth ; their only crime 
 would be that of wishing to apply productive labor to what 
 we call natural materials, M-hich, wlien not in legitimate 
 use, should be free to all. They know, in short, that the 
 man-starving monopoly of vacant land is authorized and 
 maintained by military government. 
 
 They know, also, that the monopoly of money is sim- 
 ilarly maintained by government. Free competition with 
 the government in the manufacture and uttering of money is 
 forcibly prevented. And because profits arise on account 
 of the monopoly of land and money the government is the 
 creator of rent, interest and profits, the baleful trinity in 
 unity, more powerful than any imaginary bad god to plunge 
 the human race into poverty and so into misery and crime. 
 
 Anarchists believe, still further, that all statute laws are 
 necessarily partial and unjust, unless you choose to except 
 laws against violence and theft. It is impossible to devise 
 a statute law that will not favor some persons against 
 others. The very "machinery of justice," as we call our 
 judicial system, works injustice to the poor, if for no other 
 reason, because as between a litigant Avith money and a 
 litigant without money the poor man may Ije defeated by 
 his very inability to bear the expenses of court-procedure. 
 
 All this is very briefly and insufliciently stated, but 
 Anarchists believe tliat it can be scientificallv and elab-
 
 The Anarchistic Method. 313 
 
 orately proved that, whetlier government is a ^^ necessary 
 evil" or not, it is necessaribj evil as at present constituted 
 anywhere in the world. 
 
 It follows, then, that Anarchists desire a cessation of 
 military government. It would not, however, convey the 
 right idea to say that they wish to destroy the government. 
 They desire that society should grow away from the 
 necessity for government by physical force by the gradual 
 and general acceptance of scientific jirinciples of Sociology. 
 The Anarchistic method of regenerating society, therefore, 
 is that of educating the people in scientific principles of 
 social co-operation or mutuality ; it is that of propaganda, 
 of calling the attention of the people to facts widely 
 observed and logically collated; of doing just Avhat I am 
 doing at this moment. They understand that all existing 
 governments are the expression of the will of the people. 
 Russia is ruled by a Czar because most of the people of 
 Russia believe that is the best form of government for them. 
 Public opinion prevails in Russia without the ballot as 
 effectually as with us through the ballot. ]\Iilitary protec- 
 tion of social parasites prevails in this country because 
 most of our peoi)le believe that the monopoly of vacant 
 land is right and that our present money system is just and 
 fair, precisely as they once believed that chattel slavery 
 Avas a divine institution. Most of our people are firm 
 believers in the righteousness of rent, interest and profits, 
 and the large owners of real-estate and holders of govern- 
 ment-bonds are commonly believed to come by their money 
 honestly and fairly. They are not popularly regarded as 
 monopolists who increase their riches by simply appropri- 
 ating what others j^roduce. "While such beliefs exist society 
 will remain very much as it is. Nothing can bring it into 
 Anarchistic arrangement but a general recognition of the 
 essential injustice of all wealth-getting except by wealth 
 producing. Anarchists, for the present, therefore, have 
 nothing rational to do but to clarify their own ideas, 
 develop their science and teach their principles. 
 
 I have already explained why it would be absurd for 
 them to wage war for their principles. They know that 
 nothing is ever settled by being fought out ; all right 
 consummations must be thought out. ]\Iany Anarchists 
 think, also, that it would be absurd for them to resort to 
 political methods. A ballot means a bullet. The decision
 
 314 Evolution and Social Reform : 
 
 of a majority at an election holds because the army is 
 behind it. But Anarchists, even if they were in a majority, 
 would not wish to impose their will on a minority. In the 
 opinion of very many Anarchists, therefore, the ballot is, 
 for their use, a stultifying implement. But even if it were 
 not it would not be employed by them, because they regard 
 it as useless. They believe that when public opinion 
 favors a violation or the ignoring of a statute law it is not 
 necessary to vote that law oif the statute-books. It will 
 become inoperative ; a dead letter, as we say. And as 
 Anarchists can have nothing to vote for except the abroga- 
 tion of existing laws, manifestly voting, in their case, 
 would be a work of supererogation. 
 
 For example : All Anarchists are necessarily free-traders j 
 but most Anarchists will not vote with the Democrats, 
 because they know that when public sentiment favors free 
 trade custom-houses and custom ofticers will disappear. 
 No army was ever yet organized that could force a nation 
 to pay duties or do anything else against the public sen- 
 timent of that nation. 
 
 Anarchists point to the statute-books of every nation 
 and every old State in this nation for evidence that it is 
 unnecessary to fight or vote laws into desuetude. Multitudes 
 of laws which have never been abrogated are absolutely 
 inoperative. They are so dead that it is not worth while 
 to expunge them from the records. I believe the old 
 Connecticut blue-laws have never been repealed, but there 
 is not power enough at the command of the Governor of 
 that State or the President of the United States to enforce 
 them in the present temper of public oi)inion. There is a 
 law in the District of Columbia providing that an offender 
 shall be bored through the tongue for denying the doctrine 
 of the Trinity, or something of that sort. But it is so 
 paralyzed by public odium that it is impossible to enforce 
 it and unnecessary to abolish it. 
 
 The New York Grocers' Association is a current illustra- 
 tion of how laws against tlie collection of debts will, I 
 think, fall into disuse. Anarchists object very strongly to 
 laws against the collection of debts. They think a debt is 
 contracted by a private arrangement with which the State 
 should have nothing to do ; that State interference for the 
 collection of debts tends to greatly reduce business integrity ; 
 that commercial morality would immediately reach a much
 
 The Anarchistic Method. 315 
 
 higher than its present plane if all financial transactions 
 were effected upon individual honor ; that the dangerous, 
 the ruinous credit-system of doing biisiness would be 
 desirably modified if laws for the collection of debts by 
 force were abolished. Indeed, some Anarchists think that 
 the abolition of laws for the collection of debts would go 
 very far toAvard reorganizing society upon a just basis. 
 But, important as this measure is, they deem it unnecessary 
 to vote for it, because, in time, the experience of business- 
 men will demonstrate that such laws are futile and unneces- 
 sary, and when a law goes out of use under the action of 
 popular opinion its disappearance produces no friction, for 
 it ceases because no one desires it any longer. 
 
 To fight down slavery was a mistake followed by inevita- 
 ble unhappy conditions until now. If slavery had been 
 let alone until it crumbled away there would have succeeded 
 its disappearance no sad and vexing negro-problem. This 
 was the wish of Garrison and his friends, very good 
 Anarchists, who denounced the government and burned the 
 Constitution because they upheld chattel slavery as they 
 sustain indirect slavery to-day, and who contemplated the 
 use of no other than intellectual and moral weapons against 
 the abomination. If Garrison's policy of propaganda and 
 passive resistance had been followed, the institution of 
 chattel slavery would not have disappeared as suddenly as 
 it did, but it would inevitably have fallen to pieces, little 
 by little, without leaving soldier blood and a national debt 
 where it fell. It would have fallen without the use of a 
 bullet or a ballot. 
 
 The Anarchist, then, at present is simply a propagandist, 
 by word and passive deed. He talks and writes and, as 
 far as possible, refrains from doing those things that to him 
 are useless and Avrong. He ceases to exercise the privilege 
 of the franchise. If he is entirely consistent he will 
 receive nothing that he does not earn, except by gift. If 
 he believes that it is Avise for him to become a martyr for 
 purposes of propaganda he will refuse to pay taxes and 
 take the consequences, without physical resistance. An- 
 archists, however, as a rule are not what is commonly called 
 fanatical. They rely more iipon words, for the present, 
 than upon deeds. But when they become more numerous 
 the method of passive resistance will, no doubt, be resorted 
 to.
 
 316 Evolution and Social Reform : 
 
 For example : By general consent among a large inimber 
 in a given locality, tliey may refuse to pay, nucler compul- 
 sion, their taxes, offering, of course, to resign all claims to 
 governmental protection, and perhaps offering voluntarily 
 to contribute toward the maintenance of those communal 
 undertakings of which they approve ; or they may go upon 
 vacant land to use it, suffering themselves to be evicted, 
 unless public opinion sustains them ; or they may attempt 
 to circulate mutual bank or credit money. In two words, 
 the Anarchistic method, for the present, is propaganda, but 
 when they believe themselves to be in sufficient numbers 
 they will probably resort to passive resistance. 
 
 Upon this presentation they may appear to be very 
 impractical, but if what I have so brietl}^ said is thought- 
 fully considered, and if it is remembered that Anarchistic 
 opinion as it grows will constantly be registering itself by 
 the platform-makers and law-makers, I think the conclusion 
 will be reached that Anarchists are not characteristically 
 dreamers, but are sane students of history and human 
 nature. 
 
 Let me illustrate what I mean by a case that is before 
 the public mind at this mome^it. Anarchists are opposed 
 to capital punishment, and they observe with complacent 
 pleasure the growing sentiment against the barbarous 
 practice. A bill for its abolition recently passed the Kew 
 York Assembly but was defeated in the Senate. The 
 introduction of this bill in the New York Legislature 
 exemplifies the tendency of the politicians to reflect public 
 o})inion in the making or unmaking of laws ; but the facts 
 regarding the practice of capital punishment also show 
 that it is a matter of no concern whatever what legislatures 
 do or fail to do in tlie premises. I do not know how many 
 murders Avere committed in New York State last year, but 
 there were only eight executions ; and although there Avere 
 reported during the same year 3567 murders and homicides 
 as having occurred in the United States, there Avere but 
 ninety-eight hangings. The death-penalty is gradually 
 abolishing itself, and whether the laws on the subject 
 remain on the statute-books or not, the practice of hanging 
 in this country will soon be given u]). Tliis method of 
 abolisliing an obnoxious law is Anarchistic or evolutionary; 
 and it should 1)6 understood that the Anarchistic metliod is 
 always and in every particular the application of, or, rather,
 
 The Anarchistic Method. 317 
 
 conformity to, the principles of evolution in the progress 
 of society. 
 
 From the presentation that I have made of this subject, 
 it should be seen by the most conservative mind that 
 Anarchism is nothing more nor less than the old-fashioned 
 American idea that that government is best which governs 
 least. The present apparent tendency of thought is toward 
 the idea that that government is best that governs most — 
 State Socialism, or, as it is called in its distinctively Amer- 
 ican form, Xationalism. Between these two ideas we are 
 slowly but surely being forced to choose. The question is 
 immediately before us : whether government shall, little by 
 little, increase its functions, or little by little decrease its 
 functions ; whether government shall become more central- 
 ized or society more flexible ; whether the individual shall 
 be more and more subordinated to the State or more and 
 more free to pursue in his own way, life, liberty and 
 happiness. Anarchists believe that the State should 
 decrease and the individual increase ; that the most har- 
 monious society will be composed of individuals who are 
 controlled by reason, governed by moral considerations ; and 
 that the removal of restrictions upon industry and trade, 
 the cessation of partial, monopolistic legislation, will conduce 
 to the development of men who will be able to sustain 
 social relations to each other without necessity for the 
 imaginary terrors of supernaturalism or the real compulsion 
 of military government. ]\Iutualism between free individ- 
 uals is the doctrine of Anarchism. To rationally and 
 peacefully decrease the powers of compulsory government 
 is the method of Anarchism. 
 
 There are two questions which Anarchists are frequently 
 called upon to answer. The first of these is : How can 
 communal xtndertakings be accomplished without some 
 governmental authority ? How can sewers and stn-ets be 
 made and supervised without some centralized restraining 
 or compelling power ? How could boundaries to land, 
 and all those inatters that are now defined bylaw, — and 
 disputes about which are settled in the courts, — be deter- 
 mined ? To all these questions Anarchists can no more 
 give definite answers than tlit-y can tell what the fashion 
 in hats will be in the year 2UO0. All they can do is to 
 appeal to history and show that men have learned how to 
 do many things without the aid of government, for the
 
 318 Evolution and Social Reform. 
 
 doing of which government was once believed to be neces- 
 sary, and to reason with apparent warrant that men are 
 capable of learning how to do in the future much that now 
 seems difficult or impossible. It it is remembered that 
 Anarchists suppose that men must learn how to do many 
 things by voluntary association better than they are done 
 or can be done by present methods, before they will cease 
 to be done by governmental compulsion, the question will 
 be answered as well as it can be in a single sentence. The 
 best fire-department is that which insurance companies 
 equip for their own interests ; the best schools are private 
 schools, else why do they continue in unequal competition 
 with public schools ? There is no good reason why men 
 should not yet learn how to build the best roads and sewers 
 and other communal works without the services of armed 
 constables or policemen. To suppose otherwise is to 
 strangely limit the capabilities of the human mind, which 
 has already accomplished enough once apparent impos- 
 sibilities to warrant very considerable faith in its ability to 
 meet all future social requirements and practically solve 
 all future social problems. 
 
 The other question to which I referred is : How long 
 will it be before Anarchism will or may be practically 
 realized? To this the Anarchist replies that it is impos- 
 sible to tell. Evolution is slow up to a certain point, at 
 which point events shape themselves with astonishing 
 rapidity. We can never tell at just what stage of evolu- 
 tion we are. Unforeseen circumstances often precipitate 
 accomplisliments which apparently belong to the remote 
 future. But with the question, *' When ?" Anarchists do 
 not much concern themselves. What is long to human 
 life is short as a historical period. The Anarchist is a 
 scientist ; it is for him to announce his discovery. He is 
 a philosopher ; it is for him to earnestly labor and patiently 
 wait. He believes he has discovered certain sociological 
 facts; he believes that all men will in time come to 
 acknowledge them as facts. For what is gained while he 
 lives he rejoices: but if little is accomplished before his 
 work is done he does not despair. He sees of the travail 
 of his soul and is satisfied.
 
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 ■ SOCIOLOGICAL • EVOLUTIO,\ 
 
 I. 
 
 Brooklyn Ethical Associ- 
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 1889
 
 COLLATERAL READINGS SUGGESTED. 
 
 Spencer's "First Principles," " Principles of Psycliolofjy," and 
 "Principles of Socioloj^y;" Fiske's " Cosmic Philosopliy " ; Wal- 
 lace's "Darwinism" ; Thompson's "A System of Psycliology" ; 
 Huxley and Wace's "Christianity and Agnosticism"; Ahbot's 
 "Scientific Theism," and " The Philosophy of Free Religion," in 
 The New Ideal; Case's "Physical Itealism" ; (Jarus's "Fun- 
 damental Problems" : \V. B. Carpenter's "Nature and Man." 
 
 (2)
 
 THE SCOPE AND PRINCIPLES OF THE 
 EVOLUTION PHILOSOPHY.* 
 
 SixcE the interesting biological lectures of our last 
 year's course Avere delivered, a noteworthy contribution has 
 been made to that department of evolutional;}' thought, by 
 the publication of Alfred Eussel Wallace's " Darwinism : 
 An Exposition of the Theory of Natural Selection, with 
 some of its Applications." A co-discoverer with Charles 
 Darwin of the law of Xatural Selection, Mr. Wallace re- 
 sembles him as a writer in the simplicity and lucidity of 
 his style ; and the wealth of facts with which he has illus- 
 trated his discussion of the subject, indicating the utmost 
 patience and thoroughness of research, is nowhere equaled 
 save in those epoch-making books which indicated Darwin 
 as the foremost naturalist of his own, or, perhaps it Avould 
 not be too much to say, of any time. 
 
 Writing thirty years after the publication of "The 
 Origin of Species," and in the light of all the objections 
 Avhich have been brought against the theory of Xatural 
 Selection, Mr. Wallace declares that Darwin " did his work 
 so well that ' descent with modification ' is now universally 
 accepted in the organic world; and the rising genera- 
 tion of naturalists can hardlv realize the novelty of this 
 idea, or that their fathers considered it a scientific heresy 
 to be condemned rather than seriously discussed." In the 
 defense of "Xatural Selection " as the fundamental law of 
 biological evolution, jNIr. Wallace is even more of a Dar- 
 winian than Darwin himself — showing, it would seem con- 
 clusively, that many of those variations which Darwin 
 attributed to sexual selection, can be explained by natural 
 selection, including nearly all those brilliant colors in the 
 ornamentation of male birds and animals which Darwin 
 assigned to the choice or preference of the female. 
 
 Mr. Wallace also trenchantly criticises the su})posed luw 
 of use and disuse as aifecting biological evolution, — the so- 
 called "Lamarckian factor," — the importance of which 
 * Copyright, 1880, by Jaiues H. West.
 
 4 Tlie Scoj)e and l'rtiic!j>Ies 
 
 was explicitly admitted by Darwin, though that fact is 
 often iguort'd by his critics, and has been emphasized by 
 Mr. Spencer in his "Factors of Organic Evolution," as 
 well as by l^rof. Cope, Dr. Eaymond, and the American 
 School of Evolutionists generally. '' There is now much 
 reason," Mr. Wallace declares, "to believe that the sup- 
 posed inheritance of acquired modifications — that is, of 
 the effects of use and disuse, or of the direct influence of 
 the environment — is not a fact, and if so, the very foun- 
 dation is taken away from the Avhole class of objections on 
 which such stress is now laid." Such effects, for exam- 
 ple, as the diminished jaw in civilized man, and the dimi- 
 nution of the muscles used in closing the jaw in case of 
 pet dogs which are fed on soft food, are wholly accounted 
 for by the simple fact of the withdrawal of natural selec- 
 tion in keeping up the parts in question to their full 
 dimensions, in connection Avith Mr. Galton's law of "Re- 
 gression toward Mediocrity," whereby, it has been been 
 proved experimentally, there is a tendency of organs which 
 have been increased by natural selection, to revert to a 
 mean or average size, whenever the stress of circumstances 
 which compelled the operation of this law is removed. 
 Investigating the supposed effects of use and disuse in 
 wild animals, Mr. Wallace notes the circumstance that 
 " the very fact of use, in a wild state, implies vtillfi/, and 
 utility is the constant subject for the action of natural 
 selection ; while among domestic animals those parts which 
 are exceptionally used are so used in the service of man, 
 and thus become the subjects of artificial selection." 
 " There are no cases among wild animals," he says, " which 
 may not be better explained by variation and natural selec- 
 tion," than by the law of use or disuse. He quotes Gal- 
 ton, and Trof. Weismann in his recently published " Essays 
 on Heredity," — two of the most careful students of tliis 
 subject, — in support of the non-heredity of acquired 
 variations; and on the whole makes an exceedingly strong 
 argument in favor of natural sehu^tion as the great and 
 controlling factor in organic evolution. Prof. Cope and the 
 American evolutionists, he says, "have introduced theoret- 
 ical conce])tions which have not yet been tested by exi)eri- 
 ments or facts, as well as metaidiysical conceptions which 
 are incapable of proof. And when tliey come to illustrate 
 these views by an appeal to i)ala',ontology «»r morphology,
 
 of the Evolution J'lnhisopJiy. 5 
 
 we find that a far simpler and more complete explanation of 
 the facts is afforded by the established principles of vari- 
 ation and natnral selection." Mr. Wallace's general conclu- 
 sion is that all other laAvs and factors in organic evolution 
 " must have operated in entire subordination to the law of 
 natural selection," — a conclusion which he supports by 
 logical argument from such a wealth of accumulated facts, 
 that it will be extremely difficult for his opponents si; cess- 
 fully to combat his views. 
 
 While asserting the continuity of man's progress from 
 the brute, and of the higher animals from the protoplasmic 
 cell, Mr. Wallace believes that at three definite stages in 
 the progress of organic evolution there has been an in- 
 troduction of new causes, not involved in nor evolved 
 from the forces previously operating. These are, 1st., the 
 change from inorganic to organic life, otherwise involved 
 in the conception of spontaneous generation ; L'nd, the in- 
 troduction of sensation or consciousness, which "is still 
 more marvelous, still more completely beyond all possi- 
 bility of explanation by matter, its laws and forces " ; and, 
 3rd, the development of certain noble characteristics' and 
 faculties in man, as, for example, his moral and intellectual 
 nature, and the mathematical, artistic and musical facul- 
 ties, which differentiate him from the brute animals, indi- 
 cate the reality of a spiritual universe, and prophetically 
 assure an immortal life for the spiritual nature of man. 
 
 His peculiar views on these topics will probably appear 
 more or less reasonable to different persons according to 
 their temperamental tendencies and educational bias ; but 
 no one, I think, can lay down this book without a convic- 
 tion of the great ability and transparent sincerity of its 
 author, of its pre-eminent value as a contribution to the 
 general literature of evolution, and of the weight of its 
 argument^ in defense of Natural Selection as a controlling 
 factor in organic development.* 
 
 Evolution may be true, in the field of biology, it may 
 yet be said, but what of it ? Man may .be the descendant 
 of an anthropoid ape, "probably arboreal in its habits," 
 
 *Xote should also lie made of Trof. Aujrelo lleil]irin's recently imlilished 
 liook on "The Iteniuida Islands," wliicli contains a carelul study ol the lor- 
 niation of coral reefs, contirniiiij;- Darwin's theories on this subject, whit'h 
 some recent writers have lirou^ht in iiuestion. The tendency of the most 
 recent studies has uniiuestionalily hecn to stren<ithen the hi;ih rcfiard in 
 which Darwin has hecn justly helil as a careful, conscientious investigator and 
 safe theorizer in the liolii of evt)lutionary research.
 
 6 The Scojte and Prlnciiyles 
 
 thougli of tliis we are not convinced ; Lut wliy is it neces- 
 sary to announce the fact ? Any one who traces his ances- 
 try back far enough, will probably discover relationships of 
 which he will not be particularly proud — but he does not 
 therefore find it necessary to bruit the matter abroad, so to 
 speak, — to publish it upon the housetops. Truth is a 
 good thing, indeed, but there are times when silence is 
 golden and speech is leaden — when discretion in speech is 
 the better part of intellectual valor. What moral or relig- 
 ious end can possibly be attained by the public proclama- 
 tion of a belief in Evolution ? Such are the comments, no 
 doubt, of some of the self-constituted critics of the work 
 of this Association. Another sort of criticism of certain 
 phases of evolutionary thought is often heard from those 
 who are quite ready to declare themselves converts to the 
 doctrine in its purely physical and biological aspects : Evo- 
 lution is only a method, these critics declare ; it is not a 
 philosophy, it is not a religion ; — the great problems of 
 ethics, of metaphysics, of life, what have these to do with 
 the nebular hypothesis, the origin of species by natural se- 
 lection, or the descent of man from lower forms of life ? 
 
 It should be sufficient, perhaps, to remind intelligent 
 people that if evolution is <•' only a method," it is, so far as 
 we are able to discover, a universul method, penetrating 
 into all the phenomenal activities of nature ; explaining 
 not only the processes whereby suns aud workls have come 
 into being, and the varied and bountiful forms of life have 
 successively appeared lipon the earth, but also how the sev- 
 eral faculties of the mind have grown out of the simplest 
 form of conscious a})prehension, how the special senses 
 have been developed, how individuals have been impelled 
 to combine, forming the complex organizations into which 
 our civilized societies are divided, how governmental forms 
 have evolved and the institutions of ndigion have come into 
 being — how religion itself, indeed, an(l that sense of ob- 
 ligation which constitutes the foundation of man's moral 
 nature, Iiave arisen by processes entirely orderly and nat- 
 ural, out of the interaction between (lertain ])riniitive 
 instincts and tendencies of the human mind, and the (Uivi- 
 roning conditions under which they have found exi)ression. 
 
 If we are right in assuming, with Spencer :ni(l iMske and 
 other great leaders in tliis new movement of thought, 
 that evolution is tlnis practically illimitable in its range
 
 of the Eocdation Ph'dosopJtij. 7 
 
 throughout the xmiverse of physical and mental phenomena, 
 then indeed must we confess that it is not merely a method 
 whereby the myriad forms of organic life have come into 
 being — it is a method Avhich searches into the deeper 
 prolilems of religion and philosoj^hy, compelling a recon- 
 sideration of old conclusions — a reconstruction of many 
 of their fundamental conce])tions. To speak of " the phi- 
 losophy of Evolution/' therefore, is not without warrant. 
 We may well term it, with John Fiske, a ^'cosmic phi- 
 losophy," since it is thus universal in its scope and applica- 
 tion ; or with Mr. Spencer, a " synthetic philosophy," 
 since, like the founder of Christianity, it comes not to 
 destroy but to fulfill, discovering the measure of truth 
 which resides in each antagonistic system, and by a new 
 and deeper synthesis combining them into a harmonious 
 and perfect whole. 
 
 If it should appear to some superficial thinkers that the 
 advocates of this philosoi»liy unnecessarily antagonize the 
 creeds and methods of the prevalent religious faith, — ■ 
 ideas and conceptions that by many are deemed sacred, — 
 the reply must be that the truth is more sacred than any 
 existing institution, or theological or cosmological concep- 
 tion, however venerable. In the language of Emerson, 
 " Nothing at last is sacred but the integrity of 3-our own 
 mind." There is an ethics of the intellect which imjioses 
 u))on every reverent thinker the obligation to follow abso- 
 lutely the dictates of his enliglitened reason, and fi-inkly 
 to confess his innermost convictions. In the noble passage 
 Avith which Mr. 8i)encer concludes the first part of his 
 " First Principles of Pliiloso}»hy," he says : 
 
 "Whoever hesitates to utter tliat which he thinks the 
 highest truth, lest it should be too much in. advance of the 
 time, may reassure himself by looking at his acts from an 
 impersonal point of view. Let him duly recognize the 
 fact that opinion is the agency through Avhich character 
 adapts external arrangements to itself — that his opinion 
 rightly forms a ])art of this agency — is a unit of force, 
 constituting, witli other such units, the general poAver 
 Avhich works out social changes ; and lie Avill perceive that 
 he may pro]!er]y give utterance to his innermost convic- 
 tion : leaving it to produce Avhat effect it may. . . . He 
 must remember that, Avhile he is a descendant of the past, 
 he is a parent of the future ; and that his thoughts are as
 
 8 The Scojje and Princijjles 
 
 children born to liim, which he may not carelessly let die. 
 He, like every other man, may properly consider himself 
 as one of the myriad agencies through whom works the 
 Unknown Canse ; and when the Unknown Canse prodnces 
 in him a certain belief, he is thereby authorized to profess 
 and act ont that belief. For, to render in their highest 
 sense the words of the poet, — 
 
 ' . . . Nature is made better by no mean, 
 But Nature makes that mean ; over that art 
 Which you say adds to Nature, is an art 
 That Nature makes.' 
 
 "Not as adventitious, therefore, will the wise man re- 
 gard the faith that is in him. The highest truth he sees he 
 will fearlessly utter ; knowing that, let what may come of 
 it, he is thus playing his right part in the world; — know- 
 ing that if he can cifect the change he aims at — well : if 
 not, — well also, though not so well." * 
 
 This passage is noteworthy not only for the nobility of 
 its thought and the transparent clearness of its diction, 
 but also because it suggests some of the foremost questions 
 involved in the discussion of the evolution philosophy. In 
 naming the Power which works in the thoughts of men as 
 well as in the processes of external Nature, "the Unknown 
 Cause," Mr. Spencer brings ns face to face with the funda- 
 mental problem of the nature of our knowledge — and 
 with that mental attitude which is popularly termed Agnos- 
 ticism, the hete-noire of this i)hiloso])liy in the minds of its 
 orthodox critics, as well as those of the extreme radical or 
 materialistic school of thought. In the misconcejjtion and 
 denunciation of the doctrine of the relativity of knowl- 
 edge which constitutes the phil()SO])hical breastwork of tlie 
 agnostic's position, extremes meet, and the Catholic Mal- 
 loek, the anti-Christian realist Francis Ellingwood Abbot, 
 and the nmterialist, ably Tepresented last season on this 
 l)latform by Mr. Starr H. Nichols,t clasp hands, and mingle 
 tlieir otherwise inharmonious voices. Leaving tlie fuller 
 explanation and illu.stration of the doctrine of the rela- 
 tivity of knowledge to my able successor in this course, 
 I shall eiKh-avor hereafter briefly to define phih)SO])hi('al 
 agnosticism; to show tliat its attitiuh; is neither idealistic, 
 strictly speaking, nor irreligious ; that it is not inconsistent 
 
 • First I'rinciples, p. 12.'J. 
 
 tThe Philosoi>hy of KvDlutiim. Kvolutinn Kssays, pp. .T-j;^-.^! .
 
 of tlie Evolution Philosoplnj. 9 
 
 with a realistic conception of the external world, nor with 
 the obligation to use and trust those high faculties of 
 intellect and reason Avhieh constitute the distinguishing 
 features of the mind of man — tliat in every de})artment 
 of scientific, historical-and true philosophic investigation, 
 indeed, it is consistent and coincident with the meta-gnos- 
 ticdsm of my friend, Mr. Skilton. * In si:>eaking of indi- 
 vidual opinion as a unit of that "general power which 
 works out social changes," JNlr. Spencer places uppermost 
 as the goal of intelligent tliought and action, a practical 
 rather than a merely speculative purpose — therel)y turn- 
 ing our attention to the field of practical ethics which is 
 involved in the discussion of sociological evolution. To a 
 further consideration of the relations of the evolution 
 philosophy to this topic, foremost at the present day in the 
 arena of discussion and of i)ractical statesmanship, I shall 
 ask your thoughtful attention during the concluding por- 
 tion of my paper. 
 
 What, then, let us ask at the outset, is an Agnostic ? 
 What is philosophical agnosticism ? The word, as is well- 
 known, was first introduced into English usage by Prof. 
 Huxley, and was derived by him from Paul's designation 
 of the "Agnostic" or unknown God, whose altar was 
 established by the pious Athenians. As Prof. Huxley 
 himself describes its meaning and origin, it arose from a 
 conviction produced by his early reading of Sir William 
 Hamilton's essay "On the Thilosophy of the Uncondi- 
 tioned," strengthened by subsequent reflection and the 
 study of Hume and Kant. Of the essay of Sir William 
 Hamilton, Prof. Huxley declares : " It stamped upon my 
 mind the strong conviction that, on even the most solemn 
 and important of questions, men are apt to take cunning 
 phrases for answers ; and that the limitation of our facul- 
 ties, in a great number of cases, renders real answers to 
 those questions not merely actually impossible, but theo- 
 retically inconceivable." f As regards the validity of spec- 
 ulative conclusions, he was therefore forced to adopt the 
 conviction thus stated by Kant in his "Critique of Pure 
 Reason": "The greatest and perhajjs the sole use of all 
 philoso})hy of pure reason is, after all, merely negative, 
 since it serves not as an orginuui for tlie enlargement [of 
 
 *The Evohitioii of Society, Evolution ICssays, pi). Tl'y-'Z'l' . 
 t Christianity anil Agnosticism, lluxlcy-Wace Controversy.
 
 10 The Scope and Frinciples 
 
 knowledge,] but as a disfipline for its delimitation, and 
 instead of discovering truth, lias only the modest merit of 
 preventing error." In other words, the only practical re- 
 sult of metaphysical studies is to convince the unbiased 
 student that the human mind is incapable of grasping 
 ontological facts. In the clearer language of Mr. Spencer, 
 '' all our knowledge is relative." We can know nothing of 
 the external universe— nothing even of the nature of our 
 own bodies and of our own minds — save as they are 
 directly related to our knowing faculties. Involved in this 
 phenomenal knowledge, however, and accompanying it at 
 every step, we have the inexpugnable testimony of our 
 reason and consciousness that behind the world of phe- 
 nomena there exists an Iniiuite and Eternal Energy which 
 is the source and efl&cient cause of all phenomena, both 
 physical and mental. As thus stated, the doctrine seems 
 almost a truism. How, indeed, can it be possible that man 
 should know anything which is wholly out of relation to 
 his intellectual faculties ? Nay, of what use or interest to 
 him would such knowledge be if it were possible to attain 
 it.^ And on the other liand, how is it possible f or _ him 
 to view the orderly procession of phenomena — any single 
 phenomenon, indeed — without conceiving it as a manifes- 
 tation of immanent causal energy ? A sense of depend- 
 ence upon a Power which is greater than our human 
 capacity of comprehension — an apprehension of our own 
 finitude and of that of the phenomenal universe, in the 
 presence of this Power— is indeed as necessary to supply 
 the demands of our intellectual as of our emotional and 
 religi(jus nature. If we think at all, we cannot escape 
 from the implication involved in this belief. It rebukes 
 our intellectual conceits, and touches with an infinite awe 
 and reverence every discovered beauty, every hidden mys- 
 tery, the existence of which is forced upon us by the con- 
 templation of the world nf pliciioiiicna. In the very fact 
 that the dei)ths of this mystery can never be sounded by 
 the finite plummets of our thought, lies its capacity to for- 
 ever satisfy the artistic, the poetic, the religious demands 
 of our nature. '<Who by searching can find out God? 
 Who can know the Almighty to ])erfection ? " Greater 
 than any object of our detinit(^ knowledge is the human 
 mind itself. The noblest product of evolution, it bows be- 
 fore no mere conception of tlic phenomenal universe, even
 
 of the Evolution Philosopky. 11 
 
 though infinitel}' extended in time and space. It yiekls 
 supreme allegiance, reverence and worship only to tliat 
 efficient Cause which underlies the world of phenomena, 
 both mental and material, which dwells alike in star and 
 flower, in the wonders of the physical organism, in the 
 heights of thought and in the inhnite depth of love, toi;ch- 
 imr all that we see and all that we know with a tender 
 halo of unsearchable mystery. Like the purple liaze in 
 which twilight robes the distant mountain-summits, fading 
 away into the infinite depths of the stellar spaces, and 
 softening the harsh outlines of rock and forest into lines 
 of perfect beauty, — so the apprehension of the Unknowable 
 Cause of phenomena mellows the sharp boundaries and 
 limitations of the known, softens the crude details of our 
 human picture, and gives it a symmetry and unity which 
 satisfy the aesthetic longing, while it also meets the exi- 
 gent demands of intellect and reason. 
 
 " The conviction that human intelligence is incapable of 
 absolute knowledge," says Mr. Spencer, "is one that has 
 slowly been gaining ground as civilization has advanced. 
 Each new ontological theory, from time to time propounded 
 in lieu of other ones shown to be untenable, has. been fol- 
 lowed by a new criticism leading to a new scepticism." * 
 Whether we investigate the product of thought or the pro- 
 cess of thought, this conviction is forced anew upon our 
 minds. Analyzing the nature of the simplest product of 
 our knowledge, we find that we know it only by a process 
 of classification with something already known. The 
 botanist who discovers a new flower studies its structure, 
 investigates its method of growth, and finally assigns it to 
 its proper order and class with others which he knows, and 
 thus determines its true character. But the Infinite and 
 Absolute, it is evident, cannot be thus classified. There 
 can be but one Infinite ; our knowledge of its essential 
 nature and attributes must be forever negative. The nat- 
 ure of life and of knowledge alike testify to the fact that 
 Ave can know only relations. '-Life in all its manifesta- 
 tions, inclusive of intelligence in its highest forms, con- 
 sists in the continuous adjustment of inner relations to 
 outer relations." t "Every act of knowing is the forma- 
 tion of a relation in consciousness iiarallel to a relation in 
 the environment." Beneath this vital tissue of sequences 
 
 •First I'rinciples. -tlliid.
 
 12 The Scope and Pr'mc'qiles 
 
 and coexistences we cannot penetrate. The very concep- 
 tion of relativity, however, carries with it the knowledge 
 of the Absolute as existing, and as involved in all phenom- 
 enal processes. As we cannot have a shadow without 
 litrht, so we cannot have the relative without the Absolute : 
 the existence of the one is proof positive of the existence 
 of the other. And since the relations which we know are 
 constant, since the law of cause and effect is universally 
 operative throughout the world of phenomena, our knowl- 
 edge, though relational, is real — as real to us as Avould be 
 our knowledge of the thing in itself, were such knowledge 
 attainable. In knowing phenomena we do know the nou- 
 menon as it is related to us. 
 
 The materialistic critic of the evolution-philosophy 
 comes to us, indeed, Avith the assumption that the universe 
 is just Avhat we see it to be, and nothing else. As it is in 
 sense-jierception, so it is in its essential nature. Mind 
 itself is material. " The brain secretes thought as the 
 liver secretes bile" — thought itself is a material product. 
 We must assume something, he says: why not assume that 
 the testimony of our senses is final and conclusive ? It is 
 evident, however, that this position of the materialist is 
 reached not by a [)rocess of thought, but by the negation 
 of though^, lie is either incapable of duly considering 
 the prcjbh'ms involved in this discussion, or else he delib- 
 erately refuses to consider them, denouncing them as futile 
 and unproiitabh' speculations. The evolutionist, however, 
 assumes nothing, except the actual facts of exi)erience ; his 
 ultimate criterion of truth is the inability to conceive the 
 oj)posite of the proposition under discussion. The "fun- 
 damental assumption" of the materialist is neither logical 
 nor .scieiitiHc — it is essentially a metajihysical assumption, 
 and illustrates a very crude and primitive sent of meta- 
 pliysics at that. Tlie evolutionist indulges in no assump- 
 tions, falls ])ack on no "first ])rin('iples," or "axiomatic 
 trutijs," the origin and history of which he cannot trace 
 in the experience; of the race. Every conscious ex})erience 
 constitutes a imit of knowledge, and science is simply the 
 orderly cliussilication and interpretation of such experi- 
 ences, Tp science, therciore, the evolutionist appeals — 
 not to UM'taphysies — and by science is the i)osition of the 
 mati'riali.st un(h'rmine<l and overthrown. 
 
 (Jonsich-r. for example, what science teaches us of the
 
 of the Evolution Philosophy. 13 
 
 nature of sense-perception. Tluit phenomenon Avliicli our 
 minds recognize as sound, science declares to be objectively 
 cert:.iu vibrations or wavt's produced in the atmospheric 
 medium. IJrtween the two orders of phenomena, the ex- 
 ternal fact and the subjective percejjtion of it, there is no 
 relation of identity — only one of concomitance. One is 
 subjective, Avholly, — the other objective; one is mental, 
 the other material. Without an ear, a recipient brain and 
 a conscious mind, the atmospheric vibration might go on 
 forever, and thei'e would be no phenomena of sound. The 
 same principle holds good also in sight. That which to 
 our minds appears as color, exteriially is the inconceiv- 
 ably rapid vibration of the intangible ether which sur- 
 rounds and penetrates the atmospheric envelope of the 
 globe. Without the eye, the recipient brain, and the subtle 
 synthesis of thought, the ])henomenon of vision were 
 impossible.* And so of the other special senses. But what 
 Ave call matter is inseparable from these sense-perceptions, 
 — it is made up of them. Take away what we. know as 
 form and weight and color and extension, and nothing 
 nuiterial remains. It does not follow, however, that the 
 Unknown Keality which caused in us these sensations has 
 ceased to exist. As firmly as we believe in our own exist- 
 ence, do we believe in that of a Reality external to our- 
 selves, and by precisely the same warrant — the unthink- 
 ableness of the contrary proposition. To beings constituted 
 differently from ourselves, however, this reality might i)re- 
 sent an appearance totally distinct from that which we 
 know as matter. To the simplest form of organism, for 
 example, whose consciousness is limited to a single undif- 
 ferentiated mode of sense percei>tion, those affections of 
 matter which Ave knoAV as color, taste, odor, sound, exten- 
 sion, Avould be Avholly incomprehensible. The limitati(.n 
 of our OAvn senses, both in nund)er and in range, is entirely 
 arbitrary. t It is quite conceivable that there may be beings 
 
 •Maxwell's new inafrnetic theory of light einpliasizes still more strongly the 
 jirinciple here hiid down. 
 
 tThe itresident of the British Association, Professor Flower, indorses Sir 
 .If)hn r.utiliock's idea that there may he " tilty other s^enses as dillVrent Ironi 
 ours as si>i\ihI is Ironi sitrht ; and even within the lidHiularies ol our own 
 senses there may he endless f-onnils whirh we cannot hear, and <'iili>rs as dif- 
 ferent as red from green ol wliieh we liave no eoneejition. 'fhese and a tlion- 
 sand other (juestions remain lor solution. The familntr world which surrounds 
 ns mav lie a totally dillerent pl-.u-e to other animals. To them it may he 
 full of" mnsic whieli we cannot hear, of color which we caunot see, of sensa- 
 tions which we cannot couceive."
 
 14 Tlie Scope and Pruiriples 
 
 on some other planet, like the resident of Saturn imagined 
 in the satire of Voltaire, with seventy senses instead of 
 live — to whom the universe would present an appearance 
 quite unfamiliar and incomprehensible to our understand- 
 ing. To the old and ingenious play upon words involved 
 in the familiar and brief philosophical catechism : " What 
 is Matter? Never mind. What is Mind? Ko matter. 
 What is the nature of the soul ? It is perfectly imma- 
 terial," — science and evolution, therefore, enter an em- 
 phatic protest. Matter, it declares, is the Unknowable 
 Keality as reflected in mind through the mediation of the 
 senses. Mind is that Keality as it appears directly in the 
 operations of consciousness. It is, so far as we know, insep- 
 arable from material conditions ; but it is a false logic which 
 therefore infers that it is itself material. You can neither 
 see, feel, smell, taste, weigh, measure, nor chemically de- 
 compose a thought. It responds to no material tests. Yet 
 in it lies a power greater than that of the Archimedean 
 lever — a power sufficient to move the world. Of a soul 
 distinct from mind and form, science knows absolutely 
 nothing; but since it also knows nothing of the nature of 
 the Absolute Reality of which mind and form are manifes- 
 tations, no divine possibility is slain by this admission. 
 Materialism and Idealism both err in assuming that knowl- 
 edge is absolute instead of relative. P>oth declare that the 
 universe is just what it appears to be to our senses — re- 
 fusing, like the Electoral Commission, to " go behind the 
 returns " and investigate the actual character of the suf- 
 frage. Materialism assumes that matter is the mould of 
 consciousness ; Idealism, that consciousness is the mould 
 of matter. The truth lies between the two extremes, in- 
 cluding what is true in both. 
 
 The error of Materialism is cruder and more easily 
 ivl lit cd than that ol' Idcalisui; in view of the testimony of 
 scien(;e as to the nature of our sens(^-perception, it has not 
 a foot to stand upon. In declai'iug that the Reality which 
 is (^xtcMMial to our consciousness is identical and cotermi- 
 nous witli tJiat whicli we know as matter, it bases its whole 
 jiliilosojiliy on an unverilied and unveriiiable assumption 
 whi(^h is contradictcMl by the entii'c testimony of S(nence. 
 R)Ut in ass\iming tliat there is no Absolute Jveality external 
 to consciousness, Idealism is e(]ually meta,j)liysical and un- 
 .scientitic. The (piestion in I'eality is sinijily one of physi-
 
 of the Evolution Fldlosopliy. 15 
 
 ology — of a scientific understanding of the nature of sense- 
 perception ; there is nothing speculative or metaphysical 
 about it, whatsoever. 
 
 The Materialist's position in philosophy reminds one of 
 certain crude attempts at art, Avhich, ignoring all sense of 
 perspective, and disregarding the beautiful blending of 
 lights and shadows as we see them in the natural land- 
 scape, illustrates a sort of sharply-defined wooden realism, 
 which is as distressing to the cultivated eye as it is thor- 
 oughly materialistic in its conception and execution. 
 
 The Idealist's position, on the contrary, reminds one of 
 an artist who should eschew the use of vulgar material 
 paint, and attempt to dip his pencil in the prismatic hues 
 of the rainbow. Of the two, it must be admitted that the 
 materialistic painter would produce something, though it 
 would not resemble anything that we ever see in ISTature ; 
 while the idealist would produce nothing, external to his 
 own imagination.* 
 
 In the language of Professor Fiske : 
 
 "Our conclusion is simply this, that no theory of phe- 
 nomena, external or internal, can be framed without postu- 
 lating an Absolute Existence of which phenomena are the 
 manifestations. And now let us note carefully what 
 follows. We cannot identify this Absolute Existence with 
 Mind, since what we know as JNIind is a series of phenom- 
 enal manifestations : it was the irrefragable part of Hume's 
 argument that, in the eye of science as in the eye of com- 
 mon sense, Mind means not the occult reality but the grouj) 
 of phenomena which we know as thoughts and feelings. 
 Nor can we identify this Absolute Existence with JNIatter, 
 since what we know as Matter is a series of phenomenal 
 manifestations ; it was the irrefragable part of Berkeley's 
 argument that, in the eye of science as in the eye of com- 
 mon sense, Mattt'r means not the occult realit}- but the 
 group of sensations which we know as extension, resist- 
 ance, color, etc. Absolute Existence, therefore, — the 
 Reality which persists independently of us, and of which 
 IVrind and ^Matter are ]ihenonuMial numifestations, — cannot 
 be identified either with ^Miudorwith IMatter. Thus is ^la- 
 terialism included in the same condemnation with Idealism. ''t 
 
 *That which the Idealist would produce in his iinaffimitiou, however, inijiht 
 be infinitely finer than the crude ol)jectivc iiroduction of the Materialist. 
 
 tCosniic I'liilosojihy, Vol. I. The Evolutionist is jnstitied in atlirniinjr " the 
 eternity and lunreatability of matter." which is the (latum nn wliicli the
 
 IG The Scojye and Principles 
 
 This, then, is the conclusion of the evolution philosophy, 
 differing as widely from Materialism on the one hand as it 
 does from Idealism on the other: a conclusion, moreover, 
 to which we are compelled Ly an irresistible logic from no 
 basis of metaphysical assumption, but from data furnished 
 by science itself, reinforced by that ultimate criterion of 
 truth which bases the postulates of our reasoning upon the 
 inconceivability of their opposites. The ultimate data 
 botli for the scientific conclusions upon which the doctrine 
 of the Unknowable is based, and fur the laws of thought 
 under the operation of which it is logically established, are 
 given in experience, which is the final court to which the 
 evolutionist appeals. 
 
 Philosophical agnosticism, it would appear, therefore, is 
 not identical with materialism ; it is not a cowardly i)liiloso- 
 phy Avhich refuses to think ; it is by no means to be confound- 
 ed Avith that crude liberalism which dogmatically denies God 
 and immortality. It is antagonistic neither to religion nor 
 to reason ; it is antagonistic only to those unvei'iiiable 
 assumptions dogmatically asserted as assured truths, which 
 transform religion into superstition, and philosophic reason- 
 ing into idle dreaming and unfruitful sjieculation. The 
 evolution ])hiloso])hy affirms the duty of thinking out all 
 intellectual problems to their idtimate conclusions, and 
 asserts the competence of reason to deal with the data 
 given in experience, throughout the entire phenomenal 
 universe of matter and of mind. The universe of matter 
 is infinitely knowable ; the realm of mind is infinitely 
 knowable. And in knowing mind and matter we know 
 tlie Infinite and Eternal Energy on which they depend, in 
 all its ])0ssible relations to our own consciousness. It is 
 tlic dnty of man to rise and trust his intellectual faculti(>s 
 in the investigation of all mattei's which come within the 
 scope of his intellect and understanding. All knowledge 
 which can ])Ossibly come within the range of onr faculties 
 is open to us ; hence then' is no real loss or j)rivati()n in 
 the conce])tion that the mind cannot ])enetrate behind the 
 veil oi' ])h('noiiiciia. 'I'hc supci-ticial appcaianccs of things, 
 
 |iliysi<'iil ^ciciiccH rcHt, — incaiiinK tlicrcliy tluit " tlio lleality wliidi ])frsists 
 iii(lc|)<-ii(li-iitly <>t ilH " is constant in its rcliitioiis, and woulil always manifest 
 itscll i/.s ;;if///rr to a hi'int: cir l)cint:;s possessed r)l' a eoiisciolisness like luirs. 
 The idealistie eonceidion tliat material olijeets are creations of the in<livi(liial 
 eonseidUHnesH, and liavt^ no snlistiatnm of real existence wliieh endures vvlien 
 that conseiniisnoHS is no lontrer a<tive, is of course ini'oTisistent with all forms 
 of fcientillc reuliMin, and is tlienfore rejected liy tluM-volutionisi.
 
 of the Evolution FlillosopJiy. 17 
 
 when tested by scientific methods, are found to Ite almost 
 always illusory and misleading. The perception of this 
 fact imposes upon us the sacred obligation to penetrate 
 beneath the surface — to discover the causes and the real 
 relations of plienomena, and to apply the knowledge thus 
 gained to the advancement and betterment of human life. 
 
 No realm of thought is thus too sacred for the human 
 mind to penetrate. Into the nature, origin and historical 
 evolution of religion, into the character and history of 
 man's moral sense, into the realms of psychology and of 
 the physical sciences, the reason must search for material 
 wherewith to broaden and deejjen the life of man, and 
 enlarge the area of human happiness. Nor is man even 
 forbidden to enter into the lofty regions of speculative 
 thought : only he is bidden to remember that, in exercising 
 his reason upon ontological problems, he can do no more 
 than to create symbols and imaginative pictures of that 
 which is, from the nature of things, in its absolute essence 
 beyond our human ken. Something of gain in the way of 
 mental disci[)line there is, doubtless, in climbing occasion- 
 ally into the thin air of these iipper regions of speculative 
 research, if by breathing it we do not become intoxicated 
 with the conceit that we are thereby acquainting ourselves 
 with the actual verities of Absolute and Unconditioned 
 Being. Compared with the results of research into the 
 relations of phenomena, conducted according to the scien- 
 tific method, metaphysical speculation " has proved unpro- 
 ductive, unprogressive, and sterile of practical benefits to 
 man. There is no agreement as to results among specula- 
 tive thinkers. The schools of metaphysics are as numer- 
 ous as theological sects, and for a similar reason : there is 
 no criterion of truth which all agree to accept. 
 
 It is evident that the content and metliods of religion as 
 reconstructed in accordance with the principles of science 
 and the philosophy of evolution, will differ essentially 
 from dhose which have governed and still largely goxcrn 
 thje work of the Christian church. Yet in so differing they 
 will, if we mistake not, come nearer to the essential 
 thought of the founder of Christianity. Instead of urg- 
 ing man to an egoistic strife after i)ersonal salvation, relig- 
 ion thus reconstructed will bid him so enlarge and culti- 
 vate his own nature that he can render the worthiest and 
 most profitable service to his fellow-men. Instead of basing
 
 18 The Scojje and Priiivlples 
 
 salvation on dogiuatic bt4ief, it will make it a process 
 of moral and intellectual growth — a process of character- 
 biiilding. Instead of repressing the intellect, disparaging- 
 human reason, and discouraging free thouglit, it will hid 
 man remove all shackles and fetters from the mind, to 
 think deeply, to think beyond the superficial appearances 
 of things — to breathe the keen air of the intellectual life 
 witli perfect freedom, finding therein an inspiration to the 
 noblest living and most devoted service. Instead of urg- 
 ing man to an emotional spasm of repentance for wrong- 
 doing, it will bid him carefully ponder upon the results of 
 his actions, note the instant effect of an evil deed in re- 
 l)ressing fulness of life — in atrophying the character of 
 the doer. It will show him that the penalty of wrong- 
 doing is intrinsic instead of extrinsic — that heaven and 
 hell are conditions of the mind rather than definite local- 
 ities in space. 
 
 It will regard religion as a life rather tlian a ceremonial 
 or a creed. It will inculcate justice in place of charity. 
 Instead of accepting poverty, ignorance and wretchedness 
 as ordained of God, — as conditions of life to be accepted 
 with resignation and mitigated in some small degree by 
 alms, — it will endeavor as far as may be to abolish these 
 conditions, by rendering the ])()()r self-helpful, by educating 
 the ignorant, and by removing the causes of disease and vice, 
 thus laying the ioundations of a nobler individual manhood, 
 which is the only sure basis for a regenerated society. 
 
 Jf we acce})t Cicero's derivation of the word '' religion," 
 its essential meaning is faifJifiihirss, fhoroi/fj/iness. This 
 principle of faithfulness evolution will teach man to carry 
 into every dejjartnient of his thought and labor. The 
 repl}' of the servant-girl, who had recently united with the 
 church, to the question of her mistress as to what evidence 
 she ha,d of her conversion : " I know I have got religion, 
 b('c;iMse, now, I sweep under the mats," is suggestive of 
 that conscientious element that a rational religion based 
 upon evolution should introduce into human life. INIatthew 
 Aiiiohl's definition of religion is, " Morality touched wiih 
 (•mot ion " : a moi-ality lilted out of mere conventionalisms, 
 a morality which will make the employer recognize the 
 humanity of his employee, striving to render him a just 
 (•oiii])ensati{)ii for his labor, instead of treating iiim as a 
 nifrc nioncv-niaking niai-hiiic ; which will make the work-
 
 nf the Evolution riiUosophy. 19 
 
 ingmun anxious that liis w(jrk shall be well dune, rather 
 than make hiui strive to do as little as possible for his 
 wages ; which shall abolish shoddy clothes and Buddensiek 
 buildings ; which shall do aAvay with the adulteration of 
 foods and drugs; wliich shall create a divine discontent 
 with the '' old clothes " of superstition and unreason Avith 
 Avhich the average man has been satisfied to array his intel- 
 lectual and religious nature, — this, if not answering to all 
 that we mean by religion, is the natural and consistent 
 product of a Eeligion of Life. Go into yonder church — 
 select it almost at random, if you please, from any quarter 
 of these two great cities — these Siamese twins whose 
 common artery is our beautiful Brooklyn bridge — raid 
 question its members as to the character and jueaning of 
 its creed. How many will you find who really know any- 
 thing about the dogmas which they are supposed to profess 
 and believe — a belief in which, in many instances, is 
 deemed essential to salvation ? How many of our city 
 congregations, of whatever sect, would sit patiently and 
 hear the cold logic of Calvinism brought home to their 
 understandings ? Against all these duplicities of thought 
 and life, so prevalent in this transition period, the phi- 
 losophy of evolution enters an emphatic protest, seeing that 
 that only can promote growth of manly and womanly char- 
 acter which is vitally and really appropriated by the under- 
 standing, and allowed its legitimate bearing upon the 
 healthful activities of life. 
 
 Evolution recognizes the continuity of thought — the 
 solidarity of the race — the indebtedness of the present to 
 the past. It does not therefore endeavor to establish the 
 new truth or the higher social ideal by violent or revolu- 
 tionary methods. It seeks for the soul of truth in things 
 false — for the soul of good in things evil — seeing that 
 evils and falsehoods are usually goods and truths out of 
 their pro])er relations. Evil is mal-adjustment. Its cor- 
 rection should therefore be sought by readjustment, rather 
 than by destruction. Evolution would build on the exist- 
 ing good, rather than seek to lay an entirely new founda- 
 tion. In the church. Evolution beholds an institution 
 capable of bestowing infinite benefits u})on mankind; yet 
 as organized and directed in the past, and to a great degree 
 in the present, it lias been and is an institution of doubtful 
 utility. It has repressed the individual reason, teaching
 
 20 TJie Scope and Princljdes 
 
 its devotees to accept as authority the commandments of 
 ])ope, or priest, or ecclesiastical synod, or sacred Ixjok. It 
 has made the past a shackle upon the present, instead of a 
 help and an inspiration to a larger and more progressive 
 life. It has fostered a morbid and unhealthy other-world- 
 liness, instead of seeking to better the condition of men 
 here and now. It has cultivated a low pretense of famil- 
 iarity with the person and attributes of the Deity, as it has 
 assumed to define them, instead of bidding the soul stand 
 in reverent awe in the presence of ''the Infinite and Eter- 
 nal Energy whence all things proceed." All these things 
 must be changed if the church would remain a living and 
 l)rogressive force in the individual life and in the ordering 
 of society. 
 
 Insteatl of ceremonies and worship based upon the cur- 
 rent anthropomor})hic conceptions of the deity, there will 
 arise " observances tending to keep alive a consciousness of 
 the true relation in which we stand to the Unknown Clause, 
 and tending to giw expression to the sentiment underlying 
 that consciousness." As to the character and attributes of 
 this cause, the religious teacher, accei)ting the teachings of 
 Evolution, will not arbitrarily dogmatize. In the language 
 of -Mr. Spencer, ''duty requires us neither to assert nor to 
 df'uy that it has personality, but to submit ourselves with 
 all humility to tlm established limits of our intelligence, 
 in the conviction that the choice is not between personality 
 and something lower, but personality and something higher, 
 and that the ultimate reality is no more representative In 
 terms of liuman consciousness than human consciousnes.s is 
 rei)resentative in terms of a i)lant's functions." The fact 
 that we stand continually in the presence of this Ultimate 
 Keality, that it is involved in every i)luMiomenal activity, 
 wlietherof mind or of matter, will however, be kept contin- 
 ually l)efore us. The use of the term " Unknowable," as 
 applied to this Reality, is unfortunate if thereby it conveys 
 tlie idea of that wliich is itractieally or actually non-exist- 
 ent, — a sui)erticial interpretation of j\Ir. Spencer's doctrine 
 with which we are frequently assailed by ids self-consti- 
 tuted critics, but against which he everywhere carefully 
 guards liimself, to the understanding mind. As he liimself 
 declares: "the Ultimate lieality is the sole existence; all 
 things i)resent to consciousness being but shows of it." 
 
 In the words of an able popular interpreter of the evo-
 
 of the Evolution Philosophy. 21 
 
 lution pliilosopliy : '* The agnostic miuister will be cliiefly 
 a moral educator; but while discussing ethical questions, 
 which must of themselves exert a highly elevating influ- 
 ence on his hearers, he Avill, at the same time, have ample 
 opportunity of ministering to their spiritual needs by 
 appropriate references to the mysteries of cosmology, either 
 for the purpose of quickening the religious emotions and 
 reinforcing the religious consciousness, or with a view to 
 emphasizing some moral lesson which he may wish to bring 
 home to the hearts of his hearers. Thus will man's con- 
 duct be influenced in the right direction. On the one hand, 
 the necessity of leading a moral life will be impressed 
 upon him ; on the other hand, he will be led to reflect upon 
 that inscrutable power whose marvelous energy reveals 
 itself in a universe of wonders — a jjower which, though 
 indeflnable, nay inconceivable, is yet as real in its existence 
 as it is unknowable in its attributes." * Though incompre- 
 hensible, this power is apprehensible ; though unknowable 
 in its essential nature and attributes, it is known as exist- 
 ing, known as infinite and eternal, known as the Energy 
 from whence all things proceed, and known symbolically 
 in its relations to man and to the phenomenal universe. 
 This knowledge satisfies every legitimate hunger of the 
 heart and mind. The attitude of the mind, therefore, in 
 contemplating the Infinite Source of phenomena should be 
 profoundly reverential and Avorshipful ; yet its truest ser- 
 vice will be found in no ritual or stated ceremonial of relig- 
 ious worship, but in the active and intelligent service of 
 man. And in and through this service, making life itself 
 seem ever grander, more precious, more beautiful, there 
 may grow up in tlie mind a rational ho^jc for personal con- 
 tinuance hereafter, to supplant the dogmatic assurance of 
 the old theology, in which, as inculcated by the Christian 
 church, thoughtful minds are everywhere coming to have a 
 less and less confident belief. Evolution teaches the essen- 
 tial goodness and desirability of life; and on this founda- 
 tion, if on any, a rational hope of immortality must finally 
 be based. In this direction the healthy emotions of a 
 rational mind are entitled to have free play, " so long as 
 they do not trespass upon the domains of the intellect." 
 
 ♦The Moral and Religious Aspects of Herbert Spencer's Philosophy. l>y 
 Sylvan Drey. (London: Williams & Norgate. Boston: James II. West, 
 Publisher. )
 
 22 The Scope and Princijdes 
 
 Whether this hope in intlividuals be vivid or dim will prob- 
 ably be largely a matter of temperament and predisposi- 
 tion ; bnt it will doubtless be even more dependent upon 
 the lively comprehension of this fundamental doctrine of 
 biological evolution — the doctrine of the essential good- 
 ness and desirability of life itself. 
 
 From what has heretofore been said, it is evident that 
 Evolution, whether regarded in its philosophical or in its 
 religious aspects, will largely interest itself in the practical 
 problems of sociology — in the promotion of more active 
 and more widely extended human synii:)athies, in the eleva- 
 tion of the poor, the vicious and the down-trodden — thus 
 extending the boundaries and the satisfactions of life not 
 only among the remote and barbarous populations of the 
 earth, but also, primarily and correlatively, in each individ- 
 ual member of society. The word ''sociology," as ap]>lied 
 to the science of society, — or its French equivalent, — is, I 
 believe, the invention of Auguste Comte ; but the credit of 
 working out this science of society, from strictly scientific 
 data, into a natural and comju-ehensive system, is due, more 
 than to any one else, to Mr. Herbert Spencer. It is to this 
 study, most vital in interest and importance to every 
 human being, that this series of lectures will direct our 
 attention. 
 
