The New Partv ;'*f' THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES ■T- — O • '■ 7CU» # a ^ c/:-; /■ v.--^ ^^^ n THE NEW PARTY THE NEW PARTY DESCRIBED BY SOME OF ITS MEMBERS And edited by ANDREW/REID WITH A FRONTISPIECE BY WALTER CRANE LONDON HODDER BROTHERS 1894 Printed by Ballantyne, Hanson & Co. At the Ballantyne Press, Editi burgh 1*4 CO 2^ He hath put down the mighty fkom theik seats ; QC 2 And exalted them of low degree. He hath filled the hungry with (400d things; 35 And the rich he hath sent empty away. CO tSong of the Virgin Mary. CJ ^ CD .'itSlSGD Give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with FOOD convenient FOR ME : LeST I BE FULL, AND DENY Thee, and say, Who is the Lord ? Or lest I be poor, AND steal, and TAKE THE NAME OF MY GOD IN VAIN. — Solomon. I am certain that there is a Party in this country, unnamed as yet, that is disconnected with any existing political organisation — a party that is inclined to say, A plague on both your Houses, a plague on all your parties, a plague on all your politics, a plague on all your unending discussions that yield so little fruit. — Lord Rosebery, at St. James's Hall, March 21, 1894. What ive need above all m this country noiv is Peace, and a close attention to the terrible social 2yro- blems luhich beset us. It was no use going on tinkering loith a machine by lotvering the suffrage, altering the registration, and attempting to cut off Ireland, Scot- land, and Wales from England. Tlieir opponents hoped by these alterations to gain the ground for maintaining the controversies by ivhich they lived. The machine existed for something — it existed for the purpose of making the people p)rosperous and happy, and for dealing as far as possible effectively with EVERY SOCIAL EVIL AND DANGER that Sprang up, and THIS WAS A TIME FULL OF SOCIAL EVILS AND DANGERS. Tliey looked around them and saiv a groiving mass of poverty and ivant of employment, and of course the one object ivhich every statesman who loved his country should desire to attain was, that there might be the largest amount of profitable employment for the mass of the people. He did not say that he had any patent or certain remedy for the terrible evils which beset us on cdl sides, but he did say that it teas time they left off mending the constitution of Parliament, and that they turned all the tvisdom and energy Parliament could combine together in order to remedy the sufferings luider ivhich so many of their countrymen laboured. That ivas the evil which, to his mind, was due to the plan and system of politics ivhich now for two genera- tions the Liberal party had pursued. — Lord Salisbury, Jit Covent Garden, April 21, 1894. Gentlemen, I am not blind to the signs of the times. I see neiv ideas, neiv principles, neio aims, neiu social ideals, neiv industrial methods and hopes coming above the horizon. I am not afraid of them. I welcome them. I believe that out of this great ferment good ivill come. Wliy f Because I believe that my country- men — / don't care ivhat class they belong to — luill come to a right and ivell-intentioned conclusion. I never make any concealment of my dissent from some of these plans. I should be unworthy of your confidence if I did. I believe, I say, that the English democracy has in it the elements of ivisdom, of self-restraint, of pru- de7ice, and looking at the first stejy before taking the second, in a degree that is not possessed by any indus- trial population on the face of the globe. Now, I DARESAY THE TIME MAY COME IT MAY COME SOONER THAN SOME THINK — WHEN THE LiBERAL PARTY WILL BE TRANSFORMED OR SUPERSEDED BY SOME NeW Party. — Right Hon. John Morley, M.P., at Newcastle, May 2 1, 1894. PREFACE There were two Norfolk peasants, and the one addressed the other, " Ah ! I would not be like the squire — keep my money to myself. I would do good with it. I should come to you first, John, and say, ' There is one hundred pounds ! ' " Now, it so happened that the philanthropic peasant came into a large fortune, and his former companion meeting him for the iirst time some years afterwards, said, " William, I never got the hundred pounds you promised." And he answered, saying, " Ah ! John, you see then I had the will, but not the money. Noiv, I have the money, but not the will." And he gave him five shillings ! This is the situation of the two old political parties. The one professes to have the will, but not the power. The other has the power, but seems not to have the will. And between these two Faineant parties the people are left as miserable to-day as they were a century ago. They have grown weary of this situa- tion. They find that they must trust to themselves. They have their own votes, their own ideas, and they now resolve to have their own party. Every prophet must have foreseen that it would come to this at last. Mr. Gladstone, with his powerful personality, only xiv PREFACE held the Liberal party together in opposition. The rent, begun in 1885, went down only a little way; it will now split right away down the whole length of the party from one end to the other. The Liberal party may be pulled together for one more general election, but it cannot possibly get a majority which will be strong enough to make headway against the New Party, the Tories, the Unionists, and " the Lords." It will therefore have either to make tem- porary arrangements with the iVew Party or resign. Most likely, what will happen will be this : The earnest Home Rule Liberals will keep a little com- pany of their own, and this will still be called the Liberal party ; the hollow Liberals and Radicals will join the Conservative party ; many will go out of politics altogether ; the rest will come over to the New Party. The New Party must necessarily include in its form and policy something more than the labour idea. It must not be confounded with the Independent Labour Party. Its body is being grown — it cannot be made. It will become the most comprehensive, picturesque, historical, ideal, ethical, political party which has ever stepped foot upon God's earth. Universal as well as National, its commanding and baptizing objects are Social. It is the I^^rty of the Inspired Peoples ! Andrew Reid. CONTENTS The Isocratic Party. By Grant Allen .... The ISTew Party in the jS^orth. By Egbert Blatchford ^/' ("Nunqua:\i "), Editor of the Clarion The New Era. By Walter Crane ..... Ideals : Imperial and Social. By W^^_R J3.yles, M.P. • . Onward to X'ictory. By Fred. Hammill .... The Mission of the Churches. By The Dean of Win- chester ........ The Church and the Democratic Idea. By Rev. C. L, Marson, Author of " The Psahiis at Work " . Christus Invictus. By Rev. Dh. Robert Horton Woman in the New Party. By Margaret McMillan 'J The Song of the Peoples. By Rev. W. J. Dawson, Author of " The Makers of Modern English " . History of Private Property — A Sketch. By Walter R. Warren, Barrister-at-Law . . . . Land Monopoly. By William Jameson, late Hon. Sec. of the Land Nationalisation Society ..... The Social Economy of the Future. By Alfred Russel Wallace, LL.D. v ...... . PACK I CtJX.lJ*'^ I I 35 39 49 55 73 91 ,.'.r ^A^ '^n 115 - — r 145 177 xvi CONTENTS PAGE Restored Scotland. By Charles Waddie . . .213 The Voice from the Rural Wilderness. By Rev. E. Potter Hall and J. S. Hamilton . . . .229 Our Manufactures. By the late Hon. Roden Noel . 245 The Right of Production. By Will Reason, of the Mans- field University Settlement . . . . . -255 London's " Pauper " Chaos. By Alfred Foster, A London Guardian . . . . . . . .271 The Social Work of the Undivided Church, By Rev. Percy Dearmer ........ 287 Factory Girls. By Frances Hicks 315 Principles, Hopes, and Ideals. By Herbert Burrows . 327 The Advent of the People. By Rev. P. H. Wickstebd . 335 What to Aim at. By Sarah Grand ..... 355 On the Verge of Change. By William Tirbbuck . . 363 'The Independent Labour Party. By J. Keir Hardie, M.P. 375 The Woman's Cause. By Lady Henry Somerset . . 387 My Maiden Vote. By Richard le Gallienne . . . 401 Our Policy. By Andrew Reid ...... 405 Post Scriptum 445 THE NEW PARTY THE ISOCRATIC PARTY We are assisting at the birth of a New Party. By all means let us not deceive ourselves at the outset. A new party it is, and a new name is needed for it. True, the greater part of us remain to-day just the same as ever ; but we have squeezed out the traitors. Liberals we called ourselves, and Liberals we still are. AVe have not altered a jot or a tittle of the faith that was in us from the very beginning. It is the times that have moved on. A small though noisy and wealthy wing of so-called Liberals have broken away from us and deserted us. We are the richer for their defection. That clearance has left the party stronger, more united, more unhampered, freer. We have no longer to contend with weak-kneed friends and secret foes. We are younger and fresher. We can march on, all abreast, to the triumph of the . humane and righteous principles we all hold in common. And first of all we need a new name. The name I would suggest is The Isocbatic Party. Isoceats we all are ; Isoceats let us call ourselves. " But why a new name at alH" you ask. " Is not 2 THE NEW PARTY the old one o-ood enough ?" No ; not for the purified party as it now remains. We want something more definite, more rousing, more suggestive of our actual aims and ohjects. Liberal won't do, because some of our bitterest foes still arrogate it to themselves, as though the House of Lords were to plume itself on being the English people. Radical is a comparatively meaningless term; it tells nothing of our construc- tive ideas, our evolutionary hopes, our belief in the future. It suggests to most people mere pulling down; while ive are all for building up the coming Church and the coming Commonwealth. lUit Isocrat and Isocratic exactly meet our views. We believe in the strength and the rule of the People ; in govern- ment of the People, by the People, for the People. Equality is the literal meaning of the word Isocracy. Now a name and a cry may be foolishness to the philosopher ; but, trust me, they count for much to the soldier in a battle. And we in England, who have to fight this good fight of the poor against the rich, of the weak against the mighty, have need of every advantage such a cry can give us. Let us call our- selves Isocrats, then ; not immediately and officially perhaps, but slowly, by permeation. Let us accustom ourselves and one another to the name. Let us make it our clarion. Let us learn to love it. I call upon all good Isocrats to use the word and its derivatives henceforth, instead of Radical and Radicalism, in speech and writing, on the platform and in the news- paper, till the public mind accepts it as our oriflamme, THE ISOCRATIC PARTY 3 and we become in name what we now are in fact — the Isocratic Party. And what must the aim of such a party be ? its poli- tical aim, and far more important, its social aim? What must it strive with all its might to do for the people of England and Wales, of Scotland and Ireland ? Politically.