 Whether or not societ}'" may be properly termed "an or- 
 ganism," in the strict sense in whirh the individual jirod- 
 ucts of biological evolution are thus designated, it certainly 
 bears a close relation to them in many important respects, 
 and especially as to the character of its process of growth. 
 As compared with the development of inorganic materials, 
 which grow by simple accretion or addition to their bulk, 
 oi'ganic substances grow by intussusception — a process of 
 waste and rejiair which reaches every particle throughout 
 tlicir internal structure. In this respect the growth of 
 S(M'i(^ties resembles that (jf organic substances ; it is a sort 
 of vital chemistry. All actual and ])ernianent enlargement 
 of society ]>roceeds from the voluntary co-operative action 
 dl' individuals. Aifection ami self-interest are the attrac- 
 tive forces which weld society together, and these forces 
 operate directly in and upon individual minds, throughout 
 the social structure, Tlie death of individuals, and the 
 l)irtli and growtli of others to fill tlieir places in society, 
 proceeds in like manner with the })rocesses of waste and
 
 of the Evolution Philosophij. 23 
 
 repair in organic structures. There is such au intimate 
 relationship between biological and social studies, that some 
 knowledge of the laws governing biological growth is neces- 
 sary to tit one for forming correct judgments on socio- 
 logical problems. Biology and sociology both treat of the 
 phenomena of life — both involve psychological as well as 
 merely physical conditions — the one leading up to the 
 other by an entirely orderly and natural process of devel- 
 opment. Evolution shows that the phenomenal universe 
 is "all of one piece," — and in its unity of method sym- 
 bolizes an essential unity of Being, which, if we may not 
 directly affirm it as a demonstrated fact, at least constitutes 
 tlie most satisfactory and rational theory of the nature of 
 things. 
 
 In this higher field of sociological study, how many and 
 varied are the problems that are presented for our investi-, 
 gation — the profoundest, most deeply interesting of any 
 which the human mind can attempt to solve ; for they, are 
 problems w'hicli concern the origin, the essential character, 
 the temporal and final destiny of man as an individual, and 
 of Man as a race. Without attempting to forestall the 
 solution of any of these problems, I may, in conclusion, 
 state negatively the attitude of the evolution philosophy 
 toward sociological studies. 
 
 I. Evolutionists have no special schemes for social 
 reform to urge i;pon society. They regard all earnest 
 efforts for the amelioration of existing social evils and 
 inequalities, with sympathy and appreciation, but insist 
 that the various " rapid transit " })lans for achieving these 
 much desired ends shall be rigidly examined in the light of 
 social science, and not be too hastily accepted for all that 
 their originators claim them to be. Evolutionists realize 
 that " Kature does not advance by leaps," and they would 
 carefully note the trend of past events, and study the 
 nature of individual man in history and in connection with 
 his present institutional environment, before \irging liim to 
 a definite, forward step, in a direction contrary to that 
 which he has been pursuing. To the Evolutionist, the 
 a j/n'orl scheme of the social reformer bears a certain resem- 
 blance to the philosophical system of the metaphysician, 
 and, like the latter, he thinks the former sliould be sub- 
 mitted to the test of the experiential method.
 
 24 Tlie Scope and Principles 
 
 II. In urging the study of Man in his historical relar 
 tions, however, evohitionists do not claim that society 
 should take no forward step, or that man should simply 
 imitate or repeat the past. An able student of social and 
 economic problems. Prof. Wm. G. Sumner, a gentleman 
 whose abilities I admire and with many of whose conclu- 
 sions I agree, in an article entitled " What is Civil Lib- 
 erty ?" in a recent number of the Popiihir Science Monthly, 
 makes the remarkable statement that the doctrine of man's 
 natural liberty is a "dogma," of purely metaphysical origin, 
 and asserts, in italicised phrase, that " that dogma has never 
 had an historical foundation, but is the purest example that 
 could be brought forward of an out and out a priori dogma." 
 "The doctrine of evolution," he adds, "instead of support- 
 ing the natural equality of all men, would give a demon- 
 stration of their inequality ; and the doctrine of the strug- 
 gle for existence would divorce lii)erty and equality as 
 incompatible with each other." " Civil liberty," he says 
 elsewhere, "is not a scientific fact. It is not in the order 
 of nature " ; and all these startling assertions he makes /?i 
 defense of the doctrine, the natural foundations of which 
 he arbitrarily endeavors to undermine. 
 
 To the evolutionist it is quite evident that if the learned 
 Professor Avas as well instructed in l)iology as he is in the- 
 ology, metaphysics and the a priori discussions of poetical 
 economy, he would quite otherwise interpret the sociologi- 
 cal teachings of Evolution. He is but a poor student of 
 natural science, indeed, who would simply content himself 
 with learning facts, witliout endeavoring to trace their re- 
 lations, to study their causal connections, and therefrom to 
 (b;iw i)rophetic inferences to guide his future investiga- 
 tions, to interpret underlying laws, and thus enable liim to 
 push forward to new discoveries.* To say that Evolution 
 "does not point toward civil liberty" because communities 
 of men have never existed complet<dy under its beneiicent 
 sway, is to cut away from scientific research that very 
 synthetizing and prophetic quality which is its noblest and 
 
 •If the doctrine of man's natural liberty is only a "dopruia," as the Pro- 
 fessor (iL-clan-s,— :i men- sitcculative ideal, and notliint;' more,— then it is idle 
 to iiurstie sucli a cliimara, or to base upon it a social jihilosopliy. lint if it is 
 a eoiidition of social c(|Milibriiini, toward tlic realization of wliicli man lias 
 been working tliroufrliout all the stafjes of social dc\clo]iniciit, then, like the 
 moral law, It is discoverable tliront;h ex)ierience and hisloriital investigation, 
 and is strictly "iu the order of nature," though uot as a coiuidetely realized 
 ideal in society.
 
 of the Evolution Philosophy. 25 
 
 most fruitful cliaracteristic,»and has been the foundation of 
 all advancement, invention, and discovery, from the birth 
 of modern science throughout the entire history of its 
 magnificent achievements. The history of the past gives 
 us pointers for the future — and they point always away 
 from the crudities, errors and failures of the past, in the 
 direction of an ideal perfection. In all evolutionary pro- 
 gress, Nature moves along the lines of the least resistance, 
 and these lines are not usualh' discovered by the use of 
 metaphysical divining-rods, but by patient, unbiased, per- 
 sistent investigation. Myself a firm believer in the advan- 
 tage and necessity of a larger commercial liberty between 
 nations, I do not believe that the beneficence of this prin- 
 ciple will ever be brought home to the convictions of the 
 people by a priori theorizing. The sooner our Economic 
 professors and social reformers appeal to the facts and les- 
 sons of experience, instead of to metaphysical dogmas, and 
 adopt the method of Evolution in place of that of specula- 
 tive theory, the better it will be for the reforms which they 
 advocate. 
 
 The method of Evolution, as the name indicates, is in 
 its very nature progressive. Evolutionists know that there 
 is no such thing in nature as absolute quiescence : we must 
 have either the activity of progress, or tlie activity of 
 retrogression. The one leads to a higher and more perfect 
 life — the other to dissolution and death. Let us see to it 
 that we choose the way of progress, and of Life ! 
 
 " The outworn ri.<;lit, the ohl abuse, 
 
 The pious fraud transparent gi-own, 
 The good hehl captive in the use 
 Of wrong alone — 
 
 "These wait their doom, from that great law 
 Which makes the past time serve to-day ; 
 A.nd fresher life the world shall draw 
 From their decay. 
 
 "O backward-looking son of time ! 
 The new is old, the old is new — 
 Tlie cycle of a change sublime 
 Still sweeping through. 
 
 " So wisely taught the Indian seer: — 
 Destroying Siva, forming Brahni,
 
 26 Scope and .Principles. 
 
 Who wake by turns earth's love and fear, 
 Are one — the same. 
 
 " As idly as in that old day 
 
 Thou mournest, did thy sires repine. 
 So, in his time, thy son, grown gray, 
 Shall sigh lor thine. 
 
 " Yet not the less for them or thovi 
 The eternal step of Progress beats 
 To that gi-eat anthem, calm and slow. 
 Which God repeats ! 
 
 " Take heart ! — the waster builds again — 
 A charmed life old Goodness hath ; 
 The tares may perish — but the grain 
 Is not for death. 
 
 " God works in all things ; all obey 
 
 His first propulsion from the night ; 
 Ho, wake and watch !— the world is gray 
 With morning light !" * 
 
 * Whittier, " The Reformer."
 
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 book], except l>y saying that the words and forms of our [usual] devotion 
 must be ac(-epte'd as//7(/(A-/v •>■.'/'"''"/''■. and not innfn(d>lc to thr iiiidcrstund- 
 ing. * * * It IS good' to weh-oiiie a religious science better than the old hard 
 l)igotry. Still, while we liy no means accept these • Fplifts ' as a necessary or 
 an adeVpiate substitute for the customary exercises of devotion, they are at 
 least better lifted tlian the ordinary iiraetice to a state of mind far from un- 
 connnon, and greatly deserving of resi)ect."— /•'cow a srn n-jxit/e notice in 
 the Unitarian Jlerieir. 
 
 The Duties of Women. By Fkances Poweij Cobbe. Clotli. $1.00. 
 
 "The profoundcst, wisest, pin-est, noblest book in principle, aim and tone 
 yet written ui>om Xhe true position of n-onimi in sorieti/."
 
 Monthly, $2.00 per year. Single Number, 20 cents. 
 
 Social Science and a Rational Religion. 
 
 THE Hew iDEAh. 
 
 Some Important Articles that have appeared 
 During 1SS9. 
 
 M. J. SAVAGE, Religious Instruction and the Public Schools; "The People" 
 (Poem); The Coming Civilization. 
 
 O. B. FROTHING HAM, The Keed of the Hour ; Theory and Conduct ; A "Word 
 about Agnosticism ; History of the Free Religious Association ; The F. R. A. 
 and Social Reform ; "For the Cause." 
 
 EDWARD BELLAMY, Xatioualism. 
 
 LAIRENCE GROXLUXD, Prescriptions for Social Ills ; Freedom or Liberty ; 
 An End to Enforced Idleness ; Socialism True and False ; Intellectual and 
 Etliical Aspects of Socialism. 
 
 REV. DR. McGLYXN, Catholicism and the Public Schools. 
 
 COL. T. "\V. HIGGINSON, Addresses at Convention of the Free Religious Asso- 
 ciation, The Earth for Man, etc. 
 
 WM. LLOYD (iARRlSON, Individualism. 
 
 ED^VIN I). MEAD, The Function of the State. 
 
 REV. W. D. P. BLISS, Christian Socialism. 
 
 REV. N. P. OILMAN, Profit-Sharing. 
 
 FREDERIC A. HINCKLEY, The First and Great Commandment; The Com- 
 monwealth of Man. 
 
 WM. J. POTTER, The New Ideal in Religion: Letter to the Free Religious 
 Convention; What the F. R. A. might Do ; Bellaiuv's Vision. 
 
 B. F. UNDERWOOD, Social Conditions and Tendencies. 
 
 F. E. ABBOT, Ph.D., Creative Liberalism; The Dependence of Ethics; series 
 of nine pajjcrs on The Philosopliv of Free Religion. 
 
 GEO. H. HADLEY, Science the Bes"t Teacher of Liberalism; What does Lib- 
 eralism oiler the Workingman '.' A Socialistic Object-Lesson ; Industrial 
 Training as a Rcmcdv. 
 
 F. M. HOLLAND, Robert Elsmere; The Exile (Song); Lucifer's Umbrella (A 
 Fantasy, in Three I'arts); Who Condemned Jesus to Death; Justice and 
 Taxes;" A Monument to all Religions; Ring in the Christ that is to be; How 
 to lessen Poverty (in Two Parts); Peter ami his Island, — an Allegory. 
 
 DR. EDMUND MONTGOMERY, Has Morality an Kyolutional or an'Eternal 
 Basis? Supcrnatui-al Ethi(ts Irrational and Immoral; Fatalistic Science and 
 Human Sclf-Dctcniiination ; Nationalism or Individualism'.' The Naturalistic 
 Foundations of Nationalism. 
 
 DR. LEWIS (i. JANES, The Ideal Liberal Church : The Evolution of the Earth ; 
 A Brotherhood of Consent ; The New Idea of Religion. 
 
 DR. C. T. STOCK WELL, What Shall Liberals do with their Children? The 
 Top of the Coach. 
 
 A. N. ADAMS, Agnosticism and Religion; A Study of Religion and Science; 
 Reason and Religion. 
 
 REV. PERKY .M.V15SIIALL, "Pure Religion" ; The Evolution of Religion; 
 The Fundamentals ; Ki'loiiii in Worship ; Picking the Bible to Pieces. 
 
 (HAS. D. B. .MILLS, Whether a New Religion or Not. 
 
 .M. E.MILY ADAMS, Children's Sundays ; Hospitals not Creations of Chris- 
 tianity. 
 
 ELLKN'.M. MITClIKI.L.Tlu- Freedom of Fate. 
 
 (iEOK(iK W. I'.ICKLFV. I'oliti.s and Morals. 
 
 .MRS. CL.\i:.\ M. lUSBEE. Frectlir.uglit and Ethics. 
 
 HOR.\CE L. TK.MI'.KL, Forth.' Party's Sake; Solution (Poem); Notes on the 
 Recent Ethical Convention; Braveart Tliou in Another's Sjieech (Poem); 
 Sweet Prattling Child (Poem); Svinds of .Snows (Poem); "The Sect .String 
 — the Hiiiiiaii String." 
 
 CHAS. K. WHIPPLE, TeatimonvtheBasisof History ; Intellectual Dishonesty; 
 "The Bible Says." 
 
 C.\I"T. P.. C. AD.\MS, Something Better. 
 
 C. B. HOFF.M.W, Integral (o-oiicnition in Mexico. 
 EIJZAHl'.TIl I!. CIIACE, W<iinan and Current Relorms. 
 
 P.. W. BALL, ItoMiani-^m and American Libei'ty; The Future American Citizen. 
 ELIS.SA .\L .MOORE, .\ Vision Piwt and Future; Women and Science; Light 
 (Poem); Intellectual l-'recdom. 
 
 Address Thk Xkw Tdkal, 
 Este.s Press liuildiug, 1!)l' .Simiiiicr st,, IJoston, Mass.
 
 ERNST HAECKEL 
 
 BY 
 
 THADDEUS B. WAKEMAN
 
 COLLATERAL READINGS RECOMMENDED: 
 
 Ilaeclcel and Virchoiv, in Contemporary Review, vol. xxxiii, p. 540 ; 
 Darwin and JIaeckel, by Prof. Iluxley, in Popular Science Monthly, 
 vol. \i, p. 593; article Ilaeckel, in American Cyclopaedia; Ilaeckel's 
 History of Creation, Evolution of Man, General Morphology of Organ- 
 isms, Freedom of Science and Teaching, and India and Ceylon.
 
 rn-^^^^^^^~~'^t^c 
 
 CUZ^
 
 PROF. ERNST HAECKEL, 
 
 EIS LIFE, WORKS, CAREER, AND PROPHECY. 
 By Thaddeus B. Wakeman. 
 
 It has been wisely arranged that this course of lectures 
 shall be enlivened from time to time by some account of 
 the distinguished naturalists and philosophers whose dis- 
 coveries and labors have given evolution its modern and 
 scientific form. Thus, very appropriately, in the first course 
 of this series in a former year, the pastor of this, church 
 gave an admirable discourse upon the personal career, dis- 
 coveries, and influence of Charles Darwin. And equally 
 appropriate was the most interesting account of the life, re- 
 searches, and services of Alfred Russel Wallace, by our 
 American scientist. Prof. Edward D. Cope, which opened 
 the course of the present season. Next after these two co- 
 discoverers of the great law of natural selection, no one has 
 done more to sustain, explain, and defend evolution than 
 Ernst Haeckel, the famous Professor of Zoology at the Uni- 
 versity of Jena. lie is the leading exj^onent of evolution 
 upon the continent of Europe, and has carried its conquests 
 far beyond the concepts of Darwin or Wallace. 
 
 This evening is, therefore, properly devoted to an effort 
 to get as near as possible to him, his discoveries, his phi- 
 losopliy or view of the world, and his religion. We can ap- 
 jiroach liim best for this purpose if we consider his career 
 first as a man and naturalist, then as the exponent of the 
 monistic philosophy, and lastly as the prophet of " monism " 
 as a religion — for he has brought into use this word " mo- 
 nism " to designate the final philosophy and religion of 
 evolution and science. 
 
 First, then, we must regard him as a man and a natu- 
 ralist, for these two, man and naturalist, in his case, have 
 never been separated ; and, as such, there are few personal 
 characters in the world really more worthy of our acquaint- 
 ance and study than this same German professor, now at 
 the age of fifty-six, working busily as a bee at his pleasant 
 villa, or in his lecture hall and museum, on the banks of
 
 22 
 
 Prof. Ernst HaecTcel 
 
 the Saale River, or wandering over Europe, Asia, or Af"ca 
 as the knight-errant of Science, or defending her latest ac- 
 quis tions against retrogrades and Phihstmes in t^ie scien- 
 Tfic assemblies of GernTany and Europe, and finally receiv- 
 
 ing their honors. . ^^c,. 
 
 He was born at Potsdam, near Berlin, Eebruary 16, 1834, 
 within a day of the anniversary of the martyrdom of Bruno 
 rFebruarv 17, 1600) and two years after the death ot 
 (Joethe who is still remembered as the presiding genius 
 of the Saale Valley-of Jena and the neighboring Weimar. 
 Haeckel's chief characteristic— we may say inheritance— 
 S a cMld seems to have been a love of nature, which psU- 
 fied his being called a German Lmn^us His love of flow- 
 ers began in the cradle. When but twelve years of age we 
 are totd, he was quite a botanist, and had collected two 
 herbaiSms_one k^i< in which he had placed what were 
 then called typical forms, all carefully labeled as sepa- 
 rate and distinct species, while in the other a secret one 
 were placed the " bad kinds," presenting a_ long series of 
 specimens transitional from one good species to another 
 Such discoveries were at that time the forbidden fruits ot 
 knowledge, which, in leisure hours, were his secret dehglit 
 —a delight which grew from year to year. 
 
 While at the Gymnasium, or high school, he prepared a 
 botanical work for publication. At the university he de- 
 termined to enter upon the medical profession as the open 
 gateway to the secrets of nature. As a student he seems 
 to have enioyed rare advantages. Under the distinguished 
 professors KuUiker and Leydig he studied physiology and 
 anatomy at Wiirzburg, and then under Prof. Johannes 
 Midler at Berlin, an instructor to whom he gives generous 
 meed of praise as his great teacher-for in this tone he feel- 
 ingly refers to him in his reply to, or rather duel with, the 
 cefebrated physiologist Rudolph Virchow m 1878. AV heicof 
 he then spoke he must have known well, for ^^c was also 
 the student and assistant of this same redoubtable hudolpU 
 Virchow, and apparently a favorite of his, until his course 
 of preparatory medical studies closed. At their conclusion 
 we find ]iim settling down as a practicing physician at lier- 
 
 lin in 1858. , ■■ i. • i „„ri 
 
 But it was evident to his instructors and friends, and 
 finally to himself, that he was called by nature to, let us 
 gay, a diflercTit rather than a higher work— for can there be 
 a higher than the worthy practice of medicine? As early
 
 Prof. Ernst HaecJcel. 23 
 
 as 1854 he had been engaged with Professors Kolliker and 
 Miilier pursuing exjDeriments and researches in animal tis- 
 sues. In 1857 he published his first biological essay on the 
 tissues of crabs. Two years after, in 1859, we find him 
 withdrawing from his professional practice and spending 
 fifteen months in Italy, engaged in special zoological re- 
 searches. On his return, in 18G1, he submitted the results 
 of his studies and experiments to the University of Jena, 
 especially in an essay on Ehizopods. This appears to have 
 been the turning-jDoint in his career, for in the next year 
 (1862) he was appointed Professor Extraordinary at that 
 university ; and there he has ever since remained, and has 
 been steadily advanced from one position of honor and use- 
 fulness to another, until it would seem that pretty much all 
 that a naturalist, philosoj^her, and author could desire has 
 fallen to his lot. 
 
 During the thirty years of his professorship he has had 
 many calls to other and foreign institutions, but nothing 
 could equal the attractions which bind him to this favored, 
 we may say, to him, almost sacred locality ; for, by singular 
 good fortune, his " earthly days" are spent under the shadow 
 of those Thuringian mountains where his great protagonist 
 and inspirer, Goethe, dreamed and lived, and prophetically 
 poetized the religion of evolution ; and there he works, too, 
 in that very same old independent University of Jena which 
 Goethe directed for years with the expressed hope that it 
 would some day open up this new science of evolution to 
 the world. How deeply this landscape and these associations 
 affect and inspire our professor is seen by his touching fare- 
 well to them on his dejoarture to India and Ceylon in Octo- 
 ber, 1881. Take this page, for instance, which, as if a cur- 
 tain Avere raised, opens our view at once into the very heart 
 of the man (page 11) : 
 
 "My arrangements at last completed, and the sixteen 
 boxes sent in advance to Trieste, I was ready to take leave 
 of dear quiet Jena on the morning of the 8th of October. 
 When the last moment arrived, I found that a six months' 
 absence from home would be no easy task for the father of 
 a family who had already attained the age of forty-seven 
 years. With what different emotions would I have taken 
 my departure twenty-five years ago, when a tropical journey 
 was the chief aim of my life ! True, the experience of 
 twenty-five years of teaching and zoological study would 
 enable me to accomplish more than I could have done
 
 24 . Pro/. Ernst Haechel. 
 
 a quarter of a century ago. But I was twenty-five years 
 older ! Would the concrete wonders of tropical nature pos- 
 sess tlie same fascination for me, now that 1 had penetrated 
 the abstract domains of natural philosophy ? 
 
 " These and kindred thoughts, together with the _ most 
 doleful impressions of my last farewells to home and friends, 
 passed through my brain as the train bore me through the 
 cold gray autumnal mist which enshrouded my beloved Saale 
 
 Valley. 
 
 " Only the tallest peaks of our magnificent MuscMhalh 
 mountains rose above the misty sea ; on the right, Haus- 
 berg, with his ' rosy, radiant summit,' the proud pyramid of 
 the*Jenzig, and the romantic ruins of Kunitzberg. On the 
 left stretched the wooded heights of llauthal ; and, further 
 on, Goethe's favorite retreat, charming Dornherg. I waved 
 an adieu to these dear old mountain friends, and promised 
 to return to them in good health and richly laden with In- 
 dian treasures. ^ . j, • n- 
 
 " As if to ratify the promise, they gave me their friendli- 
 est morning greeting; the dense mist suddenly fell from 
 their shoulders, and the triumphant sun rose into a perfect- 
 ly cloudless sky. Thousands of dew-drops blazed like Jewels 
 in the azure cups of the lovely gentians decorating the grassy 
 slopes on eitlier side of the iron road." 
 
 In these words we have recalled the exquisite landscape, 
 with the mists and inspirations, of Goethe's Novelle, The 
 Tale (Mahrchen), and his final, noble, wisest Letter from 
 Dornberg Castle, in those " saddest days " of 1828. Before 
 this scene, and as its product largely, we see our heart-and- 
 headf ul professor and his lovely family so clearly, lovingly 
 depicted that ordinary details must not dim the picture. 
 
 At this university, Goethe's university, his scientific ca- 
 reer began. Here his early enthusiasm was sheltered when, 
 in 18(31, he came from Italy with his love of nature kindled 
 to a fiame by his personal explorations, and not less, per- 
 haps, by that wonderful epoch-making book, Darwin's Ori- 
 gin of Species, which had appeared during his absence hi 
 18.^0. lie saw at once that the simple but far-reaching dis- 
 covery of the law of " natural selection " (implying '.' sexual 
 selection" and so much more afterwards given to the Avorltl) 
 contained in this work was the corner-stone upon which 
 materials collected by others, and recently by himself, could 
 finally be raised into a com[)lete and noble science of biolo- 
 gy J a solution of the problems of the whole organic world.
 
 Frof. Ernst Haeckel. 25 
 
 To this achievement he determined to deyote himself as his 
 lifework. Wonderful has been his success, because he has 
 brought to bear upon it a rare genius sustained by a phe- 
 nomenal industry 
 
 In order to gather some notion of what is meant by " phe- 
 nomenal industry," we need but to glance over his works 
 and explorations for a few years. 
 
 In 1862 he presented to his university a celebrated work 
 on the Eadialaria, for which a gold medal was awarded. 
 In this work new genera and species were described and the 
 whole subject newly classified in accordance with the new 
 philosophy of the genealogical descent of organisms, by which 
 he justified his adhesion to the new and then unpopular 
 Darwinian doctrine of the origin of species. 
 
 In 1803, before the Convention of German Physicians at 
 Stettin, he introduced and stood almost alone in advocating 
 the new views and discoveries of Darwinism as the solving 
 and renovating power in the biological sciences, and as 
 tributary to medicine. 
 
 In 1864 he published in illustration of the descent of 
 species, an important work on the Crustacea. 
 
 In 1865 appeared another work on the Medusce. The 
 result of these publications and of his teaching was such 
 that the University of Jena began to be recognized as 
 the unrivaled school of zoology, comparative anatomy, and 
 Biology. A regular professorship was created for him. A 
 museum was established with a lecture hall, and his fi'iend 
 and co-worker. Prof. Gegenbaur, was appointed his as- 
 sistant. 
 
 The next year (1866) the first of his larger works ap- 
 peared. The Organic Morphology, in two large volumes, 
 with hundreds of charts and illustrations, which astonished 
 the proverbially patient and industrious Germans by their ex- 
 tent, thoroughness, novelty, and general importance. Their 
 main purpose was to prove that the whole domain of com- 
 parative physiology, anatomy, and embryology was scien- 
 tifically reduced to successive order by the new views, which 
 made correlative changes and functions the solution of the 
 forms of all living organisms. By this law of evolution he 
 proved that the changes in the development of the embryo 
 epitomize the successive changes which the genus to which 
 the animal belongs has undergone in its world-history. This 
 law of comparative embryology at once gave to biologists an 
 immense power of prevision and discovery; for the tribal
 
 26 Prof. Ernst HaecTcel. 
 
 history of every animal could be largely sketched out by 
 indications and changes in the embryo, and then be verified 
 by actual research and observation in nature. Thus the 
 genesis of the tribe {Phylogenesis) and of the individual 
 ( Ontogenesis) were made to throw light upon and to reveal 
 each other. 
 
 Another view of great interest was presented in this work, 
 that the simpler organisms or microbes represented a primi- 
 tive condition of life not only below the distinction of sex, 
 but also below the distinction of animal and vegetable life, 
 and were really such simple forms of protoj^lasm that they 
 constitute a kingdom by themselves, which he calls the Pro- 
 tista and regards as the common foundation and source of 
 both animals and plants. Prof. Huxley expressed the sen- 
 timent of those capable of judging when he pronounced 
 this Morphology to be one of the greatest scientific works 
 ever published. Its influence was largely instrumental in 
 turning the tide of German thought in favor of the new 
 biology. 
 
 Certainly after such a display of genius and labor the re- 
 quirement of some rest would appear reasonable, but it 
 seems that Prof. Haeckel never rests. His vacations| are 
 spent in excursions for scientific research and verification. 
 In the winter of 18G6 he was at work among the Canary 
 Islands, and upon his return he published an interesting re- 
 port of his explorations there and on the Atlantic coasts. 
 
 In 18G7-'08 he determined to give a popular exposition 
 of the new philosophy — the new view of the world. A 
 course of lectures was accordingly delivered, reported, and 
 publislied, which are now known the world over as The 
 Natural History of Creation. This work has gone on 
 through revised editions from the first to the eighth, and 
 lias been translated into English (in two volumes, by the 
 Appletons) and into every modern civilized language. Ex- 
 cepting, perhaps, some of Darwin's works, it has done more 
 than any other to make evolution known as the fundamental 
 law of the organic world. Of it, in the preface to his De- 
 Bcent of Man, Darwin uses these remarkable words : 
 
 " The conclusion that man is the co-descendant with other 
 species of some ancient, lower, and extinct form is not in 
 any degree new. Lamarck long ago came to this conclu- 
 sion, which has lately been maintained by several eminent 
 naturalists aiul pliilosophers — for insUmce, by Wallace, Hux- 
 ley, Lyell, Vogt, Lubbock, Buchner, Ilolle, and especially
 
 Prof. Ernst HaecM. 27 
 
 by Haeckel. This last naturalist, besides his great -work, 
 Generalle Morphologie (186G), has recently (1868, with a 
 second edition, 1870) published his Natural History of Cre- 
 ation, in wliich he fully discusses the genealogy of man. If 
 this work had appeared before my essay had been written, I 
 should probably never have completed it. Almost all the 
 conclusions at which I have arrived I find confirmed by this 
 naturalist, whose knowledge on many points is much fuller 
 than mine." 
 
 Yfhen we consider from whom these words come, they are 
 the highest encomium a work of that kind could receive. 
 
 In 1869 Prof. Haeckel published an essay upon the evo- 
 lution of the Siphonoj)horeSy which was awarded a gold medal 
 at Utrecht. 
 
 In 1870 he published biological studies on the Monera 
 and Protista of the Catallacts, a new group of Protista. 
 
 In 1871 he spent March and April on the Dalmatian 
 coast near Trieste, and August and tSej)tember on the coasts 
 of Norway, in scientific researches. 
 
 In 1872 he visited the eastern coasts of the Mediterranean 
 for similar purposes. During these three years he delivered 
 courses of lectures at Jena and Berlin, and published arti- 
 cles on the division of labor in nature and in human life ; 
 also on life at great sea depths, on the genealogical tree of 
 the human race, and on the relationship of the sponges and 
 corals. 
 
 In 1872 appeared auotlier of his great works — viz., The 
 Calcareous Sponges, in three volumes, with sixty plates. 
 This, like his Morphology, is an epoch-making work. It 
 answered the demand of those who insisted upon " actual 
 facts " as the only proofs of evolution by showing the his- 
 tory, connection, and descent of the species of sponges in 
 such masterly detail that ignorance of the work was the 
 only escape from conviction. "With its publication evolu- 
 tion was generally admitted to have passed from tlic stiige 
 of hypothesis and to stand forever as a verified law of biol- 
 ogy — its fundamental law. 
 
 In 1874 he published essays upon the Castra?a, or stom- 
 ach, theory ; The Phylogenic Classification of Animals ; 
 and the Homology of Germ-layers of Aninuils. All these 
 werQ preparatory to the great work which follcnvcd. 
 
 In 1874-'75 appeared his celebrated Anthropogenic, or 
 Evolution of Alan. This is a popular exposition of the ori- 
 gin and evolution of man as a race (phylogenic), and of
 
 28 Prof. Ernst HaecTcel. 
 
 man as an individual (ontogenic), with all his organs, com- 
 pared together step by step. It is the true Book of Gen- 
 esis in the Bible of Nature, and proves how much more 
 strange, wonderful, and interesting truth can be than mira- 
 cle, fiction, tradition, and mythology. It is going through 
 as many editions as the Natural History of Creation, and 
 should be read directly after it, as its counterpart and con- 
 clusion. (Published by D. Appleton & Co.) 
 
 In 1877, before the Association of German Naturalists 
 and Physicians (the leading scientific body of Germany), 
 our knight-errant of evolution was called upon to enter 
 the lists°vith the celebrated pathologist, Eudolph Virchow, 
 his former instructor, and the leading spirit of the uni- 
 versity and scientific coterie of Berlin. In this duel, as Mr. 
 Gladstone would call it, our knight bore himself right gal- 
 lantly and well, as all may see in his work which resulted 
 from it, which appeared in 1878 as the Liberty in Science 
 and Teaching (published also in English by the Appletons), 
 with a noble and useful introduction by Prof. Huxley. Of 
 this work and its bearing upon philosophic thought more 
 must be said when we touch his philosophy. 
 
 We have noticed enough of his publications from year 
 to year to show what an indomitable man, naturalist, and 
 worker this Ernst Haeckel must be. Ilis past assures us 
 that he will go on learning, teaching, and publishing to the 
 end of his days, and that he will never touch any topic that 
 he will not enlighten and adorn. 
 
 In a letter to an American friend, written by his own 
 hand, he classifies his important works to date as follows : 
 
 I. General Biology and Philosophical Works. 
 
 1. General MorpholofifV, 18GG. 
 
 2. Natural History of Creation, 18G8, etc. (8 edi- 
 
 tions, 13 translations). 
 
 3. Collected Popular Essays, 1878. (Bonn, 2 vols.) 
 II. General ZoiJlor/iral and Phi/lor/enetic Works. 
 
 1. Gastrtea Theory, 1873. 
 
 2. Studies of the Monera and other Protista, 1870. 
 
 3. Anthropogenic, 1877 (3 editions). 
 III. Zoolof/iral Jfonof/raphs. 
 
 1. Radialaria (35 plates), 18G3. • 
 
 2. Calearspongiie (GO plates), 1872. 
 
 3. Medusfe (73 plates), 1877. 
 
 4. Siphonophorai (G-l plates), 18G9, 1888.
 
 Prof. Ernst HaecJcel. 29 
 
 IV. Reports on the Zobloyy of H. M. S. Cliallenger. 
 
 1. Deep-sea Medusas (32 plates), 1880. 
 
 2. Deep-sea Kerator^ (8 plates), 1889. 
 
 3. Siphonophorae (50 plates), 1888. 
 
 4. Eadialaria (740 plates), 1887. 
 V. Vogages and Travels. 
 
 1. Articles on Corfu, Brussa, Teneriffe, Norway, 
 
 etc., from the Deutsche llundschau, 18G6 
 to 1878. 
 
 2. India and Ceylon, and Egypt (published in Ger- 
 
 man, English, etc.), 1882. 
 
 To those who wish to be introduced to our author per- 
 sonally, we say read his India and Ceylon, and he will live 
 with you as a delightful friend and companion ever after. 
 No book of travels is superior to it^ — not even Darwin's 
 Voyage of the Beagle, said to be the best of all. In it 
 we learn to admire the jihysical courage and dexterity which 
 served him so well in the moving incidents of flood and 
 field. We see in him a good physical type of the German, 
 a little over six feet tall, body well proportioned, firm but 
 not gross, with brainy head, straight face, auburn hair, 
 grayish-blue eyes, and sanguine temperament of the true 
 knight ; ready for the contest with A^irchow at Munich, the 
 elephant hunt on the Ceylon mountain, or the dangers of 
 the coral grove in the depths of the Indian Ocean. To ap- 
 preciate these physical and mental qualities, think of a Ger- 
 man professor naked and open-eyed in such a water-world 
 as this ! We quote from his experience at Punta Gallia : 
 
 " The entire attraction of a coral bank can not be seen 
 from above, even though you float immediately over it at 
 ebb-tide, and the water is so shallow your boat scrapes 
 against the points. A descent into the fluid element is 
 therefore necessary. Not possessinor a diving-bell, I at- 
 tempted to swim to the bottom, keeping my eyes open, and 
 after considerable practice accomplished this feat. Quite 
 wonderful, then, is the mystical green glimmer that illumines 
 the whole of this submarine world. The fascinated e5'e 
 is continually surprised by the most remarkable light-etfects, 
 quite different from those of the familiar upper world with 
 its ' rosy radiance ' ; and doubly curious and interesting are 
 the forms and movements of all tlie thousand different creat- 
 ures swarming in the coral gardens. The diver is in a new 
 world. Here are multitudes of remarkable fishes, crabs,
 
 30 Pfof. Ernst Haeckel. 
 
 snails, mussels, star-creatures, worms, etc., whose nourish- 
 ment consists exclusively of the flesh of the coral animals 
 on which their habitations are fixed ; and these coral-de- 
 vourers — one may appropriately term them ' parasites ' — 
 have, through adaptation to their peculiar mode of life, ac- 
 quired the most astonishing forms, and have been furnished 
 with weapons of defense and of olfense of the most singu- 
 lar shapes. 
 
 " But, if the naturalist may not ramble free from danger 
 among palms, neither may he swim unmolested among coral 
 banks. The Oceanidcs, who jealously guard these cool fairy 
 regions of the sea, threaten the intruder with a thousand 
 dangers. The fire-corals {MiUepor-a), as well as the medusae 
 swimming among their branches, sting, when touched, like 
 the most resentful nettles. The floating cilia of many of 
 the mailed fishes {Synanceia) inflict wounds that are as 
 painful and dangerous as those of a scorpion. Many crabs 
 nip in the severest manner with their powerful claws. Black 
 sea-urchins {Diadema) bore their barbed spines, a foot long, 
 into the flesh, where they break pff and cause annoying 
 sores. But the worst damage to the venturesome diver is 
 inflicted by the corals themselves. The thousands of sharp 
 points on their calcareous structures cut and abrade the 
 skin in various ways. In all my life I never had such an 
 excoriated and lacerated body as when coral-fishing at Pun- 
 ta Gallia, and I suffered from the wounds for several weeks. 
 But what are these transitory sufferings to the naturalist 
 whose whole life has been enriched by the marvelous experi- 
 ence and natural enjoyments of his visit to the wonderful 
 banks of coral ! " 
 
 Nature may well bo willing to reveal her secrets to those 
 who woo her in this courageous way. Nor is it less the 
 delight of such lovers of nature to make the treasures they 
 ac({uire the common possession of their kind, and such a 
 treasure he is now preparing. The work of the professor 
 now i)assing through the press is upon the organic world 
 bencatli the sea.* 
 
 In this blessed work of acquiring and imparting knowl- 
 edge our autlior-hero spends liis days, and we nuiy almost 
 say his nights too, surrounded by a happy family and a cir- 
 cle of friends to whom he is the most loveable and therefore 
 
 *It app<'ar«'(l In .Tnmmrv, ISOl, fiifitlfd Plankton-Stud icn— that is, Sea-Drift 
 Stmlics -mill is a n-rnarknlile contribution to the wonder-world of protoplasm, 
 which has Its real home in the sea-world hidden from our eyes. We hope soou to 
 see a traiuliitiou iu English.
 
 Prof. Ernst Haeckel. 31 
 
 the most beloved of men — a circle that bids fair to include 
 the enlightened world ; and some parts not so enlightened, 
 if we may judge from his difficulty in tearing himself from 
 the embraces of his dusky Ceylonese attendants when he 
 had to bid them a sad farewell ! So also we must part from 
 our consideration of him as a man, to greet him as a phi- 
 losopher. But, in so doing, let us say : Fortunate it is for 
 " the new thought " that he is not alone or singular among 
 evolutionists and scientists, in being worthy of a new order 
 of sainthood, in which devotion to truth and humanity is a 
 saving grace to them, and to themselves for others. So was 
 it with Darwin and Lyell, and so is it with their living co- 
 workers and followers generally. There is no discount to 
 be taken from their personal or general worth. When these 
 pure nature-worshipers enter the Heaven where the whole 
 human race appears in the Pantheon of memory, how soon 
 Avill they rise above those ancient, mediaeval, abnormal, 
 sickly fanatics who have been canonized as " saints" ! 
 
 And now, secondly, let us turn to the philosophy of these 
 men, and especially of Prof. Haeckel, to find, if we can, the 
 life motive, or religion., which inspires such noble results. 
 They are all, indeed, scientific evolutionists ; but, of them 
 all, Haeckel appears to be the persistent, consistent, and 
 complete evolutionist, and as such he is entitled to name 
 this new philosophy and religion. The name which he has 
 bestowed upon it is Monism. The only complete evolution- 
 ist? Darwin, Lyell, Huxley, Hooker, Gray, and others never 
 went far beyond their special sciences — never assumed to be 
 general philosophers, much less prophets and teachers of 
 religion. Of those who have expressed " religious " views, 
 we notice that Alfred E. Wallace, who shares with Darwin 
 the discovery of natural selection, has become fatally in- 
 volved in spiritualism and the ghost world, so that he be- 
 lieves that we can not reach the human Ego by natural selec- 
 tion. That assumption is, of course, fatal to his consistency 
 and usefulness as far as general science and complete evolu- 
 tion are concerned. We follow him gladly until his appeal 
 to our rational nature vanishes in the shadowy realms where 
 superstition defies science. Then, like Newton, before the 
 " Prophecies," his observing intellect is powerless. In a sim- 
 ilar Avay Herbert Spencer starts out grandly, in his scheme 
 of universal evolution, but develops his doctrine of the " Un- 
 knowable " before he reaches the human Ego, and thus his
 
 32 Prof. Ernst Haeckel. 
 
 system becomes a duality which denies that the Ego is a 
 correlate of the known or knowable world. His philosophy, 
 therefore, leaves the backbone of the world of causal-se- 
 quence broken at the vital point where the objective and 
 subjective unite in Humanity, but 7iot in any Unknowable. 
 The human head is thus fatally dissevered from its world- 
 body. That is to say, he assumes that everything is only a 
 symbol of reality; that every phenomenon is related to a 
 " noumenon " ; and that the consciousness of man is not a 
 correlate of nerve and world changes ; and so between the 
 world and man lies an unaccountable gulf, which is an open 
 gateway through which Fiske and Wallace and the clerical 
 and spiritual "mediums" have (doubtless contrary to his 
 intention) brought back the whole ghostly tribe of entities 
 and spirits, gods and devils, to torture and rob the human 
 race again. The trouble is, that Mr. Spencer, in assuming 
 an " infinite and eternal energy" back of "all things," an ab- 
 solutely unknowable, inscrutable, unliuman noumenon, has 
 lost his grip on the infinite and eternal causal concatenation 
 of things. He has run science ashore on the old sand and 
 fog bank of superstition. There is nothing to do but to 
 pull off, and to change our course under the true lights and 
 verifiable methods of the correlation of " all things." * 
 
 Let us be thankful, then, that there is one complete evo- 
 lutionist who knows that there is "a causal sequence of^/e- 
 nomona " from the farthest star up to and including the mind 
 of man; and that jilienomeoia are not metaphysical appear- 
 ances or "symbols," but facts, events, changes, processes, 
 realities! Tliis avowal of the universality of the law of 
 equivalence and correlation in the works of Prof. Haeckel 
 renders them epoch-making books in philosophy and reli- 
 gion as well as in science. According to that law, which 
 has no limit, no exception (not even of the human con- 
 sciousness or Ego), THE WORLD is ONE ; this doctrine is Mo- 
 NisAf. All of the world's changes arc held together by this 
 one fundamental law of causaf correlation, from our mmd 
 that thinks (the true noumenon), ever on in boundless space 
 and time. Others had said the same thing partinlly, or in 
 whispers. Haeckel said it boldly, and with an evident de- 
 
 * It may soom iinpraciona to rofer thus to the " Propherles " of Newton, tho 
 "Pfti.acv" "f f'"mt4-, tlH' "Spiritism" of Wallace, an.l the "Unknowable of 
 SiMMCT nn.l Fisk.^ But lh<- .■rrors of >.'reat men do (,'reat harm. (.latitude to 
 
 tli>-iii for th.'ir preeminent services, and protection from the harmof llicir errors, 
 botli rcMuire a fearless ar>p<-al to ncience, evolution, and their practical results. 
 Suftlcient time has pass-d to show, in the f-i-"— "<■ ♦»■" "-.•Her tl.nt. iinim at tlio 
 ideas above quoted can atuud such an tti)pe(
 
 Prof. Ernst Haeckel. 33 
 
 termination to endiire the consequences. The religious and 
 political leaders of Germany were therefore not a little agi- 
 tated when he came forward at the Association of German 
 Naturalists and Physicians at Munich, in the autumn of 
 1877, with a paper that actually favored the practical teach- 
 ing of evolutionary science and philosophy instead of the 
 old-time theories. Thereupon, before the same assembly, as 
 we have stated, Virchow was put to the front to defend the 
 conservative, or stahis in quo position, against the incom- 
 ing tide of evolution and monism. Haeckel replied, in a 
 discourse known to the world as the book on Freedom in 
 Science and Teaching. Together with Prof. Huxley's 
 careful introduction, it should be familiar to all our readers. 
 By this discussion the thinking world was brought face to 
 face with monism as a philosophy, and thoughtful men 
 everywhere are trying to answer the question, Can it 
 stand ? 
 
 Prof. Haeckel has chosen this term monism, so, as he 
 says, to break away from the errors of the past, as indicated 
 by the terms theism, materialism, spiritualism, etc., and 
 also from complications j)fO or coi^ with other modern phi- 
 losophies, such as the positivism of Comte, the synthetism of 
 Spencer, and the cosmism of Fiske, with whose systems any 
 evolutionary philosophy must be nearly allied. _ But he 
 prefers a new name and a fresh start, and takes it accord- 
 ingly. 
 
 Both in Europe and in America monism has already a con- 
 siderable and an influential following. The Aveekly paper 
 and quarterly review. The Open Court and The j\Ionist, 
 under the very able editorship of Dr. Paul Carus, of Chi- 
 cago, are devoted to the new philosophy, and may be taken 
 as illustrations of the hold and ground which this new 
 phase of scientific thought is gaining in America and else- 
 where. We can no longer ignore it or be indilferent to it. 
 We must squarely meet the question. Can it stand ? * 
 
 Monism claims to be the last and most consistent word of 
 science in philosophy. As above noted, it grows out of the 
 extended application of the fundamental law of science — 
 that of tlie equivalence and correlation of all knowable ]^he- 
 nomena or changes possible to the whole world — thus bind- 
 ing it all together ad infinitum as a unity. The advocates 
 
 * Fundamental Problems, by Dr. Paul Cams, published by The Open Court 
 Company, Chicago (price, $1), is the important opening work ou monism in 
 America.
 
 34 Pfof. Ernst Haeckel. 
 
 of this philosophy are waiting for some one to bring forward 
 good reasons for not assenting to this completed phi- 
 losophy of science. 
 
 Let us see how it stands : The world is divided, as Aris- 
 totle of old said it, into matter, not living, and living. How 
 does this doctrine apply to each ? In the inorganic or 
 material world, or world of not living matter, this law of 
 the equivalence and correlation of changes or phenomena is 
 universally accepted. The volume of essays by Grove and 
 others, on The Correlation and Conservation of Forces, col- 
 lected years ago by our friend Prof. E. L. Youmans (pub- 
 lished by D. Appleton & Co.), swept the field and prepared 
 the way for monism in this country. That is the sub- 
 stance of the story of our science, both of the least and 
 of the greatest world-changes ; they are all " correlates." 
 The pull or push and the consequent motions, revolutions, 
 and changes of our sun and of the solar system — are they 
 not the correlates of other far-off celestial changes? Our 
 earth and its surface, and all that takes place upon it — are 
 these phenomena not correlates of the solar heat ? Those 
 mechanical and other changes as to the masses of matter of 
 which we read in physics, as to its elements, of which chem- 
 istry informs us, and its modes of motion or processes, called 
 heat, light, electricity, etc. — are they not correlates all ? As 
 to non-living matter, the question, therefore, is settled. 
 
 Next, as to living matter, or protoplasm, known only on 
 the surface of our little earth, yet the most wonderful of all 
 substances, " the physical basis of life " — can there be a dif- 
 ferent verdict ? Its chemistry shows it to be a nitro-carbon 
 in unstable chemical equilibrium (C, 0, H, N, P, and 8). Its 
 changes are not only those chemical and physical changes 
 attending other colloid or jelly forms of matter, but they 
 include that wonderful process called life, which is the con- 
 stant adjustment, reaction, and interaction of the organic 
 mass, with its environment, including the processes of as- 
 similation, growth, and dinsion into cells and special or- 
 gans. But these vital processes are manifest correlations of 
 the changes occurring in the body of the organism and in 
 the course of its ancestral development, or in the environ- 
 ment. Protoplasm is the material upon which the impinging 
 world environment plays the music of life and ultimately 
 the symphony of consciousness. That life-music is the cor- 
 relate of the two series of changes — viz., the protoplasmic 
 changes and the world changes. Life is not an entity, a
 
 Prof. Ernst Haeckel. 35 
 
 substance, or spirit, or ghost, or spook ; still less is con- 
 sciousness such an entity. The latter as a correlate is sui 
 generis. But if it must be compared to anything, let it be 
 not to any gas or material substance, however impalpable, 
 but to the imponderable agencies or forces — electricity, heat, 
 light, etc. The life of man is a process resembling electric 
 phenomena more than a rarefied gas, but it is distinctly cor- 
 related with certain physical conditions, and neither a gas, 
 ether, nor electricity, nor anything but itself ; and we must 
 get rid of such gross materialism in dealing with the subject 
 as that involved in the conception that life is a substantial 
 entity. A state of consciousness is not a property or qual- 
 ity, or even a process of matter, but a sui generis correlate 
 of such processes, and in no sense one of them or like them 
 else it could not be their correlate.* 
 
 We must also thoroughly recover from the crude idea 
 that correlates are mechanical mixtures, or we shall be ma- 
 terialists or spiritualists and not understand monism. The 
 law is, that no correlate ever resembles its antecedent cor- 
 relates, but is entirely distinct from them. For instance, 
 water is the result of the chemical combinat'on of ox3'gen 
 and hydrogen gases, but is entirely different from them, and 
 so it is with every other chemical, vital, or mental j)rocess 
 and product. 
 
 In regard to vital and social phenomena, they are in a 
 still higher degree disparate and entirely different from, 
 and wholly incomparable with, the materials and changes 
 from which they result. There is no " music " in the ^ilayer 
 or the piano, nor in the vibration of the air caused by the 
 playing ; but the correlate of that vibration, as it affects our 
 nervous system, is the state of consciousness which we call 
 music ; and it resembles nothing whatever which has pro- 
 duced it, not even the changes in the nerve-cells imme- 
 diately preceding or attending the consciousness. The pas- 
 sage from the pliysiological change to its psychical cor- 
 relate, as Prof. Tyndall says in his Belfast address, is " un- 
 thinkable,*' but yet, as he says, it is a correlate ; it " has its 
 correlative in the physics of the brain " — and that is the all- 
 important fact.f AH correlations are in the same sense 
 
 * " My final conclusion, then, about the substantial soul is that it explains noth- 
 ing and fjuarantees notliing. Its successive thoughts are the only intelligible and 
 verifiable things about it, and definitely to ascertain the correlations of these 
 with brain-processes is as much as psvchology can empirically do." (Principles 
 of Psycholofi.v, Chap. X, by Prof. William James, of Harvard University.) 
 
 + See his Fragrnients of Science, fifth edition (,Appleton"s), pp. -119, 4aO, 463, 524, 
 and to the end of the volume.
 
 36 Prof. Ernst Haeckel. 
 
 " unthinkable." The music sensation is the resultant, the 
 unthinkable correlate, of just such a concomitant nerve- 
 change, and no other ; and that nerve-change depends upon 
 the correlation of the whole world, which stands behind and 
 accompanies it. The consciousnesses of man, and the co- 
 operation by which they become the Ego, may be called the 
 felt music which the world constantly plays on our nervous 
 systems, sensitive and quivering with their own unstable and 
 assimilative life processes. Or, to say it again, like the color 
 music, when the apparently solid rainbow springs from the 
 falling drops as the sunlight plays upon them. That the 
 psychical changes are " co-related " to the physical changes m 
 the nerves, Mr. Spencer would doubtless_ admit, but the 
 correlation is only complete when we take into account the 
 generally omitted factor, the world environment, which 
 really plavs the music. Speculations on this subject are 
 generally vitiated by the omission of or failure to realize this 
 factor. , 
 
 Thus it is in the organic world of nerve-action, and the 
 mental world of consciousness, correlation is the bond of 
 unlikes. Norless is it true in sociology. The " body cor- 
 porate and political," the Leviathan, as Ilobbes calls it, exists 
 as the co-operation of all the individuals and sub-organiza- 
 tions which compose it and influence its action. But the 
 city, countv, state, and nation is not to be found by any 
 analysis of those parts. There is no city or quality of a city 
 in any one citizen — no "teaminess" in one ox. Yet we 
 have anarchists constantly reminding us that the whole 
 can not be greater than all its parts! Just as though it 
 could be anything like them, or they greater than it or 
 like it? 
 
 It is necessary to bear in mind this law of the unlikeness 
 of inseparable correlates, or monism can never be under- 
 Btood. When it is understood, the ever-varying world is 
 made one, and is at the same time unlocked by it. Haeckel 
 has beautifully illustrated this law in biology, where he has 
 frequently made discoveries that would make the fortune 
 and fame of ordinary naturalists. Take, for instance, his 
 Evolution of Man, and follow the relations of the race in 
 history and of the individual in embryo through the twenty- 
 two stages. (On pages 44 and 189, vol. ii, of the Evolution 
 of Man.) Tiie formation of cells is correlated to their past 
 and to their environment in the four simpler states. Then 
 the inner and outer skins change forms, and develop into four
 
 Prof. Ernst EaecTcel. 37 
 
 other and higher stages. Then come the vertebrates in six 
 grand divisions ; then the mammals in eight higher classes, 
 ending in man. Then every organ of the human system — 
 the eye, ear, heart, lungs, etc. — is traced back to its original 
 formation, and its changes are given till it evolves into its 
 present form. The masterly way in which this is done we 
 can hardly appreciate until we see it restated by other com- 
 petent naturalists ; for instance, in a pamphlet which I hold 
 in my hand, by Prof. Lester F. Ward, of the Smithsonian 
 Institution of Washington, entitled Haeckel's Genesis of 
 Man, which I hope you may see, and which you may doubt- 
 less obtain from him on application. 
 
 But still more wonderful than this physical correlation is 
 the constant increase of the mental correlation in proportion 
 to the rise and complexity of the physical organization of 
 animals until, finally, the highest individual manhood and 
 socially the highest civilization is reached. Each of the 
 twenty-two steps which lead from protoplasm to man has 
 its " soul," the psychical correlate of its own physical state, 
 its conditions, and its Avorld environment. In all this 
 Haeckel follows the plain'iutimation and conclusion of Dar- 
 win, and leaves the world of matter, life, and mind a unity 
 and not a duality. He traces mental evolution back to the 
 protozoa, and thence, step by step, up to the highest " crea- 
 tions " of Shakespeare or Goethe. There is no break, no 
 duality in this world, and no limit to its correlated phenom- 
 ena. The is is ever the child of the loas. There is no cre- 
 ation other than causal, efficient, inevitable correlation. In 
 nature every transaction is a reality — a complete effect and 
 cause. Phenomena are not appearances in the sense of being 
 symbols of an unknowable reality, as Herbert Spencer and 
 his agnostic disciples would make i;s believe, but they are 
 actual events of which our sensation is a direct correlate. 
 There can be, therefore, no " unknowable," for everything, 
 including the mind of man, being a correlate of every other 
 thing, may be brought into correlation with it and with our 
 consciousness. The unknown may be practically affirmed 
 to be infinite, but there is no break in or duality between 
 the mind of man and the world of which it is a correlative 
 part. 
 
 To the agnosticism of Huxley and Dr. Cams as a confes- 
 sion of intellectual modesty, monism would answer. Yes. To 
 that of Spencer (or Huxley) as an assertion of an unknow- 
 able " entity," " energy " or " power," back of phenomena.
 
 38 Pfof. Ernst Hacckel. 
 
 " from whence all things proceed," and beyond jyossible cor- 
 relation and knowledge — decidedly, No ! * 
 
 By tlie same law, the spiritism of Wallace and the super- 
 natural beings and entities of theologians and metaphysi- 
 cians are simply impossible. They are all illusions, or the 
 results of illusions or delusions, Mdiicli have been explained 
 or are to be explained by science. The verdict of the law of 
 scientific correlation remands them at once to the limbo of 
 all spooks — the world of the imagination. You might as well 
 argue in favor of the astronomy of Ptolemy because the 
 sun rises in the east, as to argue in favor of the existence 
 of disembodied ghosts because of the common illusions of 
 our senses. There are illusions, delusions, and frauds, natu- 
 rally enough and in abundance, but there can be no genu- 
 ine " spiritual phenomena." There is no chance of a pos- 
 sibility for such a thing as a spirit, a ghost, or Spencer's 
 unknowable " entity" to exist, for there is nothing left over, 
 and no chance-work possible between correlations under 
 this law of correlation. Existence and correlation are one 
 and the same thing. There can be no life to come, except 
 as it may be a correlate of this life. There can be no dual- 
 ity in the universe. Belief in duality is a sin against sci- 
 ence. Everything, ad infiniUini, is conceivable as correla- 
 tion, and therefore it is reality or nothing. There is no possi- 
 ble room for an extra-mundane God, a ghost, or a spook any 
 Avay or anywhere The true God is the totality of the corre- 
 lated universe — the divine reality. The monistic concep- 
 tion is not of a " first cause," "power," or "energy " outside 
 of all things, " from whence all things flow," but that the only 
 cause and causes are in things — all tilings. Every change 
 is effect and cause in never-ending correlation, of which no 
 exception or limit is conceivable. The phenomenal world is 
 a reality having its noumenon in the human intellect, its 
 coi'relate and its interpreter. 
 
 Such is the philosophy of monism. In it we have the 
 philosopliy of Bruno, Spinoza, aiul Goethe extended and 
 made exact by the discoveries of modern science — the inde- 
 structibility of matter and the equivalence and correlation 
 of all knowable world-changes or " forces," as they are some- 
 times dangerously called, for some people are in danger of 
 thinking of force as an entity and not a change. 
 
 * Rfo FiindiiiiK'ntnl Prol)li'inR, by Dr. Pnul Cams, fsppcinlly tlie chapter on 
 ACTTiosticism anil PhfiioiiK-naliHTn. The StronKliold of MyKliuism, pp. l;)7-154- 
 16a. and fjrisnini. Sve. also. Discussion on t)u' Natnro and Ueallty of H('lif;ioD, 
 between Herbert Speucer aud Frederick Ilurrisuii, pp. 30, ICO, ITU, and pumim.
 
 Prof. Ernst Haeckel ' 39 
 
 But if this philosophy must stand, where are we ? What 
 is left for human consolation? Well, things may not be 
 so very bad, after all. " There is no wisdom save in 
 truth." We used to be frightened by ghost stories, but 
 now people seem to be frightened when science tells them 
 that they are realities and not spooks. They seem to think 
 that life becomes too terrifically earnest when we consider 
 it so, and a flight back into some " unknowable " mys- 
 tery is sought as a relief — much as we seek shade from the 
 glare of the sun. When each Ego sees itself as the bwn- 
 ing point where the infinite world correlates into conscious- 
 ness, it naturally at first looks around for a more modest 
 and less responsible position. But, again, correlation is our 
 refuge and defense. The freedom of the will is the grate- 
 ful illusion which gives us a little world of our own, by 
 which we relieve our fatality and bring our light to bear 
 upon the great objective world, and weave our existence 
 into it as a satisfying immortal creative power. Thus, life 
 is worth living, and insures immortality by its beneficence ; 
 thus, religion and morals receive a solid, scientific founda- 
 tion. For the will, scientifically explained, becomes the 
 basis of the world of human effort — our subjective world. 
 
 The freedom of the will results as a practical fact from 
 the law that correlations are distinct from each otlicr. The 
 will, as a faculty of the life, mind, or soul, has, and can have, 
 no consciousness of its own origin, and so is, as to itself, free. 
 As such, it acts apparent! y independently in the order of 
 affairs, and counts for much (in Prof. Huxley's phrase) " in 
 the order of events." In this way it becomes the founda- 
 tion of morals and discipline and practical life. In a simi- 
 lar way, the rising of the sun in the east founds our practi- 
 cal almanacs and daily duties ; but objectively the sun does 
 not rise at all ; so our will is disclosed by science to be a re- 
 sult of our own life and mind and the world about us. Thus 
 will, free as a correlate, becomes the base of moral relations ; 
 but all those relations are shown by science to be subject 
 to objective law, which underlies the human will just as it 
 does the " rising sun." The illusions arc explained, the 
 lights remain ! 
 