— which is a small thing — its first object must be the overthrow of the Oligarchy. To-day, for the first time in a couple of centuries, the Oligarchy has determined to govern what we used to consider a free country. Some six hundred men, without a shadow of natural right, sitting in a particular room which they call the House of Lords, have decided that they will of their own mere motion oppose the will of forty millions, duly expressed to them through elected repre- sentatives. This claim to divine right on the part of an Oligarchy of six hundred idlers to rule a nation of forty million workers is sheer contumacy — more pre- posterous and ridiculous than the claim to divine right made in vain by the Stuart monarchs. It is absolutely baseless. It must be met by the whole force of the New Party with a stern and contemptuous refusal. The insolent boast of being born with a pecuHar privilege of legislating for your fellows is an insult to mankind which Isocracy will not tolerate. The House of Lords must go. It must go altogether. It must vanish like smoke, leaving not a trace or a relic of any sort behind it. We do not want a Second Chamber. What we, the people, decide, must become 4 THE NEW PARTY law at once, without the possibility of veto on any hand. The peerage is doomed. We will end it, not mend it. Ourselves will make our own laws in future. Six hundred mediocrities shall stand no longer be- tween the people and tlie course it has decided upon. Other political changes must follow as of course. No plural voting. No fancy franchises. No University preserves. No relics of the Oligarchy. One man, one vote. One woman, one vote. No distinction of class, no distinction of sex. One vote, one value. But these political changes will only be of import- ance as heralding the far greater social changes that will succeed them. They are but the removal of stumbling-blocks out of the way. When the people have the course all clear for themselves, they will make use of their freedom to some good purpose. Foremost among the tasks which the New Party will set itself, after the rout of the Oligarchy, will be the rout of the Plutocrat. Britain shall no longer be the rich man's heritage. England for the English, not for the Duke of Westminster; Scotland for the Scots, not for the Duke of Sutherland; Ireland for the Irish, not for a handful of landlords ; Wales for the Welsh, not for the Anglican priest and the sleek mine-proprietor ; those will be some of the first cries of the victorious Isocrats. And if the abolition of alien churches and the rectification of land-laws can best be done by each component section of the com- monwealth for itself, then Local Home Rule for the four countries, with a single Federal and Colonial THE ISOCRATIC PARTY 5 Parliament, will be the one way out of it. Nobody objects, indeed, to such universal Home Rule, except a handful of Plutocrats, who have made common cause with the Oligarchs, in the hope of saving a little longer their swollen money-bags. All these are but the prelude. The drama will follow them. The first act, I take it, will be an attack on the Plutocrats. A heavy progressive income-tax ; still heavier and more rapidly progressive death-duties. No man hereafter shall die a millionaire ; and the man who comes nearest to it shall find his wealth absorbed by the State beyond a certain limit. This will rank among the earliest measures of the Isocratic Party, not because it is one of the most pressing, but because it will supply us with the sinews of war, and because, Avith a Universal franchise, nobody worth speaking of will be really opposed to it. Next will come more serious and important move- ments — the Housing of the Masses, and the Land for the People. Parish Councils will here give us the thin end of the wedge. In the past, the soil of Britain has been treated as if it existed simply and solely for the private benefit of a few thousand landowners ; the people could only house themselves or obtain plots for cultiva- tion where the few thousands were pleased to allow them a footing at exorbitant rentals. All that has got to be changed. The vile political economy of the past has got to be reversed. An Isocratic Britain will 6 THE NEW PARTY recognise the principle that the first claim upon the land belongs to the household; that the first use to which it should be put is to support the family. In the country, Parish Councils will have power to ac- quire, with or without compensation, such areas as are needed for public purposes or for the housing of the citizens. In the towns, the municipalities will have power to acquire, with or without compensation, such areas as are needed for fresh air, public parks and playgrounds, new streets, schools, libraries, baths, municipal offices ; such land as is needed for the better and wholesomer housing of the labouring classes and of the citizens generally. It will be recognised that the first object of the soil is to house the people, the second to feed and support the people ; and that any interests which conflict with these plain human rights and duties must go to the wall as anti-social and inhuman. No more vile slums ; no more noisome villages ; no more wasting of a county that one man may shoot grouse and stalk red deer ; no more dis- possessing of the poor from their ancestral acres that one man may roam over miles of park-land. In the country, a home and homestead for every family that cares to till the soil to public advantage ; in the town, a decent house for every citizen who cares to hire it by the fruits of his industry. No subsidising of drones ; no allowing the idle to live at ease on the toil of the industrious. How shall we bring about this righteous state of things? I said above, intentionally, "with or without THE ISOC RATIO PARTY 7 compensatioD." I hope the latter ; I fear in part the former. If strict justice were done, there is no reason on earth why a penny of compensation should ever be paid out of the earnings of the landless in order to make up to the drones and idlers for the loss of the land they have kept so long from its rightful possessors. It is the landlords rather who should compensate the landless for the gross injustice they have committed for ages. But strict equity is a thing one can hardly expect at first even from an Isocratic community. The wrong-doers will fight hard for their unjust privilege, for their baseless claim to monopolise the soil of England ; and prejudice will so blind many good people as to make them back up the demands of these hereditary plunderers to be compensated for what was never their own out of the hard-won earnings of labouring people. As a compromise, it is probable that the Isocratic Party will begin by progressive taxation of ground-rents — good sound taxation, severe from the very outset, and increasing by regular grada- tions with time, but still more with every change of inheritance. A strange sentiment of pity makes many honest folk shrink from depriving a man, during his own lifetime, of wealth he has once enjoyed and con- sidered his own, however ill-gotten. Such people never reflect that by allowing one man to retain unjustly what was never in any true sense his property, they are robbing another man of the fruit of his labour. A wise and just Isocrat would feel his conscience prick him if he permitted a drone to live one day longer in 8 THE NEW PARTY over-fed idleness by confiscating the wealth of the poor and the helpless, ^'evertheless, this false sentiment of supposed justice will no doubt interfere to prevent immediate taxation of ground-rents to anything like their full value. Some taxation, however, will begin at once ; and its scale will be increased in a twofold way, regularly by increments (say) every five years, and irrei^ularly for each property on sale or inheritance. In this way, in a very short time, private ownership of land will be abolished altogether by imperceptible stages, without sudden upset to any private purse, and without the creation of a vast body of debt, which would be an unjust first rent-charge on the future earnino-s of the community. Whatever we do, we must not buy out the landlords. We must pay no blackmail. From the very beginning, the State must resume to itself a portion of the ground-rent which is the property of the community ; and by gradual stages it must proceed to the extinction of yet unborn land- lords. Whoever refuses to associate himself with this movement will show himself not only a very bad Isocrat, but also a very bad Christian, and a very bad citizen. He will be refusing his fellows the plain fruits of their own labour. For the one desire of an Isocratic Party will always be to mete out equal justice to every citizen. It will be absolutely impartial to lord and to beggar, and will guarantee to each the full and free enjoyment of every scrap of property they create or inherit. Other minor points of less importance will quickly THE ISOCRATIC PARTY 9 adjust themselves. Eight hours we will have, of course — a first step for the present. That is merely the acknow- ledgment of the labourer's right to some small share of reasonable leisure. A minimum wage would very possibly follow, or, at any rate, a recognition in some form of the labourer's right to a decent standard of comfort and of humane living. Previous parties have been parties of the landholder and the capitalist, the monopolist and the sweater, the confiscator and the exploiter of human labour. The Isocratic Party will be the party of the People, of the men who work, of the men who think, of the women who bring up the future citizens. It will look upon Britain as meant, not for this class or that, but for each and all of us. More jealous for the true freedom of peers and land- lords than the Liberty and Property Defence League, it will see that every citizen has his free and equal rights, and no citizen those " privileges " which are, by their very name, denials of the equal rights of others. It will see that each man is assured in the fruits of his toil, and that no man is permitted to live upon the toil of others. It will set its face against confiscation, robbery, idleness, begging, pauperism, tramping, land- lordism, and brigandage. It will insist upon every man's claim to his own, and deny any man's claim to steal from his neighbour. No one class can ever be safely entrusted with power. If it is so entrusted, it uses its power for class purposes. The strength of the New Party will lie in the fact that it represents no class, and consists of 10 THE NEW PARTY no one overpowering interest. Therefore it will care for all alike, and will have no other desire than truth and righteousness. While other parties have appealed to low and selfish aims, to low and selfish motives, the New Party will offer bribes to no man's cupidity, and will seek to cast out of itself all low and selfish and personal elements. "Is this right?" "Is this just?" — those will be for it the important questions ; and it will be strong in virtue of that very unselfishness. We call upon all those w^ho love their fellow-men, who hate the wrong and follow the right and ensue it, to join with us in the formation of this the only truly national party ever yet devised or imagined in Britain. Will you hold out and cavil over your own petty interests ? or will you unite with us Isocrats for the good of all, including even those who, in their foolish blindness, and to gain for themselves some small fancied advantage, would thwart and oppose us ? W^ill you stand up for your kind, or for your own tiny faction ? Will you be one with the nation, or will you stifle its higher and nobler aspirations for the sake of some mean gain you think you can ensure for your own pocket by retarding the happiness and refusing the just claims of your fellow-citizens ? For from this day onward there will be no such thing as political differences ; there will only be the difference between those who wish well to their kind and those who wish ill to it. Politics henceforth are merged in morals. Choose which side you will take — God's or the devil's. Grant Allen. THE NEW PARTY IN THE NORTH I AM asked to tell what the great mass of the workers in the North of England desire. It would be easier to say what they need. Many of them would ask for more wages, many for shorter hours of work, not a few for better racing " tips," or more beer. Go amongst the masses of the poor in our crowded Lancashire and Yorkshire towns, and ask them what they wish for. The men will say " a living wage," or " an eight hours' day ; " the wives, poor drudges, will tell wistfully of how their work is never done, of the struggle they have to make both ends meet. A little more money, a little more ease, a little more pleasure of their hard and jaded lives — these things they desire, and would be un- reasonably grateful for. But speaking of the northern workers in the mass, I cannot, of my own knowledge, report the existence of any earnest and efficient desire for the attainment by all of the best that human life can yield. The more prosperous workers are without heed ; the more penurious are without hope. In both cases the fact is due less to lack of noble impulse or of native sense than to lack of knowledge. Show the more successful workers 12 THE ^^EW PARTY the truth about our social system, and they are just enough and generous enough, aye, and Avise enough, to wish to right it. Show the crushed and misemble poor that their suffering and debasement are not inevitable ; show them that they have just claims to a better life, and sure means for its attain- ment, and they will prove that they possess the courage and the intelligence to fight and win. Half a century ago Carlyle described most vividly and truly the state of mind of the northern working masses : — " Thus these poor Manchester manual workers mean only, by fair day's wages for fair clay's work, certain coins of money adequate to keep them living— in return for their work, such modicum of food, clothes, and fuel as will enable them to continue their work itself ! They as yet clamour for no more ; the rest, still inarticu- late, cannot shape itself into a demand at all, and only lies in them as a dumb wish ; perhaps only, still more inarticulate, as a dumb, altogether unconscious want." Ten years ago, perhaps five years ago, that passage was still literally true of all the masses. To-day it is true of the majority. But there are signs of change. There is now, in the North of England, a party of progress ; and, which is of more value and signifi- cance than the existence of any party, there is, blazing or smouldering amongst our densely popu- lated districts, a new enthusiasm ; almost a new religion. The party, indeed, can hardly claim the name of party yet. It is scattered, it is badly organised, it THE NEW PARTY IX THE XORTH 13 consists of many and somewhat incongruous ele- ments ; resembling more a number of isolated clans in revolt than a unanimous people banded for revolu- tion. I will speak of this body or party fu-st, and will then attempt some description of the religion or soul. The New Party, somewhat inaccurately called " The Labour Party," is largely Socialistic. Broadly speak- ing, its component parts are five. There are the Social Democrats, the Fabians, the Labour Church, the Independent Labour Party, and the unattached supporters of "The Cause." Of these constituent bodies the oldest is the Social Democratic Federa- tion ; the youngest, and, perhaps, the most progressive, is the Independent Labour Party. But the largest, and, speaking generally, the most intelligent, earnest, and unselfish, is the great mass of new converts, who, for various reasons, have not joined any organi- sation. Thus in Manchester and Salford the Social Demo- crats certainly do not number 500 paying members, nor the Independent Labour Party four times that number. Yet at the last municipal elections the Labour vote in those towns was Sooo. The Fabian Societies in the North are few in num- ber, and their membership is small. Many of these associations — which at best were little more than Socialist clubs — have been merged in the Indepen- dent Labour Party. Between the Independent Labour Party and the 14 THE NEW PARTY Social Democrats there is little cordiality and no cohesion. The latter have a Federation of their own, and regard the New Party with suspicion. Firstly, because the Social Democrats did not consider a new- organisation necessary; secondly, because the Inde- pendent Labour Party refuses to put the word " Socialist " into its title. The Labour Church keeps closely in touch with all the other organisations, and also with the nume- rous unattached adherents, but is most frequently and closely allied with the Independent Labour Party. Many of its members are members of one or other of the Labour organisations, most of them are avowed Socialists. The Social Democrats are the pioneers of Socialism in England. Their Federation was formed by Mr. H. M. Hyndman more than ten years ago. They have worked hard and faithfully, and still show an un- wavering front and an unyielding spirit. At a time when the word Socialism stank in the nostrils of the people, at a time when Socialism meant scorn, and sorrow, and even danger to those who embraced it, the Social Democratic Federation men stood up boldly to preach their gospel at the street corners, in defiance of the threats of the rich and the jeers of the poor. That their numbers are still far from large, and their influence still far from powerful, is due not to any lack of honesty or zeal. Had the Social Democrats been less abstruse and less materialistic, had they more often preached higher ideals and less often THE XEW PARTY IX THE XORTH 15 higher wages, and had then- leaders reahsed the wisdom of making their economic doctrines more popular and simple, their progress would have been tenfold greater. The Fabian clubs are the result of the lecturing tours undertaken by the members of the London Fabian Society. They won over a good many men who resented the rigid code and sometimes violent language of the Social Democrats, and have, as I said before, been largely merged in the Independent Labour Party, whose theories of moderate Socialism and con- stitutional methods are in harmony with the Fabian idea. The Labour Church was founded by John Trevor in the autumn of 1S91. It began at Manchester, and has since extended southwards to Portsmouth and northwards to Dundee. Its idea is to insist upon the Labour Movement as a religious movement, and to combine in its agitation the spiritual with the material well-being of the people. Its services consist of Labour or Socialistic hymns, a short prayer, a reading from some Eeligious or Democratic book, and an address on some aspect of the Laboiu* Movement, generally delivered by a recognised leader of the Social Democrats, the Fabians, the Independent Labour Party, the Trades' Unionists, or the Labour Church itself. It is a flourishing institution, and I believe it to be of verv srreat value to the move- ment. The sreat L'nattached are more difficult to de- i6 THE NEW PARTY scribe. They consist of men and women of all classes. Amongst them are parsons, doctors, lawyers, school- masters, artists, actors, authors, journalists, shop- keepers, landlords, capitalists, merchants, mechanics, labourers, soldiers, sailors, civil servants, policemen, and officials of all kinds. They are to be found in every town and village ; in schools, post-offices, rail- way stations. Government offices, Liberal and Conser- vative clubs, and indeed in all those places where they might be the least expected. All these people are outposts, sentinels, pioneers, apostles, and recruit- ing officers. Of their zeal, devotion, intelligence, and unselfishness no one has more knowledge or apprecia- tion than the present writer. To the increase of their numbers I look for the present progress and final vic- tory of " the cause that cannot fail." The Independent Labour Party was formed at the Bradford Conference in 1893. It is a growing party, and will keep on growing. Its object is to secure Socialism by means of direct Labour representation, and independently of the assistance or action of the Liberal or Conservative Parties. Such are the chief constituents of what I have called the Northern Party of Progress. So sudden has been its origin, so rapid its growth, so completely has it severed itself from all established political, reli- gious, economic, and social ideas and methods, that as yet its significance has not been realised nor its principles understood by Aristocracy, Plutocracy, or Democracy, by Church, or Press, or Parliament. To THE NEW PARTY IN THE NORTH 17 the misgovernors and misleaders of the people the new Labour Party is an insignificant mob of ignorant men, led by a few self-seeking demagogues ; to the Tories it is a mere eifervescence of malcontent Radicals and windy Socialists ; to the Liberals it is a " Tory dodge." To those who are in the party, and have helped to make it, it is a vast and increasing army of educated, alert, and resolute reformers, who can neither be inti- midated, nor cajoled, nor cozened, nor bribed to turn aside from the task they have undertaken — the task of securing to the British people the possession, control, and enjoyment of their own country and their own lives. Five years ago there were not five hundred Socialists in Manchester. Now there must be thirty thousand. Two years ago Socialism was despised and rejected of men. Now it is on all lips and pens. It is written about, argued about, spoken about, and