 The objections to this monistic philosophy generally 
 come from those who fail to comprehend or to realize the 
 free-will and moral results of its fundamental laws of corre- 
 lation, and especially the fact tliat no correlate resembles its 
 antecedent correlates. Prof. Haeckel is by no means clear
 
 40 PTof. Ernst Haeclcel. 
 
 of confusing expressions. For instance, he speaks of " me- 
 chanical life phenomena," " atom soul," all matter being 
 considered " equally living," " molecule soul," " carbon soul," 
 etc., which enable objectors like Virchow and others to ob- 
 tain the only advantage they have ever obtained in their 
 discussions with liim. But until life and mind are found 
 to be the correlate of non-living matter, and not of the or- 
 ganic action of protoplasm only, such expressions by Prof. 
 Haeckel and other monists are to be limited to the proto- 
 plasmic matter — the brains of animals, where only sentiency 
 and thought do exist. Otherwise they are simply poetical 
 expressions as though they were used by the jDoets Goethe 
 or Wordsworth, or by Comte, " subjectively," as when, for 
 " worship " purj^oses, he styles the earth " Le grand fetich." 
 So the word " mechanical " is often used by Ilaeckel to 
 mean natural, causal, correlative. Objectors who have noth- 
 ing better than criticisms of such verbal errors of expression 
 have need to remember logician Mill's rule of safety in such 
 discussions, viz. : " Unless you refute your opponent at his 
 best, you are refuted by him." Haeckel is a German and a 
 specialist, and thus, as a monist, may have sometimes hazy 
 or limited modes of expression and exposition, but, at his 
 best, he stands on the verified, irrefragable, invincible, inex- 
 pugnable law which makes 'realities of and u}iifies the facts 
 and processes of the whole world, and compels us to conceive 
 the world as an objective unity, and not as a duality. There- 
 fore, until this law of correlation can be shown to have a 
 limit or an excejJtioji, the philosophy of monism stands im- 
 pregnable ; and Ilaeckel, who gave it this name and recog- 
 nized its scientific completeness, is rightfully regarded as its 
 latest leading champion. 
 
 For, thinllj/, Prof. Ilaeckel is prominent as a religionist 
 and a reformer-prophet. 
 
 The position of Prof. Ilaeckel as a leading naturalist and 
 philosopher would doubtless be gracefully acknowledged by 
 the conservative and even the retrograde infiuences if he 
 would not, as he does on every fitting occasion, lift up the 
 voice of ii prophet and insist that this " monism " is also a 
 religio)!. In a word, that it is the future lieligion of Science 
 and Humanity, now in its nascent state. This fact makes 
 him a sort of terror to the 8i)iritual, political, and temporal 
 " powers that be," and a subject of greater interest to us. 
 For if the philosophy of monism is scientifically sound there 
 is no escape from monism as the religion of scientific people
 
 Prof. Ernst Haeckel. 41 
 
 — that is, of people really intelligent on this subject. All 
 religion has been very well defined as some philosophy of the 
 world applied in practice and warmed by the consequent 
 emotions. Our morality we may then call our individual 
 practice of such religion in social life and intercourse. 
 Back of every religion, therefore, lies some view and theory 
 of the world, a cosmology or philosophy, by which each peo- 
 ple or sect ciphers out, as best it can, some tolerable rela- 
 tion to the mighty world and the social organism and all 
 their fellow human beings. We find the religious history 
 of our race to consist, therefore, of a gradual evolution of 
 its leading peoples from a broad base of general animism 
 and fetichism, thence to astrology, thence to polytheism, 
 thence to monotheism, and thence to scientism, expressed 
 chiefly to us in the pantheism of Goethe, the positivism of 
 Comte, the synthetism of Spencer, the cosmism of Fiske, 
 and finally by the monism of Haeckel. He proposed this 
 word monism as expressive of the world-unifying Jaw of 
 science, as the summary of all that was true and good in 
 the other philosophic names proj^osed by the philosophers 
 just named, while it excluded what he regards as the crude 
 and vulgar notions of materialism, spiritualism, and dualism. 
 Our professor is very brave, like many Germans, in in- 
 venting new words instead of adding new meanings or 
 shades of meaning to old ones. If scientific people would 
 take religiously to this name, monism, it would certainly 
 help to clear up things wonderfully, for it excludes at once 
 a mass of old erroi's and misconceptions which will hang 
 around the old words ; but to many it is just this protective 
 twilight of uncertainty in philosophy and religion — half 
 concealing and half revealing — which makes old names, 
 symbols, and ideas alternately repelling and attractive, tan- 
 talizing and comforting. Our monist prophet has brought 
 us well out of this twilight, and the situation looks better 
 the clearer it is seen. Every clear view of the world is fol- 
 lowed by a sincere conviction, and such conviction becomes 
 a " faith " and an enduring well-spring of energy and con- 
 solation. ]\[onism in that view rises above all religions as 
 the culmination of all. If anything can be, it is the imi- 
 versal faith. Because it is based upon verified science, it is 
 positive monism ; because it depends upon the objective 
 unity of the world, it is rnonistic positivism. By one name 
 or another the highest scientific solution of the world, so- 
 "^ ciety, and man, when scientific methods arc carried to their
 
 42 Prof. Ernst Haeckel. 
 
 final results over every known domain, must result in a sci- 
 entific faith. 1 1 • 
 This scientific faith, or faith according to knowledge, is 
 certainly the rising faith of mankind. It received its solid, 
 everlasting foundation when Copernicus, Bruno, and Gali- 
 leo gave us the true solar system, which revealed to us a 
 new earth and a new heaven, and consequently a new 
 philosophy, finally to lead to this new religion. From Des- 
 cartes, Spinoza, Bacon, and Diderot, Goethe received this 
 new world of science, barren and forlorn, as it rose out of 
 the chaos of the French revolution. He was the first great 
 creative and furnishing soul that fully moved into it to 
 stay. He peopled it with enduring and even liumau char- 
 acters, sowed the seed to cover the naked landscape Avith use 
 and beauty, and made the very clouds glow with a light that 
 foretold a higher heaven than humanity had ever dreamed. 
 
 Haeckel is fond of quoting Goethe ; and well he may be. 
 As we recede in time, the distance brings out, mountain- 
 like, the true height of tliis poet-prophet of the new faith 
 of the new era. We begin to see how he, in science, had a 
 sure prevision of the results of our evolution ; in politics, 
 he discounted the French revolution and the metaphysical 
 anarchy of liis and even of our time ; in religion, he rightly 
 estimated all tlie theologies, and sung the emancipation of 
 erring man (Faust), from the very devil to whom he had 
 sold himself, and the conquest of a heaven of ever-increas- 
 ing progress and blessedness by his own victorious striving 
 to accomplish the good. In a wonderful poem called In- 
 heritance ( Vermdchtniss) Goethe expressly dates the new 
 era from " the sage who showed the eartli to circle around 
 the sun and taught her sister orbs their patlis." 
 
 These triumphs of astronomy, followed by similar prog- 
 ress in physics and chemistry, made sure the material 
 foundation of the scientific faith at the close of the last 
 century. Our century opened with the great triumphs in 
 biologv, or the organic world, led by Oken, Goethe, and 
 especially the unappreciated Lamarck. They laid the foun- 
 dation of tlie new faith in the vital world, upon which Dar- 
 win and Haeckel have well-nigh completed the structure. 
 From Lamarck's Philosophie Zoologique (1809) Haeckel 
 quotes tl)is biological foundation in a useful summary, as 
 follows (History of Creation, vol. i, p. 112) : 
 
 " The systematic division of classes, orders, families, ^ 
 genera, and species, as well as their designations, are the ^
 
 Prof. Ernst Haechel. 43 
 
 arbitrary and artificial productions of man. The kinds or 
 species of organisms are of unequal age, developed one after 
 another, and show only a relative and temporary persist- 
 ence. Species arise out of varieties. The dilferences in the 
 conditions of life have a modifying influence on the organi- 
 zation, the general form, and the parts of animals, and so 
 has the use or disuse of organs. In the first beginning 
 only the very simplest and lowest animals and plants came 
 into existence ; those of a more complex organization only 
 at a later period. The course of the earth's develojDment, 
 and that of its organic inhabitants, was continuous, not inter- 
 rupted by violent revolutions. Life is purely a physical phe- 
 nomenon. All the johenomena of life depend on mechanical, 
 physical, and chemical causes, Avhich are inherent in the 
 nature of matter itself. The simjDlest animals and the 
 simplest plants, which stand at the lowest point in the scale 
 of organization, have originated and still originate by spon- 
 taneous generation. All animate natural bodies or organ- 
 isms are subject to the same laws as inanimate natural 
 bodies or organs. The ideas and actions of the understand- 
 ing are the emotional i^henomena of the central nerve 
 system. The will is in truth never free. Eeason is only 
 a higher degree of development and combination of judg- 
 ments." Thus was the truth sj^oken, but none then had 
 ears to hear. 
 
 Next as to the sociological foundation : 
 
 In 1857 Auguste Comte, another unappreciated French- 
 man, had done for sociology what Copernicus did for as- 
 tronomy and Lamarck had done for biology. He had 
 named and outlined and misap2)lied that science. He dis- 
 covered that man was not the product of Nature only, but 
 of society and its continuity and solidarity ; tliat there was 
 no solution of man without society: '■'■ Entre Vhomme ct le 
 monde il faut VhnmanUe.'''' Between man and the world, 
 he said, there lies, and there is need of, humanity, as the 
 solution of the world and the saviour of man. Comte, if 
 he did not originate, brought into order the first positive 
 philosophy, and on it founded his. " ])ositive " religion. 
 We have from him some indispensable tilings lying at the 
 very base of monism, which, because of liis papistic notions, 
 are fatally overlooked, but without which monism can not 
 be understood or appreciated, viz. : 
 
 1. A truer view of the relativity of knowledge ; that it re- 
 lates to man and not to any objective " uoumenou."
 
 44 Prof. Ernst Haechel. 
 
 2. A true correlative classification of the special sciences, 
 viz., astronomy, j)hysics, chemistry, biology, sociology, eth- 
 ics, psychology ; that is, from the greater and general to the 
 smaller and more complex — i. e., from the star-world down 
 to the mind of man. 
 
 3. The law of the " three states," or of " deanthropo- 
 morphization," as John Fiske states it with his peculiar 
 brevity. That is, that man's philosophical conceptions 
 develop from theology to metaphysics, and finally to soi- 
 ree. 
 
 4. The supremacy of humanity ; as the solution, guaran- 
 tor, and chief factor of human life and human affairs. 
 
 5. The general law of interdependence ; that the higher 
 rests upon the lower, buc that both are for each other. 
 
 6. That rights and duties are the two sides of the same 
 relation under the love, order, and progress of scientific so- 
 ciology. 
 
 The French people are slow to discover their great men. 
 Lamarck and Comte have never been understood by theo- 
 logical and metaphysical France ; and the France of science, 
 aside from narrow-minded specialism, has yet chiefly to 
 come. 
 
 The works of Herbert Spencer and of our own John 
 Fiske are also able approaches to monism, and are too Avell 
 known in this country to require lengthy exposition^ here. 
 They have added materially to the better understanding of 
 the new philosophy and religion of science, and, as commen- 
 taries upon and contributions toward it, are invaluable. We 
 have noted the error that seems to many common to them 
 both, so plainly pointed out and dwelt upon by Frederic 
 Harrison, the "English positivist, in his celebrated religious 
 discussions with Mr. Spencer — viz., the unwarranted assump- 
 tion of an unknowable " entity " or " energy " back of phe- 
 nomena and buck of human consciousness. This seems to 
 be plainly irreconcilable with the doctrine of universal corre- 
 lation. And that it is as ])lainly " unreligious " in its practi- 
 cal consecjuences, I think Mr. Harrison has made equally 
 matiifest in the Discussion referred to. 
 
 The cosmic emotion, with its wonder, awe, and venera- 
 tion, is excited and best sustained by The All — the world of 
 correlation — and not by any " energy " outside of it : " from 
 whence all things flow,*" as Mr. Spencer tells us. The ''■all 
 things" which does not include all possible "energy " is an 
 incomplete schedule. " Energy " is a correlated part of " all
 
 Prof. Ernst Haeckel. 45 
 
 things " or it is notliing. It is this imcorrelated nothing 
 which is the nest-egg of all suj^erstition and which breeds 
 uncertainty and terror instead of true, healthy world-wor- 
 ship, the cosmic emotion of Goethe, Shelley, Byron, Words- 
 worth, and of the modern school of natural poetry an(J 
 painting — the proper emotional side of modern science. 
 
 Fortunately, Prof. Haeckel is not bothered by the " un. 
 knowable noumenon," nor was Comte or Goethe, All 
 expressions from their works that seem to imply that they 
 placed a " noumenon " outside of the world, mankind or tlie 
 Ego, are, in religion, as in jihilosophy, to be reconciled with 
 science or read as poetry. As scientists 'and religionists they 
 held no parley with " unknowable " energies, entities, or 
 spooks of any kind, following strictly Faust's last advice to 
 man: 
 
 " Wenn Geister spucken, geh' er seinen Gang." 
 When ghosts spook, let him go straight on his way. 
 
 Or, again : 
 
 " Willst du in Unendliches schreiten ? 
 Geh' niir in endlichen nach alien Seiten ! " 
 In the Infinite wilt thou stray ? 
 Through the Finite take thy way I 
 
 The astonishing thing about Goethe, Comte, and Haeckel 
 is that they in religion so thoroughly emancipated them- 
 selves from theology and metaphysics ; and two of them 
 were Germans ! The result is, that they and their school 
 of general scientists and reformers are, as we enter the new 
 era, the chief sources of any true enlightenment or guidance, 
 especially in religious, social, or political affairs. Of course 
 these men are in no sense to be regarded individually as 
 models, but they had reached the scientific, historical spirit, 
 which is always integrative, saving, and yet progressive. 
 Take, for example, Comte's view of sociology and politics. 
 These, like the concei)tion of God and every other subject, 
 according to Comte's law, evolve through the three stages 
 of theology, metaphysics, and science. The old theologic 
 phase or method in sociology and politics is that of divine 
 command or authority. " Thus saith tlic Lord," etc. Then 
 comes the metaphysical stage and phase, Avhich is one of 
 defiance, rights, revolutions, " administrative niliilism," re- 
 fusal to co-operate or do anything but to agitato, fume, and 
 grumble. This spirit of anarchy, now ranijiant an\ong our 
 reformers, is in many respects more destructive and unpro-
 
 46 Prof. Ernst Haechel. 
 
 gressive tlian tlie old principle of authority. It can never 
 agree upon any proposition for social reform but not to 
 do it. Rights are fatally divorced from duties. 
 
 But there is a third view and spirit in regard to social 
 and political affairs— a spirit of science, which breathesfrom 
 tfie works of the great men we have named. That _ spirit is 
 evolutionarv. It is integrative and yet differentiative, con- 
 servative and yet progressive— laying the sure foundation of 
 the real liberty and welfare of the individual in the social, 
 integrative order, which, no matter what the form of govern- 
 ment, can alone make such liberty and welfare possible. 
 Take, for instance, Goethe's remarkable letter from the Dorn- 
 berg Castle in 1828, to which we have referred, on the cTeath 
 of the Duke, upon the administration of the little world of 
 the Duchy of Weimar, and compare its far-reaching Musdom, 
 resting upon the continuity and solidarity of society, vrith 
 the shallowness of the French social philosophy of that day 
 or of our current metaphysical anarchism. Or do the same 
 with the sociology of Comte— excepting, of course, his pa- 
 pistic Utopia, which belongs only to the past polity of the ^ 
 Latin races, as to which he was misled, largely by De Mais- 
 tre's work on the Pope. 
 
 Then turn to the latter part of Haeckel's Freedomof 
 Science and Teaching, and see how under the scientific 
 spirit he, too, preserves the integrative and the differenti- 
 ative sides of social progress, and refuses to be driven into 
 anarchy by the taunts of Virchow, who evidently sought in 
 that way to compass his destruction. Ilaeckcl had never 
 the time to study deeply history, law, statesmanship, or poli- 
 tics, yet his scientific "instinct and spirit enabled him to 
 apply in sociology the law of biology; that true progress 
 in the social, as "in the animal, world must be an ever-in- 
 creasing integration of the functions of organs ever increas- 
 ing in their freedom of individual action. This law, stated 
 by fJoethc fifty years ago and quoted from him by our Carey 
 as the basis of his great work on Social Science, is just as 
 true of a jelly-fish as of an elephant— of a Roman Empire 
 as of a mail fit is true of every social organism ; of tlie Re- 
 public of tlie United States, or of tlie Republic of the World ! 
 If some intimation of this law could reach our anarchistic 
 reformers, how soon their metaphysical bubbles would col- 
 lapse ! 
 
 Finally.— It we turn to the treatment of the religions 
 progress " of mankind under this scientific spirit of evolu-
 
 Prof. Ernst Haeckel. 47 
 
 tion, we find the wisdom and influence of the same great 
 men a source of real health and strength. They only give 
 us religion without the superstition of theology or the an- 
 archy of metaphysics. It seems clear that from them and 
 their spirit we must learn or go on from bad to worse. The 
 religion which is the social, integrative, co-operative, and 
 saving element of human nature can no longer be fed and 
 sustained by ghostly gods, spooky devils, categorical im- 
 peratives, or inscrutable unknowables. Voltaire (as quoted 
 on the title-page of his Biography by James Parton) asks 
 the j)ertinent question which he could not answer : 
 
 " 'Tis a pity to spend half of our life in destroying enchanted castles. 
 Far better to establish truths than to examine lies — but where are 
 the truths?" 
 
 Thanks to evolution, the truths have come and are coming 
 in their good time. Up to Voltaire's day the known world 
 had been little more than an enchanted, or rather ghost- 
 haunted, castle of existence. His German successor, Goethe, 
 used the true to realize the good and beautiful. He ac- 
 cejDted this life in the monistic spirit as the real fact, and 
 the whole world and God as one — The All. The concep- 
 tions of God from the Hebrew prophets down, when freed 
 from limitations and anthropomorphisms, end in this object- 
 ive conception of God as The All ; not as a ghost, spirit, or 
 spook, outside of the universe, but as reality itself, infinite 
 and eternal. We have thus the scientifically revised defi- 
 nition : God is the world, infinite, eternal, and unchange- 
 able in its being and in its laws, but ever varying in its cor- 
 relations. 
 
 Goethe, by true and grand expressions of divine and cos- 
 mic emotion, raised aloft as the true revelation of God the 
 monistic concept which has been worked out by the modern 
 objective sciences still in their glorious career of progress. 
 
 The next great fruitful religious development of our 
 time seems to come from the Latin race through the word 
 of Comte, that the true Christ is Humanity itself. 
 
 " Between man and the world there lies, and there is need 
 of, humanity"; this can not be repeated too often. The 
 organic action of society is the foundation of all social and 
 individual progress. 
 
 Only by this mediator and saviour. Humanity, is there 
 any real hope or salvation for the individual. Only by this 
 Son of Man and of God can we come unto the Father — the
 
 48 Prof. Ernst Haechel. 
 
 divine universe. Herbert Spencer, though often dissenting 
 from M. Oomte's ideas, bases his own best work npon his 
 sociological principles. Notice, for instance, his splendid 
 demonstration of the organic nature of society and history 
 in his Sociology, and his often-repeated proof that the " in- 
 nate ideas " are the results of race-inheritance instead of 
 individual experience. In all such cases he is following the 
 line of the great inspirations of our day, which are based 
 upon the continuity and solidarity of mankind. Our great 
 American patriots and orators from the Eevolution to Lin- 
 coln, and especially in the grander orations of Daniel Web- 
 ster, have these fundamental ideas and sentiments as their 
 inspiration. The generations past and to come underlie, 
 sustain, and consecrate every appeal to duty and patriotism. 
 
 Thus, as the conception of the Christ as a man, under evo- 
 lutional criticism, vanishes from history, the ideal Messiah^ 
 which gave rise to the belief that there Avas once such a 
 man, has become incarnated in the history and fact of the 
 evolution of the race itself, revealing it as our ever-living 
 Saviour. 
 
 Tlie next person of the old religious Trinity is no longer 
 the Holy Ghost, but the holy life of man, in which we all 
 partake, and which is the most precious thing in the Avorld 
 — human life ! Its co-operative altruistic power is our true 
 Bustainer and " comforter." 
 
 The " Holy Mother " of the Roman faith is enlarged, as 
 in the concluding line of Faust, into the " Eternal-woman- 
 ly " that leads humanity ever upward and on. In a word, 
 she is ^Yomanhood — continuous, replacing, sustaining, glori- 
 fied as " Maiden, Mother, Queen, and Goddess." 
 
 21ie ii'ue Bible is no longer those old Hebrew and Greek 
 documents, strangely bound together as one book ; but the 
 books, good and true, of the whole Avorld and of all time. 
 
 llie Creed is not any number of Church Articles, but the 
 conclusions of science, ever being revised, and exi)ressed in 
 a positive philosophy as the best description of the know- 
 uble world. 
 
 Of the Heavens and Hells, " the places that knew them 
 once now know them no more." But in the misery and 
 ioy, the remorse and blessedness of the human hearts they 
 have tbcir now location ; and between them stands every 
 day as the Day of Jadyment. 
 
 There is scarcely a name, symbol, or line of the old faiths 
 which can not be thus found to be replaced and enlarged
 
 Prof. Ernst HaecTcel. 49 
 
 by the new and true view of the world and of human life 
 and destiny. 
 
 There is no time nor need to continue further here these 
 old religious names, once believed in as facts, and which now 
 are of value only as symbols of the grander truths since 
 evolved, but which they, if still used, may esi3ress. How to 
 thus translate them, these hints only must suffice. The 
 illusions dejDart, the truths remain ! 
 
 When the old religions fall, what will you give in their 
 place ? We answer. Religion ! Look around ! The en- 
 chanted castle of existence of the past was but a half-seen, 
 discolored prophecy of the truth which is rejilacing it, with 
 a grandeur and a reality that terrifies the soul at first. Peo- 
 ple are frightened when science tells them that this world 
 is the real one, and " the other " its shadow. But this true 
 world includes all — is The All ! It brings with it a new phi- 
 losophy, religion, morality, life, and motive, which is an en- 
 during well-spring of energy, consolation, and hoj^e — not of 
 pessimism nor optimism, but of ever- victorious meliorism. 
 
 Do not as an ethical society fear that the old moral lights 
 will be blown out and darkness result. The true scientific 
 foundation will replace the old, as in our cities the scientific 
 electric light has come to take the place of the old smoky 
 lamps. To secure such replacement, throughout the whole 
 individual and social domain of human afl'airs, is the motive 
 and inspiration of those scientists who, in Euroj^e and Amer- 
 ica, put their conclusions before the people in the simplest 
 language, yet ever eloquent with these new purposes and 
 hopes. Of the noblest of such teachers and prophets none 
 stands forth more prominently than Ernst Haeckel. From 
 his concluding words at tliat Munich contest rings out the 
 motto which, in a word, expresses the impidse of his own 
 life, and of the creative era of the new faith of Monism : 
 Imjyavidi progrediamur ! "Undaunted we press ever on ! " 
 But in this motto we can not escape the echo of a verse of 
 Goethe's magnificent " Symbol " of the progress of man — 
 progress between "the great silences" of the stars and the 
 grave — a poem which Carlyle has called, and made im- 
 mortal to us as, the deepest, grandest word of our time : 
 
 Die Zukunft docket The future hides 
 
 Schmerzen und Gliioke. Sorrows and gladness. 
 
 Schrittweis dein Blicke, Stepwise to the sight, 
 
 Doch nngcschrecket, Yet undaunted, . 
 
 Dringen wir vorwarts 1 We press ever on I
 
 \ 
 
 50 Prof. Ernst Haechel. 
 
 ABSTRACT OF THE DISCUSSION. 
 
 Mr. Nelson J. Gates : 
 
 The intelligent world owes a debt of gratitude to Prof. Haeckel. It 
 is due to his labors, mainly, that the doctrine of evolution is now as well 
 established as Kepler's laws of the motions of the planetary bodies, or 
 Newton's law of gravitation. No careful student of modern scientific 
 thought now doubts that the law of cause and effect prevails through- 
 out all phenomena, whether physical or mental. Every effect is the 
 exact product of antecedent causes. Thought is as much the product 
 of the conditions under which it arises as is the formation of a crystal 
 or the growth of a tree. There is no room for supernatural interfer- 
 ence anywhere. Though the natural evolution of living forms out of 
 non-living matter has not been demonstrated as a fact of present oc- 
 currence, there is no doubt in the mind of consistent evolutionists 
 that the most primitive organisms were originally produced by spon- 
 taneous generation. Prof. Ilaeckel's investigations in embryology 
 constitute a most important confirmation of the Darwinian theory, 
 and entitle him to be placed in the front rank of experimental 
 scientists. 
 
 Prof. P. H. Van der Wetde : 
 
 Dr. Vander Weyde exhibited a series of drawings enlarged from 
 plates contain(>d in the works of Prof. Ilaeckcl, illustrative of human 
 evolution. The lowest form of mankind was shown to bo scarcely as 
 intelligent in appearance as the higher apes, and the brain capacity of 
 the lowest races was but little superior to that of the highest non- 
 human mammals. lie also explained, by the aid of a map, Prof. 
 Ilaeckers theory as to the geographical distribution of the human 
 race. Dr. Van der Weyde saw no difficulty in conceiving that all 
 living things, including man, were developed from eternally existing 
 mattcr^>ii]y the matter itself must have been living matter, not dead 
 and inert, as was formerly believed. 
 
 Dr. Robert G. Eccles : 
 
 Mr. Wakoman wliolly misunderstands Mr. Spencer's position as to 
 the nature of. mind or consciousness. Mr. Spencer does not regard 
 consciousness as an entity, but as a phenomenal process. Mr. Wake-
 
 Prof. Ernst HaecTcel. 51 
 
 man's position respecting consciousness as a temporary phase of being, 
 causally correlated with brain changes, positively implies the miracle 
 of creation and opposes the doctrine of natural evolution. The physi- 
 cal facts of extension, motion, and time involved in the molecular or 
 functional activities of the brain can by no possible conjuring be con- 
 ceived of in terms of consciousness. Between the two series of pro- 
 cesses there is an impassable gulf in thought. No thinkable arrange- 
 ments of the former can enable us to conceive the latter as being 
 caused thereby. An unthinkable proposition is a false proposition, if 
 we can place any reliance on i-eason. He wants us to believe that 
 when matter and motion are properly arranged together in the brain, 
 and played upon by the changes of the external world, by some 
 " presto, change " process, we get mind ; and yet he holds that neither 
 matter nor motion contains any distinctly psychic elements when apart 
 or combined in any other manner than in the brain. His statement is 
 exactly equivalent to saying that by certain arrangements of the parti- 
 cles of two mountains they could be set side by side without a valley 
 between. We know that Nature changes her form incessantly, but we 
 have no evidence that she ever creates anything new. The substance, 
 time, space, motion, and consciousness of things may assume endless 
 guises, but we have no reason for supposing an increase or diminution 
 in quantity of either. Modes of consciousness, like modes of motion, 
 may change, but both, so far as we know, persist everlastingly in some 
 form ; at least, such is the logical conclusion of the evolutionist. 
 When Mr. Wakeman tells us that there is no room anywhere in the 
 universe for a god or a sisook, he arrogantly assumes knowledge 
 which man neither does nor ever can possess. What can a finit 
 creature with finite knowledge ever know about the possibilities of the 
 infinite ? Has he grasped every fact of nature to enable liim to tell 
 whether his stupendous assumption does or does not agree with them ? 
 A more modest man might make his statement as a mere unverified 
 belief, for which he alone is responsible, but to put it forward as 
 established truth is preposterous. We know nothing of the universe 
 as it exists ai)art from our own consciousness, which i.-: finite and lim- 
 ited in its modes of activity. Our knowledge is necessarily limited to 
 the narrow range of our experience. What we know, therefore, is in 
 ourselves. Wo can know the external universe only symbolically. 
 As well might the eyeless worm try to picture the world as we see it, 
 as we to picture the actual totality of conditions of the Universal Being 
 in which we are incessantly enveloped.
 
 52 Prof. Ernst HaecM. 
 
 Dr. Lewis Gr. Janes : 
 
 Evolution has a very broad back. It can carry all sorts of theories 
 of the universe, and not break down under the load. Our biographical 
 lectures have at least been successful In demonstrating that the doc- 
 trine of evolution can be held in connection with a great variety of 
 theological and anti-theological speculations. Yet, when any complete 
 philosophical statement of the doctrine is attempted, we find, I think, 
 substantial agreement in fundamental principles. Darwin, as has been 
 said, did not assume to have any consistent, well-ordered explanation 
 of the general philosophy of evolution. He appeared to incline at one 
 time to theistic, at another to materialistic views of the world, yet he 
 named Herbert Spencer "our greatest philosopher," and did not ex- 
 pressly dissent from his main doctrines. Asa Gray was a pronounced 
 thci< who did not regard the doctrine of evolution as inconsistent 
 with his Presbyterian profession of faith. Wallace is a spiritualist, 
 and Prof. Haeckel a monist, but not more of one, as I understand 
 it, than Darwin or Spencer. The doctrine of evolution is unquestion- 
 ably indebted to Prof. Haeckel more than to any living biological 
 investigator for an immense and orderly array of facts in its support. 
 He has also contributed something of value to its broader field of 
 philosophical thought. Mr. Wakeman's interpretation of Haeckel's 
 monistic philosophy, however, to my mind, is not entirely correct or 
 adequate It is not, as I understand it from his writings, inconsistent 
 with the recognition of the psychological principle of the relativity of 
 our knowledge, on which rests Herbert Spencer's doctrine of the un- 
 knowablc. On the contrary, it expressly recognizes this principle. 
 Prof. Haeckel clearly states the doctrine of relativity in ""nierous 
 passages in his writings. In his History of Creation he says: ^ 
 nowhere arrive at a knowledge of first causes. ... In explammg the 
 most simple physical or chemical phenomena, as the falling of a stone, 
 or the formation of chemical combinations, we arrive ... at other 
 remoter phenomena which are in themselves mysterious. This arises 
 from the limitation or relativity of our powers of understanding. We 
 must not forget that human knowledge is absolutely limited, and pos- 
 * sesscsonlya relative extension. It is, in its essence, limited by Uie 
 very nature of our senses and of our brains." He also evidently be- 
 lieves that life is no mere by-play of nature, as Mr. Wakoman has 
 rcprcscnlod it to be, but a constant and eternal ingredient m the uni- 
 verse He speaks of " the animating of all matter, the inseparability 
 of mental power and corporeal substance." He quotes approvingly 
 Goethe's assertion tiiat " matter can never exist and be active without 
 mind nor can mind without matter." With Mr. Spencer he recognizes
 
 Prof. Ernst Haechel. 53 
 
 mind and matter as the eternally related but opposing sides of one 
 substantial reality. He calls his philosophy a " mechanical " philosophy, 
 it is true — using this term, as I understand him, in common with a 
 school of European thinkers, to indicate the universality of the prin- 
 ciple of causation — of what we term " law," as opposed to chance, 
 caprice, or miracle. In this respect, too, he is in entire agreement with 
 Mr. Spencer. The doctrine of the unknowable docs not imply any 
 interference with the causal correlation of jihenomena. It does not 
 open the door, as Mr. Wakeman has implied, to the primitive ghost or 
 " spook " idea. Prof. Haeckel's views are not, in the old-fashioned 
 "metaphysical" terminology, materialistic, any more than are Mr. 
 Spencer's. In his reply to Prof. Virchow he says : " All human 
 ^ knowledge as such is subjective." He declares gravitation a mere 
 hypothesis, and says : " All the conceptions which we possess of the 
 chemical structure and affinities of matter are subjective hypotheses, 
 mere conceptions as to the positions and changes of position of the 
 various atoms, whose very existence is incapable of proof." It would 
 be easier to construct a system of idealism on such foundation prin- 
 ciples than a materialistic system. Both Herbert Spencer and John 
 Fiske, the ablest exponents of the philosophy of evolution in England 
 and America, have expressly disclaimed the alleged materialistic im- 
 plications of this philosophy. Neither mind nor matter, according to 
 Mr. Spencer, is a substance or " thing in itself " ; both are phenomenal, 
 symbolically representative of one unknowable reality. The Spenceri- 
 an philosophy is a monistic system, based upon this unknowable reality. 
 The proof that this reality is unknowable, in its essential nature, is not 
 metaphysical, but purely scientific, depending as it does upon the sci- 
 entific demonstration of the nature and limitations of our modes of 
 sense-perception. The pictures which we form of the external world 
 are simply synthetized symbols of the psycho-physiological sensations 
 which we derive from contact with it. As the symbols are constant, 
 however, we recognize the order of nature as steadfast, we accept it as 
 a real, objective fact, which corresponds with our symbolical conceptions. 
 The world, therefore, is not an illusion ; our knowledge is a real, though 
 representative and symbolical, knowledge of real objective relations. 
 
 Mil. Wakeman, in reply : 
 
 My thanks are due to Mr. Gates for his very concise, clear, and able 
 statement of the general conclusion set forth in my lecture, and which, 
 I believe, will in time become the conviction of all who carefully think 
 and investigate. 
 
 I am also under deep obligations to Prof. Vander Weyde for his kind 
 and sustaining words, as often I have been during many years of pleas-
 
 54 Prof. Ernst Haechel. 
 
 ant and helpful intercourse with him in matters of science and reform. 
 We all recognize in him a worthy representative— may we not almost 
 say, in view of his advanced years, survivor ?— successor, certainly, of 
 Iluygens and the great physicists and discoverers, who have made his 
 native Holland glorious as the nursery and home of science and liberty. 
 liis remarks this evening have not only been in the line of ray lecture, 
 but his charts and drawings have made evolution visible to the eye and 
 mind at once, and so have done what no lecture otherwise could. 
 
 But what shall I say of my two opposing critics, Dr. Eccles and Dr. 
 Janes f Fortunately, by taking the last first, they help to explain the 
 lecture, and to extinguish each other. 
 
 Dr. Janes, for instance, well confirms all I said about the great va- 
 riety of limited and incomplete evolutionists ; and he joins with me in ' 
 placing Prof. Haeckel in the front rank as a naturalist and philosopher. 
 That the lecture was " inadequate " may be true, for the whole of a 
 new system of philosophy and religion could hardly be adequately pre- 
 sented in one lecture, and I claim to deserve well of you that I did not 
 further try to insert in it the •' whole world and the rest of mankind.'' 
 
 Whether wliat I did insert is -'correct" or not must not be left to 
 critics prepossessed by opposite views, but to an impartial view of the 
 wliole field. I was trying to see how the science, philosophy, and re- 
 ligion of positive monism, or monistic positivism — either will do— could 
 be held iij its extreme and most thorough statement, and without re- 
 gard to captious and verbal objections which could be picked out of 
 Haeckel or any master. I am familiar with all those clauses the doctor 
 has cited, and thiid< they amount to nothing but the using of Ilaeckel's 
 words in an anti-monistic sense. For instance, ho invokes " The Rela- 
 tivity of Knowledge." Yes, certainly ; but relative to what f Why, 
 as the rest of the sentence shows, "to our senses and brains," the 
 human mind ; as all monists say : but not at all to any " unknowable 
 entity." Then the doctor mistakenly makes me say that life or con- 
 sciousness is a " by-play of nature." No expression could be more 
 anti-monistic. Nature, as Goethe and Haeckel tcacli, has no by-plays 
 nor inside nor out. Life, mind, and the Ego are the outilowcring cor- 
 relate and glory of all nature, and no by-play at all ! But for that 
 very reason they can not be a constant, universal, eternal " ingredient " 
 in nature- any more tlian the flower and fragnince of the plant are 
 - ingredients in its roots, or the earth out of which it grows. Of course, 
 we also say: " Mental power and corporeal substance are inseparable." 
 But this substance is no unknowable entity or spook, but the prior 
 correlations from which mental action is the caused and causal se- 
 quence. 
 The doctor then makes a fog by confounding what Goethe, Haeckel,
 
 Prof. Ernst Haechel, 55 
 
 and other poets and philosophers have said about matter being " alive." 
 This he does by overlooking the distinction between the spontaneous 
 motion, or " life," of inorganic matter, and the vital and psychic life 
 found only in organized matter — i. e., protoplasm. Goethe, Haeckel, 
 Carus, and the rest of them are constantly comparing these very dis- 
 parate processes ; but no one now, with a bit of sense left, ever really 
 confounds them. They are compared for poetic purposes, as Goethe 
 does artistically and avowedly, or for pseudo-religious purposes, as 
 some modern theological " apologists " do. Dr. Carus (Fundamental 
 Problems, pp. Ill, 114, 128, 130, etc.) thus states the proper distinction, 
 made by common sense every time : " We must well distinguish this 
 kind of life in a broader sense (which is an inherent quality of matter) 
 from the vegetable and animal organisms. The former is elementary 
 and eternal ; the latter is complex and unstable, because produced by 
 a combination of the former. Spontaneity is an inherent quality in 
 all matter, and if spontaneously moving bodies have to be called 
 'alive,' we must acknowledge that nature throughout is alive, . . . 
 The word life, however, as commonly understood, is applied to or- 
 ganized life only. . . . The essential difference is the absence of or- 
 ganic growth and psychic life in one, and its presence in the other.'' 
 Then he speaks of " all organized and psychic life as evolved from 
 the general life of the universe," and he adds that a " psychic life, con- 
 sidered as foreign to our world," is the " corner-stone of dualism." 
 
 This is the monistic view, and Dr. Carus expressly states in The 
 Open Court of March 13, 1890, after a personal interview with Prof. 
 Ilaeckel at Jena, that this professor agrees with this version of monism, 
 and not with agnosticism at all.* 
 
 Now, all this is stated by monists to refute and rule out " the un- 
 knowable, substantial, inscrutable reality " which Dr. Janes gives us 
 from Mr. Spencer, and which on one side, Spencer and he say, gives us 
 matter, and, on the other side, mind. But as correlation does the 
 whole business, whence comes this fifth wheel, " inscrutable," and what 
 for ? And being inscrutable, how do we know that it has sides and 
 gives us matter or mind or anything else ? It can not be the correlate 
 
 * Dr. Paul Carus, in The Open Court of March 13, 1800. says : " Prof. Ernst 
 Haeckel is apain and again erroneously quoted as an authority in support of ag- 
 nosticism. When I visited him in .Jena last summer he very warmly expressed 
 his s.ymiiathj- with the attitude of Tlie Open Court for tal<in}j such a decided and 
 unmistakable stand against the if/norahimvs (we can not know) of agnosticism. 
 He called my attention in this connection to his own controversies with Virchow 
 and Du Rois-Reymond (especially Freie Wissenschaft imd Freie Lehre)." 
 
 The first number of The Open Court, page 17, contains the following quotation 
 from Haeckel without reference : 
 
 " I believe that my monistic convictions agree in all essential points with that 
 natural philosoph.v which in England is represented as agnosticism. ..." 
 
 Prof. Haeckel declared that he did not remember ever having written a sen- 
 tence to tliat purport, and I come to the conclusion that there is something wrong 
 about the quotation.
 
 56 Prof. Ernst Hae'ckel. 
 
 of anything ; for then it would be, as such, knowable. Can we not 
 see that " unknowability " is not a thing, but an adjective word, simply 
 descriptive of our ignorance, and exists nowhere but in our minds ; 
 when, therefore, it is applied to the objective world it is a misty an- 
 thropomorphism ; and as the basis of a philosophy an intellectual fog 
 plainly derived from theology ? 
 
 Therefore the positivists— as, for instance, Mr. Frederic Harrison 
 in the Religious Discussions with Mr. Spencer— cleared Comte from 
 this fog, and all the monists and clear objective scientists have done 
 the same. That was " the parting of the ways " between them and the 
 Spencerians, and there is no danger of those ways ever uniting again, 
 for they all see that the Spencerian philosophy as " a monistic sys- 
 tem, hosed upon this unknowable reality," as Dr. Janes repeats it, is a 
 hopeless duality. The limitations of our faculties are modestly ac- 
 knowledged, but they in no wise prove that the law of correlation has 
 an exception or a limit, much less that it ends in ^an entical " Un- 
 knowable," or leaves room for that, or for any one of the countless 
 varieties of spooks which have led up to that pseudo-idea. But those 
 limitations do prove that all our knowledge is "relative" to our- 
 selves, and "subjective and hypothetical," as the doctor states, and 
 that "atoms" are not only "hypothetical," but extremely dubious, as 
 he quotes from Prof. Haeckel, doubtless for the enlightenment of our 
 atomic friend. Dr. Eccles, who often in these lectures trots out those 
 submicroscopic spooks, as though they were realities. 
 
 These remarks clear up Dr. Janes's quotations, and do much also to 
 relieve the terror which the thunder of Dr. Eccles's adjectives, so for- 
 midable, but unnecessary, might otherwise inspire. Certainly, I have 
 not (as he says) misunderstood Mr. Spencer. I have used the very 
 words quoted and used by Dr. Janes, and which are taken from the 
 close of Mr. Spencer's First Principles, his Psychology (pp. 200, 504, 
 627 and 469, 475, 487, third English edition), and his own articles 
 printed in his Discussion with Mr. Harrison. Certainly Spencer says 
 mind is a "phenomenal process," is "co-rolatcd with nerve changes," 
 but not causally correlated with them and the world, l)ut " flows," as 
 do " all tilings," from the " infinite eternal unknowable energy." Not 
 a friend or opponent of Mr. Spencer fails to understand this posi- 
 tion. As a friend, :\rr. Fiske gives us from it The Unseen World 
 and The Idea of God, and Mr. Harrison, as an opponent, makes this 
 whole unknowable energy, power, substance, and entity religiously 
 absurd ; but neitlicr misunderstand him nor it ; nor do T, or you, or 
 Dr. Eccles. We all take what Mr. Spencer says in this regard for 
 what we think it is worth. There is no misunderstanding, but a dif- 
 ference as to facts, judgment, and conclusions. Whether the mind is
 
 Prof, E^ist Haeckel. 57 
 
 merely attendantly co-related, or causally correlated, or how related 
 to or with this Unknowable, must, according to Mr. Spencer, be forever 
 unknown, because it by this explanation becomes an unknowable " por- 
 tion " of this unknowable. Therefrom Mr. Spencer informs us that 
 it " flows," but Mr. Fiske says it " wells up." We give it up ! Science, 
 philosophy, religion, have no refuge before this entical explanation 
 except the old awe, terror, or horror of the old superstition and devil 
 worship. The theologs, mediums, and " medicine men " very naturally 
 resume their ghost dance before this unknowable spook back of their 
 knowable world, which is always their god. How different are all 
 such feelings from the healthy, rational, sustaining, scientific, cosmic- 
 emotion excited by Goethe and the monistic theory of The All, the 
 world, as a possibly knowable, an ever-correlated and an ever-causal 
 cosmos of law and order ! Kead, for instance, Goethe's poem Inherit- 
 ance, to which I have referred. 
 
 The doctor next tries to misappropriate the law of correlation so as 
 to exclude mind, because we can not " think " how its previous condi- 
 tions and correlates actually make it, and so he thinks that as an in- 
 dependent entity it " may persist everlastingly in some form." Well ! 
 what correlations are thinkable ? We have answered. None ! I have 
 pointed out, for instance, how the will can not think how it comes, and 
 so it is seemingly free. We learn by science to gradually think out 
 and know correlations, like the rainbow, music, or our thoughts, until 
 we can oversee, but probably never can exactly grasp, each detail of the 
 wonderful complexity. To grasp the law is the triumph of science ! 
 But how can a scientist, a correlationist, like Dr. Eccles, talk of mind 
 as not a correlate of the correlated world, and j-et as " persisting ever- 
 lastingly," and so consequently flitting about forever as persisting and 
 yet in " Erehwon " (Nowhere), and not see the absurdity of the situa- 
 tion ■? In a universe of solid correlation, where is the " needless point " 
 left for his uncorrelated spook ? 
 
 If, as he says, I am " arrogant " and " preposterous " because I can 
 not appreciate this position except as an absurdity, remember that I 
 am not alone. The whole school of scientific psychologists from Bain 
 and Mill and Maudsley down to the last work of Prof. James,* of Har- 
 
 * In justice to Prof. James, as he has been twice quoted by Mr. Wakeman in 
 Bupport of hi3 views, ho should be briefly heard in explanation of his own posi- 
 tion. In a note to Dr. Janes he says : •'Empiricallv, evervtliint? points to braiu- 
 activities as being conditions of our thoughts. There is thus a 'correlation' in 
 the sense of invariable antecedence or concomitance, which must be written 
 down as a scientific law. Such a law of concomitance says nothing of deeper 
 relations of causation, identity, etc.; nor, in scientific exactness, can we sav any- 
 thing rational about the relation of brain to thought. If we remain positiVistic, 
 we will write down the correlation and preteiul to no further knowledge. We 
 can t help postulating, however, that there is furtlier matter to be knon-n. . . . 
 Everything points to some sort of idealism. But the question of immortalitv 
 doesn t seem to be soluble either by science or philosophy ; it is a teleological
 
 58 Prof. Ernst^JIaeckel. 
 
 vard UniA^ersity, to say nothing of the distinguished positivists, sci- 
 entists, and monists I have already named — all deserve the same " pre- 
 posterous" epithets. But why are such epithets used? Evidently 
 they are inspired in our otherwise gracious friend by his unfortunate 
 belief in " the unknowable " — the very same unscientific faith which 
 placed more than burning words around Bruno and Servetus. Does 
 not this lapse and the tendency of that faith also show that Mr. Harri- 
 son was right in his contention that the friends of science and human- 
 ity have no more pressing duty than the exorcism of this last of the 
 unknowable spooks irom a haunted world % 
 
 hope, wliich, if the world have a teleological constitution, may have prophetic 
 value."
 
 A LIBRARY 
 
 OF THE MOST IMPORTANT 
 
 STANDARD WORKS ON EVOLUTION. 
 
 1. 
 
 Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preser. 
 
 vation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life. By Charles Dar. 
 
 WIN, LL. D., F. R. S. New and revised edition, with Additions. 
 
 12mo. Cloth, $2.00. 
 
 "Personally and practically exercised in zoology, in minute anatomy, in 
 geology, a student of geographical distribution, not in maps and in mu- 
 seums, but by long voyages and laborious collection ; havmg largely ad- 
 vanced each of these branches of science, and having spent many years in 
 gathering and sifting materials for his present -work, the store of accurately- 
 registered facts upon which the author of the ' Origin of Species ' is able to 
 draw at will is prodigious."— iVq/essor T. H. Huxley. 
 
 II. 
 
 Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication. By 
 
 Charles Darwin, LL. D., F. R. S. With Dlustratioua. Revised edi- 
 tion. 2 vols., 12mo. Cloth, $5.00. 
 
 "We shall learn something of the laws of inheritance, of the effects of 
 crossing different breeds, and'on that sterility which often supervenes when 
 organic beings are removed from their natural conditions of life, and like- 
 wise when they are too closely interbred." — From the Introduction. 
 
 III. 
 
 Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex. By Charlks 
 Darwin, LL. D., F. R. S. With many Illustrations. A new edition. 
 12mo. Cloth, $3.00. 
 
 " In these volumes Mr. Darwin has brought forward all the facts and 
 arguments which science has to offer in favor of the doctrine that man has 
 arisen by gradual development from the lowest point of animal life. Asido 
 from the logical purpose which Mr. Darwin had in view, his work is an 
 original and fascinating contribution to the most interesting portion of nat- 
 ural history." 
 
 IV. 
 
 On the Origin of Species ; or, The Causes of the Phenomena of Or- 
 ganic Nature. By Professor T. n. UcxLEY, F. R. S. 12mo. Cloth, $1.00. 
 
 " Those who disencumber Darwinism of its difScuUies, simplify its state- 
 ments, relieve it of technicalities, and bring it so distinctly witlmi the hori- 
 zon of ordinary apprehension that persons of common sense may jutlge for 
 themselves, pcrlbrm an invaluable service. Such is the character of the 
 present volume." — Fram the Preface to the American edUion. 
 
 V. 
 
 Darwiniana. F^says and Reviews pertaining to Darwinism. By As4 
 Gray, Fisher Professor of Natural Ilistory (Botany) in Harvard Uni- 
 versity. 12mo. Cloth, $2.00. 
 
 " Although Professor Grav is widely known in the world of science for 
 liis botttniculreseatvhos, but few are awaro that ho is a pronounced and nn-
 
 A STANDARD EVOLUTION LIBRARY. 
 
 flinchincr Darwinian. His contributions to the discussion are varied and 
 valuable" and as collected in the present volume thev wUl be seen to estab- 
 lish a claim upon the thinking world, which will be extensively felt and 
 cordially acknowledged. These papers not only illustrate the history of 
 the controversy, and the progress of the discussion, but they form perhaps 
 the fullest and most trustworthv exposition of what is to be properly under- 
 stood by 'Darwinism' that is "to be found in our language. To all those 
 timid souls who are worried about the progress of science, and the danger 
 that it will subvert the foundations of thefr faith, we recommend the dis- 
 passionate perusal of this voliune."— TAe Popular Science Monthly. 
 
 VI. 
 Heredity : A Psychological Study of its Phenomena, Laws, Causes, and 
 
 Consequences. From the French of Tn. Ribot. 12mo. Cloth, $2.00. 
 
 " Heredity is that biological law by which all beings endowed with life 
 tend to repeat themselves in their descendants ; it is for the species what 
 personal iclcntity is for the individual. The physiological side of this subject 
 has been diligentlv studied, but not so its psychological side. We propose 
 to supply this deficiency in the present work."— /ron^ the Introduction. 
 
 VII. 
 Hereditary Geniws: An Inquiry into its Laws and Consequences. 
 
 By Francis Galton, F. R. S., etc. New and revised edition, with an 
 
 American Preface. 12mo. Cloth, $2.00. 
 " The following pages embody the result of the first vigorous and me- 
 thodical effort to treat the question in the true scientific spirit, and place 
 it upon the proper inductive basis. Mr. Galton proves, by overwhelming 
 evidence, that genius, talent, or whatever we term great mental capacity, 
 follows the law of organic transmission— runs in families, and is an afifair of 
 blood and breed ; and that a sphere of phenomena hitherto deemed capri- 
 cious and defiant of rule is, nevertheless, within the operation of ascertam- 
 ablc law."— i^^'om the American Preface. 
 
 VIII. 
 The Eyolntion of Man. A Popular Exposition of the Principal 
 Points of Human Ontogeny and Phylogeny. From the German of 
 Ernst Haeckel, Professor in the University of Jena, With numer- 
 ous Hlustrations. 2 vols., 12mo. Cloth, $6.00. 
 
 "In this excellent translation of Professor Ilaeckel's work, the English 
 reader lias access to the latest doctrines of the Continental school of evolu- 
 tion, in its application to the history of man." 
 
 IX. 
 The History of Creation ; or, the Development of the Earth' and its 
 Inhabitants by the Action of Natural Causes. A Popular Exposition 
 of the Doctrine of Evolution in General, and of that of Darwin, Goe- 
 the, and Lamarck in Particular. Dy Ernst IIakckkl, Professor in 
 the University of Jena. Tlic translation revised by Professor E. Ray 
 Lankeptkr. Illustrated with Lithographic Plates. 2 vols., 12mo. 
 Cloth, $5.00. 
 
 " The book has been translated into several languages. I hope that it 
 may also find sympathy in tlie fatheriand of Darwin, tlie more so since it 
 contains speeiarniorpliological evidence in favor of many of the most impor- 
 tMit doctrmr-K with wliioli this greatest naturalist of our century has enriched 
 ocicuce." — From, the IWifacc.
 
 A STANDARD EVOLUTION LIBRARY. 
 
 X. 
 leligion and Science, A Series of Sunday Lectures on the Rlatione 
 of Natural and Revealed Religion, or the Truths revealed in Nature 
 and Scripture. By Joseph Le Conte, LL. D. 12mo. Cloth, $1.60. 
 
 XI. 
 
 Prehistoric Times, as illustrated by Ancient Remains and 
 the Manners and Customs of Modern Savages. By Sir John 
 Lubbock, Bart. Illustrated. Entirely new revised edition. 8va 
 Cloth, $5.00. 
 
 The hook ranks among the noblest -works of the interesting and impor- 
 tant class to which it belongs. As a resume of our present knowledge of 
 prehistoric man, it leaves nothing to be desired. It is not only a good Dook 
 of reference, but the best on the subject. 
 
 XII. 
 Winners in Life's Race ; or, The Great Backboned Family. By Ara- 
 bella B. Buckley, author of " The Fairy-Land of Science " and 
 " Life and her Children." With numerous Illustrations. 12mo. 
 Cloth, gilt side and back, $1.50. 
 
 XIII. 
 Physics and Politics ; or, Thoughts on the Application of the Prin' 
 ciples of " Natural Selection " and " Inheritance " to Political Society. 
 By Walter Bagehot. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 The Theory of Descent and Darwinism. By. Professor Oscab 
 Schmidt. With 26 Woodcuts. 12mo. $1.50. 
 
 " The facts upon which the Darwinian theory is based are presented in 
 an effective manner, conclusions are ably defended, and the question is 
 treated in more compact and available style than in any other work on tho 
 Bame topic that has yet appeared. It is a valuable addition to the ' Interna- 
 tional Scientific Series.' " — Boston, Post. 
 
 XV. 
 
 Outline of the Erolution Philosophy. By Dr. M. E. Gazelles. 
 Translated from the French, by the Rev. 0. B. Frothingham ; with an 
 Appendix, by E. L. Yocmans, M. D. 12mo. Cloth, $1.00. 
 
 " This unpretentious little work will, no doubt, be used by thousands to 
 whom the publications of Mr. Herbert Spencer are inaccessible and those of 
 Auguste Comte repellent, by reason of their prolmty and vagueness. In a 
 short space Dr. Gazelles has managed to compress "the whole outline and 
 6cope of Mr. Spencer's system, with his views of the doctrine of progress 
 and law of evolution, and a clear view of tho principles of positivisni." — 
 JVaiure {London). 
 
 XVI. 
 
 Principles of Gcolosry ; or, The Modern Changes of the Earth and 
 its Inhabitants, considered as illustratiw; of Geology. By Sir Charles 
 Lykll, Bart. Illustrated with Maps, Plates, and Woodcuts. A nwT 
 and entirely revised edition. 2 vols. Royal Svo. Cloth, $8.00. 
 The " Principles of Geoloj^y" may be looked upon with pride, not only 
 as a representative of EngUsn science, but as without a rival of its kind 
 aaywhero. GrowiiUj- in fullnea? and acwuracy witii the grouth of exT'cri-
 
 A STANDARD EVOLUTION LIBRARY. 
 
 ence and observation in every region of the world, the work lias ibcorporated 
 with itself each established 'discovery, and has been modified by every hy- 
 pothesis of value which has been brought to bear upon, or been evolved 
 from, the most recent body of facts. 
 
 XVII. 
 Elements of Geology. A Text-Book for Colleges and for the General 
 Reader. By Joseph Le Conte, LL. D., Professor of Geology and 
 Natural History in the University of California. Revised and en- 
 larged edition. 12mo. With upward of 900 Illustrations. Cloth, $4.00. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 ETolution and its Relation to Religions Tlionglit. By Joseph 
 Le Conte, LL. D. Illustrated. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50. 
 
 XIX. 
 
 The Origin of the Fittest: Essays on Evolution. By Professor 
 E. D. Cope, Member of the National Academy of Sciences. Illus- 
 trated. 8vo. Cloth, $3.00. 
 
 XX. 
 
 Animal Life, as affected by the Natural Conditions of Exist- 
 ence. By Karl Semper, Professor of the University of Wiirzburg. 
 With Maps and 100 Woodcuts. 12mo. Cloth, $2.00. 
 
 XXI. 
 
 Anthropology : An Introduction to the Study of Man and Civilization. 
 
 By Edward B. Tylor, F. R. S. Illustrated. 12uio. Cloth, $2.00. 
 
 xxn. 
 First Principles. By Herbert Spencer. Part I. The Unknowable. 
 Part II. The Knowable. 1 vol., 12mo. $2.00. , 
 
 XXIII. ' 
 
 The Principles of Biology. By Herbert Spencer. 2 vols., 12mo. 
 
 $4.00. 
 
 XXIV. 
 
 The Principles of Psychology. By Herbert Spencer. 2 vols., 
 12mo. $4.00. 
 
 XXV. 
 
 The Principles of Sociology. By Herbert Spencer. 12mo. 
 2 vols. $4.00. 
 
 XXVI. 
 
 The Data of Ethics. By Herbert Spencer. Being Part I, Vol. I, 
 of " The Principles of Morality." 12mo. Cloth, $1.25. 
 
 xxvn. 
 
 Illustrations of Universal Progress. By Herbert Spencer. 
 12mo. Cloth, $2.00. 
 
 New York: D. APPLETON & CO., 1, 3, & 5 Bond Street.
 
 BROOKLYN 
 ETHICAL ASSOCIATION 
 
 EVOLUTION ESSAYS 
 XIV. 
 
 Ten Cents 
 
 THE PHILOSOPHY OF EVOLUTION 
 
 BY 
 
 STARR IIOYT NICHOLS 
 Author of "Monte IIosa, or the Epic ok ax Alp, — A Poem." 
 
 BOSTON : 
 
 THE NEW IDEAL rUBLISIIING COMPANY 
 
 ESTE.S Pre.ss KriLniNT., 102 Scmmer St. 
 
 1S81>
 
 COLLATERAL READINGS SUGGESTED 
 IN CONNECTION WITH f:SSAY XIV. 
 
 Spencer's First Prinriplps and Psycholo(jy ; Fiske's Cosmic 
 Philoftoph]/ /Thompson's System of Psychology ; Martineau's Types 
 of Etiilriil Theory ; Peirin's lielUjion of Pliilosoi)fiy ; Abbot's Sci- 
 entific Theism ; E. D. Cope's Oriyin of the Fittest, and Evolution 
 and Idealism, (in Open Court, No. 23); Stallo's General Principles 
 of the Philosophy of Nature, and Concepts and Theories of Modern 
 Physics; hiiWiis^s iristory of Philoso}>hy ; Huxley's Lay Sermons 
 and Critiques and Addresses ; Winchell's Speculative Consequences 
 of Evolution ; Comte's Positive Philusophy ; Writinys of Frederic 
 Harrison.
 
 THE PHILOSOPHY OF EVOLUTION.* 
 
 The Evolutionary Philosophy is the latest born of time. 
 Not that it has been undreamed of in the cogitations of 
 naturalists and speculators from ancient days, but that as a 
 credible and established system its currency is very recent. 
 Its acceptance may be said to date from after the publica- 
 tion of <'The Origin of Species" by Charles Darwin, in 
 1859. And though it now assumes the air of a philosophy 
 in rank with the oldest and most honored systems, yet is it 
 in no way descended from any former system of philosophy, 
 nor even in its origin does it show relationship to them. It 
 was not born of their stock nor connected in their lineage. 
 It has not the blood of their ancestors in its veins. It is 
 rather a gypsy philosophy, born of nature under the hedges. 
 It comes not of thought, but of fact ; not of spirit, but of 
 flesh, riato had no glimpse of it, and Aristotle would have 
 regarded it not as philosophy proper, but rather as a kind 
 of mechanic generalization having no claim to place beside 
 metaphysics and ethics. It is not derived from the new 
 Platonists, nor from the scholastic philosophizing of the 
 church and the INIiddle Ages. It has no derivation from 
 Kant, though Kant, outside of his " Pure Reason," stretched 
 hands towards it; nor from Spinoza Avitli his technical and 
 tedious demonstrations ; nor from Descartes with his tauto- 
 logical cogito, ergo sum ; nor from Hegel with his vast um- 
 brage of logical sequences ; nor did Hobbes or John Locke, 
 or tlie Scotch psychologists, or Hume or Sir William Ham- 
 ilton, nor even d'Holbach with his system of Nature, nor 
 Auguste Comte in his Positive Philosophy, ever get well 
 upon tlie track of the doctrine and philosophy of Evolution 
 as we know and hold it to-day. 
 
 Rather did it make its entrance into the world from 
 quite another parentage than that of the so-called philoso- 
 phers of the old schools. For, while they were dreaming 
 and arguing, other men were examining and proving the 
 things of the material world about them ; and so it came to 
 pass that Lamarck the botanist, and Laplace the astrouomer, 
 
 * CorvuiouT, 1880, by The Xew Ideal l^iblishiug Co.
 
 344 TJie Fliilosophy of Evolution. 
 
 and Draper the physiologist, had perception of the truth 
 which all the grand metaphysicians in their reasonings had 
 clearly missed. 
 
 Of this fatherhood, the Evolutionary Philosophy got its 
 geniture ; and being itself an evolution not from Philoso- 
 phy so-called at all, but from Science, it unexpectedly grew 
 to be a philosophy, to the signal discomfiture of all the 
 previous professors of that lofty pursuit. And being thus, 
 basely born it manifests the difference of its origin and 
 blood by turning its hand against all of the ancient sys- 
 tems, itself a reckless Ishmaelite outside of the old Israel, 
 accusing them of being false pretenders to knowledge and 
 claimants of wisdom which they never possessed. For there 
 is no philosophy hitherto so-called whose dicta it does not 
 bring in question and whose conclusion it does not put on 
 trial for its life. 
 