preached about. It is the foremost topic of discussion the country through. It is even recognised and sometimes ac- knowledged by its opponents as a thing not wholly dependent upon madness or dishonesty for its incul- cation, nor upon bombs and bludgeons for its accom- plishment. It has passed through the stages of contempt and vilification, and has entered the stage of discus- sion. It has a literature of its own, and a Press of its own. The Clarion, which is the first Socialist paper that ever paid its way in this country, has a circulation in the North of 40,000. Less than three years ago we had no Clarion, no Labour Proj^het, no Labour Church, B i8 THE NEW PARTY and no Independent Labour Party. If the New Party advances at the same speed for three years more, it will be a force exceedingly difficult to reckon with. So much for the New Party : now of the new religion. Whence came it ? What is it ? If you asked a London Socialist for the origin of the new movement he would refer you to Karl Marx and other German Socialists. But so far as our northern people are concerned I am convinced that beyond the mere outline of State Socialism Karl Marx and his countrymen have had but little influence. No ; the new movement here ; the new religion, which is Socialism, and something more than Socialism, is the result of the labours of Darwin, Carlyle, Ruskin, Dickens, Thoreau, and Walt Whitman. It is from these men that the North has caught the message of love and justice, of liberty and peace, of culture and simplicity, and of holiness and beauty of life. This new religion which is rousing and re- vivifying the North is something much higher and much greater than a wage question, an hours' question, or a franchise question, based though it is upon those things ; it is something more than a mere system of scientific government, something more than an economic theory, something more even than political or industrial liberty, though it embraces all these. It is a religion of manhood and womanhood, of sweet- ness and of light. As John Trevor said in the Labour Prophet : "It has not been to a new economic theory merely that these converts have been introduced. It THE NEW PARTY IN THE NORTH 19 has been to a new life. Their eyes shine with the gladness of a new birth." For this we are indebted to the idol-breaking of Carlyle, to the ideal-making of Ruskin, and to the trumpet-tongued proclamation by the titanic Whitman of the great message of true Democracy and the brave and sweet comradeship of the natural life — of the stainless, virile, thorough human life, lived out boldly and frankly in the open air and under the eyes of God. Now I SEE THE SECRET OF THE MAKING OF THE BEST PERSONS. It is to grow in the open air and to eat and sleep WITH THE EARTH. To love each other as brothers and sisters, and to love the earth as the mother of us all, that is part of our new religion. Our new relis^ion tears the old dogmas to tatters, hurls the old Baals in the dust, declares much of that which the economists call " wealth " to be the same thing that Ruskin calls "illth." Our new religion turns its back upon the churches, with their symbolisms and ceremonies and display, and teaches us that love and mercy and art are the highest forms of worship. Our new religion claims man back to freedom from commercial and industrial vassalage ; tells him that he is as much a piece of Nature as the birds of the air or the lilies of the field ; that he, no more than they, can be healthy or fair, nor in anywise complete without fresh air, and pure water, and sunshine, and peace ; tells him that since he above all his kindred of earth and sea is 20 THE NEW PARTY endowed with spirit, so must that spirit be nourished and kept sweet by spiritual sustenance and spiritual effort, else will it inevitably become corrupt and breed disease, contagion, and death. Our new religion tells him that the body must be nourished that the soul may thrive, and that nothing which is got at the soul's expense is cheap, nor any- thing which is needful for the glory and uplifting of the soul dear : — "All parts away for the progress of souls, all religion, all solid things, arts, governments — all that was or is apparent upon this globe or any globe falls into niches and corners before the proces- sion of souls along the grand roads of the universe." There is no way for the body to be healthy, no room for the soul to breathe and expand, in the slums, in the factories, in the markets and exchanges, the drinking kens and casinos, the political clubs and bethels of our great industrial towns. Therefore the great industrial towns and the competitive-commercial system which produced them are anathema to us, and our religion bans them. We all know the glorious institutions and heroic ideals upon which Carlyle and Ruskin and Dickens and Thackeray poured out the vials of their irony and scorn. We all know the great Westminster windmill, where ignorant educated men grind wind with which to fill the bellies of the hapless workers. We all know how those illustrious legislators, when the people ask for bread, spend months and even years in debating THE NEW PARTY IN THE NORTH 21 as to whether or not it would be rash to offer them a stone. We all know the ragged Falstaffian army of the Press, " without drill, uniform, captaincy, or billet ; with huge o^;er-proportion of drummers ; you would say, a regiment gone wholly to the drum, with hardly a sound musket in it." We all know the champion ineptitude, the adroitest of all political mountebanks at swallowing words and juggling figures, the "poor forked radish" who is raised upon the bucklers by the proverbial twenty-seven millions, as the triumphant outcome of English history, and fittest man to rule over us. We all know Bobus of Houndsditch, Plugson of Undershot, and Messrs. Bounderly, Gradgrind, Podsnap & Co. We know these men, and the things they profess, and call by the names of " political economy," " practical common-sense," and " religion." We will have no more of these Dead Sea apes nor of their heroes, nor of their creeds, nor of their aspira- tions. Never surely since the world went round has it harboured a race of such mean, vulgar, and impos- sible little infidelities as the British Snobocracy with their gospel of " enlightened selfishness." A whole nation ordered, or rather disordered, on the supposition that if every man were free to rob and injure every other, universal peace and prosperity would be the natural outcome ! A class of useless and idle superior persons consuming and wasting the wealth produced by the toilers, and calmly assuring those toilers that the more wealth is wasted the more employment will it find the poor in producing still 22 THE NEW PARTY more! A Press, ruled less by its editors than its advertisement canvassers, prating of military glory, with half the Crimean veterans in the workhouse ! A ('liurch preaching serenely of the religion of Jesus Christ, and voting in solid phalanx against every attempt at the practical realisation of Christ's doc- trines ! A populace singing "Britons never, never, never shall be slaves," yet not so much as daring to put their thoughts into words for fear lest they should lose their work ! A great nation of shopkeepers who think God only good for one ciay in the seven ; who attach a "property qualification" to all offices where brains and probity are most needed ; w^ho describe adulteration as " another form of competition ; " who brazenly pretend that greed, vulgarity, injustice, and the degradation and disfigurement of the country and the people must be maintained for fear art and enter- prise and literature and heroism should become ex- tinct ! These things we know well, and despise most utterly. Well do we know the hero beloved of Smiles : the man of " self-help," the man who " rose from the people by his own efforts," the man who " got on." 'i'he New Party will have none of him. The New Party scoffs at and derides the cult of gig-respecta- bility and successful calico-sizing ; will pay no honour to selfishness, howsoever successful. Will dignify no self-made men ; will erect no statues to Hudson, or Arkwright, or Jay Gould, or Masham. Will rather honour the giver than the getter, rather love the man- THE NEW PARTY IN THE NORTH ^6 helper than the self-helper ; will put the names of John Ruskin, Thomas Carlyle, Walt Whitman, and Erasmus Darwin above those of all the money-spinners, fame-winners, blood-shedders, and self-makers that ever encumbered the earth. The New Party will not aspire to the huckster's heaven of financial success, nor deliver up its soul to escape the huckster's hell of financial failure. The New Party knows that " money never yet paid one man for service to another." It will not value love, duty, or devotion in stolen doubloons like a buccaneer, nor in scalps like a Choctaw Indian. It will spurn self-interest and crown self-sacrifi.ce. It will ask not what a man has got, but what he has given. It will not be led by the Bishop of Manchester to give a judge a large salary for fear he should betray his trust for bribes. It will not reward its Rorke's Drift heroes by a present of a pair of regulation trousers. It will not be imbecile enough to suppose that Miltons, Stephen- sons, Turners, Harveys, Herschells, Darwins, Ruskins, Alfred Wallaces, and Florence Nightingales are to be bought in the market at current rates, and that when the supply falls below the demand, nothing is neces- sary but to bid higher. It will regard a man's talent as it regards the earth and sea, as the gift of God, to be used by all for the good of all. It will answer the mere commercial hero's demand for more wages : " Strong men and clever men were not sent here to enslave and plunder their weaker fellow-creatures, but to serve them. It is the duty of the young to wait 24 THE NEW PARTY upon the old, of the hale to nurse the sick, of the chaste to succour the frail. It is the general's pre- rogative to go first into danger, the captain's to be the last to leave the sinking ship. The proudest motto the proudest man can take is Ich Dien, ' I serve! " Contrast the new religion with the old. The old religion obeys half the command: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy neigh- bour as thyself." It stops short before it comes to its neighbour. The new religion begins at its neighbour, though it does not necessarily e^id there. In place of Anglicism with its gentility, Romanism with its pomp and circumstance, and Calvinism with its fire and brim- stone, it gives us a charity which "beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things" of men, and endureth all things for men. It gives us a charity as broad, as sweet, as merciful as Whitman's "pro- found lesson of reception, nor preference, nor denial," whereby "the black with his woolly head, the felon, the diseased, the illiterate person are not denied . . . none but are accepted, none but shall be dear." It gives us a hope which will not be satisfied with a " gentleman God," nor daunted by the terrors of a whitewashed devil and a burnt-out hell. It tells us that while a single English child is hungry or ignorant, a single English woman disgraced and cast out as un- clean, a single Englishman denied the work he asks for, or deprived of the light he needs, or the love he desires, or the honour he deserves, there shall be no money for the conversion of the heathen abroad, nor THE NEW PARTY IN THE NORTH 25 the decoration of cathedrals at home. It tells us, in the words of Rnskin, " Whether there be one God or three, no God or ten thousand, children should be fed, and their bodies should be kept clean." It tells us, in the words of Christ, " Inasmuch as ye have not done it unto one of the least of these, ye have not done it unto Me." It will hearken to no platitudes about holiness from priests who do not pay trade union prices : — "While women are weeping and children starving; while in- dustrious men and women are herding like beasts in filthy and fever- haunted hovels, to build art-galleries and churches, town-halls and colleges, is like putting on a muslin shirt over a filthy skin, a diamond crown upon a leprous head. " The religion and the culture which demand riches and blazoniy while vice and misery are at their side are like painted harlots, hiding their debaucheries with rouge, and their shame with satin and spices. "The cant and affectation of piety and culture which lisp senti- ment and chant hymns in drawing-rooms and chapels while flesh and blood are perishing in the streets, and while the souls of our sisters creep shuddering to hell — this religion and this culture, these maudlin, sickening things, with their poems and sonatas, their chants and benedictions, are things false and vain and nothing else but lies." There can be no true culture, there can be no true art, there can be no true progress, there can be no true religion without sincerity. I have seen in Manchester a noble picture of Greek women at the fountain, hung up to instil into the minds of the citizens of that sordid, sooty, vulgar, and hideous town a love of beauty, and outside the art-gallery I have seen a grey- 26 THE NEW PARTY headed old English woman staggering along, bent double under a sack of cinders. When the Ship Canal, through mismanagement, was in financial straits, the Manchester city fathers ad- vanced a loan of some two millions — of the ratepayers' money— because the " honour of the city was involved." Two or three years before that, when attention was called to the fact that the Manchester slums were the largest, the foulest, and the most deadly in all England, those same city fathers were afraid to incur the expense of demolishing and rebuilding th'^im. There was much talk then of the burdens of the ratepayers, but not one word about the honour of the city. The honour of the city, it seems, is not concerned with the lives of its people. Manchester is called a great city. It has a great population, a costly and hideous town-hall, a high death-rate, and a lord mayor. But in the eyes of the New Party Manchester is in nowise great. A great city is that which has the greatest men and women. If it be a few ragged huts, it is still the gi-eatest city in the whole world. The place where a great city stands is not the place of stretched wharves, docks, manufactures, deposits of produce merely. Nor the place of ceaseless salutes of newcomers, or the anchor- lifters of the departing. Nor the place of the tallest and costliest buildings, or shops selling goods from the rest of the earth. Nor the place of the best libraries and schools, nor the place where money is plentiest. Nor the place of the most numerous population. THE NEW PARTY IN THE NORTH 27 Where the city stands with the brawniest breed of orators and bards. Where the city stands that is beloved by these, and loves them in return, and understands them. Where no monuments exist to heroes but in the common words and deeds. Where thrift is in its place, and prudence is in its place. Where the men and women think lightly of the laws. Where the slave ceases, and the master of slaves ceases. Where the populace rise at once against the never-ending audacity of elected persons. Where fierce men and women pour forth as the sea to the whistle of death pours its sweeping and unrippled waves. Where outside authority enters always after the precedence of inside authority. Where the citizen is always the head and ideal, and president, mayor, governor, and what not are agents for pay. Where children are taught to be lords to themselves, and to depend on themselves. Where equanimity is illustrated in affairs. Where speculations on the soul are encouraged. Where women walk in public processions in the streets the same as the men. Where they enter the public assembly, and take places the same as the men. Where the city of the faithfulest friends stands. Where the city of the cleanliness of the sexes stands. Where the city of the healthiest fathers stands. Where the city of the best-bodied mothers stands. There the great city stands. And Manchester does not stand there, nor does any city in all England, for great cities we have none. A gulf parts the masses from the classes. This gulf is the srulf of isnorance, and only knowledge can bridge 28 THE NEW PARTY it. It is astounding, the utter ignorance of the lives of the poor, the complete misapprehension of their con- ditions, their trials, their hopes, and their ideals, which the rich manifest in their words and deeds. For some years past I have been engaged in helping to make and to preach our new religion. Yet, not many weeks ago, a well-meaning clergyman, of Liberal views, who had just read one of my books, came to see me, and asked, "Who is it you are writing for? What is it you complain of? Are you thinking of the residuum — the submerged tenth ? " This from a Manchester clergyman, a man professing great interest in the workers, a man who sat at the time he spoke within a stone's-throw of the Manchester slums. He thought the workers, except the idle and in- capable, were pretty well off, and that poverty would cure itself. He held the notion, common to his class, that the question is simply one of wages. He thought the colliers and the cotton operatives had a good deal to be thankful for. Have they not a living wage ? Yes, they have a living wage. But have we for- gotten the long and deadly struggles they were forced to undertake to keep that wage ? and is there nothing to be given to the workers but ivages ? Even if we accept wages as the one thing needful ; even if we go as far as the man in " Our Mutual Friend," and consider the labour question simply as " a question of so many pounds of beef and so many pints THE NEW PARTY IN THE NORTH 29 of porter," can we say that the masses have as much beef and porter as they need ? What of the wages of the tailors, the shirtmakers, the match-makers, the dockers, the sailors, the railway men, the farm -labourers, the lead-workers, the slipper- makers, the shop-assistants, the domestic servants, the canal-boat workers, the chain and nail makers, the old soldiers, the match-hawkers, the feather-dressers, the silk-dyers, the artificial flower makers, the fishermen, the costers, the news-boys ? What of all the workers' wives ? But wages are not all. We have to ask how hard and how long these people work ; we have to ask what their homes are like, what health they enjoy, how much rest and culture, and fresh air, and wholesome recrea- tion they obtain. And we find that their homes are dismal and mean, that their labour is long and hard, that they have scarcely any fresh air, or sweet rest, or pure amusements. And we find that the death-rates are terribly high, that the duration of life is short, that the bill of health is bad. In one district of Manchester a committee of ladies found that 60 per cent, of the population were sick. In some of the slum districts Dr. Thresh found death-rates of 75 and 90 in the thousand, as against rates of 9 and 16 in the suburbs. Consider again the dangers, the hardships, and the sickness incidental to the work of the sailors, the fishermen, the colliers, the chemical workers, match- makers. Go amongst the cotton operatives and see 30 THE NEW PARTY how factory work in factory towns deteriorates the people mentally and physically. No ; it is not of the submerged tenth we are thinking only. It is of the English people. Over all is the shadow of fear — the fear of failure and the workhouse. But I could not in a volume so much as enumerate all the evils of our present English civilisa- tion. There is a whole library of blue-books filled with the statistics and the evidence of the hardships and labours and sufferings of those who create the wealth of this rich miserable country. Not the least of the wrongs of the poor is one of which blue-books take no cognisance, the denial to the best brain and bone and sinew of the nation of the respect due to all men by virtue of their manhood. Our workers are honoured and loved too little ; they are governed, and patronised, and lectured overmuch. What, then, do we demand? We demand that national co-operation shall displace individual com- petition ; we demand to this end the nationalisation of the land and all the instruments of production and of distribution. We demand that our industry be organised, and that production be for use and not for sale. We demand that the factory system and the manu- facturing system be curtailed or abolished because they are mechanical and unpleasant, because they make our towns and cities ugly and dirty and un- healthy, because they annually destroy thousands of useful lives. THE NEW PARTY IN THE NORTH 31 We demand that our agricultural resources be deve- loped because agriculture is more pleasant and more healthy than manufactures, because in an agricultural nation the towns would be cleaner and handsomer and more wholesome, and because the destruction of our agriculture renders us dependent upon foreign coun- tries for our food, and so exposes us to certain defeat and ruin in case of war. At present the people of the North have not only ceased to possess their own country, they have ceased to know it. They never see England. They see only brick walls, chimneys, smoke, and cinder-heaps. They are unable to so much as conceive the fairness and sweetness of England. They are strangers and aliens in their own land. We say, then, give the English people their own country. But we do not stop there. We demand that they shall not only be made the free possessors of their own country, but also of their own earnings, of their own lives, of their own bodies and their own souls. We regard work as a means and not as an end : men should work to live, they should not live to