 Now the Evolutionary philosophy in its simplicity is. 
 merely a statement of what we see about us on all sides 
 and at all times. As a philosopher the Evolutionist looks 
 about him and sees that the universe of to-day is the result 
 of the universe of yesterday, as yesterday was the result of 
 the day before that; and argues that all our yesterdays 
 were in like manner the products of the days preceding 
 them. And so he reasons, in like manner, that all to- 
 morrows Avill be the product of their predecessors, with 
 never an alteration in the everlasting procession. And then, 
 widening his view, he declares that the method of the uni- 
 verse always has been and always will be exactly the same 
 as we see it about us, one thing changing into another by a 
 restless and unintermittent procedure of which he can dis- 
 cover no beginning, nor the chance of any end. 
 
 This is saying, in effect, that this present world is a 
 sample of the whole universe, and this present time a sam- 
 ple of all eternity ; that our ])resent knowledge is the same 
 in kind with all the knowledge that ever was or ever will 
 be, to the last syllable of recorded time. Here and now we 
 have all there is of everything, at least in outline, and though 
 many tilings will be discovered in the future which are be- 
 yond our ken at present, yet will all future discoveries be 
 of the same general nature with what we know to-day- 
 They will be part and parcel of the evolution of nature, 
 along lines of cause and effect such as are familiar to every 
 one now from his early years.
 
 The Philosophy of Evolution. 345 
 
 This position is the same in philosophy with that of 
 Lyell in Geology, which has reclaimed Geology from a dream- 
 land of cataclysm and monstrosities to a world of sane and 
 familiar forces, whose effects we know and can study in 
 actual experience. It is the same position as that secured 
 by Newton in astronomy, when, by discovering the law of 
 gravitation, he dismissed the angels of all the planets, once 
 supposed to guide their revolutions round the sun, and sub- 
 stituted instead a calculable law sufficing for every emer- 
 gency. And the position rests upon the principle which gov- 
 erns all reasonable thinking, of which the law is to study 
 the known and from it to learn what is likely to be the 
 nature of the unknown, on the ground that the universe is 
 all of one piece and one order, and that there is no call for 
 any other order or law but only for the one, and that one 
 the one we already know. And the Evolutionary Philoso- 
 phy therefore insists that the more one studies the method 
 of the world about him — the present and living facts of 
 existence — the more sure is he to judge aright of the whole 
 universe and to be able to conceive the farthest range and 
 scope of its most distant possibilities. It looks down with 
 light scorn upon the assertions and propositions of those 
 who philosophize upon possible worlds with no detailed 
 comprehension of this world, who assert unverifiable propo- 
 sitions of many sorts without having mastered verifiable 
 propositions enough to steady their minds and give poise to 
 their judgment. 
 
 Now this assertion of the scheme of the universe as re- 
 sembling in its utmost reach what is known of this world here 
 and now, is based upon no less a matter than the complete 
 testimony of all the studies which men have been able to 
 make and verify respecting things everywhere. All the 
 sciences have been consulted in the formulation of the 
 dogma. Astronomy, geology, botany, zoology, embryology, 
 the utmost discoverable antiquity of the past, the widest 
 diversity of the ])resent, things most alien and separate, 
 things of the largest and those most minute, the secrets of 
 chemical action, the farthest flight of comet and star, the 
 viewless behavior of unseen atoms and the movements of 
 invisible forces, all have been taken into council and made 
 to bear their witness. Nor has the verdict been rendered 
 till each one had spoken and given his free word ; and there 
 is no dissenting voice among all of them. The doctrine of
 
 346 The Philosophy of Evolution. 
 
 Evolution is simply the widest generalization of all facts, 
 gathered from remotest orbs as well as from the gases about 
 us and the grasses beneath our feet. It is a declaration of 
 the procedure of the present from the past, of the future 
 from the present, the statement of belief that this was 
 always so and always will be so, and that the universe is 
 complete and self-regulating under the control of this prin- 
 ciple. 
 
 Being thus a generalization from natural facts, the Phil- 
 osophy of Evolution does not need to borrow weapons from 
 old reasoners or books of the past. It asks nothing of 
 nominalist or idealist ; it shows scant respect for metaphy- 
 sician or logician. It has little to say to the old disj)utants 
 about "coffito, errjo sum,''^ or the essence of being, or the 
 thing in itself, or the ontological proofs of the existence of 
 God. When reading the metaphysical philosophers, one is 
 fain to be persuaded that important interests for humanity 
 are bound up in their conclusions ; but Evolution brings 
 one to his sober senses and discloses the habit of trifling 
 which metaphysical studies give to minds devoted to them. 
 As an example, consider how many hours good minds have 
 wasted over Kant's "Critique of Pure Reason," with its 
 fruitless propositions. What is the use of reasoning as to 
 whether space and time have only formal existence or also 
 real existence, excepting as an exercise of ingenuity ? It 
 is a pretty piece of chess-playing, perhaps. And all his 
 learned discussions as to how a priori judgments are pos- 
 sible — as if there were any such reasonable judgments — 
 and the like, are they aught but mere excursions of curi- 
 osity, worthy of attention only from t^ose who have no 
 serious pursuits ? Evolution, not having been rocked in 
 the metaphysical cradle, gives cool recognition of these and 
 similar studies. It merely calls attention to the fact that 
 either side of their questions has no material proof, and 
 therefore lacks in the first condition of a verifiable propo- 
 sition. 
 
 The wide difference of methods existing between the 
 Metaphysical and Evolutionary Philoso])hies is seen nowhere 
 more forcibly than in the systems for discovering truth em- 
 ])l<)yed l)y the Transcendentalist, Hegel, and the Naturalist, 
 JJarwin, respectively. Both were men of extraordinary in- 
 tellect, of great industry, of pertinacious devotion to their 
 ideas, of wide range of investigation, and comprehensive
 
 The Philosophy of Evolution. 347 
 
 statement. But Hegel sat down in his study and gave his 
 days and nights to profound reflections on abstract Being, 
 and the course of nature as a course of thought. He then 
 developed a series of abstract, verbally logical sequences, 
 on whose lines he affirmed the universe to have been laid 
 down, and expounded them with awful toil and subtlety. 
 His main principle of the identity of contradictions proved 
 as barren as other metaphysical discoveries. The reasoning 
 was cogent, the proof by definition (if definition could ever 
 prove anything) was convincing, but still nothing ever could 
 grow from it all. Verbal propositions can produce only 
 verbal progress, and verbal progress is like Mr. Carlyle's 
 spavined horse, "all move and no go." 
 
 As if to make the futility of metaphysical investigation 
 — even if its principles were true — the more startling, 
 Hegel's dialectic had the advantage of being itself evolu- 
 tionary in its form and spirit. One proposition springs out 
 of another by a surprising derivation, resembling a real 
 parentage and sonship as closely as words can resemble the 
 facts of the world. But it proved to be valueless all the 
 same — for thought can never have the value of things, ex- 
 cept when it represents things exactly. It is otherwise 
 but a baseless fabric of vision — the cloud-world of the may- 
 be, not the land of the real. One might go on entertaining 
 its theorems for centuries, as happened during the ages of 
 scholasticism, and not a step forward for the welfare of man- 
 kind would be made in consequence. 
 
 Compare this whole i)rocedure with that of INIr. Darwin 
 in his endeavor to discover the order of natiire. Xot in 
 the closet, nor in his own mind, did he fancy that he could 
 find the principles of the universe, but only in nature her- 
 self. To nature, therefore, he applied himself, made a 
 voyage of study round the world, seeking everywhere the 
 material facts and procedure of things, comparing and sift- 
 ing verities with tireless industry and for many years, until 
 his main proposition of the transformation of species was 
 established. Then he enlarged his theory and disclosed 
 the everlasting mutation of the restless universe, the in- 
 structive and fnxitful law that anything may become any- 
 thing else if its material basis is proi)erly liandled. And 
 this phil'osophy brought, at last, the long fumbling of the 
 metaphysicians to an end. Never again could their endless 
 logomachy interest sober minds. Never again could they
 
 348 The Philosophy of Evolution. 
 
 maintain the supremacy of their industry or its claim to be 
 most worthy of human attention. Their ghosts and hob- 
 goblins began to scatter and fade in the growing light of 
 the new dawn. The emptiness and muddiness of their 
 writings began to be visible to their most devoted adherents. 
 The Darwinian fact made the Hegelian fancy look pale and 
 thin as the formless air. 
 
 And this was further elucidated by the wonderful books 
 of Mr. Herbert Spencer, who carried the evolutionary doc- 
 trine and its method of investigation through all the old 
 haunts of the metaphysicians, and showed what mines of 
 knowledge the new method could disclose, full of the silver 
 and gold of truth, where before men had perished in bottom- 
 less quicksands or quagmires of speculation, For under 
 his masterly handling the physical or physiological basis of 
 many an ancient doctrine was exposed for the first time, 
 and the material truth of which the metaphysical dogma had 
 been the confused and disconnected statement was brought 
 to light and set in its due place in an evolutionary universe. 
 Then both the adherents and the opponents of various 
 dogmas Avere angered and dismayed, to find that their con- 
 tention was a chaffering about husks and shells, while the 
 kernel of the matter had been claimed or known by neither. 
 What the Philosophy of Evolution required of the meta- 
 physicians was real proof for any of their assertions, and 
 this demand it was which brought their windy quarrels to 
 quietude. They had no real proof, and soon it became clear 
 that they never could furnish any. They had been furnish- 
 ing verbal proof, on both sides of interminable questions, 
 for centuries, but real proof in the actual working of the 
 universe there was none, and they could therefore bring 
 none forth. And when Evolution came forward, offering to 
 demonstrate by bare facts a multitude of propositions all 
 going to verify its own main principle, no Avonder it arrested 
 the attention of all and drew disciples in crowds from the 
 schools of the old teachers. For it at least furnished a 
 standard of truth, which the former had failed to do after 
 ages of painful industry. 
 
 And the main difference between Evolution and all preced- 
 ing systems is perhaps most of all in this, that its adherents 
 can verify their assertions by a standard of proof, whereas 
 the metaphysicians are still unable to do so, as they have 
 no standard, and therefore every man says that which is
 
 The Philosophy of Evolution. 349 
 
 right in his own eyes. The evolutionist appeals to fact, 
 the metaphysician to thought, with the advantage to the 
 first that the fact remains while the thought perpetually 
 changes. 
 
 A special illustration of the superiority of this Evolution- 
 ary appeal is seen in its application to those fanatics of 
 wilfulness and hap-hazard, the Intuitionalists. These 
 thinkers, of whom Ralph Waldo Emerson is the anointed 
 high-priest and oracle, were disporting themselves like dol- 
 phins in the high seas, amid what they claimed to be high 
 themes, showing an originality and brilliancy of expression 
 unrivaled. So long as they were not called upon to estab- 
 lish any of their assertions, they were very successful, and 
 astonished the empyrean with the splendors of their rhet- 
 oric and the lustre of their paradoxes. Who could surpass 
 Mr. Emerson in the courage and kindling fire of his dis- 
 course ? Who could seem nearer to nature and the true 
 order of natuTe than he ? He held his audiences and read- 
 ers enthralled, as he seemed to open to them the loftiest 
 heaven of thought and to disclose all the secrets of spirit 
 and spiritual worlds. But the arrow of evolution, alas ! 
 takes him also in its winged flight, — him the beautiful 
 Achilles, — and glancing strikes the vulnerable tendon of 
 his heel with fatal effect. For what the Philosophy of Evo- 
 lution undertook to do was, as I said, to prove its positions 
 with the amplest evidence. It would listen to everything, 
 but accept nothing without demonstration. It had no ears 
 for glittering generalities. It would have chapter and verse 
 from the Bible of fact for any proposition which the arrested 
 Intuitionalist might be inspired on his tripod to deliver. 
 This threw a coolness over the industry of those venture- 
 some and guileless thinkers, which we fear will deepen as 
 time goes on. For surely the grasshopper-like flight of 
 their thoughts is calculated to bring them nowhither. They 
 spring into the air and come down wherever God wills. But 
 Evolution, as a doctrine, builds a solid causeway of proved 
 truth through the trembling swamp of human conjecture 
 wherein they wander, — a causeway over which the nations 
 of the future may march to ever-increasing power, wisdom, 
 and happiness, as long as the world may last. 
 
 The Positive Philosophy, so-called, of August Comte, 
 has something to say to Evolution, and claims many of its 
 doctrines and benefits for its own. In so far as it induced
 
 350 The Fhilosophy of Evolution. 
 
 men to leave the pathless woods of metaphysics and myth- 
 ology for the cleared land of science it of course deserves 
 the laudation of philosophers ; but it came far short of dis- 
 covering the fundamental postulates of evolution. It was 
 itself metaphysical and fragmentary. It was so little 
 familiar with the true method of philosophizing that it at 
 last lauded its believers in the paltry and time-wasting cult 
 of its founder's mistress, and in a Eeligion of Humanity 
 which is good enough for an ideal but has no roots in the 
 nature of things. It elevates a sentiment to that throne of 
 authority which fact alone can satisfactorily hll. Posi- 
 tivism played an excellent part in its insistency that a 
 philosophy should deal with the universe itself rather than 
 with various notions about the universe. It deserves a 
 niagmim cum laude for pointing out the unsatisfactory 
 service rendered by metajDhysics. But it was only a door 
 to the method of nature, and not that method itself. 
 
 Leaving now the other systems to their own intrepid 
 adherents, let nie say that the Evolutionary Philosophy 
 seems to me to be essentially materialistic. It is true that 
 its greatest apostles, Spencer and Huxley, and Mr. John 
 Fiske as well, allege that of the two world-old dilemmas 
 between mind and matter, every analysis leads rather 
 to the conclusion that we know the universe far more as all 
 mind than we do as all matter. They do indeed deny that 
 we can claim to know its real nature at all, and so sustain 
 themselves in the airy spaces of agnosticism, declaring the 
 existence of "an Unknowable Reality" beyond our ken. 
 Mr. Spencer labors the point frequently, asserting that 
 consciousness and reason alike fail to carry us beyond a 
 knowledge of relations, which never disclose the absolute 
 reality. The permanent substratum of mental being, which 
 abides behind all the changes of thought, and the permanent 
 substance in which all the qualities of matter inhere, must 
 forever remain hid from us. liut if we were to decide any- 
 tliing as to the nature of the ultimate substance, he says we 
 should decide it to be mental rather than material, for con- 
 sciousness itself is nearer to mind tlian it is to matter, so 
 far at least as we see it internally. All our knowledge is 
 declared to be given in units of feeling at last, and these 
 units of feeling are mental. We seem thus to be crowded 
 back to the old )netaphysical basis for all philosophizing — 
 the i)riuiitive testimony of consciousness. While one may
 
 The Philosoj^hy of Evolution. 351 
 
 well pause before entering the lists against Mr. Spencer, 
 yet one is also daunted at finding himself planted on a 
 metaphN'sical bog for the foundation of a physical philoso- 
 phy, and therefore he may make a shift to get foothold else- 
 where. 
 
 And perhaps he may find such foothold in the position 
 that the units of feeling seen in consciousness are really only 
 units of force (which are recognized as the ultimate elements 
 of the external world), seen under a subjective transfor- 
 mation effected by nerve-sensibility. In confirmation of 
 this he may at least jDoint out that knowledge, so long as it 
 was discussed as composed of units of feeling, was sterile 
 of results and incapable of progress. Only Avhen it began 
 to be viewed as composed of units of force did it become 
 xiseful and open to an endless development. As an example 
 of this we may cite the futile and unprogressive study of 
 the nature of mind when conducted by the method of in- 
 trospection, or looking at one's feelings, after the manner 
 of philosophers preceding the last half century. ]Much 
 was said and written by them, all to small purpose. Mind 
 was as little disclosed as matter, and of neither was there 
 much real knowledge. Introspection merely kept turning 
 round and round in its own biishel-basket at home. But 
 no sooner did mind begin to be studied as itself a form of 
 matter, as an external object and a part of physiology, 
 than light began to appear and knowledge to advance. Sig- 
 nificant is it also, in this connection, that Mr. Spencer's 
 luminous exposition of the composition of mind borrows its 
 lucidity from the author's constant recurrence to the phe- 
 nomena of matter and material action. It might indeed be 
 called an exposition of mind considered as included in the 
 forces of material nature. In other words, though he in- 
 sists upon mind as being ultimately composed of units of 
 feeling, he expounds it as if it were composed of units of 
 force. 
 
 And this is in fact the method to which all men of science 
 are driven at last. Though consciousness gives only feel- 
 ing as its experience, and perception as the result of feel- 
 ing, and though this be asserted to be the internal and 
 primary testimony of consciousness, yet no sooner is this 
 proposition laid down than the barrenness of it begins to 
 be felt, and the faithful internal psychologist is immediately 
 hurried forth to say tliat these units of feeling appear also
 
 352 The Philosophy of Evolution. 
 
 somehow as units of force in other connections, and must 
 be treated as such in every use which is made of them in 
 verifying truth or discovering knowledge. So that we may 
 perhaps embolden ourselves at last to question the ultimate 
 character of the feelings as such, since each of us has only 
 a single witness to their existence, and that is his own con- 
 sciousness; and we may rather regard these feelings as 
 merely a subjective or special form of units of force, just 
 as sound is a special form of units of motion. They seem 
 to us at first to be units of feeling existing only in our- 
 selves ; but in everybody else, these same feelings can only 
 be observed as units of force, and the corrected statement 
 would therefore appear to be that feeling is merely a trans- 
 formed force. In other words, we correct our internal 
 experience by the larger generalization of our external ex- 
 perience and arrive at a basis which is at once universal 
 and fruitful. "We arrive at the true account of our feelings 
 by an outside knowledge got through them, which, general- 
 ized, shows that they are but one other form of the univer- 
 sal units of force. Here at last we pass over from a barren 
 introspective psychology to a fertile external universe, which 
 includes the introspection as one of its countless manifesta- 
 tions. 
 
 Consciousness is thus found to be as misleading in its 
 primitive reports about itself, as about most other things. 
 Eegarded from within it seems to be what is called a 
 spiritual or immaterial faculty, moving about the spaces 
 of the brain with the speed of light, and through the senses 
 cognizing the universe. So subtle, quick, sure, lucid is it 
 that nothing less than the attril)utes of a God are deemed 
 sufticient to characterize its nature, and it is said to be '' made 
 in the image of God." But regarded from without, how 
 different is its aspect. This Godlike apprehension is dis- 
 covered to 1)6 absolutely dependent on a brain and various 
 congeries of nerves, which are mere material substances. 
 No brain, no consciousness ; and this fine, internal, lordly 
 self-api)reciation is reduced to the modest character of a 
 function of a grey i)nlp, whioh the blow of a hammer or a 
 failure of blo(jd-siipply can reduce in an instant to complete 
 insensibility. 
 
 The external observation thus corrects or even subverts 
 the internal testimony. The ai)i)arently immaterial mind 
 is found to hang upon the material brain as the odor of a
 
 The Philosophy of Evolution. 353 
 
 rose Langs to the flo-u'er. Both are a sort of exhalation. 
 And the changes in that brain, nnder various environments, 
 embody the whole immense variety of modern knowledge, 
 whose works in the world are but a magnified magic-lantern 
 picture of slight alterations of grey brain-matter within. 
 The solidity and certainty with which this various knowl- 
 edge verifies itself in practice gives the strongest possible 
 proof of the correctness of the premises from which it all 
 springs, viz., that units of consciousness are more properly 
 estimated when regarded under their corrected form as 
 imits of force, than under their primary form of units of 
 feeling. 
 
 Perhaps both of these units may be best harmonized in 
 one unity as forms of motion, as most ably set forth by 
 Mr. Eaymond S. Perrin in his book on " The Eeligion of 
 Philosophy." Mr. Perrin's criticism of Mr. Spencer's posi- 
 tion seems to have striking validity, and to demolish the 
 necessity for supposing some " Unknowable Reality " back 
 of all knowledge, on which Mr. Spencer so stoiitly insists. 
 Motion, as the dynamical aspect of matter, seems to furnish 
 all the materials necessary to compose the universe. Matter 
 in motion becomes the fountain of all things, and thought 
 is but brain in motion, as life is but atoms in motion, and 
 knowledge is simply an active participation in the infinite 
 motion of the universe. 
 
 But if one be inclined to insist upon the testimony of 
 his own individual consciousness, and to posit mind as im- 
 'material because he feels it to be so, we can only bring to 
 bear against him the fact that in so doing he plants himself 
 upon one single experience — his own — against all the 
 rest of his knowledge, which is that of observation criti- 
 cised in detail by all that others know, and the whole course 
 of nature in its daily movement. It takes but a moment's 
 reflection to see that this last accumulation of testimony 
 affords a basis for certainty of a universal character, such 
 as never can be afforded by the weak testimony of our 
 single consciousness, which is and must always remain 
 isolated and alone to each one of us. It was dependence upon 
 this which led the Avorld of men in a fire-fl}- dance after 
 phantoms through ages, and still leads most tribes. It is 
 this which gives us a Chinese civilization in one place and 
 a Hindoo in another, and Feejis in a third. It is this which 
 gives us ten thousand sects and cranks of every hue. But
 
 354 The Philosophy of Evolution. 
 
 a distrust of individual consciousness, on the other hand, 
 forces us to the wide comparisons of modern science, and 
 the trustworthy conckisions on which all instructed men 
 agree. And on this the Philosophy of Evolution rests, — 
 not on what feeling says, but upon what corrected feeling 
 finds to be true of the units of force. 
 
 Of course this doctrine is downright materialism; but 
 then the doctrine of Evolution seems to many and probably 
 really is materialistic to the core. Nor need this be deemed 
 strange when we recall that this Philosophy was first dis- 
 covered in the material world. It was found among the 
 fowls of the air and the beasts of the field. It was cradled 
 in the manger where cattle were feeding. It had for its 
 nurses the naturalists, and it was brought up at the hearth- 
 stone of physical science. And its stronghold and play- 
 ground is still the material world. Because it places suns 
 and planets in their orbits without hands, because it arranges 
 the strata of the earth without design, because it traces the 
 genesis of crystal, plant, animal and man, step by step 
 without break and without miracle, it is accepted, and only 
 because it does so. Were it not for its incontestable fa- 
 miliarity with the history and Avays of material nature, the 
 spiritualists would long ago have remanded it to the dirt 
 from whence it sprang. But it holds to its visible facts, 
 snaps its fingers at metaphysical disproofs, and riots in its 
 tangible demonstrations, now become so profuse and all- 
 convincing. It finds no need for ratiocination, for here is 
 the daily process of nature repeating its propositions and 
 enforcing its ])hiloso])hy upon all men. And if there is 
 any work of God which is his incontestably, it is this same 
 Nature which furnishes such proofs to Evolution, and sus- 
 tains its head amid the querulous complaints of idealists, 
 spiritualists and dreamers of every feather. 
 
 But having been so born, of materialistic parentage, 
 nursed by materialistic students, reared among materialistic 
 studies, and crowned by materialistic proofs, it seems hardly 
 likely tluit it can now be sustained in any other than ma- 
 terialistic relations. Vain is it to try, as some do, to marry 
 it now into the fine old family of spiritualism* in order to 
 give it credit with minds still loyal to the old opinions, and 
 ready to fight to the death for the old tiag which has flaunted 
 
 •Tlieword S]>irit\ialifin is lien' ui^cd to denote the advocacy of Spirit as aa 
 imiuutcrial bouicwliat, distinct from Matter.
 
 The Philosojjh]/ of Evolution. 355 
 
 over so many desperate battle-fields "vrhere nothiiig was won 
 but wounds and death. The X apoleon of a new era, it can- 
 not usefully mix its fresh blood with the outworn royal 
 Austrian of igiiorant davs. 
 
 And truly, that the evolutionary philosophy is matenal- 
 istic is, to my mind, nothing against it. Xor is it that I 
 have any special antipathy toward the opposing idealistic 
 or spiritualistic hypothesis. The only interest I have in 
 either depends simply upon their truth and usefulness, but 
 especially upon their usefulness. I am willing to receive 
 any benefits from any source, and if sfjiritual or idealistic 
 philosophies have anything to give, I am glad to avail my- 
 self of their help. But they have held sway over man for 
 ages without adding serious advantages to him. They pre- 
 vailed in Christian countries to the exclusion of all mate- 
 rialism up to the beginning of this century, and seem to 
 have misused this time greatly. They did not arrest war, 
 nor banish slavery, nor diminish intemperance, nor check 
 bigotry, nor abate superstition, nor prevent persecution or 
 tyranny. In fact, while they were prevailing the world 
 dragged on, weltering in miseries, the prey of plague, pesti- 
 lence and famine, a coward before ghosts and fairies, the 
 easy victim of every natural accident, servile to kings, 
 priests and sorcerers, and devastated by perpetual fears. 
 There was small progress in thought, slow advance in knowl- 
 edge, fanciful standards of proof, little stability in propo- 
 sitions, slight discoveries in the methods of Xature. One 
 reads the records of those bewildered and disputatious ages 
 with astonishment that men could ever have been content 
 with such futilities and barrenness. Spiritualistic theories 
 were lifting their heads on all sides like a ring of serpents, 
 each hissinsr its contradictions and anathemas at the others. 
 There was little enough in the results of this devotion to 
 idealistic fantasies to make one desire a restoration of its 
 reign. 
 
 How much thinking, — how little welfare I Would it 
 have added any great benefit to the world if most of the 
 questions respecting the Trinity, the nature of the soul, 
 the nature of duty, the exact authority of conscience, the 
 nature of space and time, or the like, had ever been satis- 
 factorily settled ? Scarcely I for it is of these questions, 
 pre-eminently, that Lessing s remark is true, that the pur- 
 suit of truth is better than the attainment of it. There
 
 356 The Fhilosoi^hy of Evolution. 
 
 was and is but little in the questions excepting the value of 
 the discussion of them as sharpeners of the intellect, — the 
 same empty-handed benefit which is noisily claimed for 
 the medieeval college curriculum of to-day, on which our 
 youth are still tediously trained. Were it not better to have 
 done with futilities ? Why go on whipping for trout in 
 streams long since robbed clean of fish ? 
 
 It is therefore with impatience that one hears the reiter- 
 ated lament of public teachers and preachers over the ten- 
 dencies of the age towards Evolution and its materialistic 
 ideas. One would imagine, to listen to these wallers, that 
 there was something blighting in materialism; that its 
 marked increase during the last thirty years had been at- 
 tended with great injiiries to the human race. Whereas, 
 if one will only consider the matter fairly, this last period 
 has seen more advance in human well-being than all the 
 last 2,000 years before it. Materialism has prevailed, and 
 lias made a new world out of a sad and worn-out one. The 
 progress has been in material forms, in railroads and tele- 
 graphs, in cotton-gins and steam-driven machineries, in an 
 immense increase of wealth and luxury, in books and news- 
 papers, in applied science and philosophy, which makes 
 man handier, shrewder, more industrious, — averse to Avar, 
 tyranny, superstition, narrow-mindedness, gloom, disorder 
 and poverty. 
 
 If materialism has so many advantages to confer, why 
 should we be afraid of it ? Why should we not rather be 
 afraid of that spiritual philosophy wliich spent two tliou- 
 sand years in discussing the nature of God and the soid, 
 and human destiny generally, and duty as an abstraction, 
 leaving mankind meanwliile hungry and cold and naked, 
 the prey of disease, and the prisoner of physical and moral 
 ills ? And what insistent and l)lind folly it is to be warn- 
 ing the age against the dangers of a materialism whose 
 higliest word has proved to have more good sense and clear 
 light in it than ever fell to the lot of the best idealistic 
 discussion that literature records, from Plato down to James 
 Martineau ! Why go on cultivating the profitless sands of 
 Saliara, when tlie hills and valleys of Materialism already 
 rustle with the corn and vines whose fruits are for the 
 gladdening of the nations ? 
 
 Even from a spiritualist's point of view this material
 
 The Philosophy of Evolution. 357 
 
 philosophy is more profitable than spiritual methods. For 
 the spiritualist's clamor about duties and high aims and 
 altruistic living, and the like, is best met and satisfied by 
 materialistic methods. It may easily be shown that the 
 enormous intercourse of nations and continents produced 
 by modern commerce has done more to promote these vir- 
 tues of toleration and charity than the apothegms of Epic- 
 tetus and the sermons of Chrysostom. A merchant-ship 
 bears more than its cargo of meats or grains or goods ; it 
 bears also the good-will and friendly regard of those Avho 
 trade with each other for gain. The armies of the Chris- 
 tian Powers do not so well defend those Powers against 
 their enemies as do the commercial relations of their sub- 
 jects one with another. And if the meddling, selfish dynas- 
 ties were abolished, and all custom-houses as well, com- 
 merce would, far more than benevolent sentiments, make 
 one peaceful confederacy of German, Russian, Frenchman, 
 Italian and Spaniard, in less than a century. 
 
 So also the steam-engine, by facilitating travel, has done 
 more to destroy bitter distinction of race and religion than 
 devotion to ideal questions could do in aeons of time. For, 
 in the first place, idealistic discussions can touch but few, 
 being the pursuit of the learned; and in the second place, 
 personal contact with strange peoples and other religions 
 ■dissolves prejudice as the sun dissolves dew. By reason of 
 travel, the false and bitter slanders of one nation on another, 
 of ^ one church on another, have been disproved and de- 
 stroyed. 
 
 And a similar moral benefaction has been conferred by 
 the mere multiplication of books and newspapers by the 
 material printing-press. It is not possible for vested 
 wrongs, for ancient and established ignorances, to maintain 
 their places before the merciless fire of the daily papers. 
 JN"o artillery has such precision and range as the batteries 
 ■of the Hoe press. No adjurations to do justice and love 
 mercy have or can have one-half the poAver to realize their 
 desire as these engines of attack on injustice have to compel 
 both to be done. How many rogues have they brought to 
 justice, how many crimes searched out, how many prevented, 
 how many good causes established ! How long could a Czar 
 maintain his Siberian horrors under the steady exposure of 
 a daily press, repeating its incessant denunciations day by
 
 358 The Philosophy of Evolution. 
 
 day within his dominions ? And the press is the child of 
 materialism. It prints its sheets for gain. In the dialect 
 of the street, it is pushed to make money. 
 
 In the uses of machinery, too, we may vaunt the praises 
 of materialism in its plainest aspect. Mr. Matthew Arnold, 
 in his pleasant way, depreciates our devotion to machinery, 
 and would rather have us use the freedom of the spirit as 
 the better method. And he attacks the whole manner of 
 modern advance, and sings the praises of mere culture, — 
 "hearing and reading the best things there are going," as 
 the Greeks of Plato's time are falsely supposed to have 
 been doing for the most part. But it is quite certain, to 
 anyone who has an open eye to the world, that machinery 
 has done more to transform the world to something like 
 Plato's ideal Kepublic, in one century, than all the unme- 
 chanical centuries for twenty -two hundred years had done 
 before. Machineries of steel and wood create machineries 
 of moral and spiritual movement as well, and furnish irre- 
 sistible agencies to promote public virtue such as never 
 before existed ; and the more machinery, the wider spread 
 is virtue. "Who ever heard of a savage tribe, without ma- 
 chinery as they are, as able to do anything Avorth doing 
 except for mischief and destruction ? ^Ir. Arnoltl himself 
 remained but as the '< wandering voice " of the cuckoo in. 
 the glades of society, because his ideas could not organize 
 a machinery for their propagation among mankind at large. 
 Material embodiments are more than lofty expressions, and 
 the church itself is great, more by its machinery, than by 
 its ideas. A new machine for traveling by telegraph would 
 enlarge the human mind more rai)idly than all the colleges 
 and book-learned authors in Christendom can do. 
 
 Machinery forces men to become exact, punctual, regu- 
 larly industrious, and sober. It compels them to study the 
 properties of materials, to learn new truth constantly, and 
 conform themselves to it. Men become more observant 
 under its tuition. The commonest factory-girl has her dull 
 and aimless mind somewhat quickened and focused by the 
 precision of its work and the exactitude it demands of her. 
 It turns the vagrant savage into a thoughtful artisan, makes 
 an Ericsson, an Edison, a Bessemer, an Eifel, possible, and 
 is so far from degrading men to its level that it raises them 
 immeasurably. Think of saying that a Digger Indian is 
 degraded to the level of a Corliss Engine ! The engine is
 
 The Philosopliy of Evolution. 359 
 
 already" far liis superior, and worth more to humauit}-. 
 Machinery always elevates its employers. 
 
 See how Materialism also makes men more truthful than 
 Spiritualism. When men can be brought to an. exact bar, 
 and proved to be false, they are perforce more guarded and 
 carefi;l in their statements. Such a tedious falsehood as 
 that of the Roman church, that bread and wine are the true 
 body and blood of Christ, which has debased the minds of 
 believers for ages, could not hold its sway for an hour 
 under a materialistic philosophy. Xo more could the Pla- 
 tonic doctrine that ideas have real existence outside of the 
 brain. Men do not attempt to lie in mathematics, except 
 Avhen they have some spiritual- theory to maintain. 
 
 So, too, Ave may sing the praises of a materialistic philos- 
 ophy in that it absorbs the energies of the age in the pur- 
 suit of wealth. Never before was mankind so Avell engaged. 
 It is better to build passenger steamers than men-of-Avar. 
 It is better to build factories tlian cathedrals. It is better 
 to build railAvays than armories. It is better to dcA^elop 
 mines than to promote missions. Men are seldom or never 
 so well engaged as in making money decently. Six days 
 are not too much for profitable labor, though one day be 
 enough for Avorship, even according to Moses. 
 
 Why, then, should we hear, from our more spiritual 
 friends, a great outcry against this excellent pursuit ? For 
 it is easily seen that, since the world began, mankind Avas 
 never so well engaged in general as it is at the present 
 day. " The mad race for riches " leads to enterprise, edu- 
 cation, good health and long life. It keeps men out of 
 mischief and crime, it covers the earth Avitli great cities 
 and the water with great ships, it spans the rivers Avith 
 bridges and fills the air with voices of intelligence, it makes 
 famine impossible, and binds Avith fetters of self-interest 
 the bloody Avolves of Avar. AV'liatever is good among men 
 is largely the effect of Avealth, whether it is reckoned in 
 material goods or the advances of charity, peace, justice, 
 science, art, or jjolitics. And the Avide difference between 
 our OAvn peace-loving age and its gainful occupations, and 
 the quarrelsome and destructive ages before, is chiefly due 
 to the fact that noAv men are all seeking Avealth througli in- 
 dustry, instead of advancing religion by persecution, or 
 patriotism by Avar, or politics by lies and force, or poAver 
 by intrigues and assassinations.
 
 3&) The Philosophy of Evolution. 
 
 Friends of the spiritnal jjhilosophies who exhort us to 
 think more of their vague propositions, and to devot* our- 
 selves to God, immortality and duty, should reflect upon 
 the awful miseries which' befell those who formerly were 
 devoted to such pursuits, neglecting their bodies and worldly 
 interests the while, till a horror of great confusion overtook 
 them like a flood, and swept them down the wreck-filled 
 current to ignorance and death. There has never been a 
 better age than the present, since man has written history ; 
 and the simple reason is that man has now become materi- 
 alistic in his aims, — has turned from the bloodless spectres 
 which he formerly pursued to active care for mere flesh and 
 blood, to houses and lands and inventions and enterprises 
 and splendor and display, and whatever makes life more 
 fruitful and more abundant in material goods. 
 
 ^Materialism, which is represented as a flood that threatens 
 to drown all higher impulses, proves to be rather a Xile- 
 inundation, whose waters bear the fertilization of humanity. 
 And yet medisevalists would have us return to the dreary 
 pursuits of the spirit, where men wandered for centuries 
 living on manna and water ! 
 
 The opponents of Materialism, in their devotion to spirit- 
 ual philosophies, display many curious moral obliquities cal- 
 culated to impair a mere materialist's confidence in their prin- 
 ciples ; — as where we see them eager to sacrifice hekatombs 
 of other men, and human welfare, to the establishment of 
 their ideal visions. Look, for instance, at the idealist, 
 Tennyson, who voices in his "InMemoriam" the tenderest 
 and most reverent sentiment of the age respecting God, 
 duty and immortality, and afterwards lets himself rave, in 
 " Maud,-' to praise and glorify the multitudes of blameless 
 youth slain in that worthless and even then antiquated bar- 
 barity, the Crimean War, — because " Gods's just wrath would 
 be wreaked on a giant liar," and '^a peace that was full of 
 wrongs and shames " broken up in the awful carnage of 
 battle. As if we should say it is better for men to kill 
 eadi other in rage and hatred than to cheat each other for 
 gain. As if murder was not by far the greater crime! — 
 even if one does call it war and treat it to the luxury of 
 poetry. Materialism looks at things quite differently and 
 does not exliort us to begin killing men as a better pursuit 
 than cheating them. Materialism has its faults, but it
 
 The Philosophy of Evolution. 361 
 
 seldom loses it head or waxes enthusiastic over crimes- 
 greater than those it attempts to cure. 
 
 So much then, we may say in reply to those who are 
 afraid of Evolution because it is a materialistic philosophy. 
 As the immense body of modern knowledge, in all its vast, 
 variety, is knowledge of the properties and actions of 
 matter, it can be safely left to defend itself. That man- 
 kind will ever leave it to go back to the groping leadership 
 of metaphysics or the pursuit of the elusive mirage of so- 
 called spiritual truth, there is not the remotest possibility. 
 Like the statue of Liberty in our glorious bay, the material- 
 istic philosophy of Evolution will lift up its electric torch 
 over unnumbered generations of the future, scattering the 
 white light of its all-illuminating truth over land and o'er 
 sea, and over the ever increasing knowledge and happiness- 
 of all wise and free nations.
 
 362 The Fliilosophy of Evolution. 
 
 ABSTRACT OF THE DISCUSSION. 
 
 Mr. Ratmoxd S. Pereix: — 
 
 "When asked to criticise a lecture upon the Philosophy of Evo- 
 lution, to be delivered by Mr. Starr H. Nichols, I anticipated, in 
 accepting, a pleasure, because I knew the lecturer was capable of 
 dealing with the subject. I knew that he had familiarized him- 
 self with the general logical results of the docti-ine of universal 
 filiation or descent, so firmly established by the investigations of 
 Charles Darwin ; and I knew also that he had applied this doctrine 
 to the phenomena of mind or consciousness, which is pre-eminently 
 the realm of Philosophy. I must confess that I have been disap- 
 pointed. The lecture has closed without any exjilanation of the 
 nature of mind. The argument has been confined to a very inter- 
 esting account of the materialistic theory of society. The human- 
 izing influences of modern industrial development have been 
 pointed out. We have been shown how industrial progress pro- 
 duces social progress. The lecturer has also emphasized the uni- 
 versality of physical law, pointing out how it repeats its operations 
 with divine uniformity in all time and space, bringing into inter- 
 dependence and into fimdamental similiarity all the systems of 
 the universe, and he has declared boldly and distinctly that the 
 prime power in all this is not si)iritual but material. We can only 
 admire the courage of the lecturer in making this assertion, for 
 the reason that it is so unpopular. The great majority of relig- 
 iously inclined persons ai'e repelled by tlie assertion that matter 
 can explain everything to us. They feel instinctively that such a 
 philosophy is coarse, that it lacks sublimity, and as philosophy is 
 largely a matter of definition I must confess to a sympathy with 
 the religionists in their aversion to materialism. For matter is 
 not the ultimate fact, it is only an aspect, the statical or restful 
 aspect of universal activity, or life, and if a name must be given 
 to tlie philoso])hy of evolution which sliall distinguish it, once for 
 all, from the religious or supernatural systems, I tliink that name 
 hliould be the titdl not the materialistic i)hilosopliy. For Life is 
 the universal fact, and Evolution teaches us that .all phenomena, 
 wlietlier physical or spiritual, are forms of life. This vital prin- 
 ciple is not unknowable, for it is the simplest of all experiences ; 
 it is tlie first element of knowledge. In mathematics it is called 
 motion, in pliysics force, in biology life, in psychology mind, in
 
 The Philosojyhy of Evolution. 363 
 
 religion spirit, or intelligence, or God. All these diverse terms 
 involve ultimately the union of space and time or of the infinite 
 and the absolute. The chief advantage of the Philosophy of Evo- 
 lution is that it can explain the connecting link between mind and 
 matter, by bringing into interdependence intellectual and physical 
 phenomena, by explaining the point of contact between the spirit 
 and nature. This harmony of thought and feeling is what the 
 religionist most longs to comprehend, for it alone can bring peace 
 to the mind, it alone can dispel the contradictions which arise 
 between the belief in a divine love and the evidence of a suffering 
 humanity. The ultimate analysis which harmonizes the meaning 
 of our most general terms is a logical fact, which appeals only to 
 a class of specialists, but this analysis, so necessary to philosophy, 
 can be explained in the language of every-day life. There is no 
 limit to its applications and to its simplifications, and it will be 
 found to be the key to the Philosophy of Evolution. In Language 
 we have the connecting link between the intellectual and the phys- 
 ical. Language is a natural development, beginning in rude soimds 
 and gestures, and progressing in perfectly comprehensible steps 
 from the expression of concrete experiences to that of general 
 principles. In this vast development, resulting in the creation of 
 literature and science and j^hilosophy, there is no interposition of 
 the miraculous or the supernatural, and all the mysteries and su- 
 perstition of religion can be shown to result from infelicities of 
 speech, the lispings of primitive races, which have reached us 
 through tradition; the efforts of undeveloped language to voice 
 the abstract truths of life. The greatest feat of language is the 
 discovery of a single term to represent divine unity, the formation 
 of the ultimate generalization. The Philosophy of Evolution has 
 had its beginning in the great discovery of Darwin, who revolu- 
 tionized zoology by establishing the mutability of species, by 
 proving that organic life is a single family, developed by natural 
 agencies from a few primordial types. This theory he completed 
 by including in zoological classifications the species Man. He 
 neither attempted to show the filiation of the lower organic activ- 
 ities with chemical and physical actions on the one hand, nor on 
 the other to show the relations of higher organic life with the 
 phenomena of mind. Darwin, therefore, was not a student of the 
 mind. He was a naturalist as distinguished from a philosopher. 
 It is to such men as Meyer and Ilelmholtz, who discovered the 
 correlation and equivalence of the physical forces, and to such 
 men as Spencer and Lewes, who have established the interdepend- 
 ence of the organic and the mental forces, that we owe the exten-
 
 364 The Philosophy of Evolution. 
 
 sion of Darwin's great theory of the Descent of Man into a philos- 
 ophy of evolution; and I think that in neglecting the mental 
 aspects of the subject, the lectui'er has lost an opportunity of 
 making a symmetrical presentation of his great theme. In the 
 narrow limits of this criticism, it is possible only to suggest the 
 vast proportions of the theory of evolution. For humanity the 
 central fact of evolution is the nature of language. In language 
 we have the connecting link between mind and matter, the agency 
 which has raised man to the position he holds above other related 
 orders of li\ing beings. Language is thought, language is sympa- 
 thy, language is interaction. In comprehending its nature we 
 command the true perspective of existence, we reach the zenith of 
 intellectual life. Its categories of perception and expression are 
 universal. Gravitation and affinity and love all lead to and explain 
 it; even in the cold, clear atmosphere of thought its metaphors 
 and symbols bear out the endless analogy. The verb, the symbol 
 of acti^^ty, is the soul of language, the central fact in every sen- 
 tence, and all the other parts of speech denote simply the times 
 and places of the action or being. The sentence is the molecule 
 of thought ; it is complete in itself, containing all the elements of 
 being. It is the sentence which transforms facts into symbols, it 
 is the sentence which enables physical life to rise into intelligence 
 or spirituality. This is the ultimate analysis. It shows how social 
 development is primarily expressed in the growth of language, 
 which renders mental and moral development possible. It shows 
 us that mind and spirit are not ultimate facts, but aspects of Life, 
 and that Life means Evolution. 
 
 Dr. Robert G. Eccles: — 
 
 In the lecture and the criticism we have an illustration of the 
 danger of looking exclusively on one side of a problem. The ma- 
 terialistic mind looks only at the static side, and sees that alone; 
 tlie spiritualistic mind looks only at the dynamic side, and fancies 
 tliat is all-inclusive. Mr. Nichols and Mr. Perrin represent two 
 kindsof evolutionists: the one materialistic, repudiating tlie ideal; 
 the other idealistic, repudiating the material. Each has a half* 
 truth, and each needs the other to supplement and complete his 
 own view. But the Unknowable is tlie true basis of the whole 
 subject. Tlie philosophical doctrine of the Unknowable is not 
 concerned with knowledge that can ever be known. The phenom- 
 enal universe is infinitely knowable, but gives us no hint as to the 
 essential nature of Absolute Being. As tlie scientific problems 
 lying at the basis of this discussion are largely questions of physi-
 
 The Philosophy of Evolution. 365 
 
 ology and physics, one needs to be a physician in order to compre- 
 hend them. Matter in its outer aspects is knowable, in its ultimate 
 aspects is unknowable. Matter and force are not what they appear 
 to be to the senses. A feather is brushed across our hand. We 
 say, " The feather tickles." But this is not true. The tickle is in 
 us, not in the feather. Color is not in the objects we see around 
 us, it is the elfect produced upon our brain by an inconceivably 
 rapid vibration of the rays of light proceeding from the object. 
 Sound does not exist apart from the hearer; if there were no hearer 
 there would be no sound. "We can acquire knowledge of how the 
 universe affects us, but not of the universe itself. We know that 
 there is more than matter and motion in the universe. There is 
 Mind and Being, which cannot be explained in terms of matter or 
 motion. As to the identity of evolution in other worlds with that 
 in our world, assumed by Mr. Xichols, the theory of evolution, 
 which shows that all things tend continually to differentiation, 
 requires that there should be diversity instead of identity in the 
 development of life on other planets. 
 
 Mr. Dudley Blanchakd: — 
 
 The evolution of mechanics is one of the most important phases 
 of the whole subject under discussion, and I am glad to see it at 
 last touched upon, by the present lecturer. I rise merely, as one 
 interested in mechanical pursuits, to thank him for what he has 
 said upon this topic. 
 
 Dk. Lewis G. Jajs^es: — 
 
 As to the beneficent character of the material progi'ess of which 
 Mr. Xichols has spoken, I am wholly in agi'eement with him. 
 That this, however, is all there is of the Philosophy of Evolution, 
 I cannot agree. In all this discussion, we are questioning about 
 what we can know. Jfow, fundamental to all such considerations, 
 is the question: What is an act of knov:in(j ? What is conscious- 
 ness ? If wholly a subjective process, unrelated to material con- 
 ditions, then it is difficult to escape from the conclusions of the 
 Idealist. If wholly a product of material conditions, then we must 
 follow Mr. Nichols. But if, as I believe, it is subjecto-objective, 
 testifying at once to a thought-process which cannot be expressed 
 in material terms, and to the reality of an external material world, 
 then we must either rest in this Dualism as an ultimate and unex- 
 plainable fact, or go forward to a monism based upon the doctrine 
 of the Unknowable. Mr. Nichols says we see thought in other 
 men only as brain-motion. Now, I never have been so fortunate
 
 366 The Philosojihy of Evolution. 
 
 as to see the brains of other men think. I should like to have him 
 explain how this can be done. To me, as to Spencer, Huxley, and 
 other evolutionists, the passage from the physics of the brain to 
 the phenomena of thought is something inconceivable. 
 
 Mr. Nichols: — 
 
 Di\ Janes' s position seems to be fruitless and unsatisfactory, 
 because he never gets to anything ultimate. He must go on and 
 on, always questioning and never getting an answer, instead of 
 being satisfied to begin somewhere. It is useless to start on such 
 a quest. We can know nothing of the ultimate nature of conscious- 
 ness. [Dr. Janes : It seems that you are at last getting to the 
 Unknowable yourself.] Mr. Nichols : Your Unknowable. What 
 I meant to say was that consciousness is truly known just as other 
 things are, when its internal feeling is criticised and corrected by 
 external observation and generalized upon both. Then it seems 
 to appear that thought as observed in others than ourselves is 
 simply a motion of the brain, as digestion is a motion of the 
 stomach. The Spencerians (and Dr. Eccles will pardon my saying 
 it) are in a liopeless state of confusion over the Unknowable, and 
 their philosophy of knowledge is built on an assumption of igno- 
 rance. The position that there is such a thing as mind independ- 
 ent of brain is an unverifiable one. Dr. Eccles said that one 
 ought to be a physician to thoroughly grasp the truth of Evolution 
 — and come out where he does. Well, there is Dr. Maudsley; he 
 has some reputation as a doctor, and he is a materialist. What I 
 meant in regard to evolution in other worlds, was that the method 
 of evolution is the same throughout the universe, though the ma- 
 terials and special forms may be different. If we are willing to ac- 
 cept the ultimates as they present themselves to us, we need not 
 chase the infimte. Those ultimates we know if we can know any- 
 thing, but if we do not know them then we can know nothing and 
 there is no use in thinking. When we step beyond those ultimates 
 we land in "chaos and old night," where is nothing but dreams 
 and an aimless metaphysical whirl.
 
 Vol. I. 
 
 January and February^ 1885. 
 
 No. 1. 
 
 fWhole Number, 455.] 
 
 Subject : Co-cperation : its Laws and Principles. 
 
 [With Portrait.] 
 
 THE SUN 
 
 A BI-MONTHLY. PUBLICATION 
 
 DEVOTED TO 
 
 CO-OP-BRATION. 
 
 KANSAS CITY, MO: 
 
 C. T. FOWLER, PUBLISHER, 
 No. 16 W. Fifth St. 
 
 Copyrigkt Reserved liy The Publighcr.] [Entered as Second-Class Mail Matter. 
 
 ^ ♦ [ Price, 20 Cents. Per Annum, $1.]
 
 SYNOPSIS or COKTEKTS. 
 
 CO-OFERATIOB.— Introductory.— {!) Statemetit of its Conditions.— (2). 
 
 LIBERTY AND ORDER.- Surrender of Libertrj from Incapacity'?— {2) 
 02j'inions7-Morals%-Evils'i-{3) Critical Evils^- Crimed- {4>,. Law 
 OF SociETARV FREEDOM.— i?eap^oci<7/.—i?a<ionrtZe of Liberty.—STAivs 
 OF THE Individual. -/te Sovereignty. -(5). Function and Scope of 
 Government.- (6) Origin of Over-Oovernment.-(7). Co-operative 
 Association.— I^s Nature. Liberty in Lifk.— Its Disciplinary Power.— 
 (8) The Test of Truth.— Rectifies Conscience.— The Seal of Love.— {'d). 
 
 EQUITY —Grounds of Ownership.— iS^o< Law or Labor, but Equal Lib- 
 erty -ill) BASisoFVmc-E.-Laborvs. Skill.-(12). Competition 
 THE Regulator OFPRiCE.^^#-ec<s of ts Partial AppUcathn.-Mistaken 
 for Lack of Protection. The Currency.-(13) One of L^bor.-Und oj 
 
 Measure. — (14). 
 
 VIOLATIONS OF EQUITY. - (15) i?e««.—Pncc on Land.— Incompatible 
 with Use —Price Cancels Price.— {lb) Rise in Values.— Result of Land- 
 lord sm -(16). Interest.- i?epz/6^ canizing Credit.— {ll) How Inter- 
 est Wo/-te.- (18) Power of Usury. The Profit Making System.->Soci- 
 ety cannot Spectilate.-Cost vs. Profit. — (19). 
 
 VIOLATIONS OF LIBERTY. -Majority RuLE.-J'or Places and Person.^, 
 a Pnnciple of Liberty -{20). Co-operation vs. Corporation. -Xe- 
 qalized Privilege. Government Control- T/^e Worst Corporation.- 
 rn) Government Regulation.— A^oi on Socialistic Grounds.— Leg it- 
 imacv oftlie thing Regulated.-Must be done Natui ally. -Equal to Laissez 
 faire.— (22). Codifying the hAWS.—Contra>y to Liberty and Justice. 
 (23) Political Machinery.— A^oi an Agency. The Co-opera- 
 tor's Relation to PoLiTics.-Socra^ befoie Political Forces.- Should 
 Abstain from Politics.-i2i). Co-operative Methods All Power- 
 KUL.-Powey of Passive Resistance.- (25) Outline of Attack on the 
 Order of Business.— (2Q). Conclusion. 
 
 The Nuxt Number of Thk Sun will be devoted to The Reorganization 
 of Business, on a Labor instead of a usury basis, embracing Consump- 
 tion, Production and Exchange; or the Store, the Bank, the Farm and 
 
 Factory. 
 
 These Series of Nuniljers will aim to be practical, and contain, iit th(^ 
 end of the year, a body of instruction suitable for binding. 
 
 N. B. All Subscriptions will commence with the First Number. 
 
 Extra Copies furnished, at a discount, on application. 
 
 jji^KEADY SOON, a Supplement ..f 'Vwv. Sun on "Prohibition," 
 or the Application of Government t.) Temi)eraucc. It contains twenty 
 e; 'ht pages, and will b<; furnished for Ten Cents per copy.
 
 ^;^ 
 
 IlKKHKin" sl'KNcEH.
 
 CO-OPEKATION. 
 
 ITS LAWS AND PRINCIPLES. 
 
 Co-operation is as far in advance of civilization, as civilization is in advance 
 of barbarism. 
 
 We bave, within the last fifty years, made rapid strides in material wealth, but 
 no progress has been made in its more equitable distribution; Horace Mann. 
 
 We can calculate the relation of our exports to our imports, and measure the rate 
 of mortality, but we cannot tell bow much bread will be needed, or whether the 
 people will be able to get it. Sam'l J. Tilden. 
 
 WHAT is co-operation? From two words, con and opera^ 
 it means to work together. It is a practical instead of 
 a speculative word, and is fraught with the most fruitful 
 blessings for humanity. It is natural, therefore, that it 
 should be so generally favored as the ultimate solution of 
 the Labor Question. 
 
 But in what we are to co-operate, how, when, where, opin- 
 ion is unsettled. The truth must be sought in the nature of 
 man, as a social being. Already has it co-operated to produce 
 language and society; and through the same laws, by which 
 the world has already been formed, must it be re-formed. 
 
 THE CONDITIONS OF CO-OPERATION. 
 
 are naturally formulated under three heads. 
 
 First, it is obvious, in order to co-operate, that there must 
 be Order. This necessitates a science of Government. 
 
 Then there must be Justice., or the science of Economy. 
 
 Now, given a Umty of Interest, and we have Co-operation. 
 And have we not this? — the same eyes, the same hands, the 
 same feet? We laugh with those who hiiigh and weep with 
 those who weep. We have she same origin, the same destiny 
 and the same law of happiness. Then, may co-operation be re- 
 garded as X\xQ practical application of the science of Religion.
 
 2 TEE SUN. 
 
 THE LAW OF ORDER. 
 
 The first thing, then, to consider, is how to Jceej) order. 
 How far can a person go in his actions without being subject 
 to arrest? 
 
 Incapacity. — Can we suffer dictation, on the ground of inca- 
 pacity? Then by reason of whose capacity? What consti- 
 tutes the standard ca2:)acity? Is not folly the material out of 
 Avhich wisdom is made? Not only are they relative, they are 
 interconvertible terms. Through both runs the same warp 
 of self interest. Self help, at one's own cost, is the law of 
 growth. Everybody then has a right to the exercise of his 
 incapacity if it does not impose a burden. Every one has a le- 
 gal right to make a fool of himself, providing he pays the bills. 
 
 Ojximons. — Should erroneous oj^inions be suppressed? If 
 so, then who has got the correct one? Is not one's evidence 
 just as good to him as that of another? Does not the same 
 rule apply, Avhen my opinions seem erroneous to you, to make 
 yours so to me? Then the suppression of another's opinion 
 warrants the suppression of your own, and the suppression of 
 one calls for the suppression of all. Can an idea be hit by a 
 brickbat, much less be killed? Instead, do not "those who 
 would crush out ideas in turn perish by ideas?" 
 
 Morals. — Can bad morals be tolerated? Thought leads to 
 action. Preaching points to practice. A theory is good for 
 nothing if it cannot be put into operation. The people's mor- 
 als have their opinions behind them. Opinions cannot be 
 separated from morals. AVhat makes my morals offensive to 
 you, by the same ]>rocess of reasoning, reversed, makes yours 
 distasteful to me. The suppression business works both ways. 
 
 Emls. — Can we harbor evils? To be sure some are great. 
 But if we can suppress the greatest, then we should the next, 
 and so on till all are closed out. But evil is only a m«7-adap- 
 tation, beneatli it is a soul of goodness; to arbitrarily destroy 
 all evil would destroy the good. To call upon force indicates 
 an utter lack of all faith in virtue itself to cope with vice on 
 equal terras. A resort to force is moral cowardice, a virtual 
 self-surrender. Evil may seem to be suppressed, but it has 
 only been excited to renewed activity. Breaking the thermom- 
 eter does not alter the weather.
 
 CO-OPERAIION. 3 
 
 Critical Evils. — But some may think that when an evil gets 
 to such a crisis, that, at any moment, it maj^ break out into a 
 crime and endanger society, it should be suppressed. But iipon 
 such an elastic construction, all evils might be turned into 
 crimes. Anger would become murder, houses could be sup- 
 pressed because they burn, horses, because they kick. No, 
 the name for this indemnity is insurance, not prohibition. In- 
 surance pi'otects the community in case there is any crime, 
 while prohibition suppresses the evil before there is any cer- 
 tainty that it ever loill be a crime! Insurance covers the dama- 
 ges, but under prohibition the evil goes free from paying 
 any damages. Of course insurance- cannot cover moral ruin, 
 only moral rectitude can do that. Insurance can only cover 
 damages assessable in dollars and cents. 
 
 Crime. — A crime is an overt act of force accompanied with 
 a bad intent. It is unreciprocal in its action, destroying all 
 equality of relationship. It demands what it cannot confer, 
 and should therefore be suppressed. Why? Because in 
 exercising the supreme authority of denying to another the 
 right of habeas corinis, we cannot be too certain of our rea- 
 sons for so doing. 
 
 Not the act itself- — The reason for the arrest of crime ari- 
 ses from its relationship and not from the nature of the act 
 itself. It is not our business to prevent another from visiting 
 his vengeance upon himself, neither is he to be hindered, by 
 mutual c(*nsent, from visiting it upon others. It is not because 
 people do wrong, or we think they are doing wrong, that they 
 should be dei>rived of their liberty. The nature of the act has 
 notliing whatever to do with it. Since our })rivacy and time 
 belong to us as much as our person and property, an act good in 
 itself, may interfere with our liberty, while a bad one may not. 
 
 We have then reached the point wliich avo set out to seek, the 
 
 LAW OF SOCIETARY FREEDOM. 
 
 Ride of Reciprocity. — The only justifiable reason then, for 
 taking away another's freedom, is because another's acts adniit 
 of no reci])rocity, demanding for one's self wliat one cannot con- 
 cede, and denying to others what we demand for ourselves.
 
 4 THE SUN. 
 
 Reciprocity, therefore, is the law of liberty and the basis of 
 harmony in human relations.* Action and reaction being equal, 
 an equilibrium is maintained. This then is the one thing to be 
 subsei-ved. If liberty is arrested, it is only when it usurps that 
 of all. Then it is the arrest of only a limitation of liberty. 
 Where perfect liberty prevails, there will be perfect order, for 
 confusion cannot be conceived, where everyone has his owti 
 and attends to it. Therefore, liberty is not, as is generally 
 supposed, 'the daughter, but the mother of order.' Not your 
 liberty, solely, or my liberty, for this sect or that party, but a 
 universal, scientific liberty, verifiable by the rule of reciprocity 
 in social relations. 
 
 T/ie Rationale of Liberty is that it presupposes the integrity 
 of nature; that it can be trusted; that it is safe to leave the 
 whole of virtue with the whole of vice. As a cure for the evils 
 of liberty, gxant more liberty, for evils tend to abolish them- 
 selves. There is more hope in freedom for vice, than virtuous 
 conformity in slavery. Activity is at last the only virtue and 
 eternal vigilance its price. 
 
 STATUS OF THE INDIVIDUAL. 
 
 Individuality. — The law of liberty emphasizes individuality. 
 As things differ, they become separate. Every round in the 
 ladder of life, whether as atoms, cells, organs, or persons, rests 
 upon an individual. Everything propagates after its kind, 
 there is no hybrid. Individuality is the condition hi expres- 
 sion and of genius. It is as inevitable as that a circle must 
 have a centre, as indestructible as consciousness, Avithout it, we 
 are not. In it we live and move and have our being. 
 
 Individual Sovereignty. — Every individual is sovereign in 
 its own sjjhere, over its own affairs, a law unto itself, over 
 church and state, over treason and blasphemy. Individuals 
 existed before institutions, for them they exist, out of them 
 they are made. The individual has the right to secede, for 
 passive resistance is not a crime. No one else is thereby pre- 
 vented from giving his or her support. After voluntary rep- 
 resentation ceases, taxation sliould also cease. 
 