work. We demand for the people as much leisure, as full and sweet and noble a life as the world can give. We want labour to have its own ; not merely the price of its sweat, but its due meed of love and honour. In our eyes the lifeboat man is a hero, and the African machine-gun soldier " opening up new markets " is a brigand and assassin. In our eyes the skilled crafts- 32 THE NEW PARTY man or farmer is a man of learning, and the Greek- crammed pedant is a dunce. In our eyes an apple orchard is more beautiful and precious than a ducal palace. In our eyes the worth of a nation depends on the worthiness of its people's lives, and not upon the balance at the national bank. We want a religion of justice and charity and love. We do not want pious cant on Sundays, and chicanery and lust all the rest of the week. We want a God who is fit for business, and a business that is worthy of God. We want the code of private honour and the bonds of domestic love carried into all our public afi"airs. We want a realisa- tion, in fact, of the brotherhood we hear so much about in theory. Because we know the meaning of heredity and environment, because we believe that men are what their surroundings make them, we want justice for all, love for all, mercy for all. We are the party of humanity. Our religion is the religion of humanity. "The black with his woolly head, the felon, the diseased, the illiterate are not denied." The thief on the Cross, the Magdalen at the well are our brother and our sister ; bone of our bone, flesh of our flesh. If you persecute these, if you insult them, if you rob them, you rob and persecute and insult us. Without the love, and the counsel, and the aid of our fellow-creatures, the best of us were savages — little more than brutes. What we are they made us, what we know they taught us, what we have they gave us ; we are theirs, and they are ours, and for them we will speak and write, and fight, if needs be. THE NEW PARTY IN THE NORTH 33 For me, I am of the people, and I know them. I know them to be capable of the best. I speak for them in the words of Milton — " Lords and Commons of England, consider what nation it is whereof ye are, and whereof ye are the governors ; a nation not slow and dull, but of a quick, ingenious, and piercing spirit ; acute to invent, subtle and sinewy to discourse, not beneath the reach of any point, the highest that human capacity can soar to." I speak for them in the words of Christ — " Inasmuch as ye have not done it unto one of the least of these, ye have not done it unto Me." I speak for them of my own knowledge, for the brave and clever and good people who have been so kind, and so faithful, and so affectionate to me ; and I say that they are so capable and so worthy that the greatest men and noblest women of our time are only indications of the height which the masses may reach and surpass. Just as by cultivation the acrid wild crab has been developed into the beautiful and luscious apple, may the unripe, ill-fed, neglected wild fruits of the fields and slums be developed into pure and noble and beautiful men and women. And the means to this end are justice and freedom, and peace and culture, and love and honour from man to man. Some day, near or far, " the slave shall cease, and the master of slaves shall cease," the hideous mirk and squalor of our modern cities shall be swept away, and 34 THE NEW PARTY in the flower-starred meadows, under the sweet blue northern sky, the men and the maids of merrie England shall dance and sing, and " think lightly of the laws." God bless them, say I, these our children. We shall rest none the less peacefully under their glancing feet because we have helped to make them happy, Robert Blatchford. THE NEW ERA Once more the vernal sun, returning, flings His warm reviving arms around dear earth. And from her kindling heart the new life springs To break in bloom and song from Winter's dearth. Wells forth life's fountain to its overflow, And through the veins of trees, and beasts among, Circles in secret force, and sets aglow The heart of man, indomitable, young. The pulse of Nature universal leaps. And quickens through all being, frame and soul : All life awakes, and to its full tide sweeps Onward, still onward to its unknown goal. A sound of Easter bells is in the air, And dimly heard, the rolling organ streams With quiring voices, from the minster there. Like far sweet thoughts, and singing heard in dreams. But out to meet the sun and down the street The human torrent pours : bright faces glow, The sport of sun and wind : they part or greet — O whence this tide of life ? Whither to flow ? .(S THE NEW PARTY What is our hope, and to what end this press 1 Each one in secret strife, some hidden shoal Of self, tossed on life's stream of changefulness Who 'midst so many parts may find the Whole 1 Might some new hope not rise for us to-day- Some clear fresh vision, born of thought and love, To draw all human hearts, and point the way To helpful life and faith that none may move ! Oh ! might we see the living form and face Of pure Humanity, made strong through strife and woe, Sprung from our common clay, one with our race. With heart and brain to make us feel and know. Yea, Man and Woman, friends in love and trust, As children hand in hand on life's rough way. With doubt, and fear, and foolish custom thrust For ever back, to thwart not Nature's play. The wars of caste and creed struck from the roll, The curse of usury, the bonds of slaves, The power of gold, and the usurped control Of men o'er Man's, whom want no more depraves. Oh ! men and women true, once more take hands. Join hearts and heads, and clear the crooked maze : Set Love and Justice up o'er these our lands : Let Truth be honoured, honest work have praise. THE NEW ERA 37 And bring joy back to human days again : Lift from Life's daily round its sordid cloak ; Draw Beauty near, nor common Use disdain ; Unite in one great cause the struggling folk. To see this fair green land at last made free, The earth and all its fulness still for man ; No toil-bound slave or landed lord to be, But life new-built upon the human plan. When each and all are workers, hand and brain Divorced no more : no toil to bear the brand Of degradation ; when the common gain Is each one's good — fast then our State shall stand. Walter Crane. .'184SG9 " Constitutions are in politics ivhat 2^cc2^er-money is in commerce; they afford great facilities and con- veniences, hut we must not attribute to them that value which really belongs to what they represent ; they are not power but symbols of p>oiver^ and ivill in an eme/'- gency prove altogether useless unless the power for ivhich they stand be forthcoming. The reed poiver by ivhich the community is governed is made up of all the means ivhich all its members possess of giving pain or pleasure to each other.'' — Macaulay. IDEALS: IMPERIAL AND SOCIAL You ask me to say in few words what are the aims of the new Democratic Party, the ideals and emotions with which it is inspired. But I have no claim to speak for that party; I can only speak for myself. I am to leave out of view the practical politics of to-day, and to consider only what we are driving at ; it is not the foreground but the far horizon we are to look at. First, I hope the New Party will examine the foundations on which England's greatness rests. Is it on the extent of our territory, the remoteness of our dependencies, the strength of our navy, the deadly precision of our arms, the impregnability of our forts, the gold in our cellars, or even the volume of our trade ? These are the things for which the Briton's bosom too often swells with pride ; the staple of that English spread-eagleism which is so nauseously loud in plat- form and after-dinner talk. They are the phylacteries that the British Pharisee makes broad. England is hig, but she is not great because of these boasts. The New Party will, I hope, discover other and deeper foundations for their country's greatness, and will broaden and enlarge them. The boasts of the future —if boasting by that time has not altogether dis- 40 THE NEW PARTY appeared — will be of the skill and industry of England's sons, of the virtue of her daughters, the gentleness of her sway, the justice of her laws, the liberty, equality, and fraternity of all classes of her people. To-day in this country land decays and arsenals and "small arms" factories flourish; to-day we are verily turning our ploughshares into swords. I still dream of a coming day, though thousands of years have sped since the poet-prophet sang of it, when this process will be reversed. Imperialists, as self-styled patriots love to call themselves, sneer at all this as effete, namby-pamby Radical sentiment. To hold that it is righteousness which exalteth a nation is to class yourself a " Little Englander." Well, the New Party must try and bear these taunts for a time — perhaps for a long time. We want a nobler Im- perialism than one that aims at vanquishing and exterminating native races, and then exploiting the resources of their country ; seeking commercial gain under the hypocritical guise of civilisation and Christianity, killing the blacks because it is so good for the whites and for the world at large. We want an Imperialism — perhaps we ought rather to say a Federalism — which is sustained in its attitude of friendliness to all peoples, by its promotion of indus- trial amity and solidarity ; by open communications, Channel tunnels, ocean penny postage, instead of forts and defences ; by free interchange of com- modities and open ports, instead of retaliatory tariffs IDEALS: IMPERIAL AND SOCIAL 41 and prohibition of aliens ; an Imperialism which replies to foreign threats and aggrandisements, not by Naval Defence Acts and votes of credit, bnt by international arbitration and proposals of mutual disarmament. And within the so-called United King- dom itself I hope the Imperialism of the New Party will aim at developing, encouraging, and stimulating the Nationahsm of England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales — for each has its separate history, its differing traditions, and distinctive National life. I would no more merge and destroy these potent influences than I would demolish Lincoln Cathedral or West- minster Abbey. It is to the spirit of Nationality that we owe the successful government and loyal attach- ment of Canada, of South Africa, and of Australasia ; and by-and-by we may grow a like spirit and a like fealty among the nations of India. Race, history, tradition, custom, law, language, all forbid us to treat the component Nationalities of the United Kingdom as though they were merely EngHsh counties. If Parliament is ever to achieve any ideal at all it must decentralise ; it must disburden itself of work which it cannot do, and the attempt to do which only chokes the machine and prevents it from