 ♦Confucius, when asked if there was one word which contained the whole duty of 
 man, thinking a moment, said, "The nearest word 1 can think of is Keciprocity."
 
 CO-OPEBATION. 5 
 
 Individual sovereignty is the ripe fruit of Democracy. The 
 opposite is a theocracy. One appeals to the equal liberty of 
 all; the other, to a despotic infallibility. In the one case, 
 God created man, in the other, Man is creating God. One 
 is from the Orient, the other is Occidental. One is the Pope, 
 the other, Private Judgment. One is the Kingdom of heav- 
 en, the other is the CommonAvealth of Man. Already, piety 
 and the Church rest upon voluntary support. It inevitably 
 follows that morality and the State must; for the same argu- 
 ments adduced in favor of the one are equally as applicable 
 in favor of the other. 
 
 FUNCTION AND SCOPE OF GOVERNIMENT. 
 
 . * • 
 
 Now the sovereignty of each individual implies the sover- 
 eignty of all. This then gives ground for government, to guar- 
 antee this equcil sovereignty. It exists to stop a crime by a crime, 
 but by a defensive, and therefore justifiable one, on the ground 
 that force can withstand force and make way for liberty. But 
 this sphere of government needs to be very jealously guarded, 
 for the moment it goes a step farther, outside of its specific, in- 
 dividual function, it becomes an offensive criminal. The gov- 
 ernmental machine, like any other, from its very nature, can do 
 but 07ie kind of work. If it attempts everything, it must leave 
 its own proper work undone. Then, its influence is most dis- 
 astrous. It not only becomes a thief and a criminal, but the 
 father of them. Its administration is artificial, arbitrary, ineffi- 
 cient, costly and cumbersome. And did not government orig- 
 inate in the offensive? does it not now live by and for aggres- 
 sion? and however pervasive the government of nature is, when 
 the ear marks of authority fade, will not government as a^/>gc'- 
 ialized administration entirely disappear? In every atom, or- 
 gan and star, do we see the egoistic and altruistc balaiu-e; shall 
 man, with his sense of justice, constitute the only exception? 
 Certainly, liberty can be entrusted to stand guard over herself. 
 
 Now over-government isarelic of the god-idea. For a while, 
 he ruled direct, then delegated his powers to demi-gods, then 
 to kings, by divine right, then to majorities, who could do no 
 wrong. It arises in the worship of power. Offices, officers, le- 
 gal forms, coins, stamps, 'Be it enacted,' as a 'Thus saith the
 
 6 THE SUN. 
 
 Lord,' &c, are its political fetiches. When the people are un- 
 able to detect the direct and immediate cause of any display 
 of power, they attribute it to a third person, outside of them- 
 selves and nature, which does not exist. "A gross delusion," 
 says Guizot, "is the belief in the sovereign power of political 
 machinery." 
 
 Theoretically, it exists to protect its subjects, but, actually, it 
 preys upon them. Holding up its law and order, its misplaced 
 authority produces rebellion, for, as Emerson says, "the highest 
 virtue is always against the law." The greatest re_specters of 
 authority are the most depraved. Just as those recently slaves 
 make the. most unmerciful masters, so the most ignorant are the 
 most submissive. Rebels, in all ages, have been patriots in 
 disguise, and the paraphernalia of 'patriot «6V?i' has ever been 
 the delusion of fools. ' 
 
 Now, between a superstition and the government of nature, 
 can there be any doubt as to their Jurisdiction? If it is in the 
 constitution of things, what matters it if it is 'unconstitutional?' 
 Is not what is the previous question and the one of last resort? 
 Certainly our Anti-slavery struggle should have taught us this 
 lesson, that what is legal must not stand in the way of what is 
 lawful, nor ric/ht succumb to anybody's mere opinion about it. 
 
 CO-OPERATIVE ASSOCIATION. 
 
 Co-operative association, then, is free, spontaneous, voluntary, 
 for no organization can rise higher than its source, the indi- 
 viduals who compose it. If these are free, there will be a nat- 
 ural expression of, not only the average intelligence, as under 
 majority rule, but all of it. Of course the product will not be 
 infallible, as under a theocracy, nevertheless, it will be perfect, 
 for it will be the highest and best of which the members are 
 capable. All trusts are delegated to responsible individuals, 
 not to a committee. Its jjropositions, to gain the broadest 
 assent, are reduced to their simplest terras. Each step is sure, 
 because experimental. The constitution is liberty. It cannot 
 be In'oken, lor it is not nuide. None can bolt, for nobody is 
 arbitrarily i)ouii(l. It is a creature of growth, and in the line 
 of evolution. I^diication, under liljcrty, does not need the 
 distortion of being made 'compulsory.'
 
 CO-OPEBATIOK 7 
 
 LIBERTY IN LIFE. 
 
 The importance, attached to the doctrine of liberty may 
 perhaps pardon a farther amplification of it, beyond its mere 
 immediate application to government. 
 
 Dhciplinary. — There are some who fear to trust the mas&es 
 with liberty. They hold that man's own nature is incapable 
 of self government, unless aided by a higher power, which is 
 themselve.s\ The boys may go in swimming but they must not 
 go near the water. Liberty, with them, means danger. 
 
 Now from what does this fear orisfinate unless it be the iin- 
 natural restraints of an arbitrary and external authority? From 
 this, people break away and go to the other extreme; or else 
 blindly submit to its evils, as the will of God. So it is author- 
 ity instead of liberty which is the breeder of license. Liberty 
 is the source of self help and dicipline. As such, it has a 
 right to make mistakes. Yet accountability, responsibility, 
 all the safeguards of action, are on the side of liberty. She is 
 not infallible, yet she is the teacher of infallibility. Law 
 itself is made out of liberty. Indeed, she is the most careful 
 and conservative of mortals. 
 
 The Test of Truth. — Accusations for blasphemy and treason 
 are no longer rife, but 'heretical,' 'obscene,' 'seditious' and 'in- 
 cendiary' opinions prevail. But what is heresy and scepticism, 
 except as .their derivatives imply, but an effort of the mind to 
 discover truth, constituting a neio revelation, opposed to the old 
 only in respect to its limitations? If following one's convic- 
 tions be heresy, pray what must orthodoxy be? 
 
 And what is obscenity, except such an ignorance of sex as to 
 fear the consequences of its freest discussion? And what is 
 incendiary, except an admission that the so called property is 
 merely nominal, not real? Otherwise, how could the mere 
 expression of an opinion prove incendiary? 
 
 Hectifies Co)iscience. — Without liberty, loyalty is a danger- 
 ous thing. For what above all else are we to be loyal? to the 
 Pope, or the King? Or shall we follow our convictions? But 
 what if our convictions differ, and there is a conflict of con- 
 sciences? None have been greater persecutors than jiersons 
 under conviction. When consciences differ, there is no alterna-
 
 8 THE SUN. 
 
 tive but an appeal to the law of equal freedom. Liberty, then, 
 is paramount to loyalty. Let us be loyal to liberty and every 
 other cause will prosper. 
 
 T7ie Seal of Love. — Family instinct, through blood relation, 
 first spread into tribal affection. Then single-handed combat 
 brought association and the recognition of certain collective 
 rights. But these rights only applied to certain classes, and a 
 conflict of rights arose. The only solution of this is an equal- 
 ity of human rights, which is the greatest of rights. This 
 ushers in the unity of the race, and in place of parties and 
 sects, the brotherhood of man. 
 
 When the headquarters of authority are vested in a theoc- 
 racy, there exists the supposed government of God over the 
 Devil, or good over evil, and so authority, as a cultus, ari- 
 ses. For while there are the 'good' and the 'bad,' one will be 
 sui^erior to and above the other. It will become exclusive, 
 patronizing, pharisaical, and dictatorial. One Avill form a 
 caste, the other will become an outcast. 
 
 Now, in routing these pharisaical pretenders to authority and 
 pride, liberty holds a lamp for love, by which it is seen that 
 this personal superiority does not exist; good and bad being 
 interchangeable terms and derived from the same absolute 
 root. Do not doctors now practise medicine on the principle 
 that disease is an effort of nature to overcome an obstruction? 
 
 Besides, the autliority of 'character' as a cult, must go. For 
 both free will and the divine will are subject to law. Sinq)ly 
 change places, and saints become sinners, and sinners become 
 saints. The authority therefore, of great men, as political and 
 tlieological bosses, is not greatly worshiped under co-operation. 
 
 So liberty lights up, for love, every crook and cranny of the 
 universe. The highest love it is found is only consistent with 
 the truest democracy. The pale spiritual vanishes, to be 
 sure, with its dogmatism, but "gross, vile, dead, matter" is 
 81)ontaneonsly illuminated witli miraculous power; the ghosts 
 }>ecome living beings. Of course the sacred is lost, but no lon- 
 ger is the secular profane. The divine departs, but the human 
 is transfigured and glorified. By the universal unity of law, 
 this l)ec(m>es the other world; immortality a necessity, instead 
 of a gift, and God aiul the Devil are one!
 
 CO-OPERATION. 
 
 Liberty may be called the physiology of love; one the stem, 
 the other the blossom; one the stream, the other the ocean; one 
 light, the other heat; one the head, the other the heart; one har- 
 mony, the other fusion. Liberty is each for all, love is all for 
 each. One is the perfect law and the other is its fulfillment. 
 
 We might further trace the relation of liberty to life, to hap- 
 piness, to progress: show how it is the soul of inspiration, to 
 be preferred before life itself; but it is enough if we have in- 
 spired confidence in her as a safe guide to follow, for wher- 
 ever in the broad earth life and joy are found there is liberty. 
 
 Let us then learn this lesson, that liberty is a definite, cohe- 
 rent, scientific principle: that it is regulated by its own recip- 
 rocal action of equal freedom: that it is the basis of harmony 
 and the mother of order. If she be encountered by knowledge 
 and the consensus of the competent, let knowledge perish, rath- 
 er than that liberty should fail. Though her teachings be mis- 
 leading, even indirectly destructive, yet, let 'law and order' per- 
 ish, rather than that liberty should not prevail. Yea, though 
 the sky be black with vice, and corruption stalk abroad, still, 
 keep burning the lamp of liberty, and darkness will give place 
 to light, and the whole heavens be filled with the sunshine 
 of peace and prosperity. 
 
 EQUITY. 
 
 EQUITY is the application of the principle of liberty to 
 commerce. Without coercion, injustice is impossible. Given 
 perfect liberty, and injustice rights itself. Save as a human 
 equation, there is no such thing as a principle of justice. Po- 
 litical economy, threfore, is a misnomer, and since, in nature, 
 the sup])ly is equal to the demand, cJuirity is the handmaid 
 and nurse of injustice. Without equal liberty, property is 
 robbery and price an extortion. 
 
 GROUNDS OF OWNERSHIP. 
 
 Is age or legality a final title to property V Upon what does 
 legality rest except somebody's opinion? And as to age, the 
 older a thing becomes, it goes to decay, if one should go
 
 10 THE SUN. 
 
 hsLck fa?' enough, he would come to the savage instinct. If a 
 title, originally wrong, can be improved by years, how many 
 earswill it take to make it perfect? How many more to make 
 it more than perfect? 
 
 On the contrary, legality and age, as titles to property, have 
 been constantly undergoing modification. What was the 
 decline of Feudalism, the Corn Law agitation, the slave Enian. 
 cipatiou, but a destruction of legality and age, because incom- 
 patible with the equal freedom of all. Even labor's claim to 
 property would fail, were it not that the right to exist is the 
 most fundamental of all rights and depends upon reaping the 
 results of of one's labor. Moreover, the product of our labor 
 is mixed with the product of nature and there are many things 
 indispensable to possess, such as air, light, land and water, 
 which are wholly disconnected from any labor. How is the 
 tenure of these to be determined, except upon the basis of the 
 equal liberty of all? Liberty, therefore, is the final test. 
 
 BASIS OF PRICE. 
 
 "Labor was the first price paid for anything. The product 
 of labor constitutes the natural recompense, or wages of labor," 
 said Adam Smith. Xow the question arises, is labor to be the 
 secoiul price, or does something else intervene? Is skill a factor 
 of price? Then how? The product of skilled labor is greater 
 than unskilled, for which reason, the services of such will be 
 in greater demand, and being scarcer, will bring a higher price. 
 But is this to be termed payment for skill? not at all, for, 
 while the reward of 2>ersonal services cannot be separated from 
 their natural product, the terms of the price are always reck- 
 oned from a labor standpoint. The buyer thinks only of the 
 valu(! hv. is receiving, measured by the cost of reproduction. 
 
 S/>-i/f 7JS. Labor. — Suppose an inventor's machine will do the 
 work of a thousand men, then on the ground of skill, that 
 "a thing is wortli wliat it will fetch," it should command the 
 services of a thousand lives! But suppose ihe first inventor 
 is supplanted by anotlier, or the consumers go to manufac- 
 turing their own in.ichinos, hoAv then could skill get rewarded? 
 Oh, it has j>atentc<l a jtriiiciplu of nature, and there cannot be 
 but o;i€ monopoly of a principle of nature! Either the first,
 
 CO-OPERATION. 11 
 
 by litigation, must kill off its rival or else combine and divide. 
 In either case, full payment for skill has defeated itself. 
 As competition prevails, it will be entirely lost in labor cost. 
 
 Skill cannot be compensated, it is its own reward. Compen- 
 sation means to weigh back, it is a conservation of force. Skill 
 is natural adaptation, ease of execution. Instead of being com- 
 pensated, its possessor should be congratulated. Xot so with 
 labor, its nature is to lose, lapse, die. That of the body in ex- 
 posure and fatigue; that of the mind, in anxiety, responsibility 
 and care. These should be compensated. The reason the be. 
 lief so generally prevails that skill should be rewarded, as the 
 latest refinement of slavery, arises from the fact that through 
 tricks of trade and cunning legislation it is too often rewarded. 
 But the skill of the artist, the ai'tisan, that of the scientist and 
 the inventor, we rarely ever see culminate in a bonanza king, 
 even the Savior of the world had not where to lay his head. 
 
 Labor then, is tlie data from which all just price must be 
 reckoned. That which costs much should bring much; that 
 which costs little should bring less; that which costs nothing 
 should bring nothing. All profit that cannot be calculated in 
 tei'ms of labor is something for notliing. Under no circum- 
 stances can skill be preferred before labor in determining price, 
 and after equal liberty has been realized, nothing but labor 
 will ever permanently enter into it. 
 
 COMPETITION, THE REGULATOR OF PRICE. 
 
 But this is not saying hoio mxich labor shall enter into it. It 
 is natural and proper that the seller should endeavor to get for 
 his labor its full natural product. It is also the privilege of the 
 buyer to get his goods with the least labor. This gives rise 
 to competition, which function is to equalize prices and lower 
 the cost of production. But, that competition may work be- 
 neficently, it must be free all round. If the highways are to 
 be blocked by freebooters, if the currency is to be controlled, if 
 a tariff is to destroy private contract, if business is to be run 
 by legislative Philistines, then, all the competition will be 
 among laborers themselves, nd woe be to their lot! Supply 
 and demand will now become advantage and necessity,
 
 12 - THE SUN. 
 
 producers will become speculators, prices rise, consumption de- 
 crease, corners be made, until the demand comes to the supply. 
 And what is this supply? It is a wolf, called capital. And 
 the demand — Heaven save the mark, is labor shivering and 
 stai-\'ing. And, unwittingly, mistaking a partial liberty for li- 
 cense, it is still calling upon the legislature for more protection ! 
 
 THE CURRENCY. 
 
 After a just price, the remaining element in a just exchange, 
 is a just currency. If it does not, in return, guarantee the price 
 paid, the price itself might just as well have been unjust. If 
 the price paid then be a labor one, the currency, Avliich is to 
 represent and guarantee the price, must also be a labor one. 
 A labor statistic cannot be stated in dollars and cents. Gold 
 does not measure labor, labor measures it If a whole moun- 
 tain-full of gold should be discovered, the world Avould be bank- 
 rupt; for it would be such an inflation of labor, as to totally 
 repudiate it. Labor is now the currency of the world. Gold 
 and silver are only the counters of the money changers. The 
 merchant and the farmer use no other as the basis of their 
 calculations. For, what is a dollar's worth of any thing, but that 
 thing compared with the labor in something else — an ideal labor 
 dollar? If then, a gold dollar is. but a labor dollar, why not di- 
 rectly say so, and without subterfuge, come to a speciiic basis? 
 
 Do we not all know that gold is but a gambler's lie? That it 
 costs three times as much to dig it as it is worth, and after it is 
 dug, a leather dollar would serve the purpose better? For while 
 gold is in a currency, it cannot be used as a commodity, and 
 while an article of virtu, it is good for nothing as a currency. 
 As one scarce commodity, so infinitely divisible that a micro- 
 scopic atom,* locked uj) in a Jew's safe with the key thrown 
 away, it will still represent all property and serve as a hash for 
 — ? Looking at gold from the side of labo|| it is a fiction and 
 
 ••'In»tend of itB beinf;; the value of the metal that coiilrols the valne of money it is 
 the valne of the money tliut governs the value of the metal. The value of money is 
 entirely independent of the cubntancc of which it is machr." Vhaa. Morari on Mon- 
 ey, p. 3'J. "IncreaMe the scarcity of gold to a certain degree, nnd the smallest hit of 
 It may become more ])recl()UH than a diamond, and exchange for a greater quantity 
 of other goods."' Adutn SmUh'K Wealth of Nations. B. /. Oh. XT. "Wore the cur- 
 rency nuJlcieHtli/ limited, a Hhilling might be made to do the bui^iness, or pass at the 
 value of a guinea." J. II MrVulloch. See Hicardo, Mill, Opdyke, Walker, AC. 
 A dollar's worth of nickels Is worth eight cents.
 
 CO-OPERATION. 13 
 
 a fraud, viewed by itself, it is 2i fetich, the bead and wampum 
 traffic of savage barter, an ancient prejudice for bits of yellow 
 dross, an antiquated superstition that only the precious metals 
 were wealth. 
 
 Unit of 3Iecisure. — It then, the real dollar is a labor dollar, 
 what is its unit of measure? Plainly, it must be measured by 
 its duration and intensity, with time as the unit of measure. 
 While there are many kinds of employment, there is but one 
 kind of labor, differing only in degree, so that quality, or inten- 
 sity, can be measured by quantitiy, or duration. An hour of 
 severe labor would therefore count two of ordinary labor, or 
 100 per cent, above /)ar. The labor, by common consent, stand- 
 ing at par, would be that of agriculture. For, it is this which 
 establishes the first price, it is this in which seven tenths of 
 the people are engaged and upon which the subsistence of all 
 depends. 
 
 violatio:n^s of equity. 
 
 RENT, interest, profit and taxes are the four great thieves 
 of history. Rent is the monopoly of land, interest the 
 monopoly of money, profit the monopoly of trade, and govern- 
 ment the monopoly of the monopolies. 
 
 RENT. 
 
 Under equity, we found price rested on labor. Now what 
 is land, so much dirt void of all improvements, that it should 
 bear a price? It existed before Adam, it will continue to 
 exist after Adam's descendants have passed away. 
 
 Price Absurd. — How can there be a price put on that which 
 costs nothing'^ It cannot be cancelled by labor. No labor 
 price can be set upon it. There is not so good a title to it as 
 there was under a l)lack skin, for it did cost some labor to 
 raise a slave. To put a price on land, without any labor title, 
 is to deny all property in labor, to eontiscate it. it is blasplie- 
 my; for it denies the equal paternity of nature, of air, light, 
 water, sun, from the nadir to the zenith! It is inhuman, for it
 
 14 THE SUN. 
 
 destroys equal opportunity; a man better be owned than free 
 M'itb no laud. It is, moreover, in the highest degree criminal; 
 it not only destroys human life, but denies the right of 
 existence; for if the land can be sold, it can be entirely owned 
 by one man. 
 
 Incompatible loith Use. — Price on land, not only debars many 
 from gaining possession, but having got possession, its use for 
 living purposes, is in no way enhanced by having a price, on 
 tlie contrary, the less the price the better. 
 
 Price cancels Price. — Nor is one benefited when he comes 
 to sell, for he has to pay back again just what he gets. It 
 is supposable that all must have somewhere to stay, and 
 since one lot is only worth another, similarly situated, what 
 matters it whether we get Si. or §1000. a foot? And even if 
 one has a small income from rent, it is more than counterbal 
 ancedby the rent paid out again in the enhanced cost of living- 
 Society, then, gains no wealth from price on land. It is as 
 great a delusion as the belief, once prevailing, that only the 
 precious metals were wealth. 
 
 Rise in Peal Estate. — In America, immigration assists the 
 'boom' by reason of the desirability in new association. But 
 to put a price u])on this, is to sell one's self! Profiting by such 
 a boom necessitates an endless march towards barbarism! 
 The human race cannot always keep going "West! Finally it 
 will bring up where it started. The ebb and flow neutralize, 
 producing a calm. There is no longer any rise. And as soon 
 as the people find themselves paying the old selling price, they 
 come to their senses only to find themselves loaded up with 
 vahies representing nothing! Only a few capitalists, a few 
 drones, the first denizens of this frog pond or that sheep pas- 
 ture, now called Boston, New York and Chicago, who by 
 sijuatting in labor's hive, profit by the rise in real estate. 
 
 The Pexults of Landlordism are antagonism, waste, dilajji- 
 (lation, s(piah)r, disease, conflagrations, poverty and crime. It 
 is an lieirlooni of war and shiverv. It does not guarantee an 
 cfjual sliare of what land the people want to use, but, until the 
 pound of flesh is \),xu\, prevents its use. In New York, it once 
 took five acres of ground to supj)ort one German gardener, 
 and tiiat by hard work. Now, the 'unearned increment' of this
 
 CO-OPERATION. 15 
 
 plantation commands the services of 5,000 'born thralls' of 
 Wm. Astor. Every 10 years, according to the rate of increase 
 on the investment, the city, from rent, is rebuilt and given 
 to the land-^r(7s/ Already, in Fifth Avenue, the ground 
 rent exceeds the improvements, and io! there are the Five 
 Points! In 10 years, these five acres will call for the labor of 
 10,000 men; this is London. In 20 years, it takes the labor of 
 20,000 men. Yet still, the land 7'ises! In 30 years, it takes 
 the labor of 40,000, in 40 years, 80,000, in 50 years, 160,000! 
 Good heavensi where can they all stand? how can they live? 
 They cannot live, twelve are in a room, the sewers give way, 
 life is unbearable, death a boon, home and citizenship are al- 
 iens, the city sleeps on a volcano. Was Paradise a gardeyi'i 
 here is a living hell! Hark, there is the sound of an explosion, 
 the heavens are filled with a lurid glare, revolution has begun! 
 Now shiver the palaces of glass, now shrivel the rainbow col- 
 ored walls and not a vestige remains of the iniquitous system* 
 
 INTEREST. 
 
 Interest is the twin of rent. It has no labor equivalent and 
 denies the right of private property. It is not payment for 
 any service performed, nor, since loans are made on security, 
 is it for any risk incurred. Neither is it payment lor a share 
 in nature's increase, for this is free and equal to all. Neither 
 is it because capital employs labor, for capital is the child of 
 labor,and when properly organized, can employ itself. Inter- 
 est is a tax on exchange, through a monopoly of credit. 
 
 Republicanizing Credit. — Money is not a 'tool,' a 'medium,' 
 or even a 'representative' of value, it is simply so much tcater, a 
 floating account. And banking is but a method of securing, or 
 keeping those accounts. It is not a 'creature of law,' but of 
 commerce. The right to issue money is as inalienable as the 
 right to produce. It is 'law' which has wrought all the mis- 
 chief with money. If it is not solvent, can it be made so by 
 calling it 'legal tender?' If it is already solvent, can it be 
 made more so? If the banks should discard the trade dollar, 
 what could the government do? Then why meddle, why 
 
 ♦i'here is no foumlation in uii' uic, or natural laws, why a sef of icords on parch- 
 ment, should convey the dominion of laud.— Blackstone's Commentakies.
 
 16 THE SUT. 
 
 interfere? Only to profit by the monopoly of the currency. The 
 necessity of interest, when National bank notes are issued at 
 one per cent., and greenbacks in London, are above par in gold, 
 is no longer an 02:>en question. The only question is, who, and 
 what kind of property, shall share in the benefits of free bank- 
 ing. It seems to us that he who is able to furnish security, of 
 whatever character, with which to redeem another person's 
 money, is amply able, with proper machinery, to issue his own. 
 Otherwise, the sinner becomes greater than the redeemer.* 
 
 How Interest Works. — Suppose the world's capital is $100,. 
 000. at ten per cent, interest, employing 100 men at a dollar a 
 day. The first year, the capital increases to 8110,000. But 
 there is only $100,000. of money with which to pay $110,000. 
 How is it to be done? Out of the products of labor. Capital- 
 ists never finally pay any interest, they simi)ly charge it over 
 in the fonn of liigher prices. Those Avho never borrow pay all 
 the interest. The cost of living has now risen 33 per cent., wa- 
 ges are 66f cents. In ten years,^interest and principal double; 
 wages are now 33^ cents a day. In twenty years, interest and 
 principal quadruple and Avages are 33^ cents less than nothing! 
 
 But, actually, this result is sooner reached. As production 
 advances money must increase. But there is only so much to 
 be had. Credit must therfore be substituted, and debt incur- 
 
 *THE TRUE INWARDNESS. A Farmer discounis, at the bank, his note of $loOO 
 or $900., what really occuris? 
 
 (1) They exchang • notes. (2) Both notes promise gold dollars, but neither has 
 any. (3) Intrinsically, one note is as good as the other. (4) In addition, the far- 
 mer gives to the banker a deed of trust on a $.3X)0. farm. (5) In case the farmer 
 fails to pay, the farm can redeem the banker's (gold?) and if the bank fails, its as- 
 sets are the solvency of its patrons, therefore, (6) The real specific basis of the 
 bank is the farmer".-* security. (7> Redeeming another's money ix equivalent toissu- 
 ing one'g own. (8)The farmer then gives his money away, to buy it back! (9) 
 The banker draws interest on what he owes. (10) The shave of S 00. was for hand- 
 ling the farmer's money. (11) All the farmer lucked to issue it, was the machin. 
 ery. (12) For questioning the right to monopolize this machine, so that the far- 
 mer can save his interest, danger signals are sounded, and yon are denounced as a 
 •'wild cat," a"red dog" and u ■'communist." 
 
 During the war the government desired to move a box of hard tack from an Illi- 
 nois farmc^rto a wounded soldier. But there was no medium of exchange. So we 
 go over and b rrow Irorn a .Jewish broker a lump of gold, giving therefor an inter. 
 CMt-bearing bond, wiih the fiirnier and soldier as bondsmen, through whom the 
 hard tack has been i)ai(l back three times. The interest on all the Ijonds being 
 many times the value of all the slaves over which the war was waged ! 
 
 W. II. Vanderbilt owns §47,0.) ,0 '■. in U. S. bonds, bearing interest at the rate o' 
 $l,88.5,(Ko per annum, or 88.-'»8 per minute. 
 Congress has 189 bankers to l.T farmers, yet there are four farmers to one banker. 
 "Pay your National debt in 17 installments of interest, at Cpercent." — A. Johnson.
 
 CO-OPERATION. 17 
 
 red, until there are many times as much owed as there is cash 
 with which to pay it. So that by the fifth year, whatever the 
 crops, times begin to grow "Aarc?/" By the seventh year, with 
 wages at a minimum, capital fails to make its accustomed div- 
 idend. The mills shut down and a corner is made on the con - 
 sumer, which is facetiously termed '•'•overproduction!'''' But turn- 
 ing people out of employment is not the quickest way to make 
 them consume. So business becomes blocked, it cannot sur- 
 mount usury, engagements go by default, failure ensues, confi- 
 dence is lost, and d, panic begins, during which the people are 
 sold out for 33 cents on the dollar. Hard pan is now reached, 
 and at a nominally lower rate, the machine is wound up again! 
 
 Pow&' of Usury. — If only one dollar had been loaned, at a 
 simple, 6 per cent, interest, when Christ \\'as born, it would have 
 now more than eaten up the entire world of solid gold! Can 
 anything be more conclusive, that interest is a legal fiction? 
 What an awful gnaAving upon the vitals of labor must there 
 have been through every dollar! There is no rate of interest, 
 but what, when compounded, will devour all property, enslave 
 all men and finally destroy itself! If Vanderbilt's income is $50. 
 per minute, and his brakemen's Si. per day, what is to become 
 of the train of human destiny by the time W. H. V. Jr. begins 
 to crawl out of has cradle? The public will surely by that time 
 be 'damned,' with Malthus to carry. Every |1,000. of teaser, in 
 Western Union, commands the seiwices of an operator; loaned 
 for 50 years, at 15 percent., it would be worth more than 20 
 skilled mechanics, at $3. per day; making them bring but $50. 
 apiece, one twentieth the price of an ordinary negro. In- 
 deed, it was recently reported that Rothschild had an incum- 
 brance on and was about to foreclose the Holy Land! 
 
 The monopoly of money is, literally, the monopoly of every- 
 thing that money will buy. Kent tells where one may work, 
 interest, xoheii^ how long, and what one must receive. Between 
 these two mill stones, labor is completely crushed. The 
 more it writhes and struggles, the more deplorable its lot, 
 imtil it costs less to keep the average worker than the average 
 convict. 
 
 "O tull them in their palaces. 
 These lords of land and money. 
 They must not kill the poor like bees, 
 To rob them of life's honey."'
 
 18 THE SUN. 
 
 THE PROFIT MAKING SYSTEM. 
 
 We here pass the tariff monopoly of 43 per cent., corners on 
 coal, corn, pork, wheat, sugar, oil and the staples; on transpor- 
 tation, telegraphy, patent rights, &c., to speak of profit making 
 as a system. It is enough to know that society cannot specu- 
 late off from itself. If one charges his neighbor something 
 for nothing, it comes back to him again in a circle. Profit 
 thus abolishes profit. While each one gains nothing, all lose. 
 But under the cost system, while none lose, all indirectly gain. 
 Count then the waste under profit. If there is room for but one 
 lealer, he makes a monoj^oly. Soon there gets to be two, when 
 they have to raise prices. A third comes, and they form a 
 'pool', a fourth causes bankruptcy. Every city directory now 
 illustrates this state of affairs. Moreover, note the cost in dis- 
 play, rent and advertising. The consumer pays all the bills.' 
 
 But, greatest of all, is the, demoralization attending profit. 
 Under cost, the interests of buyer and seller are identical, 
 under profit, antagonistic. One has one price, the measure of 
 justice, the other has many, measuring the gullibility of its 
 customers. One serves, the other trades. Trader, traitor 
 and traducer all come from the same word. Robbery, once 
 the respectable profession of pirates and freebooters, is now 
 the pastime of bulls and bears. Secrecy, deception, lying, 
 cunning, 'tricks of trade,' 'shop-made goods,' adulterations, 
 overproduction, failures, strikes, panics, lawsuits, wars, all are 
 begotten by the profit making system. 
 
 TIOLA TTONS OF LIBERTY. 
 
 MAJORITY RULE 
 
 BY majority rule, we do not mean a majority vote, which 
 selects between two necessary evils, for nobody's liberty .is 
 thereby infringed. We mean the coercive power of numbers, 
 indeed, a mere comparison of numbers, for Avhat constitutes a 
 majority in one place or at one time is a minority at another 
 place and time. The same number that it takes to elect one
 
 CO-OPERATION. 19 
 
 to office in one town niiglit defeat liini in tlie next, and if a 
 third candidate be in the field, a minority can elect its man, 
 while the majority go unrepresented. What is the real signifi- 
 cance of 8 over 7 ? Of course the 8 rule and the Y are ruined 
 until 1 goes over, when the 8 are ruined and the 7 rule, all by 
 a majority of one! \Yhat an- inviting field, where vested 
 interests are at stake, for bribery, lying, blackmail, bulldozing, 
 jerrymandering and 'returning boards!' Some call these the 
 corruption of the ballot box, but they seem to us to logically 
 flow from the rule of the majority. 
 
 Now since all admit that thei-e should be some limit to ma- 
 jority rule, the only question is what shall it be if not the equal 
 liberty of all? For, che last minority, by the next step of liber- 
 ty, is expecting soon to be in the majority. The equal sover- 
 eignty of all, will then be the last majority. Politics follow 
 Protestantism; as George the Third was Pope, so now major- 
 ity rule is our political Bible. But every new protester 
 destroys its authority in favor of equal sovereignty. Yox 
 popull vox Dei, means the voice of Liberty, each and every 
 one of the people, not that of a mere majority. Majorities are 
 always wrong. God speaks only to individuals. "One with 
 God is a majority." 
 
 CO-OPERATIOX versii^s. C ORPORATION. 
 
 Co-operation is a natural Avord, corporation is a legal one. 
 One is free, voluntary, spontaneous: the other is chartered to 
 act as one body. But co-operation has all the strength there 
 is in each individual and, when occasion arises, can act as one 
 man. Why then become incorporated so that, whether you 
 will or not, you are obliged to act as one man? In order to 
 exclusively control, for private gain, nature's resources and so- 
 ciety's social franchises, such as the use of water, gas, trans- 
 portation, banking <fcc. It is an artificial, legal, man of straw, 
 with powers and privileges legislated into him, which are 
 denied to the natural man. In being addicted to stealing from 
 the public, it soon learns, tlirough a ring within a ring, to steal 
 from itself. What possible benefit can the whole people^ 
 under co-operation, derive from a cliarter save what is already 
 granted by nature under the right of private contract? They
 
 20 TEE SUN. 
 
 seek no profit, nor any limitation to tlieir liabilities, If some 
 can live by act of Congress, others will have to steal or stance. 
 
 GOVERNAIENT CONTROL. 
 
 Government control, is offered as a substitute for what is 
 called the 'corruption of corporations,' but this would be jump- 
 ing from the fiying pan into the fire. Is not the government 
 a corporation, the father and boss of all the rest? Better a 
 thousand ordinary corjiorations, than one governmental corpo- 
 ration, for there would then be some room for competition. 
 What if the government should run the roads 'at cost,' at whose 
 cost? unless it be at the people's cost. 
 
 GOVERNMENT REGULATION. 
 
 But, is it asked, are not public functions amenable to govern- 
 ment regulation? But the selling of a paper of needles is a 
 social function, which brought A. T. Stewart as exorbitant a 
 revenue as that of any bank president. Publishing the N. Y. 
 Herald is a social function, dependent too upon the small earn- 
 ings of the poor, yet its editor connnands a salary larger than 
 that of all the Presidents combined. Should Bennett and Stew- 
 art therefore be regulated by the constable? What principle of 
 liberty have they violated? Whom have they injured? Not 
 then, on socialistic grounds, can governmental interference be 
 justified. 
 
 But it may be farther claimed that exclusive monopoly leads 
 to extortion, that there cannot well be but one gas company, 
 one water works, one telegraph and railroad between two 
 points, one pass through mountain canyons, one Iloosac tunnel, 
 one Panama canal, any more than there can be more than one 
 Atlantic ocean or Mississii)pi river; to block up these, would be 
 a crime, to make exorbitant charges, would be robbery, tliere- 
 fore, they should be regulated. Quite true, but the regulation 
 of a thing implies the legitimacy of the thing regulated. We 
 do not regulate the small pox but quarantine and abolish it. 
 So of corporations, their monojjoly rests in legislative pi'ivilege; 
 it cannot be regulated, it must be revoked.
 
 CO-OPERATION. 21 
 
 But, aside from their legal franchise, corporations are com- 
 posed of individuals, a natural product, as such, they must 
 be reorulated in a natural manner. How can this be done save 
 by letting them alone? To interfere with their business is an 
 unwarranted violation of the right of private contract. Con- 
 gress cannot regulate nature. Efforts at regulating the rates 
 of interest have only tended to raise the price of money. So 
 of the hours of labor, they can no more be regulated by legisla. 
 tion, than the rising and the setting of the sun. Only the organ, 
 ization of industry can do that. Did every Trades Union in the 
 country to-morrow get ten hours pay for eight hours work, they 
 would relatively be no better off, for the corresponding in- 
 crease in the cost of production would leave their lot the same. 
 This regulating business is government's chief delight. Hav- 
 ing first created inequality of conditions, it further likes to 
 tinker at them, until like quack doctors, it lives off of the 
 diseases its own medicines make. 
 
 Wherein then, upon last analysis, is the touchstone of 
 criminality, for instance, in a railroad corporation, justifying 
 governmental interference? It lies in the monopoly of the 
 roadbed. These are piiblic highways. But, do you ask us if 
 we expect to release this monopoly through a set of lawless 
 bar-room sprawlers on the banks of the Potomac? We answer 
 no. There are more natural, direct and potent agencies, 
 through which to regulate both Congress and the corporations. 
 
 CODIFYING THE LAWS. 
 
 If the State cannot rccfulate nature, can it make her laws? 
 What is a law? We speak of the laws of matter as uni- 
 form modes of motion. They are natural^ inherent, universal. 
 Thou shalt not injure thy neighbor is the law of justice It 
 is inherent and born of experience: had it come from outward 
 authority, history would not have presented the spectacle t)f all 
 progress being a rebellion against authority. If there is no 
 universality in the law of justice there can be no equality be- 
 fore it. The penalty also, for the violation of the natural law 
 of justice follows, as a natural consequence. 
 
 Now note the operation and effect of all man-made lavs. 
 Since things are intrinsically right and wrong in themselves,
 
 22 TEE SUN. 
 
 any outside calling tliem so cannot alter the fact, either more or 
 less. Since the authority of the law is internal, not even God 
 himself can add to its obligation. Therefore any declaratory 
 jDart, however perfect, has not only no force or operation what- 
 ever, but to im))0se its outward authority, violates liberty. 
 
 But this is not all, it obstructs the free and full execution of 
 the natural law. Not being inherent, it is inapplicable and 
 gives rise to endless constructions, interpretations, and amend- 
 ments. Ethics become confused, litigation arises and a legal 
 hierarchy is instituted. Technicalities spread a net for the 
 unwary, allowing the guilty to escape. The interpolation of 
 justice has become its travesty. The law, being no longer 
 universal, saints and sinners, legally speaking, become inter- 
 changeable, with the geography of the country. 
 
 But, worse still, the penalty of the law, also, becomes most 
 arbitrary and unnatural. For, whoever heard of nature send- 
 ing the gout, for a sprained ankle? Or for the violation of 
 one member, condemning the wj/iofebody! 
 
 But, do not the complex relations of our civilization demand 
 certain rules and regulations? Yes, and have we not got them 
 in the customs and usages of the common laxo'i Thev have not 
 come doM'n from the State house, but vip from the people. We 
 certainly do not need any "Be it enacted," as a "Thus saith the 
 Lord!" Out of the 47 state law factories, with an annual prod- 
 uct of about 5000 laws, we are unable to find more than half 
 a dozen that concern the whole State, such as the state alms 
 house, hospital tfec, and these could be much more economic- 
 ally provided for, through voluntary co-operation. The rest, 
 omitting those usurping local jurisdiction and amendatory of 
 former blunders, are really for private gain, though profess- 
 ing to be for the public good. 
 
 The laws are but the enactment of the peoples' prejudices 
 and their administration, the enforcement of their wills. Law- 
 yers ought to be saints, if handling the laws makes one such.* 
 There is hardly an epithet too degrading for onr neighbor, who 
 is limning for ottice, until he is elected our law-maker! 
 
 •rherere are three kindn of lawyers, first, those who possess a natural sense of jus- 
 tice, second, thoHt; who work f or ii client to win, ihrough hook or crook, third, those 
 legal vultures who prey on innocent people. 
 
 John Smith wii.- so trnnlilcd with JoncH' turkeys that he put tliem in llie i>()un(l. 
 Smith was provoked and sued for damage, wliich the judge awarded, on the ground 
 that, while cattle, sheep and geese were specified, turkeys were unmentioned '.
 
 CO-OPERATION. 23 
 
 POLITICAL MACHINERY. 
 
 After the laws, let us notice what influence the political ma- 
 chineiy has upon liberty. Its theory is that of an agency, with 
 the people as principal. But whoever heard of a leading firm 
 becoming partners with Tom, Dick and Harry, on election 
 day? When did ever a business firm 'set up' its agent at a 
 primaiy, or consider itself committed to the verdict of a ma- 
 jority at the polls? What firm allows its agent's salary to be 
 many times that of its principal? or turns him loose, without 
 bonds or instnictions, into his employer's vineyard? Even 
 though this agent be caught stealing, he can only be white- 
 washed! However big a scoundrel, he cannot be discharged! 
 whatever be his record, there is no certainty of promotion! 
 Then there is the presidential agent with his 100,000 office seek- 
 ers. Certainly this kind of an agency is not the one recognized 
 by law or business. What then is it? It is a^. relic of kingly 
 prerogative and arbitratry power .All further doubt of which 
 Avill be expelled when it is remembered that, through compul- 
 sory taxation, this beautiful agent of ours does not allow his 
 principal even to audit his own accounts! Should he attemjjt 
 to keep the books of the firm, this SAveet angel of an agent 
 would pounce upon his principal with a whole standing 
 army at its back, shouting, "Your money or your life!!" The 
 citizen becomes subordinate to the soldier. The question then 
 seriously arises as to what use any one has for such an agency! 
 
 THE CO-OPERATOR'S RELATION TO POLITICS. 
 
 We have seen that government can create nothing; that 
 it does not generate, only eat; that it cannot make character; 
 but in turn is stamped by it; that it contains no moral power; 
 and that without public opinion, it could do nothing. What 
 use, then, has the substance for the shadow? does the weather 
 need the thermometer? Politics do not liberate society, soci- 
 ety liberates politics. They simply show how far the peoi)le 
 have outgrown their superstition and can govern themselves.* 
 
 ♦There is no need of the natiunal government farther than to protect the nationiil 
 boundary. A wise and frugal government will restrain men froui injuring one 
 another, leaving t)iem otherwise free to regulate Iheir own pursuits of industry and 
 improvements, taking not from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. •/»;irer»o/(.
 
 24 THE SUN. 
 
 Now, in tliis work, there are but two parties. One is thej^ar- 
 ty of liberty, complete and logical, and the other is the party of 
 authority, complete and logical. One i)oints to God in the Con- 
 stitution, 'a strong government,' with an informer and a spy in 
 every house. The other leads to self government, to the Dec- 
 laration of Independence and Co-operation. Between these 
 two there can be no middle ground. They are as antipodal as 
 the poles. Are there any so toothless as to suppose that there 
 can be a compromise of methods? 
 
 But it may be asked, is not the ballot the American method? 
 Did it not free the slave? Is it not the present method of 
 political education? And may not proj)ortional representation 
 be gained through a majority vote? 
 
 But proportional representation, instead of being gained by 
 majority rule, is, in so far, its abrogation. As the half-way 
 house however, between tyranny and liberty, it is indefensible. 
 In the face of the principle of liberty, representation, by per- 
 sons, may be just as tyrannical as that of places. And so far 
 from majority rule being the means of political education, is 
 not rather the end of political education to escape from it? 
 
 And as for majority rule having freed the slaves, the oppo- 
 site occured. The tyrannical mandate of party faction did 
 bring on the war but it did not free the slave, tlie slave freed 
 it. As to the method of the ballot being American, it was 
 not used by the Tea Spillers nor does the Declaration seem to 
 countenance it. After a hundred years of voting, the country 
 through this centralized power, is in the clutches of the worst 
 monopolies. What then has the ballot done for labor? "What 
 has it done for Ireland? AVliat is it now doinj; for the neirro, 
 for our large cities? Indeed, so vital is the governmental sitle 
 of co-operation, that it cannot move a step on the majority rule 
 hypothesis, it separates friend from f<je, lie who would forego 
 co-operative for political methods must be a fool or a knave. 
 
 But, to the co-operator, there need come no disapi)ointment. 
 No more promises for him, green in the bud, but l)lasted in thi. 
 fuUillment. No more deception of the money power mas(|uer- 
 ailiiig behind ])olitical parties. No more obfuscation of labor 
 that it can get something for nothing through the legislature 
 without having jtaid for it twice. No more voting for a man 
 you do not know, to do he knows not what. No more waiting,
 
 tO-OJrERATION. 25 
 
 compromising, swapping, deceiving. Vale, then, the "setting 
 wyf at tlie Primarv, the imbecile harangue, the "striker", tlie 
 political trick! Vale the saloon influence, the demagogue, the 
 lobbyist and the law maker! Have we not the people, public 
 opinion, social and business organization? to seek expression 
 through the legislature, would not only be slavish but suicidal. 
 
 When the C;hurch is social worth. 
 When the State house is the hearth , 
 Then the perfect state has come. 
 The republican at home. 
 
 The position then, of the co-operator is to rigidly abstain 
 from the j)olls. He cannot possibly use political methods. Ac- 
 cept what the different parties say of each other, as the truth 
 about all, including the last; for it is majority rule that consti- 
 tutes every party's platform. The ballot is the high art of not 
 minding one's o.vn business. Polling booths are approved 
 appliances for herding American cattle. Every voter is,of ne- 
 cessity, not only a slave, but a slave drivei*. The people think 
 they vote, when through the machine, they are only voted Be- 
 cause they are allowed a majority vote, is no sign that they are 
 represented. A majority vote, where noses are counted instead 
 of weighed, is only a government of rats. The great American 
 fallacy is in supposing that, having the form for the substance, 
 such is a government of democrats. 
 
 But, to be practical, the government exists for property in- 
 stead of personal rights, does it not? How then can you escape 
 from the dilemma of buying votes? And are not these substan- 
 tially owned already by being in the clutches of the usury sys- 
 tem? Besides, you have got to get a majority of noses all over 
 the States, if it takes a hundred years, before any locality can 
 call its soul Its own. And supposing you get the requisite 
 number, numbers do not settle a principle, they rest on force, 
 and where great vested interests are to be jeopardized by the 
 mere triumph of numbers, a resort to force is inevitable On 
 the other hand, where there is an inordinate reverence for the 
 governmental Moloch, civil toar ensues! A tie between some 
 future Butler and lilaine, as at Lincoln's election, will precip- 
 itate such a result. The ballot box, then, leads to the cartridge 
 box. They are the rich man's tool and the poor man's ti-ap. 
 
 Then, in the first place, majority rule for labor cannot be ob-
 
 26 TEE SUN. 
 
 tained, second, it would not be wanted, if it could. It is worth- 
 less in the nature of things. And if it was either desirable or 
 obtainable, it could not be executed under the present business 
 agencies. The labor question, primarily, has nothing whatever 
 to do with politics, but of dollars and cents, of business and 
 book-keeping. And need it further be shown that the organ- 
 ization of the almighty dollar wields a far greater power than 
 the ballot? The seat of government is reallj'^ no longer in Wash- 
 ington, but in Wall street. The President may be in position, 
 but, whichever party rules, Gould is in power. Steam and elec- 
 tricity already have divested government of its sovereignty. 
 It is then the organization of industry that is needed, and the 
 cZisorganization of politics.* 
 
 If to morrow, government were perfect, and immaculate, it 
 would make no difference, business would all the same have to 
 be reorganized, by the people tliemselves, before they cease 
 to be cheated. Bu^,, the moment this is done, instantly politics 
 become obsolete. They are always on the side of the loaves 
 and fishes. The mill stops running, when the water goes dry. 
 
 CO-OPERATIVE METHODS ALL POWERFUL. 
 
 The methods of liberty are her ends. Instead of voting^ 
 petitioning, praying, organize to immediately enter in and 
 take possession of all the rights and iiniiimiilies of self gov- 
 ernment. This is the simple, the direct, the i^eaceable and 
 self respecting way. It is also the concrete Avay, easily taught 
 and immediately remunerative. It is nature's way, therefore 
 the necessary and on/i/ one. Do you doubt your business 
 ability? That is just what capital says is the matter with 
 you! Are the people not yet ready? That is but confirming 
 the verdict of the aristocrats of all ages! 
 
 The way to ac(piire one's rights is to use them. Outside gov- 
 
 *Politic8 come from the Hiime word iiH})oUct/, and demagogue too, is a word in diw- 
 repute: prjliticB being tabooed in well orlered nociety. '"As licentious as a 
 prievt; art gluttonous as a priest; as greedy as a priest," was once a current 
 remark. Now it is "as tricky as ii i)()liticiiiii ; as unreliable as a politician ; as 
 ';orrupt as a politician." "No man, who has a reputation at stake, will comiiromiKe 
 it by running for Cougress," says president Kliot of Harvard college. Congress 
 is the standing joke <)f the country, '"Is lliat thing running still !■'■ and '"Now that 
 it has adj.)iirned. we may e.\i)cct a season of prosperity," are heard. Preesidntial 
 slection year i s called ''thi' o/Tyear" in l)usin('ss.
 
 CO-OPERATION. 27 
 
 ernment is then impossible. Failing to do this, one deserves 
 to be a slave, for all the abuses of government are thus 
 invited and made necessary. What folly, standing on the out- 
 side preaching, while the dog is on the inside eating, or idly 
 complaining of the best there is, while lifting not a finger 
 to supply anything better. 
 
 Nothing can cope with the power of peaceable, passive resist 
 ance in the exercise of one's rights. Through an arbitrary law 
 you may 'drive a coach and four,' but all the powers of nature 
 reinfoi'ce those who co-operate with her. Possession, by exer- 
 cise, is every point of the law. No outside, arbitrary power 
 can reach it, to attempt it would be like fighting the elements 
 the sea, tire, air, electricity. 
 
 Let us cease then, longer leaning on the arms of paternal 
 government; let us no more be deluded with the sophistry of 
 the economists. Let us begin at our own doors and organize 
 business on a labor instead of a usury basis. Let us stuj) divi- 
 ding, by closing the holes whereby the producer fails to get 
 what he produces. 
 
 Where we now come in contact with the usury system and 
 support it, let us begin, with consumption, and organize a sup- 
 ply department, by pooling our custom, and selling it to our- 
 selves, at cost. This is the outlet of the old and inlet to the new. 
 Having a place where a solvent currency can be redeemed, 
 in everything that money can buy, upon the property of 
 the members, as a bank of issue, mutual banking begins and 
 interest is abolished. Government cannot prevent the people 
 effecting their own exchanges, while 1)7 per cent, of them are 
 already being accomplished with commercial jiaper. 
 
 Having a free currency and a store needing sujjplies, produc- 
 tion, manufacturing, self employment, follow. There being 
 no dividends, the interests of labor and capital are identical. 
 
 We have now a conij^lete epitome of business, consumi)tion 
 production and exchange: the bank, the store, the farm and 
 factory; Avhose superior organization must draw all other 
 stoi'es, banks and factories to it. 
 
 Let the tariff monpolists keep up their own establishments. 
 
 If a bonus is to be paid to capital, the consumers must share it. 
 
 Let the people organize a blind pool, to build up thit 
 
 road, to bankrupt that, to bid in its stock, get straddle of its
 
 28 TEE SUN. 
 
 directory, squeeze out its water, and run one road at cost. In- 
 deed, they have so lavishly built and giv^en away so many, 
 roads, one would suppose that they could afford to build one/ 
 Let it run from Kansas to Virginia, via Harper's Ferry. Of 
 course there would be no tariff on rails, nor interest on bonds, 
 hardly any labor even, for the army of strikers and tramps 
 could lend a hand, and without money, since the farmers have 
 plenty of supplies! Why always dream of free travel when 
 it only requires the guarantee of one's custom to obtain it? 
 Moreover, selling 'short' in Yanderbilt's lines might leave a 
 handsome bonus besides! 
 
 Then, too, the laborers of 'New York, Boston and Fall River, 
 who have so often in rent, rebuilt those cities, could move down 
 to Fortress Monroe! It does not take forty years of wander- 
 ing now to find a Paradise. What, the outlook for labor des- 
 ultory? The air is full of j^romise. Everything conspires for 
 it to take posesssion of its own. Already the old usury sys- 
 tem is asking for a receiver. Fear not then monopoly, the 
 fittest survives, and the monopoly of capital, antagonistically 
 organized with itself, can never compete with labor harmoni- 
 onaly organized. All hail, then, the world's creators, — nature's 
 aristocrats; to hell with the drones in the human hive. Fear, 
 force and fraud have had their day. Welcome, Liberty, 
 Equity and Light, harbingers of Universal Co-operation ! 
 
 " The greatct^t vantage for humanity 
 Is this, that each does everything for all, 
 And each in turn receives froni.al) the same. 
 
 How little one contributes to the whole 
 
 How much however one receives from all I 
 
 How little more is needed after all 
 
 For concord bliss and peace. 
 
 Than the will of all 
 
 To seek in life itself the good of each I"
 
 '^PEOHIBITION;" 
 
 OR THE KELA llON OF 
 
 goyeb:n]mji:nt to temperance 
 
 The most important question of the hour is what is the proper function and 
 province of government. 
 
 THE Proliibitionist holds that iutemperance is the great and 
 ci-ying ftvil of our time ; that it is the direct cause of much 
 of our taxation, and most of our crime, therefore the State 
 should interfere to suppress it. 
 
 SUPPRESSION OF EVILS. 
 
 Now no one dispiites the evil of intemperance, suppose we call 
 
 it the greatest of evils. If government can or ought to suppress the 
 
 greatest, then it should tr}^ its hand at the next in importa nee. If 
 
 two pigs are tearing up the sward in your yard is there any i-eason 
 
 why, while driving out the one that weighs one hundred pounds, 
 
 you should leave the other, which counts ninety and nine ? That 
 
 would be a discrimination only against one pound of rooting ! If 
 
 the greatest evil can and ought to be suppressed, then the next 
 
 gi-eatest evil can and ought to be supi)ressed. The Living Issue 
 
 says, "There was consumed last year in the United States 3, 212,- 
 
 000,000 cigars. This twin brother of the drink curse will demand 
 
 the same methods now advocated by the Prohibitionists. The pi-in- 
 
 ciple will be settled as to alcohol, and then may be easily extended 
 
 to include all such useless and destructive agents.'' The Living 
 
 Issue is both logical and consistent, and the Christian Statesman 
 
 ah-eadv reports a law, in Kansas, to the eflect that no dealer shall 
 
 sell tobacco to a person under sixteen years of age. The 'old man' 
 
 will now have to go and get it himself, which serves him right !
 
 2 PROEIBITION. 
 
 Tobacco is a poison far more dirty and deadly than wiiiskey. 
 Unquestionably its nse is a 'great evil,' the useless expenditure for 
 which would support all the schools and churches. Supposing only 
 12,000,000 people in the United States use tobacco and these spend 
 but five cents per day, the annual expenditure would amount to over 
 $20,000,000. And it is well known that the unnatural thivst and 
 craving, born from the stimulation of tobacco, calls for the use of 
 strong drink. If then, on the ground of the evil, one should be 
 suppressed, the other ought to be. 
 
 Tea and Coffee are evils quite as wide spread and insinuating, 
 if not .so palpable, as the evil of intoxicating drink. The American 
 indulo-es in it for the same reason that the French and German use 
 their extract of grapes and of barley. On the ground of evils, I 
 see no reason why one should be suppressed and the other not. 
 Tea and coffee are no more a necessity than tobacco, and it proba- 
 bly costs the people four times as much. Then there are patent 
 medicines which are a gi-eat evil, being often times but a mere dis- 
 guise of the drinking habit itself. These of course should be 
 suppressed. 
 
 Evils of Eating. — But if what is drank is so injurious to society 
 how much more so are the evils of eating ? How can the dividing 
 line be drawn when the use of intoxicating di-inks follow a diseased 
 ai)petite ? The bar naturally succeeds the table's cuisine. Where 
 a few die of delirium tremens, all dig tJieir graves with their teeth. 
 The race dies, on an average before thirty years of age, and half 
 before they are seventeen, all brouglit about, directly or indirectly, 
 through the stomach. If governmental interference is justifiable, 
 on the ground that a tiling is an evil, wliat better argument could 
 the disciples of Trail and Jack.son and Graham have for abolishing, 
 at one fell swoop by act of Congress, or an amendment to the Con- 
 stitution, the use of meat and pastry ? 
 
 Evih of Dress m s(mie respects outdo the evils of eating and 
 drinking. What more heart rending subject to contemplate tiian 
 the corset! Consid(!r all the vital functions compressed into the 
 .smallest sjjace, tlu; lower portion of tlie lungs in disuse, and the 
 ril)S lapping each other ; is tlierc not here a suljject for legislators 
 to pondtu- upon ? And in order tliat the law may be faithfully exe- 
 cuted, should not the District attorney be empowered, upon suspi- 
 cion or complaint of a member of the Y. M. C. A., to visit any house 
 and diligently search it? Most assuredly he should; if any law 
 should l)e nuide against an evil, it should be executed. 
 
 Hpirihial Evils.— Bui what are bodily ills compared to the evils 
 which prey upon the .soul. Wiiat a far reaching evil is that of
 
 EVIL OF SUPPEESSION. 3 
 
 wrong preuatal conditions, passing its inilueiice along through he- 
 redity. Recently, in Boston, the city of purity and cultuie, 175 
 babes were exhumed from the sewers. But when the 'paternal' 
 nature of our government is full}'^ understood, nothing more of that 
 character need to be feared, under the argus-eyed surveillance of 
 the legislature. 
 
 Evil not only hovers about us in our infancy, but it follows us to 
 the grave. According to Dr. LeMoyne, the cost of funerals exceeds 
 that of the public schools, more than our annual product of gold 
 and silver. And after the people are buried, the poison that exudes 
 from their bodies, to contaminate the air and impregniite the waters, 
 fills the world with disease and death again. On the ground that 
 it is within the province of government to suppress evils, should 
 not the disciples of cremation get out an act preventing the church's 
 burial of the dead ? 
 
 Then there is the evil of poverty, with its degradation. Now 
 Socialists claim that the State should be one great work-house. 
 Then there is the evil of infidelity and our religious friends would 
 have the catechism taught by the State, and their churches untaxed, 
 because they are doing so much good. They would likewise have 
 Ingersoll suppressed because he is doing so much harm. But reli- 
 gion sometimes goes astray, becomes fanatical and superstitious. 
 SluiU revivals, then, be suppressed ? They must, of course, if when 
 tlie Infidels get into power, they can show tliem to be an evil, that 
 they produce nervous derangement and cause a Freeman to kill his 
 own child in imitation of Abraham. 
 
 Now the genuine Calvinist holds that there is no ]}(trticular evil, 
 but that all is evil until it lias been rodcemed by sovereign grace. 
 Suppose now we let out to the elect all the remaining evil in tlie 
 world, to abolish on shares. The first article in their Constitution 
 would be, "■Resolved that God has given the government of the woi-ld 
 over to His saints." And the secoiul H'ould read, '■'■licsolvcd that we 
 are tlie saints." The wjiole world woulil be given over to the sup- 
 pression business ; everybody's evil suppressing everybody's evil. 
 The moment one ([uestioned another's authority for so doing, he 
 would be instantly suppressed. All that would remain in tlie world 
 would be an old intolerant, dried-up Johovaii as tlie the emltcMli- 
 ment of the elect. On each side would ))e the Y. M. C. A. and the 
 W. C. T. U. ; and St. Jolin, Joseph Cook, and Anthony Comstock 
 would be liis special agents ! 
 
 The last and greatest evil, then, recpiiring suppression would 
 be the spirit of intolerance, or the sujipression business itself. For, 
 to this complexion have we come at last, that if one evil can be sup-
 
 4 PROHIBITION. 
 
 pressed for the "public good," then is there no stopping place. If 
 we are justified in suppressing one evil, then we are another and so 
 on until all are closed out. What kind of a state of society this would 
 lead to may be conjectured. The massacre of Saint Bartholomew 
 was only one application of the paternal principle ; when every sect 
 and party get to putting heads on to each otlier, then we may see 
 a perfect hell on earth. 
 
 Then we may conclude that governmental interference in the 
 case of (tny evil is unjustifiable. However injurious it may be, and 
 however conduci\c it would be to the piiljlic welfare to have it re- 
 moved, it is plainly not the province of government to attempt to 
 do that vmvk. People may be unwise, immoral, imi)ure, corrupt, 
 and it is the business of government to look on as an idle spectator. 
 All cases of imbecility, immorality, impurity, are beyond its juris- 
 diction, "WW* with which it has no more to do than it has with bad 
 reli jrions. 
 
 «• 
 
 CRITICAL EVILS. 
 
 But it may be said that, "Evil is the beginning of crime. To 
 claim that a man may be arrested after getting drunk and not pre- 
 vented from getting drunk is folly. It would be like damming up 
 a stream without stopping the spring, or locking the stable door 
 after the horse had been stolen. As prohibitionists we do not claim 
 to suppress all evil, only its dangerous character, whicli, at any mo- 
 ment, may break out into a crime." 
 
 But murder often results from anger, slander from malice, theft 
 from avarice ; shall the State therefore suppress anger, malice and 
 avarice ? Can we tell just where anger leaves ofl" and nnu'der com- 
 mences ? Are we sure tliat all cases of drinking will result in a 
 crime, or that any particular case will ? If not, then the arrest of 
 evil, on the ground that it will terminate in crime is purely con- 
 structional, (lep(!ndent \\\w\\ public opinion. If the critical condi- 
 tion of all evils is tiius to be left to Madame (Jrundy, who is safe ? 
 
 "But," says the proiii])ilionist, "neither can any prove that a 
 critical f\il will not result in a crime ; the probabilities arc that 
 it will, who is then to indemnify society against the risk?" But 
 this is an entirely dific'rent thing from prohibition. Iku-ausc the 
 critical condition of mules is such tliat they somelimes kick, is an 
 amendment to tiie Constitution to be advocated abolisliin<r mules ? 
 Houses Hometimes burn, should they, therefore, those that do and 
 those that do not, all be prohibited ? No : i)rohibition is not the
 
 JrERFECT FREEDOM. 5 
 
 thing, but insurance is what is wanted. If the mule were a free, 
 moral agent, he shoukl be put un(hn- bonds to keep tlie peace or be 
 sent to a reform scliool, and tlie liouse sliouhl be insured ao-ainst 
 damage in case, there ever is afire. In the case of insurance, a man 
 is put under bail against tlio ]ial)ility of his running away. Under 
 prohibition he is hung without giving liim a chance ! On the ground 
 that an evil is criti('al, proliibition would either suppress before there 
 was any certainty that it ever will be a crime, or else through a 
 mistaken view, permit it to escape altogether from paying anv dam- 
 ages, in case it should become a crime. Surely such a kind of pro- 
 hibition is plainly untenable. 
 
 INSURANCE vs. LICENSE. 
 
 It may here be asked if the jirineiple of insurance is not equiv- 
 alent to a license? No, for a license is levied indiscriminately 
 upon the good and bad alike. Insurance is only placed on risks 
 mcurred. A license is the same to all. Insurance is high or low ac- 
 cording to the risk. License is a tax. Insurance is only a security. 
 License finally comes out of the drinker. Insurance comes out of 
 the pi'ofits of the saloon keeper. In the case of license, it may fall 
 far short of the damage done, or be far in excess of it. In the case 
 of insurance the liquor deale^- is held responsible for the exact amount 
 of damage, when it occurs. If it does not occur, he is unrestricted 
 in the sale of liquor. 
 
 LIRERTY THE BASIS OF ORDER. 
 
 "Then eveiy one is to do as he pleases. Individual liberty is 
 to be so extolled as to preclude all jiuthority, order and discipline. 
 Every thing is to go on in a laisscz-fuirc way until it plunges over 
 the Niagara of crime. The youth is to be permitted to taste, tlie 
 taster to become a moderate drinker, the moderate drinker to be- 
 come a drunkard, the drunkard to become a common drunkard, 
 until lie at last blows out his wife's brains, makes paupers of his 
 children, and dies of delirium. Great is the liberty of license!" 
 cries the prohibitionist. 
 
 Ncal Dow sjiys "Wc do not wisli to interfere withonc's private liberty to (/nwA." 
 How then will he vto)) intemperance r He ehiinis to proliiliit only the riiiht to itrll. 
 How then i!< one to have the rijilit to drink, if there is no place where one can K»'t 
 anythtng to drink ? It ic like the boy's |)light when his mother told him he might 
 go in swimming, but lie mniit not go near the water. But the late Constitutional 
 amendment, now advocated, puts a quietus on all this liberty business. It says 
 fermented liquor shall not be sold, mauufactuted, or used.
 
 6 PROHIBITION. 
 
 In reply, let us say that we have now reached that portion of 
 our subject, where we can assure the prohibitionists that they 
 are the instigators of license, and we the sticklers for order. 
 We propose to show to them that we are really more friendly to 
 them than they are to themselves. For, in exposing their errors, 
 we are prepared to rescue for them the real truth underlying their 
 cause. If this is rejected, there is not the least ground for them to 
 stand upon. 
 
 How is it possible for the prohibitionists to detect the beginning 
 of ci'ime when they do not know where an evil leaves off ? How 
 can they ever expect to suppress the one, when they fail to allow 
 proper latitude for the other ? Without recognizing the proper 
 liberty for the individual how can they prescribe the jjroper order 
 for society ? In their utter confusion as to the line of deniarkation 
 between evils and crimes, must they not get tilings mixed ? And in 
 suppressing the things which ought not to be suppressed must they 
 not inevitably /rt«7 to siipprcss the very things which ought to be pro- 
 hibited ? Besides, in suppressing things which liave an equal riglit 
 to be free will they not be provoked to regain their equal rio-hts 
 through subterfuge and artifice ? And in tlius Ijrcaking loose from 
 SMchunnatural and arbiti'ary bonds, will they not, to find an equilib- 
 rium, go to tlie other extreme ? Then it is the prohibitionists, 
 wlio are tlie abettors of license and crime. In their blind frenzy 
 to pervert a republican form of government to ecclesiastical ends, 
 it never occurs to them to iitilize the common law against commoii 
 offenses ? Wliy have they never, under tlie law against fraud and 
 misrepresentation, indicted any saloon keeper for adulteration ? 
 Instead of preying upon the social recreations of the beer gai'den 
 and the wine table, why have they made no arrests for disturbing 
 the peace ? Instead of complaining that tlie licpior (ralfic confers no 
 good, but imjjoses such burdens upon the tax payers, why do they 
 not hold the individuals directly resjjonsible for the damages they 
 incur? If a drunkard cannot pay his fines, why is he not .sent to 
 an asylum to work it out ?* And if In; repeatedly disturbs the peace 
 and taxes the comimmity, why not keep him in an asylum until 
 .society is assured of no encroachment ? lint how could the prohibi- 
 tionists be expected to properly administer a government of which 
 they have no conception ? However, as advocates of "law and or- 
 
 * If tho HiilDoii kci'pur gels the wiiguK of tlic drinker, who in then arrowted, and 
 hn« 110 money with which to pay hit* line, beside throwing his family on to the tax 
 paycifrt for support, how can they become indiMnnlllcd? f^an tlie saloon keei)er be 
 held iiH particf Jig crimmixf No the drinker must be held solely resjionsible for 
 the effect of his drinking; the saloon k('e|)<T simply dous the sellin},', the same ae 
 the selier of llrearms, or teas: be cannot be made resjionsible for what the users of 
 hesc articles do with them, The drinker should be made to remunerate the 
 tax payerp.
 
 LIBERTY AND ORDER. 7 
 
 der," we must hold them responsible for the overt offenses under 
 the common law. In omitting their opportunity here, they fritter 
 awav their advocacy ; and we certainly should have to suspect them 
 of insincerity, were it not apparent that they are as blind as they 
 are sincere. 
 
 We would have our friends remember that the doctrine of gov- 
 ernment herein advocated is no loose affair . Liberty, in its recipro- 
 cal action, is very severe and jealous in the discipline it inculcates. 
 Its mill grinds so exceeding small that no trespasser can escape. 
 There are as manv justifications for the arrest of crimes as there 
 are ways to commit them. The defense of liberty needs no special 
 statute, it is the result of ages of human experience, and tliere is 
 great unanimity for its enforcement. It requires no decoy detectives 
 or eaves-droppers. Societary equality is the collective side to indi- 
 vidual liberty. The reaction of tlie one is equal to the action of 
 the other. The equilibrium and poise of nature are reproiluced in 
 the harmony of society. It is impossible to conceive how equal 
 liberty can lead to license ; to suppose so would be a contriuliction 
 of terms. As Proudhon said, it is indeed "the mother of order.' ' 
 And the dictatorial imposition of "law and order," reganlless of lib- 
 erty, is the mother of disorder. Where there is perfect liberty ti.ere 
 will soon be perfect temperance ; but where libex'ty and equality are 
 denied, ignorance and tyranny and license ensue. 
 
 SOCIETY vs. THE INDIVIDUAL. 
 
 But prohibitionists claim tliab the interests of society are greater 
 tlian those of tlie individual. Now in what respect are the claims 
 of society greater or different than those of the indivitluals who 
 compose it ? To be sure society is tlie aggregate wliile tlie individ- 
 ual is only a part ; measured by (jHdutUij one is greater than tlie 
 otlier ; and in serving the whole tlie indiviilual is greatly gloritied. 
 But in doing so the standard of society's welfare is lirst reflected in 
 one's own self interest. The source of its autliority comes back to 
 the individual. J^ven in times of public danger, the sovereignty of 
 the individual supersedes that of society. The individual is then 
 sovereign over what he shall eonsi«ler a public danger, and whetlier 
 or not his oivn danger is included. That would be a pretty 'public 
 danger' where it should be the fate of the citizen to get an unmer- 
 ciful Hogging, in order to appreciate the danger of the situation ! 
 If then, in times of war the individual is supreme, lie is certainly .so 
 in times of peace. Society can claim no rights that do not primarily 
 belong to the individual.
 
 8 PROHIBITION. 
 
 If the rights of all individuals wei'e any greater than those of 
 any individual, they would increase as society grew. A community 
 of ton would have twice as many rights as one of five, one of one 
 hundred would have ten times as many rights as one comi^osed of 
 ten. And whei'e there were a million souls there rights would be so 
 vastly increased that the individual would have hardly any ! No ; 
 a society of ten, a hundred, or a thousand, has no more rights 
 than au}^ one in that societ3^ Ten is but a repetition of one ; one 
 is but the unit of measure for all the rest ; the rights of the whole 
 are contained, in miniature, in the rights of one. And this one 
 is a complete sovereign from all aggression, so long as he does not 
 transgress another''s bound himself. If this foundation be ignored, 
 society itself has no rights at all. This talk, then, about the supe- 
 rior claims of society is a trick of words, a delusion, a usurpation. 
 Individuals existed befoi'e society ; out of tliem was it made ; away 
 from it can they secede. In short, the governmental status of the 
 individual decides the status of society. Society exists for the indi- 
 vidual, not the individual for society. Society is but an individual 
 written large. The sovei'eignty of the individual then, is of supi'eme 
 importance as a factor in the welfare of society. In one of the 
 brightest gems of legal jui-isprudence, the law has always recognized 
 tills fact. Does it say that anything may be done to the individual, 
 provided it is conducive to the welfare of society ? No, it says "A 
 wrong done by the government to the humblest individual is a wrong 
 done to the whole people." Why ? Because liberty is alwa^'^s vio- 
 lated in the persons of the dos])ised, never against the rich or the 
 respectable. And if the rights of these are protected, even though 
 they are "saloon keepers !" the rights of all are secure. 
 
 PRIVATE INTEREST vs. THE "PUBLIC GOOD." 
 
 Another thing the prohiljitionists are solicitous for, and this is 
 the "jMiblic good," tlic greatest good to the greatest number. And 
 for this end pi-ivate interest, or nrivate good, must get out of tlie way. 
 Now is there any such tiling, in government, as the public gooil 
 divorced from one's own private good ? What is the greatest gov- 
 (iriimeutal good if it is not to make every one mind his own busi- 
 ness i' 'J'liis having b(!<'i) accomiilished, an e(juMl oi»porlunity is 
 e\l«'nil<'d to all to help themselves. All being oili;r(;d an e(jual op- 
 jKntiinily for self lielp, they will be al;le to help themselves, and in 
 i!ase of nece.s.sity, be able to help otiiers. Ecjual liberty necessitates 
 (Mpiality, eiiuality begets fraternity, and fraternity solidarity. For
 
 CRIMES VS. MORALS. 9 
 
 the government then to guarantee the perfect liberty of each indi- 
 vidual, is to guarantee the "greatest good" to society. We have 
 heard prohibitionists quote the maxim that "Tlie public good was 
 the supreme law," but we have never heard of it elsewhere. We 
 have heard that the public safety was the supreme law, ' ' Salus pop- 
 iili suprema lex.'''' But this is a very difterent thing from the public 
 good as the supreme law. Neither, as has been shown, is the pub^ 
 lie safety at all incompatible with one's private safety. 
 
 MORAL vs. LEGAL WRONG. 
 
 The great mistake made by the prohibitionist, is in confounding 
 what is morally wrong with what is legally wrong. He says "We 
 rejoice in the utmost personal liberty so long as the people do 
 right." And the Czar of Russia rejoices in the same way. No se- 
 curer lease of power could any tyrant have. With the individual 
 siibordinate to society, with each one's private interest suri'endered 
 to the public good, what end would there be to tyranny ? This 
 very article, were prohibitionists in power, could be suppressed, on 
 the ground that it was injurious to society. It may be morally 
 wrong for a person to eat many mince pies, on going to bed. Yet 
 it is not the State's business to regulate dyspepsia or nightmare. 
 It is a moral wrong for one to get drunk, but it is beyond the prov- 
 ince of government to say what a person shall drink. There are 
 many ways in which people may voluntarily injure themselves, yet 
 it is not the business of government to direct all our thoughts and 
 habits. Evils and vice do far more harm to society than crimes; 
 and their indirect inlluence is greater than the direct, yet for alj 
 t,liis, government is unjustiiied in interfering. The world is full of 
 misexy and woe ; the strong have to bear the burdens of the weak; 
 the wise must sutler from the ignorant ; the virtuous are pained at 
 vice; and would it not be a blessed thing to sweep them all out at 
 one fell swoop by act of Congress! But no, government cannot 
 l)r(;perly move an inch, without becoming criminal. But let the 
 King so much as tread on a peasant's toe, and it immediately be- 
 comes the duty of government to leap to the rescue ; — it is a crime.* 
 Now the ndiurc of a crime, as distinguished from a vice, and 
 which specially brings it within the power of government to sup- 
 press, is an overt act of force accompanied with a bad intent. Af- 
 
 * "VVc do not iiroposc to iiiterfero with iinmonility and vice, but to siternly siip- 
 pii'ss ciinii'." — Pull Mull (iuztlle But llic C'liicago ''Law and Order League" had 
 tlie American publishers of the Loudon exposure arrested, on the ground of 
 immorality 1
 
 10 PROHIBITION. 
 
 ter an aggressive act of force has been begun it is jiistifiable to use a 
 counter force, to withstand it. When a crime is thus committed, 
 the sovereignty of the individual is surrendered, in the very act, in 
 favor of equal sovereignty. The rationale for the arrest of force is 
 because it is misplaced, unreciprocal, out of balance. If the intent 
 be good it does not alter the false relationship, which having been 
 rectified, the collective force of society is at an end. This is illus- 
 trated with mathematical exactness when a drunkard enters one's 
 house. The law says if an order to leave will do, the use of force is 
 not justified. If he oft'ers slight resistance, then 07il(j just enough 
 force to overcome it is ijermissable. 
 
 The government itself is amenable to law, it cannot violate that 
 which it is to enforce. Its office and exercise is no lono-er a chaotic 
 mess of opinion and guess work, but determined with scientific ex- 
 actness. It does not exist to promote morals, or order, but for 
 the scientitic ])reservation of individual liberty. It follows then, 
 that, like ever}' other natural oreaniKation, it must have its own 
 particular individuality. As a bird with wings cannot swim, or a 
 fish with tins cannot fly, or a reaping machine cannot thrash, or a 
 thrasher harvest, so the governmental machine can do but one kind 
 of work. If it attempts everything, it will do nothing well ; if it goes 
 out of its sphere, it has lapsed from that of a defensive to an aggres- 
 sive criminal.* And when in the name of "law and order" the <rov- 
 ernment itself becomes the source of disorder, that arising from indi- 
 viduals is small in comparison. The kind of government the people 
 sustain i.s a siu-e gauge of their own peacableiiess and co-operation 
 To such an extent is this true, that when only a scientilic govern- 
 ment is desired, that will not long be necessary. For, in standing 
 guard over liberty, who can possibly be more interested than liberty, 
 herself ?t 
 
 * Only think of Mic Anu-rican eagle, luivi;,' torn tlie bloody siiiit to tattern, now 
 Btoopinng to poke over the dirty linen of nrigliani VoiingI O shame on ghiinie: 
 The downfall of the American republic will date from llie party of "public improve- 
 ments" and great "moral ideas." 
 
 t How much defensive government does the reader suppose would be necessary? 
 This cannot be exactly told until we get out from under the elTeels of ;i paternal 
 one. How far people would voluntarily transgress, may be conjectured, by notic- 
 ing those native tribes who are void of government or civilization. The reports of 
 students are that the rule of reciprocity is universally recognized. Theft is rarely 
 known. No police, safes, or locks are needed. Individual Bovcrcignty fairly bris- 
 tles with a jealous regard for equal sovereignty. There is no inequality of condi- 
 tions. If we now turn to civilized countries, with a national government, we find 
 all this reversed. Nay, more : not only do we find that crimes against property are 
 a re>!ult of civilization, but that they increase with progress. There is now Ave 
 times us much crime as twenty live years ago. I'ateriuil government, too, since the 
 war, has increased that fast. Tin; r.ad.T may n-.w be left to judge which is the
 
 THE ''PUBLIC good:' 11 
 
 PATERNALISM, vs. LIBERTY 
 
 But liow utitiiral it is for one to desire to see the affairs of the 
 community administered as a father woukl govern his family. 
 When tlie wise are able to see a course of action that would plainly 
 be for the benefit of the ignorant, how well it would be for the 
 community to insist upon tlieir following it. And how natural it is 
 for us to impress our ego before the truth. If we were to start a 
 colony, it may be asked, would it not be desirable to pick the best 
 people, and would not sober people be the best, and after having 
 gained these would it not be of first importance to keep all others 
 out? 
 
 There is no doubt but that sober people are preferable, and that 
 a community without saloons would be desirable. But it would be 
 far more desirable to have an immoral community well governed 
 than to have persecution and a whited-sepulchre-kind of morality. 
 A far richer and more complex life would be engendered from a 
 vai'iety of people of diflerent morals, but recognizing equal liberty, 
 than could be derived from any class, sect, school or clique. 
 Without this indispensable requisite, even heaven itself and the 
 society of angels, would be intolerable. However, any set of indi- 
 viduals have the right to unanimously make their own contract not 
 to have any saloons, and to parcel oft' their own ward or tract, 
 where such conditions shall exist. But they have no right to ex- 
 clude adjoining disenters from establishing saloons, as a part of 
 their right of contract.* 
 
 Then it may be further objected that, " If the principle of pater- 
 nalism is not applicable in the State neither is it a tenable one to 
 hold in the family. '' Certainly not. Who has not heard the i-emark 
 when a particularly wayward youth was noticed, '• He must be a 
 minister's son?" The doctrine of equal liberty obtains between 
 parent and child as much as between children themselves. "But is 
 not the parent' s counsel the child' s safeguard ?" Only when the 
 child is free to disobey it at its own cost can either its experience or 
 
 most criminal, the govurninent, or the people naturally towards each other. And 
 whether ornot, when the weak and vicious offspring of paternalism have been dis- 
 posed of, there will be any need of even a special police force. Indeed, we are in- 
 clined to thi)ik that such a standing force exercises a predatory function. 
 
 * Liberal, Mo., has evinced the same lack of discrimination in prohibiting not 
 only saloons, but churches. Pullman, near Chicago, is a complete illustration of 
 paternalism, which has resulted in a huge plantation specnlation. Our boarding 
 schools and colleges are all conducted on the paternal principle, which is the cause 
 of much of their immorality.
 
 12 PROHIBITION. 
 
 character be formed. If it be said that the doctrine of equal liber- 
 ty is surrendered in the case of infants, it is because they are infants, 
 and cannot be made responsible for their parents' acts. Their lib- 
 ert}"^ begins with their capacity to show that they are responsible. 
 "But has not a child a right to be well born ? If so, the State should 
 regulate offspiing." Yet, not even here as its last resort, and with 
 Plato for a guide, can paternalism find lodgement. Force can nev- 
 er supplement the defects of the parrental instinct. 
 
 Again it ma}^ be claimed that if a purely defensive governmeut 
 is the onl^r correct one, "It could not educate the children, take 
 care of the sick, or relieve the poor. ' ' Certainly not any more than 
 it can teach religion. "Then it cannot employ inspt^ctors of meat 
 or milk, institute sanitary regulations, erect light-houses, grade 
 streets, build bridges and sewers, improve navigable streams, issue 
 money, or carry tlie mails. " Most assuredl}" does the doctrine of 
 equal liberty and a defensive government allow people to volunta- 
 rily provide these things for themselyes, ".as their intex'est may 
 appear. " 
 
 "But can large enterprises be carried on by voluntary associa- 
 tion?" Yes, the continent has been spanned with rails, the sea 
 dotted with sails, the Alps have been tunneled, a canal is being dug 
 across the Isthmus, the desert of Sahara is about to be watered, all 
 b}- private enterprise. And did not the government keep her dead- 
 headism screened from competition, some Yankee would have, long 
 ago, given us penny postage and the postal telegraph. A Chicago 
 daily, by ocean cable, gave us a whole revelation from God to man, 
 the following morning after it appeared in London. Meanw hile the 
 only distinguishing feature characterizing governmental supervis- 
 ion, is its emplo3nient of an espionage of the mails. 
 
 But it may be said, "The doctrme of paternalism is not incon-* 
 sistent with but inclusive of the doctrine of equal liberty. '' So far 
 is this from the truth that where the execution of the doctrine of 
 paternalism begins that of ecjual liberty leaves oft". Where paternal- 
 ism is simply advisory or I'ecommendatory, it falls outside of the 
 category of governnient. Paternalism in government, imposed by 
 force, however good or benelicial in design, is pure tyranny.* 
 
 Many pretended justilications of paternalism grow out of pre- 
 vious vi(jlatious of liberty. Fencing laws, for instance, are un- 
 warranted iisurj)ati()ns of liberty. So are all stock laws. No man 
 should be compelled to fenee against another's stock, neither should 
 another's stock be proiiiljiU-d from running on the public domain. 
 
 * The more paternal the Ki'veniment the more it i(> hated, until people put out 
 their eyt-H. pull out their teeili, cut off their llngerM, uud lie uljout tlieir tuxes, to es- 
 cape itM service.
 
 PATERNAL GOVERNMENT. 13 
 
 All trespassing is a matter of private grievance. But grant a mo- 
 nopoly of land, and all the other laws follow. Poor men's ex- 
 emption laws have never helped a poor man, except to curtail 
 his credit, and make him dishonest. But having instituted the 
 devouring shark of usury, the paternal State likes to protect the 
 poor ! The unjustifiable usury laws, can only be rationally inter- 
 preted, by acknowledging the right of free banking. Compulsory 
 education, excusing itself under "universal suffrage," becomes 
 needless, after the abrogation of majority rule. 
 
 The doctrine of equal liberty, on the other hand, covers all that 
 is so bunglingly attempted by paternalism, without its expense or 
 injustice. For instance, a person has a right, on the ground of 
 equal liberty to make his own kind of street and side- walk, but if it 
 should be such as to impede travel, he could be complained of. But 
 on the ground of paternalism, one could not regulate the architec- 
 ture of his ovm house ; and if it was a Quaker who was in office, it 
 might have to be painted drab. 
 
 Pternalism itself, at last, comes to reciprocity for judgment. 
 The mooted questions of governn- ental jurisdiction can be settled 
 in no other way. Take, for instance, the dispute over the Bible 
 in the public schools, where the religious conscience of the Catholic 
 is diametrically in conflict with that of the Protestant. What is 
 to unlock this difficulty, and insure peace, except the doctrine of 
 eipial liberty ? There is compulsory vaccination, what can pater- 
 nalism do to adjust the relations of the rival claimants ? Take the 
 case of free speech for Dynamiters and the parades of the Salvation 
 army, what is to decide the limits of governmental jiu'is diet ion ? 
 Take the problem of land tenure, how can paternalism settle it ? 
 But, upon the basis of equal liberty, it settles itself. 
 
 In our hue and cry iov political liberty, as interpreted by ma- 
 jority rule, the counterfeit is often taken for the real. The advo- 
 cates of paternalism, then, cry '■'laissez faire,'''' and "do as you 
 please." We answer that these are none of the characteristics of 
 equal liberty. License is always a result of an irresponsible pater- 
 nalism, an undefined reaction from it, or a relic of i)atornaIism, in 
 tlie name of liberty. Equal liberty is the very soul of order con- 
 servatism and progress. 
 
 Let us not, then, confound the application of paternalism witli 
 Die doctrine of equal liberty. The exact principle that separates 
 tliom is that governmental interterence is never justifiable on the 
 ground of the nature of the act itself, but on the ground of its uu re- 
 ciprocal relationship. An act, good by itself, may be very meddle- 
 some, while a bad act, which injux-es only the party concerned, is 
 not to be suppressed. And if there is ever any doubt as to how far
 
 14 PROHIBITION. 
 
 the direct influence of a person's acts may extend, it is always safe 
 to give the benefit of the doubt to liberty. 
 
 SOVEREIGN RULE OF THE MAJORITY. 
 
 It may be claimed that a purely defensive government is inop- 
 erative in the presence of majority rule. Then so much the worse 
 for majority rule. If the majority should vote to chop off the heads 
 of the minority would it establish the unlimited right of majorities 
 to do as they please ? And would the minority be justified in return- 
 ing the same favor, when it gets to be the majoi'ity ? If not, then 
 ,is there some principle or standard of liberty, above the majority. 
 It is called a constitution. And a constitution, in limiting the powers 
 of the majority, recognizes certain rights for the minority, such as 
 the right to life, liberty, and property. But these are not rights, if 
 they conflict with the equal liberty of others to the same. The 
 equality of rights, then, is the only fundamental riglit, the greatest 
 of rights, embracing all others. A constitution, guaranteeing this, 
 would be perfect, in the nature of things, for all. But, one failing 
 in this, woukl be only a constitution for the majority, who need 
 none. It would not only be no constitution, but woi'se, an instru- 
 ment of oppression. 
 
 The modus ojierandi of vesting sovereignty in the majority is as 
 absurd as it is unjust. Suppose the sovereign will is composed 
 of eiglit noses, and a minority consists of seven. Then, if one from 
 the eight goes over to the seven, those which previously were ruined 
 now rule, all by a majority of 07ic.' What a temptation, where ves- 
 ted interests are at stake, to buy, bribe and bulldoze that one ! Or 
 where personal rights are jeopai'dized, the result is a bolt and seces- 
 sion. If a third party be in the field, consisting of two, it will hold 
 the balance of power, and a minority rule. If from the seven one 
 should move into a ward where six constituted a majority, then what 
 was a majority in one place, would be a minority in another ; the 
 sovereign power resting in a mere comparison of numbers. If the 
 majority of voters are industrial slaves, the strongest organized so- 
 cial influence, a moneyed oligarchy, will rule. Politicians, instead 
 of statesmen, beconn! dic(! throwers ; ixflitics become an organized 
 mob, with no heart that can be appealed to, no head that can be 
 blown ofl". Great is the sovereign power, not of liberty, but of 
 noses ! It matters not whose, or of what kind, only so they can be 
 counl(Ml ! The more numerous the}' are. and the lower in the scale 
 of creation, the more republican the /orm of government!
 
 MAJORITY RULE. 15 
 
 The real fact is, then, that the rale of the majority, under a re- 
 publican form of government, must always be wrong. God never 
 speaks through majorities. The majoi'ity, over here, a« against 
 King George, did repi'esent libert}-, but it has never since repre- 
 sented it except as a protest against some previous majority. The 
 majority rule system, then, carries in itself the seed of its own dis- 
 solution. King George was once our political Pope, then majority 
 rule became our political Bible, and 'rule of faith and piactice.' 
 Soon will the private interpretation of sects and parties so divide its 
 authority, that the last majority will be the sovereignty of the indi- 
 vidual, as typical of the ecpuil sovereignt}^ of all. Mere numbers, 
 devoid of any principle of liberty, only indicate brute force. And 
 when an important issue or crisis arises, it results in civil strife. 
 
 Majority rule and compulsory taxation, then, are the tap root 
 of all violations of equal liberty. They are survivmg types of brute 
 force and rapacity. When a car of cattle or hogs is unloaded to 
 feed, the form of government thej- immetliately resolve tliemselves 
 into is one of majority rule and compulsory taxation. The mo- 
 ment one should be stationed, as an umpire to keep the others in 
 place, we should have a government of reciprocity. And as soon 
 as all should find that it was for their interest to Keep themselves in 
 place, \vithout any outside government, we should have local au- 
 tonomy, or self government. 
 
 Now the evolution of government passes through these changes. 
 First, we have the government of animals, or brute force, which 
 takes an aggressive form. Then we liave brute force, directed by 
 cunning and greed, qualities of the fox and the wolf. This direction 
 of government is exemplified in wars of conquest, in commerce, in 
 corporations, and makes most of our legal titles to 2)roperty. The 
 function of government is that of a thief and Iiighwayman. Then 
 we have brute force aggressively directeil by paternalism, or the rule 
 ot the good over the bad, the respectable over the unrespectable, 
 tlie orthodox over the heterodox. The source of authority emanates 
 from a central lieail, the pretext for its exercise is always " the pub- 
 lic good." Tills is tiie government of tlie theologians, for its au- 
 thor and oriirin is God groverning the worhl. It is the government 
 also of the refoiiners and the state Socialists. It is the govern- 
 ment of the best, of the aristocracy. Some wise man has said that 
 it does not make any dillerence what the form of the government, 
 if only the best rules ! 
 
 Lastly, we have the kind of government herein advocated. It 
 is not the entire elimination of brute force, ])ut it is used defensively, 
 instead of aggressively, repressive not initiative. Its use is to
 
 16 PROHIBITION. 
 
 withstand force, to put it at rest, not to set it in motion. Action 
 and reaction being equal, an equilibrium is produced and peace 
 obtained. It differs from paternalism as to the source of its author- 
 ity. It does not come from God, nor any person, however good. 
 It is not the government of any man over man. It arises from the 
 necessity of reciprocity in harmonious, human relationship. 
 
 This kind of government never suppresses an action because it 
 is bad, nor assists one because it is good. It knows nothing about 
 the "i^ublic welfare." It does not aim to make you pure, or chaste, 
 or wise, or religious, or learned, or moral, or good. It only aims 
 to keep the peace, to prevent tresjjassing, to award damages. 
 
 In its use of force, it is to preserve equal liberty It is the be- 
 ginning and end, the only thing for which it exists. When this is 
 accomplished, law and order are the result ; but in seeking law and 
 order first, libcT-ty is violated and disorder ensues. A defensive 
 government, therefore, is the only kind that is legitimate, effica- 
 cious, definable, subject to law, or stops when it gets through.* 
 
 PROHIBITION CANNOT PROHIBIT. 
 
 Having disposed of the jurisdiction of prohibition, showing that 
 it has no right to pi'ohibit, we now come to show how it could not, 
 if it would. Do not all know that knowledge is not administered 
 by proxy, that all wisdom comes from expo'ience, and that outside 
 imposition never can raise the moral standard higher than the in- 
 ward development ? Prohibitionists might as well advocate pro- 
 ducing a vacuum by legislation, as to make character by it. It is 
 an utter impossibility. To be sure, an artificial obstruction has an , 
 influence, but how? In exciting the drinking habit to renewed ac- 
 tivity. And, in the use of force, the exei'cise of the character is 
 changed from the higher to the lower faculties. You mav not see 
 the accustomed expre.s.sion of the habit, but, depend upon it, it is 
 tliere, it has been driven in. A disease had mucli better be on the 
 
 * Herbert Spencer's "Social Statics" was one of his first books, written over 25 
 years ago. "Man and the State" is one of his last. In the first, he showed the in- 
 elHcacioiiB working of all State interferences with banking, with cdncation, sanitary 
 aflairs, iVrc. In the last, he denominates class legislation in favor of labor as 'The 
 Coming Slavery." Tnder "I'roliibition," we have endeavored to show another in- 
 stance of like character. Cannot the reader now perceive the laiv of inefllcacy 
 which applies to all paternalism t Hardly, for that would imply that the govern- 
 mcutal mind was imbued with an idea of nalurul caumtlon. Until then, let it be 
 understood that God and government are the rmly two lawless objects in the Uni- 
 veise 1 But the moment tin- mind recognizes that these two objects aan be tamed, 
 let it be remembered that tliere can no more be parties in government, than in botany 
 or chemistry.
 
 PROHIBITION CANNOT PROHIBIT. 17 
 
 surface ; the best authorities say bring it out ; by di-iving it in, yo\i 
 will kill the patient. The weather cannot be changed by breaking 
 the thermometer, it will go right along just the same. You can no 
 more change a person's morals b\' law than you can teach a child 
 to pray, with a whip. It is only by bringing the counter moral and 
 intellectual influences to bear that vice is eradicated. It must be 
 drawn out by attraction, not suppressd by compulsion ; the sun 
 may melt it, but the wind cannot drive it away. There is a correla- 
 tion of forces in the moral as well as in the physical world. When 
 the devils, in Scripture, were driven out, it is said that they all came 
 asrain, brino-ing with them seven other devils worse than the first. 
 Why ? Because the chambers were em-pty, there being nothing left 
 to take the devils' place. How virtuous, that man must be, who 
 never takes a drink only because he never gets a chance ! 
 
 Our prohibitory friends seem to mistake the nature of evil ; they 
 give to it a theological instead of a philosophical cast. They regard 
 evil as an entity, an emanation from the devil, a thing that can be 
 cast out. Now bodily physicians have given up this idea long ago. 
 They regard disease as an effort of nature to overcome an obstruc- 
 tion ; and their method of cure is to assist nature, in overcoming it, 
 not in obstructing her ! Prohibitionists, therefore, from their diag- 
 nosis, are entirely unfitted, to treat intemperance. The real fact 
 is that every evil begins as a good ; it only becomes an evil when it 
 goes to seed, becomes respectable, or is outgrown. In all evil there 
 is a soul of goodness, in error a soul of truth, and to arbitrarily sup- 
 press the evil, unless it is naturally outgrown, one must also sup- 
 press the good. Evil and good being only relative terms, it follows 
 that all Pharisaism is ill founded ; anv and all effort endeavoring to 
 overcome its ?>u</-adaptatiou, is ecpially saintly. To resort to force 
 to exterminate an evil is a sui-e sign that one's own virtue is at a low 
 ebb. It shows a moral cowardice, a lack of faith in one's cause. 
 It indicates that it is risky busmess to allow the whole of vice to 
 combat with the whole of virtue. The prohibitionists see virtue 
 down and they run up to the great bull dog of the State and say, 
 "Seize him ! Pull the Devil off'." Believing that the heart of the 
 Universe is rotten, they beg Congress to cover it with a paternal 
 plaster ! But we have far more faith in vice, under liberty, than in 
 all their regulation and conformity. Give us a good healthy sinner 
 any time, in preference to a dead saint ; above all, give us a good 
 square look at a natural human beuig. 
 
 Now cf what is the evil of intemperance composed ? Instead 
 of its being the cause of all other evils, as our prohibition friends 
 would lead us to supposi', is it not caused by tiiem, the result of 
 them ? Have they not got the carl before the horse ? Is not in-
 
 18 PROHIBITION. 
 
 temperance the necessary outgroAvth of present conditions ? Men 
 first took to spirit, when their own got at a low ebb. It indicates 
 that our social conditions are abnormal. Buddha said there was no 
 need of getting drunk, for man was naturally enough intoxicated 
 through the Holy Ghost. Perhaps the angels live on pure alco- 
 hol, their organizations not being sufficiently gross to admit of a 
 relapse. However the Holy Spirit may be connected with alcoholic 
 spirit, we know that they are both derived from the same root. In 
 Avine and the vine, Jesus found many of his spiritual illustrations. 
 He even was called a wine bibber, and on one occasion turned dis- 
 tiller. At all events, so long as people are overworked, so long as 
 many can live in luxurious dissipation withoiit work, so long as 
 business is competitive gambling, so long as usury eats at the vitals 
 of the poor, so long as landlords deprive the people of homes, so 
 long as woman is a connubial appendage and children are the result 
 of passion, just so long will the natural and sweet wine of life, 
 which Buddha refers to, be unorganized and wanting, and the peo- 
 ple seek its counterpart m an artificial stimulus. 
 
 PROHIBITION UNNECESSARY. 
 
 Not only can prohibition not prohibit, it is entirely unnecessary 
 to call upon the State. What is there to hinder anyone, believing 
 in prohibition, from first prohibiting its use from himself ? Then 
 if lie is a cluu-ch member, wliat hinders him from endeavoring to 
 make the practice of temperance the sole condition of membership ? 
 If he conducts a manufacturing establishment, a railroad, or a 
 bank, I know of no law dictating whom he shall employ, or with 
 wliom he will have any dealings. He has a perfect right to not 
 speak to a man who drinks green tea, if lie chooses. And when an 
 association of such has converted the whole world to itself, as it can, 
 if it has the truth, there will then be prohibition. 
 
 But no ; this is not the line of action the prohibitionists are the 
 most fond of working on. This course would necessitate some self 
 reliant, spontaneous virtue among themselves, and then who would 
 there be for theii to 'nvallop" ? Such a regime would never do; 
 t lie cause of the church and the cause of prohibition, would both 
 sufler therel^y. i 
 
 PROHIHITION PROMOTES INTEMPERANCE. 
 Not only ha.s prohibition no right to prohibit, not only is it im-
 
 PROMOTES INTEMPERANCE. 19 
 
 possible to prohibit, not only is it uncalled for, but to attempt to do 
 so, is the worst thing possible that could happen to the temperance 
 cause. 
 
 First, in chasing this artificial an d fictitious remedy, all atten- 
 tion is diverted from the real one. The temperance movement is 
 thereby divided into two sectarian camps, fighting each other, ui- 
 stead of the common enemy. Educational work and natural regen- 
 eration have been given over to partisan triumph and the counting 
 of noses. Women, who were more acquainted with the recesses of 
 the sanctuar}^ now rise from their knees and enter the lobby. The 
 priests who pray join hands with the politicians who also prey. 
 
 Now we will suppose these jjeople's opinions have passed into 
 a statute, and is called "the law." Their wills are to be imposed 
 on the community, and it is to be called justice. Is it a law that ex- 
 ists anywhei'e else in the world of mind or matter ? Is it so con- 
 structed that it applies to the guilt of each person under any and all 
 circumtances ? O no, the law finds no counterpart in the nature of 
 things, nor is it sufliciently elastic to admit of an equitable construc- 
 tion. So the law catches a few innocent people wlio are made to 
 think that they may be guilty, while it serves as a net work of tech- 
 nicality for the guilty to escape. The lawyers are fed. The law 
 is as iron clad as it can be made, yet it does not convict, "it is not 
 executed." Yes, here is where the trouble lies, for you have got to 
 repeal every other law in the Universe before this can be made to 
 work. It is not the vicious who are opposed to it, it is the virtuous, 
 it is temperance people themselves. The law is a partisan, a class 
 law, over which a respectable comnuuiity is ecpuiUy divided. If a 
 horse is stolen, a citizen murdered, woman outraged, or legal justice 
 mocked, an indignant populace "Would I'ise, clothe itself with tlie 
 hurricane, and bearing courts and juries on its shoulders, march to 
 swift vengeance. How difterent the execution of the liquor law ! 
 These same high handed yeomanry cannot be niaile to believe tliat 
 the taking of v glass of "sea foam," is anything like stealing a 
 horse, much less ihe source of devastation to our land ! They wipe 
 their mouths, crack jokes, and wink at "the law." They enter into 
 a freemasoiu'y to break it, calling themselves "The Personal Liberty 
 Lea":ue," tlie meanest thing of whieh a member can do is to "iro 
 back" on a brother. The law's violation they regard as a duty. 
 A })rosecution tiiey consider a persecution. Instead of society being 
 their victim, they regard themselves as the victims of society. 
 Juries cannot be founil to agree, witnesses fail to appear, or commit 
 perjur}', to tell the truth. Ollicers are bribed, politics and the courts 
 become corrupted.
 
 20 PROHIBITION. 
 
 The friends of the law now find it necessary to make more strict 
 provision for its execution. They move that prosecutions be taken 
 awav from their local jurisdiction, that nobody but Prohibitionists 
 sit on the jury, that it be only necessary to have a suspicion in order 
 to convict, in case there is no one to suspect, that the beardless 
 youth of the Y. M. C. A. be taught to decoy some unsuspecting one 
 to commit a crime, that every house be subject to search without a 
 warrant, and that all resolve themselves into a smelling committee 
 to root out the deadly evil. A beautiful state of society has now 
 been reached, old neighborhood feuds are revived, every man now 
 is a spy or a hypocrite. The air is full of deception and fraud. The 
 liquor interest is active and ingenious. The flames that were fanned 
 now burn all the fiercer. Men who never drank in open day, now 
 lind stolen ])leasures sweet. Men who drank before, now drink all 
 the more. They buy liquor by wholesale now, and every man's 
 cellar becomes a saloon. 
 
 It is under such a system of gymnastics, that prohibitionists 
 claim that intemperance is on the decrease. They offer statistics 
 to prove this. But how can they get at the statistics, after they 
 have been driven in ? If it should be found that there was less drunk- 
 enness, would it necessarily be proof that it was owing to prohibi- 
 tion, instead of education, or general prosperity, or climate, or na- 
 tionality ? Pro hoc, propter hoc, is not always an infallible guide. 
 Wliile the evil of intemperance is doubtless large enough, it is no 
 less true that the prohibitionists are not noted for temperance of 
 statement in their general statistics. Travelers tell us there is less 
 drunkenness in the wine and beer drinking countries than in our own. 
 Massacliusetts long ago tried prohibition, and has outgrown it. 
 Maine is trying it, and the police statistics of Portland show no 
 abatement of dnmkenness, while but one man in fifty, during the 
 last presidential election, tliought enough of prohibition to make it 
 national. In Iowa, prohibition has been in operation one year up 
 to the Fourth of July ; and the testimony of the mayors of twenty 
 nine leading cities and towns, is that there are open saloons in nine- 
 teen. The total number of places where liquor is sold, is 916. 
 An iiirrcasf of 14G during the year. Kansas, a young, agricultural 
 state, with no great cities, and Ijut little foreign population, showed, 
 according to Gov. Gliok's message, the following result. 
 
 Peumits Issued to Sell liquor. 
 
 I.ast year of Local Option 1132. 
 
 First year of I'roliibition 17W. 
 
 First forty five days oi second year 1 14«. 
 
 Conccalt'd nit-thods not stated.
 
 ORIGIN AND ANIMUS. 21 
 
 ORIGIN AND ANIMUS OF PROHIBITION. 
 
 Having now canvassed the outward eft'ect of prohibition, lei 
 us examine its inward imi^ulse. We must first recognize that pro- 
 hibition is not, primarily, a temperance question. There are many 
 people opposed to prohibition who have practised total abstinence 
 all their lives. Such men as Dr. Dio Lewis, Howard Crosby, Ex 
 Gov. Robinson and Henry Ward Beecher are not all drunkards, and 
 take no stock in prohibition. On the other hand, many might be 
 named, who, while holding that proliibition is the best policj' for 
 the State to pursue, still, in private, think it perfectly pi'oper to fol- 
 low Paul's advice to Timoth}-. Many saloon keepers in Kansas are 
 Prohibitionists. So that the dispute over the subject arises not so 
 much as to whether people shall be temperate, but how. The matte?' 
 is not in dispute, but the manner. It is not a question of morals, but 
 of methods, not whether it is best for one to drinK, but whether it is 
 the function of the State to deter him. In brief, it is not a temper- 
 ance question, but one concernino- the science of government. 
 
 Now since the function of the State is to suppress crime, not 
 to enforce morals, it foUows that, if drinking and selling liquor are 
 not crimes, then the attempt to suppress it is a crime. The very 
 thing for which the State is properly constituted to defend, it vio- 
 lates. And because the perpetrators are deluded, they ai"e exempt 
 from arrest. But as between a fool and a knave, for a pilot on a 
 dark night, give us the one who can steer clear of Niagara, though 
 the other would shove us over with the best of intentions. A mis- 
 take in government always results in a crime. Those administering 
 it may be as sincere and respectable as Cotton Mather, when he 
 himg Quakers and drowned witches, but the nature of tlieir acts is 
 all the same. It may be an open question which is tlie most dan- 
 gerous member of society, one who has an intense, but benighted 
 conscience, or one who has enlightenment without a conscience. 
 
 If then prohibition is, at bottom, but persecution, whence did it 
 originate ? Prominent among the bearers of this ark of the Covenant 
 is the Woman's Christian Temperance Union. The reason given 
 for this departure in temperance is specially in the interest of "the 
 home." "The Home vs. tiie Saloon," is their banner. But the 
 homes of the country are a subject of very broad and varied im- 
 port. It is dillicult to s<!e how the saloon can enter the houseiiold 
 without some member of the household first enters the saloon. But 
 it is not an impossible tiling to conceive how sucli a member can 
 be induced to leave an unattractive home to iro to a saloon. It 
 takes a competence, culture, and donu^stic fclicily to maki- a home.
 
 22 PROHIBITION. 
 
 These come from the workers getting their pay, from leisure, and 
 equality and independence in marriage. Now if you should ask a 
 majority of these women why, as home champions, they do not 
 strike at the squalor and want which infest the workingman's hovel 
 and the sewing girl's garret, and you would be frightened with 
 the word "communism," and run the chance of waking up some 
 of the soundest sleepers along the broad aisles of the leading church- 
 es. If you should indicate to these estimable women the propriety 
 and importance of making marriage a free and voluntary contract, 
 in order to be virtuous, and they would scorn you as an enemy of 
 mankind. Such a home, it is plainly evident, the priests have got 
 a padlock on. What peculiar kind of a home is it, then, to which 
 these women are so devotedly attached ? It is what is called a 
 "Christian home.'" These champions of home are not only women 
 but Christian women. The reople's Temperance Union would be a 
 most narrow title, under which to conduct all their operations. It 
 would not hit "the liome," much less the "Christian home." By 
 Christian home is meant, not a liberty loving home, or a justice 
 seeking home, but an Evangelical Christian home. (3ne that can 
 repeat the Catechism, subscribe to the creed, and belongs to the 
 church ! 
 
 Now we have the true significance of 'the home vs. the saloon." 
 Once, when it was respectable to drink, the church was a saloon. 
 The minister took his jug of New Englaml rum into the pulpit, and 
 drank between acts. It occupied an equal position on boanl the ship 
 with Bibles and missionaries bound for the heathen. Now, it is not 
 respectable, but the great mass of communicants are in the saloons. 
 They hold the balance of power. Between them and the church 
 tliere seems to l)e a rivalry as to who sliall gain tlie most Sun- 
 day scliool scholars. While the church is immolating its victims 
 on a life to come, puttuig tliem into tall boxes and making them an- 
 swer <piestions whicli they dy not want to ask, the ordinary, carnal 
 niimled youtli much ratli(!r i)lay billiards or go in swimming. Then 
 his clotlies are liatdly suilicicnt in wliicli to worship tlic Most High. 
 A seat too, in tlie opera, could be g(jt for less ; and withall he feels 
 much more at home with an ordinary sinner tlian with an unnatu- 
 rally allected saint. In a- word, the masses have left the clmrcli, 
 and sh(! has lost her hold. Henceforth, the world is to save the 
 church, instead of liie church saving the world. 
 
 Now the women are the most useful members of a church, to 
 pull the priests' chestnuts out of the fire. Scenting the rising dis- 
 content among women for enlarging their "sphere," they say, "Di- 
 rect all your energy to a Christian home iu a Christian republic !"
 
 END OF PROHIBITION. 23 
 
 So prohibition, divested of its skin, is one form of church extension. 
 Scratch a Prohibitionist and there will show u]} a God-in-the-Con- 
 stitution man. While there ma}' be some "liberal" dupes to the 
 prohibition movement, who do not espouse the latter cause, I can 
 assure them that when it comes to the God-in-the-Constitution be- 
 liever, he has no hesitancy in knowing who is on his side. Mrs. 
 Ellen Foster, of Iowa, a lawyer and one of the chief officers, says, 
 "The prohibition movement is but the first step towards engrafting 
 Christianity into the Constitution ; we shall keep on till we have all 
 under the banner of Jesus." There, do 3'ou want anything more 
 explicit than that ? St. John is a vice president in the movement to 
 unite Church and State. This means that American institutions be 
 blotted out, and that we be set back into the Middle ages. The 
 Church, made \\\> of fear, the State, made up of force, and trade, 
 made up of fraud, shall constitute one happy trinity. Three in one 
 and that one, — tyranny. The Chui'ch has alwa3's been a dead head 
 when the assessor was around, now she aims to be a dead beat when 
 the constable comes around. 
 
 The amusing part of this performance is that it is all to be 
 brought about to vindicate the right of woman to the ballot ! We 
 thought that the only excuse there was for meddling with another's 
 aSairs was when one failed to properly mind them. Now your 
 Voice in your neighboi''s business is justilied in proportion as you 
 fail to mind your own ! What more exact statement of a basis for 
 the ballot, than that persons shall be put in possession of a thing 
 as often as they show they do not know \\o\w to use it. But if men 
 liave made fools and tyrants of themselves, in its exercise, have not 
 women a i-ight to an equality ? That depends upon wiiether they 
 exercise that cqiiaJity upon tliemselves or tiieir noiglibors ! Women 
 seek to be in fasliion ; and the fasliion with the best minds of to day 
 is to find that form of social and Industrial organization which is 
 to supplant, not repeat the present political system. 
 
 ULTIMATUM OF PROHIBITION. 
 
 The proliibitory movement, then, is tlie dying embers of that 
 paternalism which presided at tiie Salem witchcraft ; the dying gasp 
 of an effete tiieology. Its adiierents ai'e not Germans, or French- 
 men, from England, or from tiie Continent, or from the mixed pop- 
 ulation of our great cities. It is directly traceable to the Puritanic 
 zeal and intolerance in those country parishos, settled by tiic New 
 EQo:land descendants of tlvose who banished Roger Williams and
 
 2^ FROEIBITION. 
 
 hnno- M-irv Dyer. The blood still tells. In other states it has a fee. 
 ble existence/and is used as a foil for the God-in-the-Constitution 
 
 ^'now whatever be the side issues, or the party name, we know 
 that there is but one line of political eyolution. and that is in the 
 direction of liberty. We therefore hail our prohibition friends, as 
 co-adiutors in that cause. We would not have them suppressed, by 
 •mv means ! Tliey will succeed, but in a way altogether different 
 irom what they expect. The good which their agitation will accom- 
 plish will be because of its educational influence, not because of its 
 leo-al bearing, because they are temperance men and women, not 
 because they are prohibitionists. Instead of getting God into the 
 Constitution, they will finally effect the complete divorce of Church 
 and State. Thev will show to our "liberaF' friends the unsound- 
 ness of introducing any other than a defensive function, under the 
 province of government. And as for these devoted women, so zeal, 
 ously attached to the church, what can be said for them ? We warn 
 the priests of the dangerous character of the liberties they are 
 concedino- For, no sooner will these women have exercised then- 
 new fled °ed wings in one direction, than they will begin to use them 
 in another : must not this divide your power ? Already, a leading 
 woman, in a leading article, in a leading magazine, discounts the 
 baneful influence of Christianity upon her sex.* Therefore vve wel- 
 come "prohibition" as an adjunet in the cause of civil and religious 
 
 ^' *" When one looks back over the history of the church, and in- 
 quires in what respect she differs from other religions, we arc im- 
 pressed with the intolerance growing out of her "plan of salva- 
 tion The hypothesis of its "divinity" does not permit a doubt. 
 For if it is divine, and the only one, what becomes of the sinner 
 wliile in doubt ? He is irretrievably damned. (iuite contrary to 
 this is the first postulate of science, that a thing is not true until it 
 is proved. Science says, if you do not doubt, you are damned. 
 
 Now there is not a Christian clergyman, to day, retained in his 
 place, first and foremost, because of his character or attainment, 
 lie may be very wise, and pure, and lovable, yet if he hoUls o no 
 nart of this "plan," he cannot be an ordained clergy-man. There- 
 lore intolerance and arrogance are their cardinal characteristics. 
 These celesiastics, by nature, never lead the life of '^^y^^; ^^^^ 
 • It IH with innnito sorrow that I see carncnt wonu-n wasting so much enthnsl- 
 
 lion." whercvi-r they ftnd it, whether in church or slatc.-itfr«. EhzaOeth taay 
 Stanton, in the North American Review.
 
 VIOLATIONS OF LIBERTY. 25 
 
 and the Prophets, in their time, were always opposed to them. 
 Being bound to an institution which never changes, nor graduates 
 its pupils until they die, they always reflect, the prevailing sentiment 
 of the time. Their seven scriptural principles are, practically, re- 
 duced to the live loaves and the two tishes. Nor is this derogatory 
 to any trade, when it is not aided by privilege or false pretense. 
 Where there are a great many priests, there sin abounds. The peo- 
 ple are led to think that it is the latter which causes the former. 
 Statistics show that the clergy furnish more criminals than any other 
 class, the saloon keepers unexcepted. Yet, the saloons have never 
 demanded that the churches be suppressed. They only ask that they 
 stay at home. There is just as much reason, from a slrct reciproc- 
 ity, why the churches should 1)e taxed to support the saloons, as that 
 the saloons should be taxed to support the churches. Jehovah must 
 be swapped for a natural standard of reciprocity among men. 
 
 WAYS THE PEOPLE LOSE THEIR LIBERTY. 
 
 The encroachments of authority, are veiy insidious in their ap- 
 proach One avenue by which the peoj^le lose their rights is through 
 the everlasting "minor." The "law and order" leagues are now 
 working their greatest racket over these young men, who are minoi'S ! 
 As though every saloon keeper kejjt a family register of every 
 youth that passes. A young man is of age when he would buy a 
 revolver, but he immediately loses his majority, the moment he 
 asks for a glass of beer ! In one case, the parent is properly respon- 
 sible for its oft'spriug, in the other case, the saloon keeper is respon- 
 sible ! The infantile part of creation is a fruitful held for pater- 
 nalists to jjet in their work. Tlie solicitude of mothers is nuthinjr 
 when compared with their watchful eyes. 
 
 And then the popular superstition about the Sabbath, makes 
 a tine stake, in the name of the saloon keeper, upon which to crucify 
 liberty. God is good and needs our worship : worship is akin to 
 rest ; rest should be compulsory for people will overwork ; when 
 not at work, they get into mischief ; the better place for tliem tlien 
 is in churcli ; all competition should be destroyed, in order that they 
 may go ! Do you see the logic ? The chain of title is complete ! 
 
 Ao-aiu it will be noticed that these restrictions are urtjed airainst 
 a class. Now the individual's liberty is rarely ever violateil by a 
 class, except it come in the form of the State. Therefore any such 
 ground for restriction, may be at once set duwn as a bid iov pdrtisan 
 prejudice, in order to obtain party supremacy. Their great cry of
 
 26 PROHIBITION. 
 
 "protection" is for themselves. They are so zealous for the "public 
 o-ood" that thev would crowd it down the people's throats ! _ 
 
 ° The people having no definite standard for government, admit 
 the restriction, without protest ; it is recognized, acquiesced in ; con- 
 tinued acquiescence gives consent ; consent makes a contract ; and a 
 contract settles a thing. One false restriction leads to another. 
 The first has been established as a precedent, by which an inequal- 
 ity of conditions is admitted, and there is then no end to govern- 
 mental tinkering. Separate violations, at last, run together into 
 one chronic disease. This disease is called government. Its i\r- 
 annv at last becomes 'vested' and 'divine' ; to question it is treason 
 andWasphemy. The people are "the m-asses," the "lower classes. 
 Their general degradation is so stereotyped, it is attributed to a 
 second law of nature, where they must forever remain. They are 
 subservient, degenerate, and only know how to imitate and obey. 
 Tlie individual lias been absorbed by the county, the county by the 
 state, the state by the nation. The rulers are a set of despots, liv- 
 mo- on war and taxes. The people have lo^t their liberlij. 
 
 " Now prohibition utilizes all these methods in m-esting away 
 the people's liberty First, their interpctation of the principle of 
 o-overnmcnt is false : second, the precedents they adduce to sustain 
 Their position are false : third, they seek to accomplish their ends 
 by means of class prejudice. 
 
 THE TWO KINDS OF GOVERNMENT CONTRASTED. 
 
 Now picture to yourself two communities where tliese two 
 kinds of goveVnment are in operation ; one paternal, the other 
 defensive ; one the regulator of morals, tlic other a suppressor of 
 crime In one of them (Jod's inspiration flows down through the 
 eaves of the orlliodox .Inuch un.l passes along in conduits of uni- 
 form order. There are no saloons, but tlie people drink just the 
 same. There; are no houses of prostitution, l)Ut llie people are just 
 as uncliaste in their lives. Tliere are no gambling dens, but every 
 one desires to overreacli. Tliere are no erroneous views, but the or- 
 thodoxy is musty and mouldy with age. IHaving all public places 
 of vice sui)prcssed, it is now our duty, if the law is correct in prin- 
 ciple, not to allow it to be evaded in private. And since no law is 
 of any avail, unless it is executed, private houses should be put un- 
 der guard. Detectives and tlie secret seiwice should be introduced. 
 Whei-c every body is suspctrtcd, but no one detected, decoys must 
 be (•iuph>ycd to tn,q,l the olVence. Tl.e ollicers must .show enough 
 .rame to "make their .services needed. In detecting immorality ev-
 
 GOVERNMENTS CONTRASTED. 27 
 
 ery body must either become a hypocrite or a kuave. At last an 
 eruption bursts fortli througli this repression. Peoijle ai"e assassin- 
 ated, poisoned, put away mysteriously. Now it is Russia, now Ire- 
 land. Nobody knows who is safe. The community is as moral as 
 a peuitentiar}-, and every body is trying to break jail. A Puritanic 
 sabbath reigns, but it is over the corjases of a Saint Bartholomew. 
 Such is the logical termination of a community governed by pater- 
 nalism. Beginning with dictation in morals, it ends in crime. 
 
 Pass now into the other community, whose one compulsory rule 
 is the equal liberty of all. Everything is natural, and spontaneous. 
 There are all kinds of morals, as there are all kinds of people. 
 There are different standards as to purity, and every body has his 
 own opinion. Do you ask if they do not make mistakes, if there 
 is not immorality ? Suppose we grant there is. But there is also 
 crime, you say. But the distinguishing feature of this community 
 is equal liberty ; that everyone should have his own business and 
 mind it. And in doing so, they have a clear idea of tvhere their so- 
 cial duties begin and leave off. They find they cannot all be pater- 
 nal to one another, but must be fraternal. In discarding morals 
 from their government, they are all doubly jealous about crime. 
 They will brook no trespassing. Each having his own rights knows 
 those of his neighboi's. Perfect liberty makes perfect order. 
 
 How now about the morals ? For the sake of illustration, we 
 have conceded these were bad. It is impossible, however, to con- 
 ceive of a low state of morals under such a government. For when 
 force has withstood force, and order prevails, the best ideas of liv- 
 ing must come to the top. Liberty is the very breath of truth. Nor 
 is this all. Under a defensive government, every intlividual is the 
 source of sovereignty. Not until people are integers, until they are 
 separate, can they come together and co-operate. The people now 
 standing separate, being free and independent, must, of necessity, 
 voluntarily asssociate anil co-operate As they do so, their govern- 
 ment for defense falls into disuse, as being unnecessary and expen- 
 sive. As co-operators, they finil that a unity of interest leads them 
 to where, by each working for all, all will, in turn, be working for 
 each. This is the .solidarity of mankind, brought about \:y the free 
 and independent interchange of the parts. Which kind of govern- 
 ment would the reader choose to live under, — that which beirins 
 with saints and ends with demons, or that which begins with tlie 
 average inilividual and leaves him a saint ? In a word, that of pa- 
 ternalism, or that of ciiual liberty. Such is the problem which pro- 
 liibition presents to us.
 
 28 FROHIBITION. 
 
 WORDS OF WARNING. 
 
 Let us profit by past experience. Let us learn the principle 
 of liberty. Principles are greater than measures or men : and 
 the principle of liberty, well defined, is the greatest of principles. 
 He who is on the side of liberty, cannot but be on the side of tem- 
 perance. When all this zeal is spent, this gush exhausted, still 
 will abide the star of liberty. Beware, then, that your sympathy 
 and o-enerosity be not imposed upon by any false clamor for the 
 "public good." Know well that "law and order" are inseparable 
 with equal liberty, and that true temperance cannot be advanced 
 by the constable, but by education, growth, and better conditions. 
 Scrutinize well the hoofs and horns of this blind crusade, that would 
 make its inroad upon popular government by exciting prejudice 
 against a certain class. Permit no false construction of paternahsm 
 under the name of "protection," to barter away the right of private 
 contract ! Indignantly repel every such encroachment upon a 
 purely defensive government.
 