doing what it might. The key to this devolution is the spirit of local patriotism. National Councils, increased autonomy, are suggested by the success of our great municipal corporations. Why do busy capable men in a constant stream of succession voluntarily devote themselves with great public spirit to the municipal 42 THE NEW PARTY affairs of Bradford or of Birmingham 1 Because they are proud of the position and jealous for the reputa- tion of their town among other towns. It is to local patriotism that the good management of these great towns is due. And local pride stimulates rather than lessens National pride. So it would be, a fortiori, if the National (not Imperial) affairs of Ireland were managed by Irishmen, of Scotland by Scotchmen, and of Wales by Welshmen. They w^ould do for themselves, and do well, much that the joint overstrained common Parliament now perforce leaves undone, or does badly and ignorantly. They would none the less join in the work common to all, and would still share proudly in the Imperial interests of the mother country. In this direction must the new party work, its ideal being to make a truly United Kingdom in which the component parts are free to compass their own destinies. But the ideals of the New Party have a social as well as an imperial aspect. Their democratic prayer was written for them by King Solomon : " Give me neither poverty nor riches ; feed me with food con- venient for me ; lest I be full and deny thee, or lest I be poor and steal." There are two great social evils in the community, Luxury and Penury, each being the prolific mother of moral and physical diseases in the body politic. The horrible extremes of wealth and poverty need no enforcement. Public attention was never more drawn to them than now, and there are hopeful signs that the public conscience is beginning IDEALS: IMPERIAL AND SOCIAL 43 to awaken. I went the other night from West London to East London — from Hyde Park to Shadwell. The contrast is abhorrent. At one end of this great city, indolence and opulence ; at the other end, toil and privation. Ought not the privation rather to couple with the idleness, and the wealth with the toil ? It should be a distinct aim of the New Party to make the idler less rich and the toiler less poor. We are muzzling the ox that treads out the corn, and the wealth which Labour and Nature are together pro- ducing is being squandered in vulgar selfish extrava- gance and enervating indulgence by men and women who toil not, neither do they spin. The plenty and contentment should be in the labourers' cottages, and if there must be want and penury, they should be the lot of white-handed loafers and blue-blooded " wasters." The jaded lives, the overfed appetites, the rotten society, and the hollow virtue of the West are more repulsive than the squalor and wretchedness of the East. There you find dirty ill-lighted streets, miserable homes, degrading poverty everywhere ; pale draggled women, anaemic children ; gin the only exhi- larating influence within reach. But you do not find emiui. As you move among this awful poverty, you feel pity, but not contempt. Work — ill-paid and exces- sive though it is — gives a sense of dignity to life which one always feels to be wanting in the circles of fashion- able society. Starvation wages and exhausting toil are only part of the evil. The overworked sempstress and the 44 THE NEW PARTY underpaid match-girl — the cinderellas of the national household — are shameful products of social injustice, but there are others whose plight is even worse, namely, the men and women (I fear an increasing number) who get no work and therefore no pay at all. Mr. Keir Hardie does well to insist in forcing on ParHament this question of the Unemployed. The solution of this problem of Darkest England is hard, and the public ear is unwilling to listen. Because the way out is not plain, Society buries its cowardly head in the sand. There is a sense in which it is too true that in this land of boasted freedom men are not free to work, but only free to starve. Generally speaking, a man can only work if some one else consents to employ him. If England were not a civilised country, he need not wait for that consent ; he might hunt the woods or fish the streams to supply his pot. But here all fish, flesh, and fowl fit for human food are " strictly pre- served," and Acts of Parliament protect them as the monopoly of the few. In the Sunday school he is taught to thank the goodness and the grace that he *' was not born a little slave ; " but if he had been, his master would have found it worth while to feed him even when he was out of work. Your average citizen thinks that the Unemployed difficulty ought not to exist. So wrong of parents, says the superficial Malthusian, to bring children into the world whom they can't main- tain ! So easy, says the airy Emigration theorist, to transfer this surplus population to other lands where there is abundant room for them ! Send them out IDEALS: IMPERIAL AND SOCIAL 45 of sight, says the one ; don't let them be born, says the other ; and straightway Priest and Levite pass by on the other side. This sort of thing may serve well enough while the Unemployed problem presents itself as a social injustice only. But when it becomes also, as it is fast becoming, a social menace, then the cry of men standing idle in the market-place because no man will hire them will force unwilling ears to attend. A very poor but long-headed workman said to me the other day, as we discussed these matters, " What have I to lose by an outbreak of violence ? If there were a revolution every tw^enty minutes, it would not hurt me. I could not be worse off, and might be better." A principal aim, therefore, of the New Party, and one which is perhaps its chief actuating power, is to redress the social balance by reducing the inequalities of wealth, by adjusting the expenditure of human energy, by increasing the opportunities for honest, self-sustain- ing labour, and to do these things by destroying the monopolies which now impede a natural and equable social development. You are simply proposing, then (I hear some objector say), to rob Peter to pay Paul. By no means. It is not robbery, but restitution, that we desire. The Have-nots do not wish to take, and surely the Haves do not wish to retain, that which does not belong to them. But, asks a second objector, is there enough to go round? I believe there is even now enough wealth actually produced in this country to give solid comfort and ample leisure to all its citizens. But given access to natural opportunities, 46 THE NEW PARTY and the incentive resulting therefrom, and the total product would unquestionably be greatly enlarged. Take all restrictions off land and all restraints off labour, and then a fairy with a magic wand would set all things straight in a night. The work of the New Party must be to accomplish without magic, by the slow process of converting and then enforcing public opinion, the task of the beneficent fairy. There is yet another class of objectors to meet : those who say it is at best a sordid and material gospel which these new politicians preach, and who plead that the people require something more ennobling than these bread and butter politics. I answer that bread and butter is only the beginning of it. Carnal things must come first. " Man does not live by bread alone,'^ but he cannot eat the Bread of Life if his lower nature is starved. It is recognised nowadays that Board School children with empty stomachs must be fed before they can be taught. And equally the moral teacher must find it well-nigh impossible to kindle the divine spark amid the physical conditions of East Lon- don. Only the very commonest and hardiest plants can live where the soil is poor, the atmosphere smoke- laden, and the exposure sunless. So it is with human organisms. Surround them with a suitable environ- ment, and the preacher of morals may sow the seeds of spiritual life with some hope of reaping the fruits of righteousness. There is something higher than mere bread and butter politics in the aspirations and emo- tions of this new labour movement. A gospel of IDEALS: IMPERIAL AND SOCIAL 47 materialism ! No ; it is a gospel of justice, and justice is the primary virtue, the basis on which all spiritual life is built. In one word, then, the aim of the New Party is Justice, and "the consequences of justice (says Mr. Ruskin) will be ultimately the best possible, both to others and ourselves." W. P. Byles. ''If, in short, you are of opinion that the principal object of a government is not to confer the greatest possible share of power and glory upon the body of the nation, but to ensure the greatest amount of enjoyment, and the least degree of misery to each of the individuals loho compose it, — if such be your desires, you can have no surer means of satisfying them than by equalising the conditions of men and establishing democratic institutions'' — De Tocqueville, vol. ii. p. 142. ONWARD TO VICTORY The incontestable truth of social and political develop- ment on new lines, or more independent lines, during the past ten years, as a rapid and increasing force, is now recognised by every person who has an opinion worthy of consideration. The seed of social and political education is yielding fruit so abundantly that it causes surprise to its most sanguine pioneers, teachers, and reformers. Undoubtedly, the rapid pro- duction of a new force, and with it a " New Party," is striking a note of alarm inside the camp of the already existing political parties. That it is a growing force, an increasing party with increasing power, and that it has come to stay, is already decided. It is a party composed of new elements and broader views, more energy and earnestness, more realism, in fact imbued with a new spirit, eagerly, energetically, and deter- minedly demanding justice for all, combining the elements of each for all and all for each, and the principle of "do unto others as you would they should do unto you." The forces of free education, unemployment tem- porary and permanent, strikes and lock-outs ; the cut-throat competition of our present chaotic system, with a general organisation on independent labour 49 X) 50 THE NEW PARTY lines, have long been at work towards this end, having now created the long-hoped-for demand for something new, and have now established successfully a real united party with a definite programme and united action. This "New Party" will work in the future towards improving the welfare of the whole community, and not, as the old parties have worked heretofore, in the interest of a class only. Every person of the party must be, and will be, prepared to make personal sacri- fices to attain this end, knowing, that while we are assisting others we are assisting ourselves. The basis of the " New Party " is direct independent