 
 THE REORGANIZATIO^l OF 
 
 BUSINESS 
 
 "Put Monet in Thy Purse."— /agro. '-There's Millions in It."— Coi. Sellerg. 
 Motto:— BUILD AND BOYCOTT. 
 
 IN a previous issue, we ascertained that the first principles of 
 Co-operation were Liberty and Equity, We showed what they 
 
 were and their mutual relations. We found that majority I'ule, 
 in government, must give wa\' to equal sovereignty, and pi'ofit, in 
 commerce, give place to cost ; — one the rule for properly minding 
 one's business, the other the basis of common honesty. 
 
 Now, the.«e invisible laws, if such, are just as operative when 
 disobeyed as when obeyed. Tlie only part which we are asked to 
 perform is to adapt ourselves to them in our organization. In ex- 
 amining the working, of the present profit-making system we shall 
 lee wherein they ai"e violated, and how to apply the remedy. 
 
 THE GENERAL SITUATION. 
 
 As we look over the tendency of the general business world what 
 do we find ? A concentration of capital, on the one hand, and a di- 
 Tision of labor, on the other. If every co-operator will imagine him- 
 self in the position of the body poli ic, we will indicate his present 
 condition. First, if we regard the telegraphic system as corres- 
 ponding with his nervous organization, we find it entirely manipu- 
 lated by one man, and he a stock gambler. His muscles, the rail- 
 roads which draw off all natural resources, are subject to a 'pool,' 
 wherever there is any competition. His blood, the curi'ency, which
 
 2 THE sex. 
 
 courses through his veins and arteries, is coutrolled by a J«^li^ate 
 of Shvloeks. literally establishing all prices. And tlus three-fo d 
 nower bv its monopoly of the land, the mines, the forests, the fish- 
 eries niachiuery in production and all means of employment, is 
 able to bind the hands and garrison the stomach. Then, after hay- 
 incr all as if there wa. more, the insatiable greed of proht, wmdd 
 even rise up over the very bones of its itnmolated victim and bellow 
 forth its dissatisfied rage, in 'the public be d-d,^-as the case ^vlll 
 
 hear. . , i i .. 
 
 On the other hand, look at the unorganized producers and consu- 
 mers who pay tribute to this organized presumj.tion. Go among 
 the cumbrous and revolving machinery, and vhev are a part. The 
 machine however gets oiled when it needs it for it is owned, but 
 only the services of the operator are owned. Harnessed to steam, all 
 his functions are automatic, mechanical and monotonous. Has he 
 a place to stav ? By paving rent. Has he a corporation store ? 1 o 
 prevent his ever having the money with which to run away. He 
 even has not an assurance of work any longer than it will declare 
 
 a dividend. . 
 
 Are the farmers better off than the operative ? Not it they had 
 to buv everything in dollars and cents. What can they not aftord 
 providino- it can only be paid for in work, work is the cheapesji 
 ( ommodftv the farmer knows, money tlic dearest. Is it not noted 
 that agricultural laborers, both as to the number of hours they work 
 and tlfe compensation they receive, are nearer to Feuchil serfdom 
 
 than any other class ? 
 
 But sui)pose we finally come to the general con.sumer. are the 
 prices of the articles he buys at all governed by that wonderful 
 law of the economists called supply and demand ? ^ot one, every . 
 leading article has had the price set beforehand by a combination. 
 
 * President Gowen. of the Heading railroad, defended, before the Pennsylvania 
 Legilturc, hiK part in the coal con,..inationK. on the ground that he had to recip- 
 rocate with the re.-l of the tra dc, for, said he :- . . , u, 
 ..Every pound of rope that we buy. for our ve.Bels. or f-;";'; "'>"-•- ^"^^fj 
 ata oriee fixed by a coninnttee of .he rope manufacturers ol the I nUtd btate». 
 EverrUeg of "Hil". every paper of tack., all our .crewe and wrenches "'hI »""p«. 
 fhe oiler nue" for our locomotive., are never bought except at the pr.ce fixed by 
 t le ^"vJJn^wL of the null, .ha, manufacture them Iron beam, for your ho««- 
 e o your br dge . can b. had only at .he price, agreed, upon by a con^b.nauon of 
 tSoTe wS. p od^.ce them. Fire brick, ga. pipe, terra cot.a pipe for drainage, every 
 kcglf powder we buy to blant coal, are purchased under the .au.e arraugen en.. 
 Every pane of win.K.w gla.. in .hi. hou.e wa. bought at a .cale of P"«- - "''- 
 H^^ed 'exactly in the .ame manner. White lead galvanised ^''cet -n Jio.e J.elt^ 
 l,.g and file, are bought at and .old a. a rate detenn.ned n «»^e ^a.nt way 
 Lord, of Induxtry, by H. 1). Lloyd, in .he North American Kevlew, June, 1884. 
 
 There are 30()0 memberH of the New York Produce Exchange, whereas W, prop- 
 erly organSd in the inlcreHts of the producern. could easily handle all the business.
 
 VO-OFEBATION. 3 
 
 Anil Ix'foie c;oiul)ined monopolies of such niouslruu> jiiojxntions. 
 the people retire in subservient antl appalling- apathy. 
 
 INSUFFICIENCY OF G0VJ:RNMENT AID. 
 
 Now it is evident, to reach these evils, we must have uational 
 CO- opei'ation, but this is a diflereut thing from govenmental co-op- 
 eration. There are some so totall}' confiding as to suppose that tlie 
 government can aid them out of their difiicult\-. Such credulity is 
 beautiful to see, were it not lacking in sagacity to supposes that 
 government can ever become a grand bureau of philanthropy. 
 When that bureau is established, it will be the one missiu"' article 
 in its furniture. How did wise men come by the idea, that the far- 
 ther back one goes, there is no government, while the farther for- 
 ward you come, government increases ? Just the opposite is the 
 case. The great inaugural, the culmination of governmental au- 
 thority, the palmiest days of the era of "law and order' were when 
 savage beasts roamed the wilds, and i-ent the air with their ferocious 
 howling. Then government began, in aggression, and by it it. has 
 always lived, and when it ceases, the government will be no more. 
 For this is its last analysis describing its species.'' 
 
 But there are certain well meaning ones, who hold the same rela- 
 tion to authority in government, that others do to the same in reli- 
 gion. They think that they will remedy the source of one party's 
 oppression by substituting that of another. Thinking they see a 
 law that needs 'repealing,' they feel it their duty to be drawn into 
 the cogs of the political machine. And so they defraud themselves 
 and nature, by repeated attempts to galvanize new life into this 
 great, secular superstition. 
 
 Every article is bought and sold forty or fifty times while delivered but once. In 
 the city there are also ll.'io, brokers, which probably average $,5,irtHi a year, to cover 
 expenses. Cotton, wheat, corn, and other cereal products, lard, pork, bacon, butter 
 cheese, oil, iron, steel, copper, ifec, have been added to the list of things bought and 
 sold on margins. 
 
 * The basic idea of all past governments has been force, not liberiy. Itemanaten 
 from a central head, oran arbitrary power. The pretest for the exercise of its au- 
 thority is to make men good, wise, pure and moral. 
 
 Now cooperative government does not meddle with people's pursuits, nor aim 
 to make their acts moral, good, wise, or pure. Its authority emanates fiom no cen. 
 tral head or arbitrary power Its use of force is to counteract and destroy it, 
 
 Iheref re. they are opp site; where one commences, the other leaves off ; until one 
 is destroyed, the othercannot prosper. Such a brutal monster has government ever 
 been, there is no doubt that when it is outgrown, there will be a peaceable reeiproc. 
 ity. The cry'of anarchy,' isonly the cry of sacrilege by the worshiper of his idol.
 
 ^ THE TUN. 
 
 The only wholesome way to 'repeal' a 'bad' law, is to ignore it, 
 as no law at all, and to organize for the substitution o the real law 
 ^atis ever active, self executing, and whose authority never can 
 be glsaid. There are no laws in nature that need to be 'repealed.' 
 Anfwhen ^e are organizing in harmony with them, there are no 
 other! hat we need fo fear. The high water mark to its oppression 
 ronlY reached when the people are too ignorant to help themselves. 
 The In who sincerely enters nolitics to help you may be innocently 
 demented at lirst, but he cannot long remain there without becoming 
 unrntlsly corrupted. History is full of ^^-ted lives and hopes, 
 which if thev had had a natural foundation upon which to build 
 ^^h 'have moved the world. The organization of business is so 
 To^ln to the prooer function and organization of government tha 
 t cannot aid us An animal with fins cannot perform the functions 
 of one hav nc^^^^ As so much dynamite, it can blow out one's 
 
 braTns, but ircann'o t put them back again. It may destroy the out- 
 ward symbol, but it cannot disturb an organized idea. 
 
 PROFIT IN PRACTICE. 
 
 If then we are alone to look to the reorganization of business 
 for aid let us examine more closely into the ways of profit. When 
 im::g savage tribes, it was well in its place, but ^^^^^ 
 of Pivflized life now cause it to be unreciprocal. However, naa 
 iTlento iLeK, the free course of things would have long smce 
 reduceli ti abor cost. But in order that all competition migh 
 be destroyed, fraud struck hands with force, and entrenched .tf 
 behind the government. It is the organic lavv of proh^, hke^a cow 
 ard. that it must have some advantage in order that it may bnng 
 1 aemana to tke supply. The greater this ^f^^^^^^^J^l^^^^^ 
 urgent the demand, the higher the profit. Unti f ^^^^'^.^^"^^^^^^ 
 has this profit-making organisation become, that, bke a g eat liades 
 Union, with starvation on one hand, and 'overproduction on 
 
 Hlternative left to it, except to reciprocate w^h profit ? What began 
 asatyran.. now continues as a conspiracy among laves^ 1 
 weaker will surely go to the wall and the « -°g-/-«"^^^^^^^ 
 Does anyon.. suppose that they can inaugurate cost ? "^ " 
 their destruction They cannot tell what cost is from then stand 
 point. Such an organization must begin with the people^ Trade 
 i tself is waiting for them U> start the initiative. Until they do , 
 profit must keep on centralizing until co-operation is a necessity.
 
 CO-OFERATION. 5 
 
 Now what is the nature of this advantage that all the producers 
 and consumers can be controlled by a few speculators ? Is not the 
 producer the tirst possessor ? Does not the consumer pay the 
 profit ? And has such a power no advantage over the speculator's 
 necessity ? 
 
 THE FULCRUM OF POWER. 
 
 We saw that the real advantage of profit consisted in its being 
 able to bring the demand to the supply, and that each consumer 
 was the outlet for the profit on that supply. Then, is there any 
 other alternative, except to reverse the pi'ocess by organizing the 
 consumers so as to bring the sux)ply to the demand ? This will relieve 
 profit, serve as an inlet for production and exchange, turn profit to 
 cost, an oligarchy to a democracy, the corporation to co-operation, 
 and mark the evolution from a chaotic, competitive, commercial 
 cannibalism, to that of an ordei'ly and scientific organization of 
 business. 
 
 THE PEOPLE'S POOL.* 
 
 The nature of this consolidation of the consumers is to pool their 
 custom and hold it together so as to dictate the terms upon which 
 it shall be served. The association is voluntary and guided by self- 
 interest. For, each one's custom being his own, he has a right 
 to do with it as he pleases. It is therefore, not a combination, or 
 clique, aimed against anybody, but a co-operation of the whole 
 people against a false system, for universal ends. It is not a new 
 expenditure of power, but a simple change of attitude. "Whereas 
 I once supported usury and found it grievous to be borne, 1 now 
 relinquish it. and suppoi't it no longer. Hereafter, "as for me and 
 my bouse, we will serve the Lord." 
 
 Its Power. — Since the trader must follow his customers, the 
 withdrawal of custom from one place and the casting it in an- 
 other is able to build up and break down trade. The consumers 
 become 'boss' instead of the trader ; — if anybody is to 'be damned' 
 it is he, not 'the public' Moreover, this consolidated custom, as 
 a commercial franchise, is a very valuable piece of pi'operty. 
 
 We now have the driving power and balance wheel of co-oper- 
 ation, constituting the great monopoly of the people. It remains 
 
 * The writer humbly declines any credit for originality in the use of this word.
 
 THE SUN. 
 
 for us, according to the law of individuality, to attach the difterent 
 machinery. In doing so, let us begin with the store. 
 
 PAKTI:— THE STORE. 
 
 Its Economy.— Om- customers being secured, we have: — 
 
 (1) No advertising to do in order to get them. They were easily 
 obtained at first, and they will always remain. Nor do we need any 
 shop-window or side-walk displays to catch the passer-by. We need 
 no parade within, to show our goods, only a few samples with 
 their quality and price attached. 
 
 (2) Our rents are small. We have no occasion for the main 
 street, the thorough-fare, or the costliest corners. Nor need we 
 fear our landh^rd will raise the rent because he thinks we cannot 
 move and carry away our custom. 
 
 (3) Our stock is small. For, being acquainted with the custom- 
 ers' needs, we know what, how much, and when to buy. Our goods 
 are fresh, in date, and not shop-worn. 
 
 (4) Onv capital need not be large, or idle, for our goods will be 
 turned often. And let it be here understood, that our store is not, 
 primarily a deposit of supplies, with the design of bringing custom- 
 ers to it, but an exchange depot, a commodity-clearing house, with 
 only such things on deposit as cannot be exchanged direct, without 
 the intervention of a middle man. 
 
 (5) Our clerical force is mucli less, since our customers, m buy- 
 in'' from themselves, have no interest in consuming another's time. 
 Our delivery, also, makes shorter drives, and the hours for keepmg 
 open 8toi-e can be much reduced. 
 
 (6) The number of stores to each community is now determined, 
 an item of much greater importance than the number of clerks rc- 
 quiritd for each store. 
 
 The stability of the store is a.ssured from the fact that the cus- 
 tomers are pledged. Wherea.s, under profit and high prices, 96 
 per cent, failed, now under cost and low ones, 100 per cent, succeed. 
 
 Tlius we see that the pool, in controlling trade, possesses under 
 
 "^
 
 CO-OPEHATJO]^. 
 
 Z!l.r'\ """i "T""""'" "''^""^-^"^ '^'''' "" profit-making system 
 can begin to duplicate its prices. ^ ^y^^em 
 
 The PooVs L^m^laUons.~\^ni as the pool has had a function to 
 
 fou dTo'bT r" 't:\^''''' '' ^"^ ^^^•«"^^^- ^*^- '^^ - 
 
 teims. It maj advertise for proposals, or servants, or appoint a 
 trustee secretary, agent, or executive committee of one, to act L 
 . , bu having made its contract, it has nothing more to do unl s 
 .t be to see that it is fuimied. It does not go to keeping sL 2 
 become resolved into a 'joint stock company.' " 
 
 THE EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT. 
 
 in i^'is t^^Z'' " "'" '';'" ""^""' ''^' ''' f"-»-n. -d 
 resnonsib le ( '"""^^" ^"'"'^ ''' '' '''' '^« «^°°«t '- naade 
 
 not unit J but a harmomous working of free and independent part, 
 ts executive department is something more than greennes 1 , 
 the one hand, and irresponsibilitv on the otler iv.JYuT 
 ^ mediocrity. Co-operation must C^^h.: ' ^ i^;:::: 
 body s busmess is nob.>dy^s. It must command better sei^ices ban" 
 
 people can extend greater pecuniary reward, and second i, i. ,.;/ 
 
 tbepre.sentprom.nakingsv.steM, " "'"' ''="" ^"^^^'••-'" 
 
 THE CONTRACT. 
 
 ^va'^^t^T'" r!' '''*' ""'"'" """ ^^'"^ iudependent in law 
 *.. 1 p.a t.ce, the conditions of the contract are to be consichM-.-.i 
 I he customers constitute the first party. Thev are not hi 
 aci*<*nt f).« »;...» . ^ "^ * '"^j are not ODli":ed to 
 
 aci-ept the hrst or .second application. Situated as thov m,-. . 
 
 p's,; zr:";:::.t'".r.- '""'" "-' ■-''.'"."; ;.'::.; 
 
 L ..«,■< f'''';' 7^^'«- H'-^ compensation, to insure support, should 
 contnbute to ,t m pn,port,on to rh. service ren.lered to each. So
 
 THE SUN. 
 
 in the delivery, those only should pay for » *-fj''° ^" l'.^-'^''',! 
 Persons and thinjs, whieh do not belon"; together, should be lett 
 rZrateb free to act in their spheres, and be made re^on.Me^ 
 r^diMon, to promote emnlation, the -'ore*-r- -£ ,P™P"'^ 
 be allowed a pereentage on all sales over a -P^-'-f ^^ ' ^^^_ 
 But what if he should say, this poohng f "g™^"' '=^,'':"; 
 „hat new I have no assurance, other than their word, that they 
 ;m luarlntee so much trade. How could the agreement between 
 Them pirtake of a business character, without some eons.derat.on ? 
 ThT would have to be whatever they cotdd "S- upon^an* be 
 
 riternti wir^nrr ^Brhr To^^n: h"^^^^^ 
 
 besides what >^ ^'V-'^^^. / „„ ^^,,^ j^, „!,,, *«« be would need 
 L'belerrd. \l: X po„l sbouM gain customers, then it would 
 "ofro-rha^irtLomcrswould require the s.re..eeper 
 
 •"Tircrtite'ta^'bf :™r";;^to .^ <^ir..^^ 
 
 Jl price.. (3) That it should he 'narteiopen^- (4 The 
 ,„a«, and .raOe of go<K,s to be '^P^^;^^^,^^'^ VJ trust. 
 tations to be guaranUed. (6) t'"" Vj „„s.«r to he appointed 
 lfaf;rc"Jrth:'eXrs ta^-^'arT^volce Of the^goods at 
 tt;"m'ar;tp lee. '^^^J"^^' -^T:^:^::.. the 
 But who will -™' ; '- „"^ ::i„, ^Zm necessitate putting 
 customers, or both. " ""^ °"'""" J ,„,.„i,h one half, it should 
 the store-keeper under bonds. U they tm " ^ .^ 
 
 „e as an i-Oepe-dent '»": -^t-wotw^rFor^tL store-keeper 
 
 The better and simple. "^>; °";\;™-^„j ^b„„t „„„ Hfth of what is 
 to furnish ,t, as we »>>al A" ' to ^ >,,, ^^ ^^ ^__^ .__ ^^^__^^___ 
 
 :rttr:!^irv,r;:nbe.Ie::eSer hanking and production. 
 NATIONAL PURCHASINU SYNUICATE. 
 
 We have, then, now organised a local store, whose organism 
 under -cost,' is wholly different from that under PjfJ;;^*; ^^^ 
 
 =:,t':::n:;"^;::;:r::ro;;^^^^^^^^^^ - the same 
 
 S::g":T,upi:a.e^of the one a,..^^^^^^^^ 
 and the Btore-keeper. As the customers miy
 
 CO-OPERATION. 9 
 
 keeper, so the store-keeper buys of this central purchasing syndi- 
 cate. As the stoi'e-keeper is independent of the custom, so is the 
 syndicate independent of the store-keeper. A repetition of the same 
 development, except on a difterent plane. 
 
 The goods now, for each retail store, ai'e bought in bulk by the 
 syndicate from the manufactory without the intervention of any 
 wholesale house. The goods come direct, are fresh, in style, in mod- 
 erate quantity, and at bottom prices. In progress of time this syn- 
 dicate may have a representative in every state. And as consumers 
 are also producers, and buyers, sellers, there will be a universal 
 exchano;e or brokerao;e of commodities. Have and Want will find 
 an automatic clearance, and the number of 'middle men' be reduced 
 to perfect accuracy. 
 
 COMPETITION. 
 
 Now that our Monitor is fairlj^ launched, it will be seen, from 
 the pool's nature, that it must have a tight. But her victories are in 
 the interests of peace. We make no war upon ti'aders in the com- 
 petitive, pi'ofit-making sense. We rather pity their lot, and would 
 gladly assist tiiem in imloading their goods. But some capitalists, 
 superlatively wise in tlieir own conceit, will not be run ashore by a 
 'cheese box.' They will break us up, if it takes their last dollar. 
 
 Now, while our ca])italist is just cutting under our prices, and 
 drawing away our custom, how can we keep up our expenses ? We 
 do not aim to 'make money,' neither have we any to lose. In 
 the tight, tlien, with capital shall we not go down ? No, two ways 
 are open. First, our store is so lightly equipped, it can stand a 
 running tire, until we exhaust our adversary's exchequer. Second, 
 our pool, in guaranteeing a minimum of custom, can alibrd, for such 
 great advantages, to keep its organization idle. For, the moment 
 it should die, capital would again put up its prices to cover its loss. 
 But, if it only sells at cost, we can then undersell it, for, fi'om the 
 nature of our organization, their cost price is above that of our's. 
 
 If we had no opposition, what should we be good for ? The 
 point is however, in so overcoming our opponent, as to be accelera- 
 ted in our progress. So that our capitalist would not ouly lose his 
 trade, but his capital also. And where would he tind it ? In the 
 hands of the pool. For, the process we are inaugurating, is the 
 transfer of one system into that of another. Just as a wine mer- 
 chant, by means of a syphon transfers a full cask into an empty 
 one. And in this operation w« work with nature and, as by force 
 of gravity, are reinforced by all her power.
 
 THE SUN. 
 
 PROFIT. —DIVIDENDS. 
 
 ■But/' it is said, "if you reciprocate with the trade, and do not 
 sell at cost, you will meet with no (competition. '^ But that is jtist 
 the opposite of what we have set out to do. It is the profit-making 
 system from which we have fled. The whole of the laborer's cause 
 is wrapped up in labor.-cost. It is the secret of our economy, it dic- 
 tates the outward character of our store, and inspires its inward har- 
 mony. Cost is our begining and end, our anchor and destiny, the 
 only real profit to any individual, and the only profit for all. -'But 
 would not everybody come to the store ?'' 
 
 "But outsiders Vould then get their goods as cheap as those wiio 
 first formed the pool ?'' True, but had we these outsiders to be- 
 gin with, we should have never needed to form any pool. They 
 are preserving the objects of the pool, to get their goods at cost^ 
 and we shall °oon need them to further the cause of co-operation.* 
 •'But should not the first contributors of money receive some divi- 
 dend?" But, the making of a loan is a separate aftair from the 
 selling of goods, and will be further treated under co-operative 
 bankhig. "Then are we to have no profit ?" cries our interlocuier. 
 So far from it, that unless, through the store, we can attack privi- 
 leged usury itself, "the savings of the store may prove a greater 
 cm-se to co-operators, than ootatoes have been to Ireland, or rice to 
 the Chinese. For then would the holders of land and money make 
 U{> the difference in wages. 
 
 English Co-opemtion. — What is the .sole, economic and organic 
 secret of the English co-operator's success ? Nothing but having 
 his custom previously pledged. Why. then, should he discrimin- 
 ate against those wiio would help him swell that custom ? If the 
 dividl-nd of twenty five cents on a sack of flour behmgs to him, why 
 docs he not take' it, on the spot, when it is due, without the check 
 system ? And what about those other co-operators, who raist'd 
 and ground the flour ? Do they not deserve a dividend ? But 
 this would leave the purchaser twenty live cents out of pocket. 
 What, then, is the English co-operator's great weakness? This 
 nibbling at profit. How couhl he be expected to throttle the vam- 
 pires of his native Isle, while fishing for minnows from the mouth 
 of a shark ? For, is it not this very system which leaves (ill laborers 
 out of pocket ? ^ 
 
 * 8ince,we do no advertising. <)'>r new custoiiiern will mainly come through the re- 
 ports of the old oncH. and will Hub^fcril^e to the i-riiK iplcH of a concern from which 
 they derive bcncfll. It ix the'luw, where nogooln .irr hoM for proiii, to cl;is8 it a» 
 a charitahle iuxtltnlion, requiring n o 'license.'
 
 C(j-oprrat[on: u 
 
 Then imagine, if you can, each laborer strutting as a small 'cap- 
 italist.'' Hear him deliver his mind of such sapient utterances a 
 these : "Tlie whole trouble with labor does not lie in the system, 
 but in human nature. Would he but leave off dissipation and lazi- 
 ness, any slave might soon become a master. The real rea.son the 
 country is going to the dogs, is because laborers themselves are 
 unwilling to sufficiently 'retrench,'' and this, in turn, brings on an 
 'overproduction' " He even relieves God of all responsibility in 
 his make-up, by declaring himself a 'self made' man, and capable of 
 standing along side of Jay Gould. A most incorrigible 'co-opera- 
 tor' is he, who, once having been a slave, has become an overseer! 
 
 • 
 
 OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 
 
 We will now attempt, in further elucidation, to answer some 
 objections that might be brought against the pool. And first, 
 does it seem impracticable to pool a custom before there has been 
 a store-keejjer selected ? But would the objections not be gi'eater 
 afterward ? If the pool selects its own store-keeper, would it not 
 insure greater satisfaction ? And where all are interested, would 
 not the selection be a proper one ? 
 
 But the pi^ople are not ready or sulHciently wide awake to form 
 a pool. But there are some j)eople sufficiently interested to form 
 one pool, the first one, when all outsiders will be drawn into it. If 
 this cannot be done, then nature's method of bringing the supply 
 to the demand can never be accomplished. But you will have all 
 sorts of cranks who will imnKnliately stamp your movement with 
 ridicule and throw it into contempt. But. it is not necessary that i t 
 should assume that cast, while it is guiiled by a reform itlea. its re- 
 alization is purely a nuitter of business. 
 
 But the majority in your pool would domineer the rest. How 
 could they, when the conditions of membership are voluntary, with- 
 out fees, and with every one's interest kept separate ? But to begin 
 with, you elect the store-keeper by a nuijority vote, and there arc 
 two candidates, each having friends, and one might come within a 
 few votes of being elec^ted, would not such an infriuiremeiit of the 
 rights of the minority break the pool ? No, for the benefits accru- 
 ing from remaining in it, would mon; than counterbalance those 
 received by staying out. Nor would anyone's liberty be infringed 
 by being permitted to choose that which he liked best. 
 
 Bxit supposing tlie character of the pool should be so entirely 
 changed, by the majoritv, as to divert it into a jon it-stock profit-
 
 j2 THE SUN. 
 
 makiucr concern ? Then of course the minority would be justified in 
 formin- another pool, by dividing, and each going its way. But, if 
 there is no binding obligation, the pool will be like a flock of sheep. 
 But our obligation is internal, based upon self interest. There is n. 
 other required : where compulsion is necessary, dissolution begins. 
 But would not contracts, thus made, rest upon an insecure founda- 
 tion ? But a contract, to be binding, must be voluntarily made. 
 After we ao-ree to guarantee a minimum of custom, we are willing 
 to secure the store-keeper against all risk, in his venture on our 
 
 ^^ In turning profit into cost, what is cost ? The labor cost, first, 
 that enterino- into the raw material, next, its manufacture, last, its 
 distributionr including insdranoe, waste and expense. But this is a 
 circuitous and complicated transaction. Assuredly, but xifree the 
 natural course of supply and demand will adjust itself to the labor 
 cost But, on 'change, there are now fluctuations every mmute. 
 Yes, to artificially produce them is the life of profit, but when we 
 eet one normal exchange, the crops will determine prices. But 
 can one expect to compete with small Jewish second-hand stores 
 where the wife lives in the rear, takes boarders, tends the baby, and 
 waits on the store, without any cost ? No, we do not desire to com- 
 pete in that direction, below co^U and, when the full influence of 
 our oro-ani/.ation is felt, no one we hope NviU be compelled so to do. 
 But°is not co-operation the most delusive of words, else, how so 
 many faih.res ? The Sovereigns of Industry, started well, but 
 finally failed. But this was not owing to the fact that co-op- 
 erative principles would not work, but because they were wrongly 
 interpreted and applied. Periiaps the exponents in those move- 
 ments now see that their failure was less owing to the unwilling- 
 ness of the people to be lead, than to the imperfection in their plan 
 of organization. Such failures only emphasize the practical impor- 
 tance'' of a study of the first principles of .social and economic action. 
 
 REVIEW. 
 
 Now, as the Lord looked upon Creation and 'pronounced it good.' 
 let us take a parting glance at the store. Can its ™*";^g^";'«°^ 
 be abused ? Not unless a liberty has been granted without a. 
 equal responsibility. Can its custom break up ? No. for they have 
 voluntarily followed their self interest. But may they no altei the r 
 minds? Yea. and in the change of management, we have made 
 provision for growth. We do not claim to alter human nat^re^ 
 only lo have put greater inducements in its way for honesty tha.
 
 GO-OPEBATION. 13 
 
 dishonesty. And as for the economy of the store, how could it be 
 improved ? Is not the interest of buyer and seller identical ? Can- 
 not the best goods, in any market, be bought for the least money ? 
 This should he the final test. 
 
 PAR r II :— THE BANK. 
 
 WE now have the store, where everything can be bought that 
 money can buy, as a miniature world for the circulation of our cur- 
 rency. Soon production, which will be needed to furnish the stoi-e 
 with supplies, will make the complete round of exchanges. 
 
 A JUST AND SCIENTIFIC CURRENCY. 
 
 But what is it that we have to exchange ? We have seen that 
 'cost" at the store, was to be the basis of the price, and 'cost' \\\\\ 
 dictate the pi'ice, at the factory. What, then, must a currency be, 
 to sandwich these two conceptions, unless it be a labor currency ? 
 
 Is all property and prosperity to dance at the caprice of one 
 small, shiningjfetich, called gold, and this in the hands of profes- 
 sional gamblers ? It cannot be. But can we any the more accept, 
 as a substitute out of this dilemma, the issuing' of multitudinous 
 paper promises to pay that which we have not got, never will have, 
 and which does not exist ! Most surely not. Then, too, what is a 
 paper dollar ? It must have some objective reality, besides being a 
 mere chimera of the imagination. If it is not gold, then what 
 other commodity is it ? No other. Then it is not any particular 
 commodity. Can we not then see that the birth of t\\e first paper 
 dollar was the logical and inevitable end of the last specie one ? 
 For, between the two, there is no middle ground. 
 
 But, if the dollar represents no special commodity, yet passes 
 in exchange for all commodities, what is its real standard of value ? 
 Plainly, labor, that which underlies all commodities, including gold 
 itself. And what is its par standard ? The average labor in the 
 most common avocations. 
 
 We need, then, to change the old nomenclature, and for dollars, 
 to insert the new standard, 'hours of labor." For, if for ten hours
 
 14 THE SUN. 
 
 labor, I get seven hours labor and three dollars, must I not again 
 measure my three dollars by labor, before I can count my money ? 
 And if in doing so, I tind that the dollar, measured by the natural 
 labor products of the country, is not worth more than fifteen min- 
 utes of my labor, then I should find myself ijreatly cheated. 
 
 Likewise, any commodity other than gold, as a measure of labor, 
 would be as unsuitable, with which to make contracts. If, iustead 
 of a labor note, I take, for my service, an order for a bushel of 
 wheat, and carrying it a year, present it to the farmer, the changed 
 conditions of production might bankrupt him, or, when considering 
 the cost, might bankrupt me. For the average product of labor, 
 during that'time, would be other than a bushel of wheat. But, the 
 labor,''throughout. remains the same. Therefore, it can, at any 
 time, both measure, and redeem all commodities. It is the only 
 just statement of the elements in the human equation between the 
 contracting parties. It correspoud.s with the only defensible postu- 
 late concerning property and price, and a currency which is just, 
 may be said to contain nearly all the elements of a perfect one. 
 
 A FREE CUIillENCY. 
 
 Having provided against the inherent injustice in the gold dol- 
 lar, let us proceed to rout it from the royalty of its bankii g prerog- 
 ative. In oliiiM- words, to put a sto^) to the toll it in.po.ses, as apart 
 of profit, and which it styles interest. 
 
 If a paper dollar can" be issued on a tirtitious gold dollar, it can 
 be issued on a house, that will sell for gold dollars. If in one ease 
 the interest is saved to the banker, in the other case, it is saved to 
 the property holder. And when the value of the house is so many 
 more times that of the gold, it is easy to see which will be the lirst 
 to "suspend specie paynuMit." For, as it happens, when the bank 
 fails, its real specilic basis is the assets of its patrons. Now, un- 
 less the sinner is greater tiian its redeemer, what is now being 
 done under usury, can be done at cost, providing the property hold- 
 ers only hav(; tlitf proper machinery. 
 
 Hut is the way to do this perfectly open to all our givernmeutal 
 brethren ? If not, we shall have to stop and give them a lift, for, 
 unless the ground of action c(»mmends itself, we shall be (tailed 'im- 
 practical.' Let us, th.'ii, briefly state the grounds for, and the na- 
 ture of « free currency. 
 
 First, we have the riyhl to make exchanges. This right is only 
 .second to the right to produce. Without it, surplus products must 
 perish on the spot. And in expediting exchanges, parties have
 
 CO-OPE RATIOS. 15 
 
 the right to issue such commercial paper at< will make a record of 
 the transaction. 
 
 Inseparable. — Neither can this fiiuction be s(;parated from the 
 exchange, or the right to make a contract. Nor is there any power 
 that can prevent it. since to do so, would put an end to commerce. 
 Utility. — Without local self goveriiaieiit in Jii:iince, how can all 
 credit be made available ? But witii il. even tlie demands of the 
 pawnbroker can be met and satisfied. 
 
 Indispensable. — And we are furtlier pn^parevl to prove that no 
 cuiTenoy can be normally got into circailation except through loans, 
 payment for services, or damages, which are all subject to local 
 application. 
 
 Elasticity. — How in any other way can its volume be regfulated, 
 except it be free to regulate itself. Just as loaves of bread are I'eg- 
 ulated, by the natural law of supply and demand. 
 
 Usefulness. — The reason that a home currency is as useful tis a 
 general one, arises from the fact tliat 95 per cent, of it would be 
 spent at home, most of it, in going to the store, on Saturday night. 
 
 Economy and Safety. — Besides, a IocmI currency is less liable to 
 forgery, owing both to the small inducement to do so, and the greater 
 (diance for detection. It is also unnecessary to add. that the more 
 local the administration, the more economical and efficient. 
 
 Solvency. — It is thought by some that onl}' a government cur- 
 rency is solvent, and that all othei is 'wild cat.' So the Catholic 
 tliinks that only Papal infallibility is solvent, anil that all Protestant- 
 ism is 'wild cat.' So the Anglican church looks u[)ou all volunta- 
 ryism, as the death of religion. Whereas, the history of American 
 religion shows it to have been solvent, only as it has been frc(>. So 
 of the faith in things financial. While the promissory notes of busi- 
 ness men are preferred at alow discount at the b;tnk. one lialf of our 
 State and municipal securities aie either at default, comi)r<uniscd, 
 or repudiated. No national gov(^rnment ever, nominally, paid its 
 debts. Probably, there never will be one, for no oil.er reason than 
 because they have been paid so many times already. For, next to 
 the multiplication tabic, there probably is notiiing truer, than, tlial 
 to pay a debt once, in whatever form, is just as good as to |>ay it 
 999 times. An<l 'the people,' who are con.siantly paying the.se, 
 over and over again, will com(^ to the conclusion that tiiev will rest 
 while the_coupon-cutters work. •• But such a doctrine would not 
 be reciprocal in private life." No, when parties voluntarily make 
 a bad contract, let them nnitually be held. But when an irrespon- 
 sible class, contracts debts, for class purposes, and supports them by 
 party supremacy, with whom does it recinmeati' ':" Such debts .lo 
 not po.ssess in law one element of a solvent contract. They are not
 
 .g TEE SUN. 
 
 voluatarv, iust, or certain of fulfillment. Had there been a con- 
 Ircting party he died long ago. If there are any - reveres -1^ 
 as to suppose the 'public faith' can be any greater, or '^^ff;--* f 7 
 private faith, that is their risk. Between the bondholder and the 
 bondman, as between the slaveholder and the slave, we side with 
 the latter. 'Public faith,' first, toward labor, then private contribu- 
 tions for bondholders is our motto. 
 
 When one remembers all the depreciations of com for revenue, 
 its inflations, end contractions to suit a creditor class, its periodic 
 hard times to rob the poor, and its panics to throw into convulsions 
 legitimate enterprise, one is led to damn the solvency of such a 
 co"ncern, and the stupidity of all its abettors.* 
 
 On the contrary, individuals are responsible, in law. They own 
 property which can be attached. And, by local, voluntary associ- 
 ation, they can become as general as they please : and where the 
 whole, individually agree to be responsible for each, a sohdanty 
 of credit is obtained. 
 
 It was probably through the influence of some such considera- 
 tions as these, which caused Plato to say : "That currency is best 
 which is good for its own time and place, and worthless everywhere 
 else '' Certainly, to organize such a one, is the easiest part of 
 co-operation. On every hand, we see tickets, orders.* checks, notes, 
 and various forms of commercial handwriting, which are examples 
 of a non-interesL bearing currency. 
 
 THE MOBILIZATION OF CREDIT. 
 
 Let m, then, show how easily the machinery for a non-interest 
 bearinsr currency can be practically put in operation. A half dozen 
 customers of the stor e decide to pool t heirjire dit. 
 
 "T^ol^ETHOi. . Wbilc we sympathize ^vith the Greenbacker. a. to the end he 
 huB m view, a non-inter. M bearing' currency, a. that is what the greenback assured y 
 L we dive;ge as to n^thoUK He begins with the government and leaves off wUh 
 ,he individual: we begin with the individnal. and le .ve off when- he began. He 
 egurdl the present governmental machinery as a proner medium for finaneu^lco.o^ 
 
 .ration : while we. in onr analysis of the function of governmental sovereignty, can 
 find no ...round for its either issuing, or regulating the currency. ";' ^.^g"'™ 
 laws, and atten.pln to repeal them : while we do not recognize that they <^reUyi^: 
 and would peaceably or, anize to ignore them. 1'*^^ '^^^j''' "P°" VT-' wWle he 
 while we would aid ..ur.elves. One does not see how this can be done . while the 
 other . annot see how anything can Iv accomplished in any other way. *'« 0"^ °« 
 walls legislative nBurpatlon, while the other bewails the Btupid-ty of poUtica 
 organization. 
 
 ^he corporations already have their co-operative storee; and are now doing a free 
 banking buBlness, in the «rm of 'Btore orders,' over the heads of their employees-
 
 CO-OPERATION. 17 
 
 Occasions for Credit. — One wants to lay in his winter's coal, one 
 to pay his taxes, one to release a sewing machine from. pawn, one 
 to pay a doctor's bill, another to buy stock to which to feed his 
 surplus corn. You may say these occasions lor credit grew out of 
 old conditions. But this does not obviate the necessity for their 
 relief. These parties, being of difierent employments, may be able 
 to balance these exchanges, or nearly so, on book account, and so 
 require but little money except for the purpose of making 'change.' 
 
 Object. — But the primary object of this credit mobilier is to move 
 one man's stock for another's coal, without intei-est, and to utilize 
 the old currency, in paying off it.s interest bearing debts. 
 
 Method. — And to do so, we appoint a broker, to break up the far- 
 mer's property, and under a general mortgage deed, as secui-ity, to 
 issue several little, transferable ones, of different denominations. 
 After the deed of trust has been made out, for the purposes stated, 
 the broker turns engraver and with his pen, on the spot, writes out 
 the scrip, for the farmer to sign, and the thing is done.* 
 
 System.~Bnt, uniformity of method as to security, length of 
 loans &c. will now be needed. We should say that one half of the 
 assessed value of improved real estate, for the last tc7i years, would 
 allow sufficient security, for a year's loan ; and that an elevator, or 
 warehouse receipt on grain &c. would serve as security for ninety 
 days. Of course, through endorsement, other security could bo 
 rendered available. The individuality of function, and the volun- 
 tary independence of each individual should be preserved. Co-oper- 
 ators cannot become incorporated, except as they do it themselves, 
 through their right of private contract. Then, if they are sued, it 
 will be as individuals. However, this does not prevent them all 
 from enlisting in the defense. Neither is it incompatible with a 
 mutual contract to be severally responsible, in the form of insurance, 
 for the unavoidable shortcomings of each. This would constitute 
 a local solidarity of security. 
 
 National Association. —Now if these local associations should 
 agree, for facility of exchange among themselves, to issue ten per 
 cent, on these local securities we should have a national currency. 
 And if, as with the local solidarity, the whole should agree to be re- 
 sponsible for the failure of any separate association, we would then 
 have a national solidarity of credit, the most solvent imaginable. 
 But, before then, through letters of credit, bills of lading, commer- 
 cial reports, the telegraph, in conjunction with our stores and pur- 
 chasing syndicate, a national clearance can easily be effected. 
 
 * We purpose to be here a little flippant, to divest this 'ransaction of Its mystery.
 
 l,s THE .sex. 
 
 Credit Slrategetic. — We must now remember that the emergen- 
 cies arising out of the present relations between labor and 'capital,' 
 invite die display of some new and original tactics. We see the 
 Trades Unionists out of employment and starving, while the wheat 
 of t he Grangers is rotting, and they out of money. What is to unite 
 these interests except a new manipulation of credit ? There are 
 thousands of men yeai'ly going on a 'strike,' and millions fleeced 
 from the farmers, in exorbitant transportation rates. Both the rail- 
 roads and the manufactories would be glad to get on their knees 
 and beg, in view (if a new application of credit. Then, again, there 
 is the present creditor class, few in numbers, but setting their trap 
 and waiting for the game. Now, we know just how much gold there 
 is in the country, should we not know where it is ? For, having an 
 organization of business completed, what is there to hinder our 
 turning the tables npon them if but one man in ten, on Saturday 
 night, should hoard his $5. gold piece. The National banks threat- 
 ened Congress, cannot Inhor. properly organized, threaten both ? 
 
 ^SIMPLICITY OF LABOR CREDFr, 
 
 How dirt'erent now the laborer's credit from Shylock's credit. 
 We have been extricuitiny: ourselves. One entailed debt, distress, 
 and was always prospecting how and when it could take advantage. 
 But the other is so simple, I had almost said, it needs no credit. 
 For what does labor need credit if it gets jiaid, will there not be suffi- 
 cient lloating capital ? There is no stringency, for which it must 
 borrow, to get out.* And it cannot 'speculate' or gamble, for if it 
 should lose, as one party must, there is no natural law that could 
 (enforce the collcclion of debts. No, an cxaxit and complete equiva- 
 lent passes in all transactions. There is no interest lo compute, no 
 'investments,' no 'divid(;nds.' But how improvements go forward, 
 and of such a solid character ; and natural resources are developed, 
 iiaiid in }ian<l with lalior. Tlicrc! is no 'watered stock' now, nor 
 iiitcrcsf bcaiidir boml'^. tnc ljridir<!S, the school-houses, the nuirket- 
 iiouscs, th<; water works, the railroads are all binlt without inter- 
 est. No more 'hard times,' 'suspensions,' 'panics.' For the gold 
 dollar, l)oth as to its intrinsic nature, and its mode of issue, has be- 
 come transformed into a Labor Dullar. 
 
 'I'lirrc !iro two kinds f)f (Todit. Credit at cont, and credit moiio|oly. Or'ditfor 
 Hix'ciilatiiin iinil cn'djt for lahor exchange. C)ne enslaves, the ottier lit)ei'nte». 
 One rreatPH debtH, the. otlier does not enforce their collection. One produceB bank- 
 riihtcv and panics, the other fails only when the crops fall. Then enhanced price?; 
 cancel the loss. These two credit svstems should not be confounded.
 
 CO-OPERATTON.- 19 
 
 Bit, if equity should not prevail, but be compromised with protit 
 and a cheap commercial spirit, should the acceptor of credit go wild 
 over his uew 'perpetual motion,' or the prospective value of corner 
 lots, then, somebody will get his security, and he never will be in a 
 position again to borrow, without interest ;— partly on account of 
 the risk incurred, and partly owing to his necessity. Again has 
 the labor dollar become one of gold ! 
 
 PART III:-rilE FACTORY. 
 
 Now we have the capital, hurrah ! With it. we have helped 
 many a poor fellow out of the grasp of Shylock. Now, ho ! for 
 the employme.'it <;ffice ;— and there are iifew who will apply ! All 
 sorts ; and cannot wc handle them ? What, not those who want 
 to woi-k") Of course we can. Labor now employs capital, instead 
 of it employing labor. The "capitalists''' are more sorely in need 
 »)f labor now, than labor is of their capital. We can undersell them 
 by ten per cent, the lirst leap. Besides, we now have our goods 
 already sold before they are made, without any canvassers, commis- 
 sions, Of 'overproduction.' But we must attend to those deraand- 
 itig work. And, strange to say, they come in faster than our stores 
 need supplies. They are ditiicult to classify, some are tramps, some 
 broke jail, some are colhige graduates, aiany can do nothing well, 
 all are in search of an 'cnsy job." Now these people must be guar- 
 anteed immediately, somctuing tliat all can do, for subsistence, 
 sf'cond. what each likes to do, and can do best, third, they must 
 have a chance to learn what they would like to do, but cannot. 
 Those that are skilled laborers of course find employiui-nt in tlu; fac- 
 tories, while those th:it arc iniskillcd, are set at some plain mechan- 
 ical pursuit, go on to the land, or become apprentices. 
 
 Now for the kind of maiutgement, and the ethical relations tliat 
 shall exist between 'lai)(jr :u'd capital.'' One must b»' satisfied, the 
 other, secured. In elucidating this, let us suppose that the capital, 
 or plant, is entirely owned by one man, and according to individu- 
 ality of function, is conti-oUed by hira, wliat is to determine tlie law 
 of harmony between employer aiid employee? 
 
 Their Mutual Jielalion.^.~T\\e manufacturer has the machine, 
 but all that it is good for is to be run, and, if idle, it will require la-
 
 THE SUN. 
 
 bor to keep it in condition. On the other hand, the laborer want, 
 the means of employment, whereby he can -t>l- ^^ -b^r to the 
 best advantage. Now, how shall the machine be kept m tact, and 
 what shall be the wages for work and superintendence . 
 
 Co77ipensaiion and Exploitation.-Theve are but two wajs to 
 settle this. One is to debit the use of the machine to .^he laborer 
 and credit him with his product. The other is to debit him with 
 his product and credit him with an allowance for subsistence whik 
 he is employed. Between these tw^o positions there is no middle 
 ground. In one case, there is compensation, in the other, income 
 This income is made up of interest and skill. But we have disposed 
 of interest ; how now shall laborers dispose of the reward for super- 
 intendence ? By putting it up at auction. The one who can be 
 found that will do the work best for the least money will decide 
 the compensation. How will it compare with menial labor . A3 
 to the supply, there will be many who can till the position, and as 
 to the demand, it will be preferred to menial labor. While respon- 
 sibility consumes more vitality, all other considerations are in favor 
 of the labor that contains the least drudgery. Probably Vander- 
 bilt would prefer to do the work he now does, at the same price, 
 than to serve as brakeman on his road. 
 
 But, it may be asked, how is the laborer to secure capital, since 
 he starts with nothincr. Had lie got his deserts he would have had 
 something, for the first day's work leaves a net result to secure cap- 
 ital. The first day the laborer becomes capitalist. How, otherwise, 
 could capital find immunity ? 
 
 WORKING OF THE TWO METHODS. 
 
 In the tirst case, the laborer is. substantially, working for him- 
 self. As he gets in proportion to what he produces, it is for l.is inter- 
 est to produce all he can : in the second case, he is working against 
 time, and it is for his interest to produce as little as i)ossible. In one 
 case, the workman is responsible for damages: in the other, the 
 proprietor, so that capital is never secure. In the first case, wages 
 automatically adjust themselves, according to what one contributes. 
 There are no strikes, for there is nothing to strike against. Be- 
 tween the hand that produces and the thing produced there can be 
 no warfar*!. Hut. in the other case, there is a chronic civil war be- 
 tween labor and capital. In one case, there is an e(iuality of rela- 
 tionship between employer and employee : in the other ca.se. one is 
 •boss,' the other H 'hand.' In one case, a foreman lays out the work : 
 in the other case, an overseer spurs on the men. In one case, there
 
 CO-OFERATION. 21 
 
 are no disputes to arbitrate : in the other, arbitration fails and dyn- 
 amite is used instead. In one case, they work many hours to accom- 
 plish httle : in th^ other case, they work few hours and accomplish 
 much. In one case, they welcome inventions : in the other case they 
 oppose them. As consumption increases as 2, 4, 6, 8, and pi-oduc- 
 tion according to 2, 4, 8, 16, &c., there wfll soon be a net result to 
 labor. Prices under co-operation, would then eventually fall into 
 the category of natural resources, and property at last become a 
 spiritual entity. Artisans would then become artists, and labor 
 exercise. It would be set to music and rhythm, as the brooks now 
 flow, as the birds sing, as the flowers bloom, or as the planets roll. 
 Laborare est orare, to labor is to pray. For when 
 
 "The traveller and the road seem one, with the errand to be done, 
 'that were man's and lover'^part, that were Freedom's whitest chart." 
 
 COROLLARIES. 
 
 If what we have now passed over is correct, three deductions, 
 somewhat important, may be derived: — 
 
 (1) Wayca. — When usury is abolished and we get what we earn 
 there is no more slavery in working for another than in working for 
 one's self. Neither is the possession of private capital, void of leg- 
 islative increase, at all inconsistent with either liberty or equity. 
 The farmer who possesses it and employs himself, may be a greater 
 slave than those who do not possess it and who work for wages. 
 It is impossible for anyone to say for another just where his surplus 
 possessions begin and his personal needs leave ofi". Whatever is net 
 beyond immediate use belongs to I lie producer just as much as 
 what has been consumed, anil to divest Iiini of it would be rob- 
 bery. As a proprietor then, he has a right to hire others, and they 
 can justly work, for wages. The "wage system" then must forever 
 remain. And because of the law of individuality of functions in na- 
 ture it is perfectly compatible with co-operation. The recognition 
 of this may simplify, and hasten the possibility of organizmg co-op- 
 erative production . 
 
 (2) Capitalistic Interest.— The capitalist may now inquire how 
 he is to be benelited by owning property upon which he can derive no 
 revenue ? This is answered in the fact that in nominally losing his 
 ten per cent, 'dividend' in a false system, he saves :is a producer 
 and a member of society vastly more on his labor, in conjunction 
 ■with his capital, nature and co-operation. 'Industrial partnerships'
 
 22 THE SUN. 
 
 are an inefficacious but sure forenmnei" of this result. The quicker 
 this change is made, the surer will be the chances of realizing par 
 upon the pi'esent plant. For a lesson and a warning, against what 
 might prove a possible and unexpected result, reference is made 
 to the present and former condition of Southern slaveholders. 
 Their i)lantations are unsaleable at ten per cent, of their former 
 valuation, and yet, they could not now be persuaded, did the law 
 allow it, to invest $50. in a Fall River operative,— -so much cheaper 
 is 'free' than slave labor. 
 
 (3) Competition imder Co-ope7'ation.-' Again it vvill be noticed 
 that competition under co-operation is nut ab(jlislied as it is inider 
 communism and state socialism. But it is animated by a new idea 
 and directed into new channels. Under co-operation the problem 
 is solved how the fullest exercise of individual genius is wholly 
 compatible with the public good. While society gains in efficiency 
 and ecoiu)ray, individuals are preserved from lo-is. (yompetition, 
 as guided by the demand, builds up instead of bi'eaks down. Under 
 profit, society and individuals both alike pay the penalty, now all 
 parties are benefited. Under {)rofit the greatest trickster and the 
 longest purse survive ; under co-operation the most usefnl member 
 of society survives. 
 
 (4) The Tariff. — Having now a free cui-reticy, all p(M)ples of tin; 
 globe and every climate, from Alaska to Mexico, c.mnot we com- 
 pete with England ? I think we can. and with New England, also. 
 For C()-oi)erat,ors will do their manufacturing on the spot where the 
 raw material is raised. Meanwhile, by pooling onr consumption, 
 we shall be able to share in the bonus ])aid to capital, for our ']iro- 
 tection.' Thus, is it seen, that co-opcia lion, without entciing (lie: 
 arena of politics or waiting for another presidentipl^electlon, out- 
 flanks the custom-house, and settl<!s the tarift" ((uestion in the inter- 
 est, alike, of /)(>th Fi-ctt Trader and rroeclionist. 
 
 THllKK IN ONE. 
 
 We now have consumption. iiistril)ution and prcxhu'tion, llic.vtore, 
 the bank, the farm ami factory. These three are one : they consti- 
 tute th(! thn-c sid(;s of tin; triangle to the (•onii)h!t(* reorgani/ation 
 of business and industry. VUc. pool is designed to make a complete 
 round of labor exchanges. The store, alone, would i>e of minor i>o- 
 portance, not n;acliing the hidden sprir)gs of usury. Then- is now 
 such coin])ei,i(,ion. and so little margin, tliat m )st of tliern fail. It
 
 CO-OPERATION. 23 
 
 is probable that the economic administration ot our store would 
 save us from this result. But when one, complete, three-fold ex- 
 change has been made, there is saved all profit, waste, antaoonism, 
 strikes, failures, rent, interest and middle men. The store, now, as 
 related to these, is of prime importance. It makes a market for 
 {)roduction, gauges the amount, and guarantees employment. And 
 this furnishes us with a Held for the inauguiation of exchange. 
 While, all joined together, thej' reinforce and aid each other. 
 
 Now, this three-fold organism contains the application of every 
 element entering into the organization of business. When once it is 
 completely formed, in however small a wa}', its natural superiority 
 of organization must necessarily absorb and drive out the old sys- 
 tem. It cannot resist natural law any more than the weaker can 
 destroy the stronger. And through its outstretching and beneficent 
 arms in new applications, all laborers may be relieved and set free. 
 Every strike that now occurs, we are in a position to utilize, every 
 failure that takes place we can buy in at bankrupt sale, and when 
 the panic comes we can sit under our own vine and fig tree, and 
 say, "Gentlemen, you can have your money ; it is good for nothing ; 
 the trap that you were setting for us, has sprung back upon your- 
 selves ; you can now stay out and perish, or come in and behave." 
 Possessing such a fulcrum of power, we shall find little occasion to 
 'boycott.' Instead of 'teaj-ing down' the old, it will be our only 
 care to get out of its w ay, lest it fall down. "Stay as long as you 
 caw," Nature cries, "we will not compel you, but you must." 
 
 PRACTICAI. REVIEW. 
 
 So, methinks, I see the humble beginning of the first store. It is 
 in an attic. The customers are only ten. Their stock in trade is 
 perhaps but a sack of coflee. It may have taken thirty days for this 
 to accumulate. For, on the first of the month, they make their first 
 division. An iunuble beginning ? But the smaller the better, since 
 this leaves room for growth. By the chain of cause and effect, if 
 there are no wrong or missing steps to retrace, these co-operators 
 can now see the end from the beginning. Tiiis end is, from the at- 
 titude of the consumer, to break all profit-making organizations. 
 The next month, having tohl it to their friends, they are joined 
 by ten others, and they make a division in two weeks. At the end 
 of the second month, each m«mber's encouraging report of how 
 lauch tney had saved by pooling their custom, brought their num- 
 bers to forty, with cash orders, on Saturday night, amounting to 
 $150. Now, they had heretofore simply bought at wholesale, buy-
 
 24 THE SUN. 
 
 incr but one grade of goods, which bore the largest profit, and could 
 be'^most easily divided. One of their number did the purchasmg 
 made the division, and rendered a statement, free; the goods came 
 at wholesale rates. But now, the orders are so increased, and a e |« 
 so varied, that a room and a store-keeper are necessary. But on y "^ 
 
 a room for tilling these orders, storing what is left and a pla e o | 
 
 put any special bargains, or to keep a small assortment. Ami the 1 
 
 storekeeper must not be occupied only at stated ^^ur^^^f^ 
 to serve this custom. Therefore, a room in the store-lceepei s hou e 
 would be most convenient. Now the bare cost of t-nsacting th. 
 business is the store-keeper^s compensation. t can be reckoned 
 from the time consumed by each, or rated on the amoun ot good 
 sold The terms of the contract and the character of the oiganiz 
 
 ation having been ^e^^^f ?,^^'^^^'f^;^^^^,^,,, ,,, ,ni say, are 75 in 
 Now, how are we situated? The cu.tomeis, we wii y, 
 
 number Their trade averages $3. each per week, oi $2^«- ^^^o 
 
 getTiei Before, they got their goods at wholesale rates, which was 
 
 a savin, of 20 per cent. Now the extra expense of room and stoie- 
 
 keeper costs $5. per week, or 2 per cent, on the amount of sales. 
 
 ^"t^^^o^r!^^::^'^^ an hour or two each day to 
 accommodate tSscusLm. He is independent, furnisl.sh.eapit^^^ 
 or credit buys his own goods according to his judgment to sup- 
 
 pyhscistoL^^^ ^^^ t"'^'""rat and 
 
 go'tting some of their trade. They denounce him -^ P^-^^ ^^^^^ 
 I bushlhacker. The 'leading dealer,' who has .capital attemi^ts 
 to cut on prices. The two systems, 'capital and ^co^t now o^e 
 in contact, and one or the other must go undeT. If ^''^f^^^ H 
 dinary organization, it would be ourselves Even some c^ om co 
 operators say "Now we have got a good thing, wlij -^ ^^^ 
 
 . , ■ • • f <,f^,A- ct..rf whv should we be anxious to seu 
 
 it bv forming a loint stock store, wny miuu 
 
 iL uy iuimiiig«j „„4.'," Rut if we do not go on, we 
 
 goods to the outside world at cost f B"t it we ao g 
 
 ^hall go backward, and at last be absorbed ^Y eai^tal. Now ^ hde 
 our customers, in patronizing outside ^^-;f^^l^^^^:^^ 
 the indir«ct benefits of their organization, they must not ^^^'^^^^J^ 
 Here is where comes in the applicath^ of the ^--^-J"^^ 
 the store-keeper, to pay for the use of the room, and to pieser^e 
 the coherency of the pool. While capital ts sinking its monej our 
 expense n such sales is nearly zero. When it has sunk all it can 
 am>rd our customers come back, bringing with them those of the 
 rahf.r yfore For. we sell at cost, to all. 
 
 Mcanwl,ile, a purcha.mg syndicate ha, been form..! between 
 the managers;, several loeal »tore,. that they may buy at ba„k,u„t
 
 CO-OPERATIUN. 26 
 
 Bales, and at manufacturer's rates. They select an indiTidual to 
 serve them, just as they serve the local custom. Moreover the lo- 
 cal store, whicli had kept a mixed stock of goods, open only on part 
 of the time, finds its custom sufficiently large to keep open all the 
 time, and to move into a department building of its own. Here 
 samples may be seen of nearly everything that monev can buy. It 
 has a social, ethical, and unobtrusive air of reciprocity not found in 
 common stores. The emulation seems as great to sell things low 
 as high, and any fluctuation or flaw is as readily pointed out when 
 against you as in your favor. Anyone can send a child, or order 
 goods by mail as by person. The number of the regularly enrolled 
 custom is a guide to the management, but the pool is now trans- 
 formed, so far as consumption is concerned, into organized society. 
 
 B\it, long before this, production and the mobilization of credit 
 have begun. They began almost simultaneously with the store. 
 The farmer first added his supplies, and soon many articles of the 
 store which had been brought from abroad, are now manufactured 
 nearer home. Of coui'se our store-keeper buys goods where he can 
 get them the cheapest. And, in doing so, we patronize those mills 
 which espouse the labor cost principle. In the first place, as in- 
 terest with us, has become one of the lost arts, we pay it no longer. 
 As we pool our consumption, at cost, we are to lop off" 42 per cent. 
 tarifl\ We are not to pay any exorbitant profit for superintendence. 
 For who can superintend better than a skilled workman ? Nor are 
 we to pay for the present waste and antagonism, of strikes and fail- 
 ures, advertising, wholesale dealers, commission men and runners. 
 We have a market for our goods, and there can be no possible risk 
 in supplying them. If producing in large quantities is economical, 
 so is home production, besides conferring independence. And just 
 now electricity is coming to our aid in changing the world's motor 
 power. 
 
 But when these tolls to capital have been eliminated, the farm- 
 ers and wage workers establish the price, which is one of labor. 
 And since the only standard of a reciprocal exchange is a "day's 
 work," we again come to the point where the labor dollar becomes 
 the labor note. The mobilization of credit we found required no 
 establishment, but little organization, and was the easiest part of 
 co-operation. A half dozen financial reformers among the pool 
 first agreed that they would relieve each other in an emergency, by 
 loaning their spare money on deposit. They drew up a chattel 
 mortgage, each to himself, and capable of being available, at any 
 time, by endorsement. They next agreed, under these, to issue so
 
 26 THE HUN. 
 
 much scrip. One of tlie men was a blacksmith, one a doctor, one 
 a miller, one a soap maker, the other two were farmers, t'lntl they 
 liad $300. issvied between them. As these parties are well known, 
 their word being as good as their note, the xtore-keeper agrees to 
 take the scrip and locks up the securities in his safe, until the first 
 of the montli, when a statement and a clearance is made. Soon, 
 others start a warehouse for deposits, and their receipts are trans- 
 formed into certified checks, indelibly perforated with certain defi- 
 nite amounts. They issue a currency on real estate, also bonds for 
 their department store, for illumination, and for water. These are 
 in denominations as low as -fo., and are paid for in work, materials, 
 or money. In return, they are redeemed in service, meanwliile 
 passing as currency. 
 
 With this three-fold organized exchange, we not only are able 
 to make one labor exchange free from the tolls to monopoly but we 
 have a stereotyped organism which will forever establish all exchan- 
 ges on a labor basis. Then will the pool and its machinery become 
 mero-ed in society, where riches are alone the reward of merit, and 
 poverty only the consequence of indolence. Then there will be an 
 ethical yard- stick with which to measure ])rices, and the variations 
 of supply and demand so vvell regulated, that their influence will 
 V)e almo.st imperceptible in modifying the first cost. 
 
 We therefore, as consumers, call a halt on all the tolls to capital 
 of whatever description. We aflirm the utmost freedom for the 
 exercise of equity, knowing that it has the power to banish all dead- 
 headism. We constitute a power before whose gaze there is neith- 
 er sufferings nor martyrdom, but a veritable bonanza. Nature, in- 
 vention, association, all pour their treasure into the lap of labor. 
 Has any one any doubt that the only way to prevent being defrauded 
 is to stop dividing ? The only way then to do this is to form a chan- 
 nel where an integral exchange can take place. Is it possible to 
 con.;eive how labor can be otherwise emancipated ? It is not a la- 
 bor or class movement, l)ut a societary one. It takes in all classes 
 equally but the most obtuse, and these will be finally compelled to 
 come in. It is limited to no j)articular country in its application ; 
 It is capable of immediate introduction, and of conferring immedi- 
 ate ben fits. 
 
 PROPA(iANDA. 
 
 So our (trganization is ripe, oven though education has not begun. 
 We do not exp(!ct the tin pail brigade, or the farmer, weary with
 
 CO-OrERATIOX. T, 
 
 following tlic plow, to sit down and .sliidy pulitical economy, or tiic 
 science of goveinment. Few read, fewer think, less reasi>n, less 
 still reason correctly, and hardly any can apply their thought to 
 life. Yet ail can see, and feel, have common sense, self interest, 
 and know what benelits their conthtioii. And tbe test of our gospel 
 is not that it brings a serpent, or a sermon, or a stone, but Inead, 
 and money, and fishes. All can partake of the results, when they 
 will Ijc frieniiiy to the principles. We have no fees, no formulas 
 no pledges, not even a name. What have we to defend ? We 
 pursue the even tenor of our course. Whom need we ottend H The 
 trader can be taken in. Cannot a club of custom be obtained as 
 easily as a political club ? Do not people want to get out of debt P 
 Are they not travelling the .streets for employment P Do t!..ey not 
 want a luuie ^ \^ not capital seeking a safe investment ? Do not 
 all desire a competence, in old age ? Is not the whole industiial 
 world groaning and in travail to be relieved ? Then, let them come 
 to us, whose yoke is easy and whose burden is light. The marriage 
 feast is spread. Nature's banquet stands waiting, — Come ye in out 
 of the by-ways and hedges O ! ye Long-Defrauded, and partake of 
 what is yours. But, for the loafer, the nonproducer, there is no 
 place left for him. no alchemy in nature's laboratory luit can .-<u.s- 
 tain his life. 
 
 PROSPECTUS. 
 
 Hut what shall we say of the inthnMu-e tills changeil method of 
 production, and the molnlization of credit must have on tliejiresenl 
 land tenure, in distributive centres, and the tariff on railroad traffic '^ 
 Much we may safely say, tor our organization is rinally national, 
 and carries away the trade monopolies. Even tho.se, 'protected,' 
 are looking al)out for a place to unload their goods. But we are 
 not left to any indirect action of business to cope with these power- 
 ful monopolies. The ellicacy of the pool is not liiuited to one kind 
 of application. It can be applied to the r.iilroads and landlords as 
 well, — yes to the Stock P^xcliange and the Boards of Trade. The 
 whole of that old legal word, "propertA ,"" is liable to get a terrible 
 shaking. If there is any virtue in the future organization of labor, 
 it can show the landlord's titles as trees walking, and send 'securi- 
 ties,' in Wall street, higher than they were ever tossed by bulls and 
 bears. When we show our .strength we shall begin to be respected. 
 The priest will then make favorable mention in his prayers, and 
 the judge reserve a plact; for us rn his constructions. Even Mad- 
 ame Grundy, herself, will ilesire to make our acquaintance. And 
 lastly, the politicians, scenting our power, leeringly hover arouiul
 
 28 
 
 THE SUN. 
 
 to catch the breeze. But, poor old government, what can she 
 do now that Babylon is falling ? Divorced from her banking 
 laws, her tariff tinkering, her chartered privileges, from all class 
 legislation and meddling with private pursuits, what is there left 
 for her to do ? To appoint the Post-masters ? Every improvement 
 in the Post-office has come through the instigation or competition of 
 private enterprise. The surveying of the i?«6Ztc lands ? That 
 has only been an obstacle to natural development. A Bureau to 
 educate the Freedraen ? That is a farce, without land or credit. 
 Having these, they are amply able to educate themselves. A police 
 force ? But local jurisdiction is only competent for this. A stand- 
 ing army "> What use will the workingmen and women have for a 
 standino- army, when the usurers are dead ? Then is there nothing 
 left former to do. Like the fifth wheel to a coach, or a last year's 
 almanac, she is inoperative and obsolete. What, arbitrary force 
 exist, when there is no more fraud ? It is impossible. While one 
 v.'stige of it remains, fraud has not entirely ceased. One is the 
 cause, the other the effect. In life, they were happily united. 
 in death, they cannot go undivided. Yes, authority with profit 
 must die. Then pass away, hoary old monster, and thief, and 
 tyrant of time ! No more voting,-for you tu make 'good' laws 
 over us, or to unmake bad ones, but a recognition of those that 
 require no 'making.' No more taxing,-to compel one to buy what 
 he does not want, or could get cheaper nearer home. In a word. 
 no more war! But, instead. Peace arches the heavens, supported 
 bv two pillars,-Libertv and Equity. Cost, the only enduring basis 
 of profit, and the Equal Sovereignty of All, the only tranquil source 
 of a.ithority. The all mighty Dollar is no longer supreme. A new 
 «(.cial ideal has taken its place. Humanity is exalted, and Labor 
 
 is King. , , . 
 
 But we care to indulge in no Utopian fiights. All that we claim 
 for society is contained in a few, simple, definite, and self evident 
 things. If they are not as yet enjoyed by man, they already belong 
 to th(! brute creation. They are these:— 
 
 First— A place to work. A guarantee of work. A kind 
 that is adapted to tlie worker. 
 
 Second,- (Jomprnsnti07i. All one earns. The product of the 
 oroducer, or its hibor equivalent. 
 
 Third,- Capital Secured. The creature and the creator at 
 
 peace. 
 
 Fourth,— Poverty and the Crimes against property, no longer 
 
 a necessity. 
 
 j,''ij-lfi,—A Home and a Competence for All.
 
 THE FINANCIAL PROBLEM: 
 
 ITS RELATION TO 
 
 H H 
 J 
 
 AND PROSPERITY, 
 
 fhe Wnciplis of Moinetaiy Scigiet, 
 
 er 
 
 )EMONSTRATING THE 
 
 i0^ 
 
 ^ABOLITION OF INTEREST 
 
 ro in: ttnavoidarle. 
 
 By Ai.'kreh I'.. AN'ksti 
 Honorary member jif the Socicdad La^^C faxes Prodiictoras, 
 
 m;1' \l> \l.\ lAkA, MKXlt'O. 
 
 '* 
 
 
 DALLAS, TEXAS. 
 
 PUBI.ISHKD KY THE AUTHOR. 
 1886.
 
 
 i
 
 
 Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 
 Kv ALFRED 15. WESTRUP, 
 
 In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at ^^'ashinQ;ton.
 
 PREFACE TO SECOND EDITIOIT 
 
 Many years ago while lecturing and canvassing in the interests 
 of Labor Reform, and regarding financial reform as indispensably the 
 initiative step towards any real progress in that direction, the author 
 advocated the adoption of Colonel Wm. B. Greene's plan for Mutual 
 Banking, in order to abolish interest; and the utilization of other 
 products of labor besides gold and silver as a basis for the issue of 
 paper money, in order to obtain a surplus of capital, instead of a sur- 
 plus of labor, as we have at present. But conflicting financujkreeds 
 revealed the necessity for scientific formula upon which ts^^se the 
 true or correct system, and as diligent search for it failed to discover 
 any successful effort, while despairing of accomplishing so important 
 a task, the writer nevertheless made the attempt. How well he has 
 succeeded i^ tor Mi^^^^ *° judge. In 1879 the Murray Hill Publishing 
 Company, issued a i>amphlet entitled, "The Abolition of Interest, a 
 SiiTiple Prbblem," embodying in a condensed form what progress had 
 been made up to tlMt time. The present pamphlet is a second 
 edition, revised and enlarged, but the fundamental principles are the 
 same. It is sincerely hoped that it may, at least, contribute in some 
 measure to the solution of the great ([uestions that are herein dis- 
 cussed, and thus solve the problem of c(^])eration, which must 
 ultimately take the place of all government.* 
 
 w Thk Author. 
 
 * Government means coercion, In co-operation there is no compulsion — what 
 •govcrnme^BlfcB^is, is selk govkknmknt.
 
 PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION. 
 
 To state, that interest for money loaned on good security is irra- 
 tional, and that its abolition is not dependent upon philanthropic mo- 
 tive, but upon business principle, and therefore unavoidable, is to 
 either startle the "civilized" world or else to evoke ridicule. To state 
 that S|ay2g^ l)anks are economic absurdities, and that history gives no 
 greate^lividence of man's folly than in their establishment, is to be- 
 come not only the laughing-stock of superficial thinkers, but to be re- 
 garded as non compos mentis by "learned" writers on political 
 economy. Of course we do not court, neither do we fear these 
 results. They do not constitute arguments. The^^e the result of a 
 firm belief in accepted views of the nature and omceo^money, and 
 of the laws of value. It remains to be seen how long error upon this 
 subject will remain unassailed, while mankind itf making rapid prog- 
 ress in other directions. 
 
 To those who will further extend to us the courtesy of their atten- 
 tion, we would say : The proof that interest u])on money loaned on 
 good security is irratioi^l, is the fact that the security is capital, and 
 that what the l)orrower obtains is merely something w hi( li enables him 
 to avail himself of the use of his ca])ital, WTOOut ( utling it up into 
 small pieces, as is done with the capital consisting of ihc metals, used 
 as money, but which in his case is impossible. The b^^jjjLKNDS his 
 CRKDii, and the borrower I'Lkdgks mis (ai'Iial ; tjIJ^^^hr 
 
 FAR MORK SECURK THAN I'HK HOLDER OF THE HANK^^^^»<:R. 
 
 banker i akf.s i-av for the use of capital, althcnigh ne furnishes 
 none; for the capital is fuknismed r.\- iiii. I!Okr()wkk. 'I'he banker.
 
 therefore renders no more service to the borrower than he would if, 
 both using in every way the same kind of spectacles, the Ijorrower 
 should hand his to the banker, while he borrowed the banker's for his 
 own use. 
 
 But it is not our intention to enlarge here upon the subject of our 
 essay, which is fully treated there. What we propose is not new ; it 
 has long been known to a few, who, when we hear the unsound doc- 
 trines of those who want an exclusive government money, and the 
 fallacies of "specie basis," wonder how long we shall have to wait be- 
 fore WE get a hearing. We can only say in conclusion, that the in- 
 compatibility of present money systems, with the requirements of 
 modern progress, is a guarantee of their speedy overtTirow, by the 
 establishment of a Money System in which interest will ha|^o part. 
 
 The Author. 
 
 '»i 
 
 U
 
 — 8 — 
 RESOLUTIONS. 
 
 Sonic resolutions offered at the Eighteenth Annual C'onvention 
 of the New England Labor Reform League, in Chapel Hall, 820 
 Washington S^ Boston, Sunday, Jan. 31, 1886. 
 
 1. >?^BWf, That, since personal liberty and the right of associa- 
 tion are inseparable from intelligent, fruitful existence, the claim of 
 "rulers" to dictate what we may or may not do is monstrous usurpa- 
 tion tolerated only because superstitious irrationalism pretending to 
 be law and order is not yet repudiated by growing sense of natural 
 right and duty destined to abolish all extant governments. 
 
 2. Resolved, That the aims of Trades Unions to exterminate, as 
 "rats'" and "scabs" those refusing to join their repressive monopolies, 
 is a sa^ga relic of mediaeval barbarism hostile to the spirit of liberty, 
 to comWwi sense of right and duty of which labor is the creative ex- 
 ponent ; that the organization of working people, to be permanently 
 useful, must assert not invade, the rights of the weak and defenseless, 
 resenting injury to the least, as crime against all. 
 
 3. Resolved^ 'I'hat since the Knights of Labor ado])t sex, etjuality 
 and the mutual interest of all workers to unite for-^mmon drfense — 
 two leading doctrines of this League, we invite them to !■ it their 
 despotic policies relative to land, money and exchange; ^over- 
 board treacherous timber which tends to make their great order a pi- 
 rate ship rather than an ark of safety for the toiling millions; that like 
 the Labor Congress, the (Grangers, the Sovereigns of Industry and 
 many other extinct organizations, life in Knights of Labor 'will be 
 abortively short, unless they speedily turn from tyrannous ways and 
 head towards liberty. 
 
 4. Resolved, 'I'hat, the fight of silverists^ith goldists is a class- 
 war between two sets of thieves for mono])olizing control of jnetals 
 "precious" in usurped power to defraud service ; that neither national 
 bankists, greenbackites, goldists, silverists, or any othefj^^^ of legal- 
 ized robbers should furnish compulsive currency; (^^^^Bmo 
 every species of property being available banking basiHBerei)y in3T 
 viduals and associations can al)olish interest by providing their own 
 money at their own \'\^V nnd ( ost.
 
 INTRODUCTION, 
 
 % 
 
 We are sometimes "told that we cannot change human nature. 
 We are not trying to change human nature. It is their mistake, not 
 ours, in attributing the evils of society to manifestations of human 
 nature, and therefore unavoidable. The evils we complain of are the 
 consequences of invaded rights. Protect those rights from invasion. 
 and the evils will disappear. 
 
 A mother's love for her child, or the individual's desugito sur- 
 round himself with the comforts of life, and his unremitting efforts to 
 accomi)lish it, are manifestations of human nature. But it is also 
 human nature to protest against, and forcibly prevent robbery. If 
 you live in a small country village and your house is invaded and 
 your pro])erty carried away without your consent, you resist the in- 
 vader (unless ii i^ government levying a tax on you) : if superior 
 force is ijased you (all for help and citizens come and rescue your 
 property. If still threatened you become more vigilant, put better 
 locks on your doors, and fastening on your windows ; if this does not 
 avail, you employ watchmen or detectives. If others rights are in- 
 vaded in like manner, you hold a meeting to adopt measures for 
 self-protection ; each one volunteering his share of the labor, or cost 
 of such i)rotection. This is co-operation or ski.k-(;ovkrnmkni'. 
 
 The banking institutions of large cities, in order to facilitate the 
 transaction of business that they may have with each other during the 
 day, establish an oftice at a central point called a Clearing House, 
 where a representative of each bank meet at a fixed hour of the day. 
 This obviates an immense amount of labor and saves a great deal ot 
 time. Tl-uBhi^utualism or co-operation. 
 
 But v^^^ftvernment interferes with production or exchange of 
 roducts u^^^\NV PRKTKX r, notwithstanding the open protest of many 
 citizens, and levies taxes on each one, and compels some to bear arms 
 against their wish, to carry out and enforce such interference : this is 
 
 ^^rodi
 
 lO 
 
 not co-operation, it is coercion, it is not self-government, it is (;ov- 
 ERNMENi I'.v FORCE, it is tyranny, it is invasion of the rights of the 
 individual. 
 
 Why we demand that all restrictions, which interfere with free 
 banking and free exchange of service or products shall be removed, 
 is because the prime factor m human happiness is existence, and the 
 prime factor in existence is to supply your own wants. If in your 
 effort to do this, you are restricted, you cannot attain happiness. 
 Hence, the removal of all restrictions on production, or the free ex- 
 change of service or products, is indispensable to human happiness, 
 whether that restriction be in the form of a tax on the products, in the 
 methods of furnishing the medium of exchange or in the amount fur- 
 nished. To deny this is to deny the right to associate or co-operate 
 for mutual good I 
 
 N^ature thinkers on these subjects know that to co-operate or as- 
 sociate to lessen the burdens of life, we must have freedom to act. 
 Majority governments are no more infallible than autocratic govern- 
 ments. Are not majorities aliuays 7c>rong first, he/ore they ore right f 
 Does the individual suffer any less because wronged by a majority than 
 he would if wronged by any other usurper < What excuse will this 
 majority usurper have for assuming guardinship ovg^kJM^ther when, 
 his conscience (demands a reason ? It is patient, unceasing experiment 
 alone that can teach us better ways. Hence, the i^ril that threatens 
 our country inheres in the folly of the idea, that twenty-six men, most 
 of whom have studied nothing but their own selfish ends, have a right 
 to govern — make laws for — seventy-four men and women out of every 
 hundred (but even this projjosition only holds good in cases where 
 laws are submitted to popular vote for approval. In most cases it is 
 a few individuals making laws governing the whole population of a 
 State, or the entire nation), many of whom are earnestly and con- 
 sistently devoted to the improvement of the physical and moral con- 
 ditions of the whole race. Not presuming, however, to be infallible, 
 and loving liberty more than wc do to govern, prefer even to suffer 
 wrong rather than make laws for others lest we should i '^ i wrong. 
 Not willing then to dictate to others, but simply comri^'uir onriTRn 
 experience w.- nwait the triumjih of reason.
 
 THE RELATION OF FINANCE TO LABOR REFORM 
 AND PERPETUAL PROSPERITY. 
 
 It is only as we emerge from the mist of superstition, cast aside 
 the veil of prejudice, and enter the broad field of human, action, that 
 we realize the effort it takes to initiate and forward the great work of 
 reform ; that we see bright lights here and there shining and exposing 
 to view dark and forbidden paths ; and that the mind is overAvhelmed 
 in its effort to keep pace with progress and passing events. Ideas 
 are modified or changed ; governments are reconstructed or reformed 
 institutions are remodeled ; land-marks are shifted ; islands, mountains 
 and- boundaries disappear. All is change ! 
 
 The ^jgyillllH diversities of human effort; industrial and agricul- 
 tural processes and methods, those of living ; systems of transpor- 
 tation and trawl, education and the treatment of the sick; all are 
 subject to the modifications which our better knowledge and ex- 
 perience dictate. And the time has come when reform must enter 
 that field where contending forces threaten the downfall of one 
 oppressive i)Ower by the establishment of another. 
 
 In canvassing this vastly important subject, its history, past and 
 present experience, the logic of events, the pressing needs of civiliza- 
 tion and the demands of justice, we find no explanation to existing 
 usage, save chroiiic error; and the various remedies proposed but 
 reveal the chaotic condition in whicli the (juestion presents itself to 
 the public mind. 
 
 Tn th||fc|^nce of a correct solution there can be no successful 
 effort to r(^^Pn but when that solution comes, effort will be suc- 
 ( csslul and reform will be speedy and effectual. 
 
 There can be no question as to the honesty of purpose on the 
 part of a sufficient number to defend what is rieht and just, and when
 
 I 2 
 
 an appeal is made that can establish itself on these grounds, the front 
 lines will be covered and the best talent will be available. 
 
 The great need of to-day is reform, not "social" or "political" 
 but a reform that shall change the whole structure of human society — 
 a reform tlj^^t shall abohsh poverty, and initiate an era of prosperity, 
 in which morality can be possible, for no society can be moral while 
 a majority of its members are suffering all the discomforts and most 
 of the horrors of i)Overty. 
 
 In the light of the knowledge we possess of sanitary measures, 
 and hygienic Hving, what becomes of our boasted civilization ? Why 
 preach and print so much about the rules of health, the necessity of 
 ventilation, drainage and cleanliness, while the great majority of man- 
 kind are doomed in their poverty to be filthy, breathe disease in the 
 polluted air of cesspools, and suffocate in houses they pay rent for, 
 but cannot reform. Is it filth, ignorance and injustice that we should 
 seek to abolish ? Then let us abolish poverty ! You may labor in 
 "civil service reform" while the universe lasts, but you will not thereby 
 abolish poverty, or put an end to these financial crises, which periodi- 
 cally visit our commerce and our industries, and whose presence are 
 more disgraceful than their effects are ruinous. These, as well as 
 poverty, have a special cause, which must be sought out and removed. 
 To confess our inability to do this, is unworthy of- a progressive age. 
 To leave to posterity an inheritance so shameful, ami seek refuge from 
 responsibility behind a supposed ignorance of its cause, is unworthy 
 of those who labor under the banner of reform, inconsistent with the 
 -pirit of their teachings, and contrary to the objects they wish to 
 accomjjlish. 
 
 To say that most men and women must forever toil in a condition, 
 less favorable than that of the common brute, that nature, with the 
 magnitude of her inexhaustible sui)|)ly, her countless and untold 
 resources, and the jjrodigality of her productions has left man, the 
 highest and grandest of all her achievements, to be the victim of his 
 own necessities I That she has imposed on him the ' ' M'rions under 
 which he shall live, and has failed to provide the m. ,.^ of fuifiUing 
 those conditions I That she has said to am,, eat, or )S shall surelj"* 
 die; yet not have provided for all! That she inflicts the penalty of 
 death for violating her health laws, yet rendered compliance with
 
 — 13 — 
 
 those laws impossible ! Shall the doctrine of Malthus still soothe the 
 c^Dnscience and stifle the voice of manhood ? 
 
 Yet it is not by appeals to humanity, nor by legal enactments 
 that we expect to succeed. It is not upon the valor or fury of an 
 armed mob — legal or otherwise — that we must stake the issue ; so 
 great a reform cannot rest upon so fickle a base, but upon the fact 
 that all reforms spring from an intelligent sense of wrong, or greater 
 economy in proposed methods. 
 
 If we would reform labor, we must reform capital. We must 
 institute a most searching investigation into the subject of finance — 
 that main branch of economic science which has ever been used by 
 crafty and greedy men to acquire wealth and power at the expense of 
 useful people, and we must popularize correct notions in order that we 
 mav eliminate the vicious features that these men make use of, and 
 by which they accomplish their ends. 
 
 That there is a profound sense of WTong in the present banking 
 system, will hardly be denied. That there is greater economy and 
 justice in the one we propose, it is my purpose to demonstrate. 
 
 I hold it to be the duty of those who have arrived at any definite 
 conclusions on matters of pubhc economy, to make' known the result 
 of their research, and it is with a view of fulfilling this duty that this 
 work is published. 
 
 It is now more than twelve years since my attention w^as first 
 called to this subject. During the period that has intervened, I have 
 devoted much time to its study, and I hope, succeeded in formulating 
 the correct principles of monetary science, and thus refute prevailing 
 erroneous and unsound doctrines maintained by money-lenders and 
 their associates who profit by existing institutions and systems. This 
 will aid us to understand the true nature of exchange, or, in other 
 words, what constitutes equity in the exchange of service or products ; 
 for in this inheres the whole secret of the labor problem, that, since 
 you cannot take something from nothing, and, since all things are 
 produced by lal)or, * what capital gains, labor loses. By what 
 methods and how to ren\edy it, is the purpose of this essay to explain. 
 
 I shaj^omnience by cailing your attention to a preliminary ar- 
 gument i^H^erence to the various banking systems. First, let us 
 inquire int(^ne specie basis system 
 
 * See definition of wealtli.
 
 — 14 — 
 
 In order that we may be understood, we wish it to be borne in 
 mind, that whenever we speak of interest, it is ahvays in connection 
 with money borrowed on good security ; a business transaction in 
 which no risk is supposed to be incurred, and not in connection with 
 transactions that partake more or less of the nature of a favor, and in 
 which more or less risk is incurred. The one we will call real credit ', 
 the other, peisonal credit. With the latter we have nothing at all 
 to do. 
 
 We will now suppose two individuals equally wealthy ; the wealth 
 of one to consist of the metals, gold and silver, and that of the other, 
 of buildings or any other product of labor. 
 
 What, we ask, are the facilities afforded by this financial system 
 for the obtaining of real credit on the part of these two individuals ? 
 If they possess an equal amount of wealth are they not equally 
 wealthy ? Do they \\9\. stand on an equal financial footing, and are they 
 not ecjually entitled to real credit? 
 
 The fair, honest and impartial answer to this question together 
 with the abolition of property in, and recognition of the ecpial right of 
 all to natural wealth, is the simple, effective and only settlement 
 possible to the conflict between labor and capital. 
 
 In the specie basis system of banking, as in others, this right to real 
 credit is utterly ignored ; first, by government coinage and "fixjng" the 
 \ alue of gold or silver, or both, or in other words making the ( i lin legal 
 tender; second, by government giving the owners of this coin the 
 EXCLUSIVE PRIVILEGE * to issue paper money, not only to the extent of 
 this "fixed" value of their coin, but to the extent of three times as 
 much. What right, we ask, has government to "fix" the value of any 
 ]jroduct of labor, or make it legal tender, authorize the issue of paper 
 money to the extent of three times the amount of this legal tender 
 coin, and jjrohibit the issue of paper money by the owners of any other 
 products. If government has the right to "fix" the value of one 
 product, then it has the right to "fix" the value of all products, and 
 what is this but communism, or state socialism? 
 
 \o. it is a fundamental error in political economy to admit the 
 right of government to "fix" the value of any j^roduct, inasmuch as it 
 exempts it from the effects of sup])ly and demand to )i^^H all other 
 
 inasmi 
 
 • .^ jirivilege to one is the same thingas the; supjiression of the naturnl rights of the 
 st, nncl KC'vernnient is a USUKI'I'K when it attcMiij^ts it.
 
 — 15 — 
 
 products are subject, and is therefore diprivilege which infringes on 
 the rights of owners of all other products. 
 
 But it is a far graver error for a government to suppose it has 
 the right to restrict the issue of paper money, for this is attacking the 
 rights of owners of property to a much greater extent. If one can 
 not use property to the best advantage, he is restricted in its use. One 
 of the uses of property is to obtain real credit, as is done by the 
 owner of coin when they issue paper money to the extent of three, 
 and even ten times the amount of their coin, only, that in this case 
 they get from three to ten times the amount of credit they are entitled 
 to. If owners of other products may not issue paper money to obtain 
 real credit, they must borrow from those who do issue. Now, inas- 
 much as this involves the payment of interest largely in excess of what 
 it costs to print and issue paper money, he pays for something he 
 does not get ; and as the public, who take all the risk, and should 
 therefore be furnished ample security, derive none from banks which 
 pledge only one-third or one-tenth the amount in coin, which, by the 
 way, they retain in their own possession while they recpiire of borrow- 
 ers a perfect security in the form of a mortgage or pledge of some 
 product which far exceeds in value the amount of paper money loaned 
 thereon, the issue should be made directly on the property of the 
 borrower ; he would then get his real credit at cost, the same as the 
 owners of coin demand the pledge should be made to the public; it 
 would then be reAij$.vcd of the risk it takes. 
 
 To i)rohibit this, under 7i<hatever pretext, is to restrict the citizen 
 in his right to the use of his property. To restrict the issue of paper 
 money to any one or two products, even though it be increased many 
 times more than the amount of such product, is to reduce the amount 
 of pajjcr monLV to the caprice or interests of those who own and con- 
 trol such ])roiUu t. besides compelling the jjUiblic to take the risk of 
 bad faith or bad management, and allowing such owners more real 
 credit than they are entitled to ; and as paper money is the instrument 
 with which exchanges of the pri)ducts of labor are effected, both real 
 credit and exclnniifes (>/ t/iese products are control led bv those 'vho issue 
 tfie paper money. 
 
 Have w^^>t demonstrated successfully that such a system of 
 l>anking is unjrist, in that it gives an exclusive privilege to the banker? 
 And have we not ecjually demonstrated that such a system of banking
 
 — i6 — 
 
 is unsafe, in that it furnishes no security to the holder of the paper 
 money issued by such banks ? 
 
 We will now show that such a system of banking is too costly. 
 
 If we ascertain from time to time the total wealth existing in any 
 
 country, it is easy to determine the actual annual rate of increase, by 
 
 dividing the intervening time into years, and ascertaining the per 
 
 centage corresponding to one year, by a little calculation. 'I'hus the 
 
 United States census, for i860, gives the assessed valuation of the 
 
 Total real and personal wealth as - $12,084,560,005 
 
 The same for 1870, .... 14,187,986,732 
 
 The same for 1880, .... 16,902,993,543 
 
 The rate of increase, per annum, for the ten years ending 1870 
 is less than 2 1-2 per cent. The rate of increase per annum, for the 
 ten years ending 1880, is less than three per cent. We presume that 
 the average rate of interest in this country is not less than 7 or 8 ])er 
 cent; if it is seven, it is nearly three times as much as the average 
 increase of wealth. 
 
 Now, if the average increase of wealth, per annum, in the United 
 States is 2 1-2 per cent, and the average rate of interest is 7 per cent, 
 wtiere does the 4 1-2 i)er cent come from, which money-lenders 
 demand for the use of their money, in excess of the said average? 
 And since, not only money-lenders, but all capitalists, demand a 
 similar rate for the use of their capital, our dilemma increases. Hy 
 what process of arithmetic can the situation be explained !" If all 
 capitalists and money-lenders w^ere to demand and receive but 2 1-2 
 per cent, all those who have no capital, but who earn their living by 
 their labor, could not accumulate, and at the end of each year would 
 find that all that they had appropriated would be what they had con- 
 sumed. But the fact is that most capitalists and money-lenders do 
 receive a much higher rale, and some large fortunes have been 
 accumulated so rapidly, that the percentage of increase can only be 
 expressed by hundreds. ("an it be exj)lained by sui)posing that so 
 large an amount of capital is idle, or receives no interest, and that 
 another large amount receives so small an interest as to account for 
 the difference between the average increase of wealth, and all the 
 varying rates of interest to capitalists and money-le^ws from that 
 which exceeds the average increase of wealth, to that re])resented by 
 the most rapid accumulation ? May we not venture to introduce here
 
 — 17 — 
 
 also, the item of failures as legitimately connected with this phe- 
 phenomena ? 
 
 Let us imagine a great balance sheet : — 
 
 ON THE DEBIT SIDE WE WOULD 
 FIND : 
 
 Idle Capital, 
 
 Low Rates of Interest, 
 
 No Interest, 
 
 Partial Loss of Capital, 
 
 Total Loss of Capital, 
 
 Failures. 
 
 ON THE CREDIT SIDE WE WOULD 
 FIND : 
 
 High Rates of Interest, 
 Rapid Accumulation, 
 Immense Fortunes. 
 
 In other words, if there were no failures, there could be no rapid 
 accumulation such as we see. For all capital that increased at the 
 rate of 5 per cent, there would have to be an equal amount that did 
 not increase at all; for all capital that increased at the rate of 10 per 
 cent there would have to be three times that amount that did not 
 increase at all ; for all capital that increased at the rate of 20 per cent 
 there would have to be seven times that amount that did not increase 
 at all; for all capital that increased at the rate of 50 per cent thera 
 would have to be 19 times as much that did not increase, and so on 
 in that proportion, otherwise the average would exceed 2 1-2 per 
 cent, which is noAhe case. Think then of the failures that must 
 occur when you Contemplate the vast accumulations of the Vander- 
 bilts, the Goulds, the MacKays and all the other millionaires you 
 have created within the last twenty years. 
 
 If such desolation — such annihilation of human effort, and 
 slaughter of human hopes, is the result, is it not a matter of self- 
 interest to all concerned to put an end to such barbarism ? — invent a 
 system that has common sense as well as justice, or cease to associate 
 our generation with these terms — blot them out from the vocabulary, 
 and substitute in their place hypocrisy and fraud. 
 
 Is further argument necessary ? Need we go any deeper into the 
 subject to show that a rate of interest, even equal to the average rate 
 of increase of wealth, is incompatible with a just distribution of the 
 same ? For \vj||k such a rate of interest money-lenders and capitalists, 
 will absorb allThe increase, and lahor, the only creator of wealth, 
 cannot participate in the enjoyment of its own offspring. 
 
 Therefore, as the specie-basis system of banking, if readopted in
 
 — i8 — 
 
 this couutry, would not materially change the rate of interest, much 
 less reduce it below the average rate at which wealth increases, we 
 must decide that, in addition to its other defects, it is out of all pro- 
 portion to the economy required oi i^istitutions tofuniis/i real credit. 
 
 But we have still another reason for rejecting this system. If in 
 the future, gold and silver cease to be mined from any cause, or the 
 supply greatly reduced, and such large quantities are consumed in the 
 arts and trades as to constantly diminish the amount until it is ex- 
 hausted, what would become of the system based on these metals ? 
 We may finally conclude to dispense with a "measure of value," and a 
 "standard of value," even if such a thing ever existed. But can we 
 have a system of money based upon silver and gold without any such 
 metals to base it upon ? \\'ho will venture to affirm that fifty years 
 from now the amount of gold and silver coin in existence will not be 
 reduced to one-half or one-fourth its present volume, or that the 
 world's commerce will not be double what it is now? And if both 
 take the place, will the advocates of specie basis still insist that we 
 must adhere to their pet system ? 
 
 Bui, sujjpose, on the other hand, that by new discoveries of vast 
 quantities of the "precious" metals, and greater facilities and economy 
 in process of reduction, they become as abundant as copper or lead, 
 is their market or exchangeable value to l)e kept up bi^legislation ? or 
 are we to have silver cjuarters as big as saucers and gold dollars that 
 weigh an ounce ? And if so, how arc we to manage the loss that 
 such changes entail ? 
 
 Need we extend this argument to show that there is no science 
 in a system that may be dej)rived of its base, and therefore impracti- 
 cable ? Can the impracticable be scientific ? If the term science can 
 be apjjlied to a money system, it should be because it is in every way 
 practicable, not only to-day, but for all time ; that it furnishes a mon- 
 ey that fulfills the office or functions required of money perfectly ; that 
 it is reliable absolutely at all times, jjortable and sub-divisable to the 
 greatest extent, and obtainable at the lowest possible cost, 
 
 \\e must decide, therefore, that instead of being^ accord with 
 scientific jjrincijjles, it is a scheme to enrich bankers wd their asso- 
 ciates at the expense of the rest of mankind. 
 
 That ii affords no security to the holders of its i)aper money.
 
 — 19 — 
 
 That it is the worst of all monopolies, because it is the basis of 
 all monopolies. 
 
 That it limits the circulating medium to a fraction of what is re- 
 quired to develop the resources of nature and transact business for 
 cash, instead of on the credit system at present unavoiadable, by ex- 
 cluding as a basis for the issue of paper money, all wealth except gold 
 and silver. 
 
 That it absorbs all the increase of wealth through high rates and 
 compound interest, thus directly creating pauperism and indirectly 
 misery and crime. 
 
 That it corrupts and vitiates integrity and morality in all transac- 
 tions, and perverts industry and commerce into a species of piracy. 
 
 We will now pay our respects to the National Banking system, 
 which is in vogue in this country. 
 
 This system is so well understood that a description of it will be 
 unnecessary. It will be well, however, to refer to the cause that pro- 
 duced the change in the banking system of the country^ converting the 
 old State banks into National banks. 
 
 It is a well-known fact in political economy that you can increase 
 the market value of an article by creating a demand for it and 
 controlling the supply. How did the bankers create a demand for 
 United States bonds after they had purchased most of them of govern- 
 ment at a large discount ? They established the National Banks and 
 made the bonds the basis for the issue of paper money, and at the 
 same time passed a law that any individual, corporation or company 
 that should issue notes, bills, checks or anything that could circulate 
 as money, should pay a tax of lo per cent on such issue, except Na- 
 tional Banks, hence, the change. 
 
 So delusive has been the idea of safety under a republican form 
 of government, so forgetful the people that "eternal vigilance is the 
 price of liberty," and so crafty and successful the tyrant, whether in 
 the garb of a republican or disguised as a democrat, that we can 
 no longer boast of this as the home of liberty. If you have forgotten 
 what constitutes democracy, read the Declaration of Independence 
 and refresh your memories with those glorious sentiments. Call up the 
 honored dead and ask them if the institutions of to-day are what they 
 had expected or hoped to establish. Beaten on the battle field, aris- 
 tocracy has appeared in a new form. It is not now taxation through the
 
 20 
 
 tax-gatherer only, to support royalty ; but it is taxation in all the va- 
 rious forms, which monopolies are able to impose through their con- 
 trol of the currency. 
 
 Suppose the working people had controlled legislation at Wash- 
 ington, and suppose that instead of the bonded system with its twin 
 parasite the National Bank, they should have estabHshed a scheme 
 something on this order : — 
 
 By prohibiting any building material being used except hand- 
 made bricks. The bricks to be delivered as fast as made to duly ap- 
 pointed government officials, who should pay for them at a fixed high 
 rate in paper money printed for that express purpose, and all other 
 money, including gold and silver be prohibited by a law similar to the 
 one which now protects the National Banks from competition. All 
 duties on foreign goods to be paid in bricks, which, of course, could 
 not be obtained except of government, and all bricks paid in this way 
 to be used in constructing government buildings and other public 
 works. The bricks received of makers to be disposed of to custom- 
 ers, and a certain proportion of the money paid in this way to be can- 
 celed and destroyed, unless it could be loaned on good security, at one 
 per cent, per annum. The government to receive said money at par 
 in all cases except duties on imports. 
 
 What would the gold bugs have said of such a project ? They 
 would have denounced it in unmeasured terms ; pronomjc ed it a dese- 
 cration of sacred rights and time-honored customs. Their patriotism 
 for gold would have been aroused to such an extent, that they would 
 have called upon their foreign allies to come over and help them "put 
 down such communism." 
 
 And yet such a scheme would have contained more common 
 sense, and been far less disastrous to the inhabitants of this country 
 than what we have had to endure. 
 
 Such are our reasonings a priori unbiased by superstition, preju- 
 dice or personal interests. We will now review these from the scien- 
 tific standpoint.
 
 THE PRINCIPLES OF MONETARY SCIENCE. 
 
 The present essay is intended to show that there is a true and 
 correct monetary system ; that there is a Monetary Science ; that 
 monetary science defines the office or object and use, as well as the 
 nature of money ; and that our present, as well as all past monetary 
 systems are as unscientific, and the popular views of money as in- 
 correct as the notions entertained in regard to astronomy before the 
 days of Copernicus. 
 
 As much of this comes of a misunderstanding of the definition 
 of terms, in order to arrive at comprehensive views on this subject, we 
 shall commence by giving the definitions of such terms as we shall 
 make use of, and in regard to the meaning of which, there exists a 
 confusion of ideas. 
 
 The terms whose definitions we give, as we understand them, are 
 as follows : — 
 
 Wealth ; Value ; Measure of Value ; Unit of Value ; Money, 
 Circulating Medium ; Usury ; Cost ; Barter : 
 
 WEALTH. 
 
 1. Wealth There are two kinds of wealth, natural and arti- 
 ficial. Natural wealth is that which is the spontaneous product of 
 nature, or in the production of which man has taken no part. Artificial 
 wealth is the product of man's labor, or in the production of which 
 man has taken part. Wherever the term wealth simply is used in 
 this essay, it is intended in every case to mean artificial wealth. 
 
 VALUE. 
 
 2. Value. — There are two kinds of value. There is what is 
 commonly called "market value." The market value of an article is 
 ordinarily determined by the exposure of that article for sale. Owing, 
 however, to our deplorable financial condition, the market value of 
 products often depends very largely upon the "money market," 
 whereas, when we come to correct monetary principles, the "money
 
 22 
 
 market" will have nothing to do with it. The other kind of value is 
 constituted by the usefulness of an article. Thus the air we breathe 
 is so valuable that we cannot live without it, yet its market value is 
 nothing. So with water (unless labor is bestowed upon it), it has no 
 market value, yet to one dying of thirst, it is not easy to compute its 
 value. Money, also, because it is not issued by scientific method, 
 has, and until it is, will continue to have, two values. First, its ex- 
 changeable value ; second, its value in procuring an income. It must 
 be evident to any one of sound mind, that the fact that one has bor- 
 rowed money without interest, will not affect its purchasing or 
 exchangeable value ; hence this exchangeable value must depend on 
 something else than upon the amount of interest that money will 
 bring, whereas the other value is entirely dependent upon its ability to 
 draw interest. But when common sense enters the "money market," 
 and aboHshes interest, this value must disappear ; then the only value 
 that money will have will be its purchasing power or exchangeable 
 value. 
 
 MEASURE OF VALUE. 
 
 3. Measure of Value. — There is a fatal misunderstanding in 
 regard to this term, and almost all writers on the subject of finance 
 appear to have fallen into an error. In the sense in which it is most 
 popularly used, there is no sueh thing as a measure of value. Instead 
 of saying, "gold is the measure of value," or, "the gold dollar is the 
 measure of value," we should say, the dollar is the unit of value, 
 as the inch is a unit of length. The fact that we cannot express the 
 value of an article, except by stating a (juantity of some commodity, 
 is proof that there is no fixed or permanent measure of value, for the 
 (market) value of all commodities change with supply and demand, 
 and the ol)ject "measured" is as much the measurer as the commodity 
 by which it is "measured."* Value not being a substance nor occu- 
 pying space, cannot be reached by mathematics ; its "measurement" 
 is an attribute of the mind, not of the yard-stick. The absurdity of 
 this i)opu!ar view of the measure of value, is graphically illustrated in 
 the Constitution of the United States in "conferring the power" upon 
 Congress to "regulate the value of money," for neither Congress nor 
 any other legislative body have any more power to regulate the value 
 of money than they have to regulate the velocity of the wind, or the
 
 — 23 — 
 
 degrees of solar heat. So long as competition — supply and demand 
 
 regulate the market value of labor and products, it, and not 
 
 legislation, controls the purchasing power of money. 
 
 UNIT OF VALUE. 
 
 4. Unit of Value. — We have already indicated the meaning 
 of this term, and for reasons already stated, believe that the terms, 
 "measure of value," and "standard of value," should not be used, as 
 they convey incorrect ideas of the functions of money, as well as in 
 regard to the laws of value. 
 
 MONEY. 
 
 5. Money. — Circulating Medium. These two terms have about 
 the same meaning. Money is a circulating medium, and a circu- 
 lating medium is money. 
 
 Money cannot properly be called wealth, although it is wealth to 
 the extent of the market value of the material of which it is composed, 
 as is the case when it is made of gold, silver, etc., but it is not wealth 
 when it is made of paper, for the wealth contained in a paper dollar, 
 or a thousand paper dollars, is too insignificant to be called wealth, 
 or rather to warrant the statement that such money is wealfh. Hence 
 to call money wealth, is incorrect, for that would imply that all money 
 is wealth, whereas, as we have already shown, some kinds of money )^ ft; 
 not wealth. Therefore, in defining money, we say, money is a rep- 
 resentative of wealth. Or to state it more fully, money is the circu- 
 lating medium ; its office is to facilitate the exchange of the products 
 of labor; its nature is a representative of wealth. 
 
 We do not expect any opposition to our first two propositions, 
 viz.: that money is the circulating medium, or that its office is to 
 facilitate the exchange of the products of labor ; but to our third 
 proposition, viz.: that the definition of money which relates to its 
 nature is not wealth, but a representative of wealth, we anticipate 
 opposition from a certain quarter. For instance, an opponent might 
 argue that money is wealth, and attempt to prove it by the fact that 
 the possessor of a million dollars, even in paper money, is a wealthy 
 individual. We do not deny this, yet it does not conflict with our defini- 
 tion. He or she is a wealthy individual, because he or she possesses 
 the representative of one million dollars worth of wealth, and can
 
 — 24 — 
 
 exchange it for wealth at any time. But to say that that individual is 
 the possessor of wealth, would not be correct, for he or she is the 
 possessor of wealth only to the extent of the market value of the 
 paper stock contained in the said paper money. We cannot too 
 strongly urge the importance of recognizing this distinction, for by so 
 doing, we admit the fact that we do not increase wealth by issuing 
 paper money ; yet by issuing paper money amply secured, we increase 
 in the same proportion the available capital for the purpose of pro- 
 ductive enterprise, and at the same time, as will be seen by the plan 
 for Mutual Mortgage Banks, destroy that which is the bane of all 
 modern enterprise, usury ! 
 
 USURY. 
 
 6. Usury. — The term usury is applied to that sum which is paid 
 for the use of a larger sum. It is true, the word "interest" is now 
 more commonly used, but this is because the former is somewhat 
 odious, owing to the fact that modern legislation has "legalized" usury 
 up to a certain extent ; hence, it is now customary to regard usury be- 
 yond what is "allowed by law," as immoral, and call it "usury," while 
 legal usury is politely called "interest," and regarded as acceptable 
 morality. According to this philosophy, legislatnres are the source o^ 
 morality ! 
 
 COST. 
 
 7. Cost — The term cost is meant by the present writer to denote 
 the net expense of production, exclusive of any profit. 
 
 BARTER. 
 
 8. Bartkr. — This term is given to that transaction which is an 
 exchange of wealth for wealth, or one j)roduct of labor for another pro- 
 duct of labor ; such as a house for a farm, a watch for a horse ; a 
 pair of shoes for a hat, or all these for specie. Specie is a species 
 of wealth ; therefore, to purchase with specie is barter. 
 
 Having given our definitions of the terms in regard to the mean- 
 ing of which we might be misunderstood, will now proceed with our 
 subject. Our object being to prove that the money question is a sub- 
 ject of science, and that there are principles by which we can test the 
 correctness of a money system, we will first state what those principles 
 are and then test the correctness of i)revailing systertis by their ap- 
 l>lication.
 
 ESSENTIAL QUALITIES OF A SCIENTIFIC 
 MONETARY SYSTEM. 
 
 PRINCIPLE NUMBER ONE. 
 
 Money being a representative of wealth, a money system must 
 provide a sufificient volume and facilities to enable all wealth to be 
 represented by money. 
 
 PRINCIPLE NUMBER TWO. 
 
 As interest for money loaned is not "compensation for the use of 
 capital," the borrower possessing the capital (wealth), and needing but 
 the representative (except in cases where money is loaned without se" 
 curity), a money system must provide for the loaning of this represen- 
 tative at cost. 
 
 PRINCIPLE NUMBER THREE. 
 
 As the holder of a bank bill or government note is not thereby 
 the possessorof wealth, a money system must provide absolute security 
 against loss to the holder of paper money 
 
 The three forgegoing principles constitute, in our judgment, the 
 basis of a correct money system, and any system that does not 
 fulfill their requirements, is unworthy of confidence, and fails to supply 
 what is wanted, as their application to the following systems will show. 
 
 "SPECIE BASIS." 
 
 The system most popular with bankers is commonly called "hard 
 cash," or "specie basis. "That is to say. gold and silver form (almost) the 
 only circulating medium, except bank bills, which are issued either by de- 
 positing an equal amount of coin as security, or in case an additional 
 amount of bills are issued, this additional ami^ount is otherwise "se- 
 cured" by mortgages, railroad and other stocks and bonds, individual 
 notes, etc., etc., etc., The amount in coin in all casesl to be sufficient 
 to satisfy the claims of such bill-holders as might (according to the
 
 — 26 — 
 
 law of chance, only understood by bankers) present them at any one 
 time for redemption, or, in other words, to be exchanged for coin. 
 
 In the first place, the system does not fulfill the requirements of 
 principle No. i, for all the gold and silver in the world is not adequate 
 to represent the balance of wealth, and would still remain without a 
 representative itself. For example, suppose the demand for money to 
 be such as to induce all owners of buildings to seek money by mort- 
 gaging the said property, it is evident the amount would not be suffi- 
 cient. But suppose the circulating medium to be increased by the is- 
 sue of more bank bills, securing the same by depositmg the mort. 
 gages. Each additional issue would render it more and more difficult 
 for the bank to "redeem on demand," until finally it would be an im- 
 possibility to meet even the ordinary demands upon the bank for coin. 
 
 In the second place, such money is not a representative of 
 wealth, but to the extent of the metals used, it is wealth itself, and 
 therefore cannot fulfill the requirements of principle No. 2. 
 
 In the third place, the system does not fulfill the requirements of 
 of principle No. 3, for aside from the notorious fact that the history of 
 such banks is a history of failures, these banks promise to do what 
 their managers know is an impossibility, for the history of banking 
 shows that no bank could ever redeem all its notes on demand at any 
 one time, having issued at least three dollars in paper to every silver 
 or gold dollar on deposit. Again, such banks do not afford that 
 security demanded by our principle No. 3. from the fact that the only 
 "security" is in the hands of the bankers themselves. 
 
 It is evident from the foregoing that the specie basis system of 
 money is unscientific. It does not possess any of the qualities 
 demanded by monetary science*. 
 
 GREr-:NI!ACKS. 
 
 We will now consider the paper money known as the "green- 
 back." Clreenbacks are notes issued by the United States govern- 
 ment. They are promises to pay. When first issued the government 
 made the duties on imports jjayable in gold only. This action on 
 the part of the issuer of the greenback very naturally caused a premium 
 to be demanded for gold. There being a steady demand for it and 
 the supply limited and controlled, like any other comiuodity, its price 
 advanced, and the purchasing power of the greenback corre-
 
 — 27 — 
 
 spondingly diminished. As soon as the government made the 
 greenback receivable for all dues (including imports) its purchasing 
 power became equal to that of coin money. 
 
 The greenback adopted as the only circulating medium as 
 advocated by large numbers of people in the United States, does not 
 fulfill the requirements of principle No. i, for government issues of 
 paper money — treasury certificates of service — at best could but 
 represent the wealth created in the service rendered government, but 
 could not represent wealth not so created. 
 
 It does not fulfill the requirements of principle No. 2, as owners 
 of private wealth cannot obtain it to represent their wealth at cost. 
 
 It does not fulfill the requirements of principle No. 3, because 
 holders of such paper "money" are not secured against loss, and the 
 arbitrary issue of such enormous quantities would cause its depreci- 
 ation. 
 
 It is equally evident that the National Banking system does not 
 fulfill the requirements of either of our principles. 
 
 A GOVERNMENT PAPER MONEY WHICH ACCORDS THE 
 
 NEAREST TO THE PRINCIPLES OF MON- 
 
 ETARY SCIENCE. 
 
 A. First. A government may issue treasury certificates of service 
 
 with which to pay its expenses, providing the volume issued does not 
 
 exceed the total amount or its revenues in any one year. 
 
 B. Second. A government may issue treasury certificates to the 
 extent of two-thirds of the value of the wealth it possesses. 
 
 In each of these issues each bill or certificate should bear upon 
 its face a pledge that the government, in all its departments, will 
 receive it in payment of all dues at par. The facts in regard to the 
 volume issued, and to be issued, in accordance with what has been 
 stated in paragraphs A and B should also be impressed upon each 
 certificate. Torn and wornout certificates should be exchanged for 
 new ones without charge. Government has no need of promising to 
 exchange these certificates for coin, any more than it does its revenue 
 stamps. No need for provision for the cancellation of such issues, 
 except for the burning of certificates received for new ones, and also
 
 — 28 — 
 
 such amonnts as it is desired to retire from circulation, as, within the 
 limits already indicated, the certificates will continue to circulate at 
 par, and providing such circulation is not made compulsory by "legal 
 tender" acts. 
 
 The certificates should be placed in the treasury, offered in place 
 of coin and paid to those who will accept them. 
 
 Such treasury certificates do not conflict with principle No. i. 
 They either represent wealth which is the property of government, or 
 they represent service rendered government, and as they are not 
 intended to be the only circulating medium, other means being pro- 
 vided (in the plan of the Mutual Mortgage Bank) for a representative 
 of private wealth, they are not affected by our prihciple No. 2. 
 
 It does not conflict with principle No. 3 as ample security is 
 obtained in the limit to the amount issued. The fact that the 
 government receives this paper money in all payments at par, and in 
 its voluntary acceptance when paid out of the treasur}\ No greater 
 amount can find its way out of the treasury than will float on the 
 market at par. 
 
 Having demonstrated through our Principles of Monetar}' 
 Science, the defects of prevailing banking systems and the utter 
 inability of such institutions to fulfill the pressing needs of our pro- 
 gressive civilization, we call attention to the following system which 
 does, and is destined to supersede all others.
 
 PLAN FOR THE MUTUAL MORTGAGE BANK. 
 
 The following is Col. Greene's plan for a Mutual Bank, with 
 such alterations and additions as, in my humble judgment, will explain 
 it more fully, and add to its usefulne/s and safety as a co-operative ^ 
 instrumentality : 
 
 1. The inhabitants, or any portion of the inhabitants, of any 
 town or city, may organize themselves into a MAtual Mortgage Bank- Q\ 
 ing Company. J 
 
 2. The officers of a Mutual Mortgage Bank should be a board 
 of directors, an appraiser, a manager, a cashier, and a secretary. 
 
 3. Those who propose to become members, should elect the 
 appraiser and the board of directors, who should hold their office for 
 one year. 
 
 4. The board of directors should first elect the manager, cashier 
 and secretary, from among their number. 
 
 5. The manager, cashier and secretary should hold office until 
 they resign, or are removed by the board of directors, who should 
 require each to give bonds. They should be subject to, and not 
 members of the board, nor participate in its meetings, except when 
 called upon to do so ; and the same rule should govern the appraiser. 
 
 6. The appraiser and members of the board may be removed 
 at a general meeting of the members of the bank, and others elected 
 to fill their places, of which due notice should be given. 
 
 7- Membership ceases when a member pays his notes to the 
 bank, and none but members should be directors. 
 
 8. The board of directors should employ a secretary of its own, 
 and a legal advisor, and fix the salary of the officers and employees.' 
 
 9- The manager should manage the affairs of the bank, the 
 cashier the usual duties, and the secretary should have charge of all 
 documents, see that all mortgages were duly recorded before notes 
 are cashed by the bank, and keep an account of the printing and issue 
 of bills. 
 
 2£^^j^y^PgIiQ^J?^^y become a member of the >rutual MorteaL-e
 
 — 3° — 
 
 Banking Company, of any particular town or city, by pledging 
 UNINCUMBERED buildings, not vacant lands, situated m that 
 town or city, or in its immediate neighborhood, to the bank. 
 
 II The Mutual Mortgage Bank should print (or have printed) 
 paper money, with which to discount the mortgage notes of its mem- 
 
 bers. 
 
 1 2 Every member, at the time his note is cashed by Ae bank, 
 should bind himself and be bound in due legal form, to receive in 
 payment of debts at par, and from all persons, the bills issued and to 
 be issued by the bank. 
 
 13 Notes falling due may be renewed by the bank, subject to 
 the modification which a new valuation may require, so that the note 
 
 does not exceed two-thirds. tvt ^ i 
 
 14 Any person may borrow the paper money of a Mutual 
 Mortgage Bank on his own note running twelve months (without 
 indorsement), to an amount not to exceeed two-thirds of the cost of 
 the building (exclusive of the value of the lot) pledged by him. 
 
 15 The charge which the Mutual Mortgage Bank should make 
 for the loans, should be determined by, and if possible, not exceed the 
 expenses of the institution, pro rata.* 
 
 16. No money should be loaned by the bank except on the 
 
 above conditions. 
 
 17 Any member may have his property releasedjrom pledge, 
 and be himself released from all obligations to the Mutual Bank, and 
 to the holders of its bills as such, by paying his note or notes to the 
 
 said bank. 
 
 18 The Mutual Mortgage Bank shall receive none other than 
 its own money, or that of similar institutious, except such coin money 
 as the board of directors may designate, and this should be discounted 
 
 one-half of one per cent. 
 
 19. All Mutual Mortgage Banks may enter into such arrange- 
 ments with each other, as shall enable them to receive each other's 
 
 bills. 
 
 20 'Hie Mutual Mortgage Bank should publish in one or more 
 
 daily papers each day, a statement of its loans the day previous, 
 
 ♦ '-Shcnpard Homans says, ihat the savings banks of Massachusetts, paid their 
 ...r'.r.L .P... .n .... J.h ,hrec-tentbs of one per cent per annum.
 
 _3i— 
 
 describing the property mortgaged, giving the owner's name and its 
 location, with the appraiser's value and the amount loaned on it. 
 And also a statement of the notes paid, and mortgages cancelled 
 during the same period, which statements should be signed by the 
 manager, cashier and secretary. 
 
 The foregoing plan for a bank of issue or bank to discount 
 mortgage notes, upon the idea of mutuality, and wherein the stock- 
 holder is dispensed with and usury is abohshed is suggested after 
 mature reflection ; but the author will gladly accept any improvement 
 that could be proved to be such. It is obvious, that if individual 
 notes that are secured by mortgage on buildings, can be discounted 
 in this way, so can individual notes that are secured by mortgage on 
 other imperishable property ; nor is it necessary to state that an 
 essential condition, is that all such property should be covered by 
 ample insurance, payable to the bank. We would simply add that 
 Mutual Insurance can only be possible ivhe7i nsiiry is abolished ; then 
 none other can exist, and such will afford the best protection that 
 human institutions can furnish. 
 
 That this system of organizing credit is based upon our principles, 
 must be evident to any one candid enough to examine it. The ques- 
 tion remains then, are they principles ? or are they dogmas merely? 
 The answer we must leave to the future. 
 
 That this plan will furnish real credit independent of any monied 
 power, at cost, and thus materially help personal credit, seems evident 
 to us. 
 
 The emancipation of borrowers-with-colateral, from a monied 
 power who control the circulating medium, will render financial crisis 
 impossible and perpetuate that prosperity which is destined to abolish 
 poverty, and with it all the evils it is the cause of. 
 
 If there are those who think they can refute any of the arguments 
 or ideas advanced, or conclusions arrive at in this work, we shall be 
 most glad to hear from them, either through the press or by directly 
 addressing the author. All such communications or published articles 
 will receive careful consideration and be courteously answered.
 
 — 32 
 
 Tine following able workis v^ill be 
 foTJind of great valtae ajs aids 
 in tbis line of tboiagbt. 
 
 2. MUTUAL BANKING, by Col. W. B. Greene. 
 
 2. HARD CASH, by K. H. Heyvvood. 
 
 2. YOURS OR MINE, by E. H. Heywood. ^ 
 
 1. TRUE CIVILIZATION, by Josiah Warren. 
 
 1 RICHES AND POVERTY, by Wm. Hanson. 
 
 2 NATURAL LAW, or The Science of Justice, by Lysander Spooner. 
 2 HENRY GEORGE EXAMINED, by J. K.Ingalls. 
 
 2. THE ABOLITION OF INTERF.ST. First edition of the present work, by Altred 
 
 B. Westrup. 
 2. USURY, The Giant Sin of the Age, by Ed. Palmer. 
 2 CO-OPFR VriON. Its Laws and Principles, by Chas. T. Fowler. 
 ^2. THE REORGANIZATION OF BUSINESS; In the Store and the Bank, on the 
 "Farm and in the Factory, by Chas. T. Fowler. 
 
 I will furnish any two of those marked 2, and a copy of the present book for 50 
 -n^^S^J^S^ i^ r^I^d^^^^r ^b/^a^l^u&atis. ';^Ioney a.d 
 the Mechanism of Exchange." in two parts by Prof. W Stanley Jevons. I- . R. S. I w.ll 
 
 25 cents. Address, Dallas, Texas. 
 
 The following are Radical Reform publications, fearless in utterance. 
 
 T H K WORD, 
 
 A MONTHLY JOURNAL OF R E F O R M 
 
 E. H. Heywood, Editor. 
 Terms, 75 cents annually in advance. Princeton, Mass. 
 
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 Issued Fortnightly at One Dollar a Year: Single Copies Five CenU. 
 
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 A. I'. KICLLY, - - Associ.\TE Editor. 
 
 Office of I^iblication, 18 P. O. Square. 
 
 Post Office Address: Libkrty, P. O. Box 3366, Boston, Mass. 
 
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 Proudhon. Translated by P.cnj. R. Tucker. Spo pages octavo. Price, cloth, $3.50; 
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