representation on all public bodies, attaching to the party others who declare for progress and direct repre- sentation ; of course, with definite and approved aims, and working in agreement with the basis of the " New Party." There are parties formed already who claim to sup- port all we advocate and all we strive for. They have long been tried and found wanting, have been trusted and proved faithless, hence the desire for a more really progressive " New Party." Education is fast making Jack as wise as his master, and north, south, east, and west of the United King- dom this wisdom is permeating the people and com- munity as a whole, taking possession of them, they of it. Compulsory education, as Avas predicted by its most far-sighted opponents in 1870, is arming the population with a weapon of warfare, the more it ONWARD TO VICTORY 51 spreads the more powerful will the weapon become, to be wielded with increased power and vigour by the increased and strengthened " New Party." Representation in the past has been interested repre- sentation by interested class " parties," thereby class representation has previously dominated the community. The representation of the community has been the employe by the employer, poverty by the capitalist, the sweated worker by the sweater, slum-life by the slum-owner, agricultural labourers by lords, landlords, and country squires, drunkenness by the brewers, gambling by race-horse runners, bad laws by bad lawyers, and so on. Whichever party may be in office, landlords and capitalists are always in power, while labour is left outside. The "New Party" declares against all this, pledged to alter it, and opposes any party or any person who may support it. Policies of the past, called "spirited foreign policies "—really barbarous policies — will be opposed and crushed, and the man, " the coming man," will not be he who has a " spirited foreign policy," which means blood and war, pride and glory, which, when interpreted by the "New Party," means poverty and desolation to the com- munity. The coming man will be the man of " peace and progress," and the "New Party" the Isocratic Party. The democratic spirit having now taken hold of the people, giving daily assurances of soHdarity, we may look forward with hope, for we have everything to gain and nothing to lose. County councils, munici- 52 THE NEW PARTY * palities, local boards, and other public bodies are being revolutionised by the newer democratic thought and action. Scores of instances might be quoted in proof of this, which is needless, as it is better known to no one than it is to our enemies. The labour world is striving towards unanimity in favour of the " New Party," many of the middle and upper classes who are ashamed of the old order of things are assisting, asso- ciating, and concentrating the varied forces, and pro- pelling the new spirit. This so-called " Dangerous Isocratic " lever, with the fulcrum of a good and righteous cause, is likely ere long to overturn the two already existing political parties, and we have them so evenly balanced just now that they are continually overturning each other, and we, the *' Isocrats," can turn them whichever way we please, and we are about to do it independent of their consideration, only con- sidering (as they have long done) ourselves. It now depends entirely on how far the Liberal party are prepared to co-operate with the "New Party," and this will early decide whether they ever go into office again as a party. If our next Government is a Con- servative Government, to be in office probably five years, our party, the " New Party," will educate, orga- nise, and consolidate, preparatory for taking the field, scattering the parties and taking possession. Any one who has any knowledge, any grasp at all of what is going on, what is coming, and how it is coming, can- not refute these facts, and cannot retard this growino- coming force in the name of the "New Party." It ONWARD TO VICTORY 53 would indeed be dangerous to attempt to thwart its claims. Unemployment, poverty, desperation, squalid misery and crime demand new action, nay, a "New Party." They have no confidence in, and are tired of, the old gang, and will have none of it. Thinkers, legislators, and reformers, social, industrial, and political, have to choose between three things — ( i ) Anarchic destruction of society, (2) physical force revo- lution, or (3) immediate legislative remedies for the cure of the evils of society by constitutional means. The " New Party " chooses the latter one, and further neglect will produce one of the former. It may now be taken for granted that the "New Party" is formed already, growing by daily evolution, eliciting and obtaining recruits from outside, also from inside of every other party. What it will do, what it will achieve, remains to be seen. It is dangerous to pre- dict, but it may be acknowledged as a practical party with a practical policy and programme. That it will succeed in the end, in the near future, is certain ; and come what may, the person or party that stands in its way will be first to fall. It has declared " Onward to Victory," which means, a brighter life to our millions of desolate men, starving women and children ; the right to live by honest employment ; a more equal contribu- tion and distribution of the world's wealth, — all tend- ing towards securing and making us a more happy, more prosperous, and more enlightened people. Fred. Hammill. " One who never turned his hack hut marched hest forward, Never douhted clouds would break, Never dreamed, though rigid were luorsted, ivrong ivould triumph, Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better, Sleep to wake.'' — Browning. THE MISSION OF THE CHURCHES The Church, men daily say, is crippled by pride of place, by wealth, and selfish secondary aims, till she believes the husk to be the kernel ; and the State is cankered by divisions dating from the days when a few families ruled over us, so that she, too, cannot do her best, because we care more for party than for truth. It is not the skill or beauty of the game on which our eyes are set. We care only that our side should triumph and our bets be won. It is true enough : both one and other fall very far short of what they might be and do. Yet it is also true that Church and State are drawing nearer to one another, and, it may be, are preparing for a recon- struction on both sides, which will have very far- reaching results. It may be that, at risk of seeming to forget Christ's denunciations, we shall have to take the world into our confidence and learn from it. But then we must be sure that by " the world " we mean the right thing. If it be that well-dressed person who looks wearily out of Club windows ; if it be that which ministers to the vices of society ; if it means the betting-ring, the gambling den, the gin palace ; if it be the noisy Vanity Fair through which poor, frightened Christian 56 THE NEW PARTY has to force his way with eyes averted, and ears stunned by the nnholy din— then surely we must answer as of old, "Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world." But if to us "the world " is the struggling, suffering mass of our fellows, hardly winning bare livelihood under adverse condi- tions of our social life, then we shall give a very different answer; for for this world Christ came, in this He toiled, giving Himself for it, and leaving it to His Church as her chief charge and care. This century, the age of the new development of nations, has seen our English people endeavouring to combine the centripetal and centrifugal forces, which form the attractive and repellent poles of social life. Nowhere is there stiffer or more self-contained national life ; nowhere are constitutional problems faced with more coherent patience ; nowhere is there a prouder patriotism, a truer love of home — and yet, on the other hand, there is no race so ready to leave the ancient Lares and Penates, and to wander across the world, breaking up the homes of ancient England and with the fragments building new Englands far away. And so we see this strange phenomenon — • as the mother-land, sometimes in anger, sometimes with indifference, never with enthusiasm, has flung off her many offshoots, so the wanderers, even the out- casts, accepting this propulsion as a kind of destiny, have bravely built up copies of the old country at home. Goodwill and a growing wish for unity are succeeding to offence and jealousy ; the sea-ways ot THE MISSION OF THE CHURCHES 57 the world are full of us ; our people call to one another from the furthest corners of the earth. The loss of so much of our young and vigorous blood has strengthened instead of weakening the race ; the more we give the more we have ; the old mother is bound to her children in a hundred lands by innumerable cords of amity and interest. Even the oldest, the most ill-treated, of our early offshoots, the United States of America, have become our friends ; the relations, so often strained half a century ago, are now cordial and brotherly. As each colony wins its manhood the talk of disrup- tion grows less ; ties grow stronger ; commercial interests, social sympathies, pride in the joint in- heritance of freedom ; love for the old country, sympathy with the struggles of the new communities — all these things knit the English-speaking world together in bonds indissoluble. And may we not hope that the Christian religion, when better under- stood, and more faithfully acted on, will, by taking the side of justice, become the golden chain to link us all together, and bind us to the throne of God ? Those who have lived a good while, taking notice, may have seen that Great Britain has been quietly and steadily changing her place in the world. We used to hear good people, scared by a political problem of some complexity, declaring that they wished Ireland could be towed away and moored against the mainland of America. To all intents and purposes, not Ireland alone, but Great Britain also, has actually undergone this process. To-day we are far nearer some of the 58 THE NEW PARTY English-speaking lands than we are to the continent of Europe. Fresh means of communication, steam and electricity, have made distance a secondary matter. And, as our relations with the Colonies have grown closer, our dealings with the European States have grown less intimate and important. We are of the sea, not of the land ; the ties which bind us to our brethren across the Atlantic are stronger than those across the Channel and the North Sea. Some day we may even be able to guarantee ourselves against the infinite curse of war by a defensive federation built firmly on the seas. With these changes has come a change in the domi- nant ideas and principles of the race. We seem to be entering on a new life, in a new world, in which the careers and the duties of men will also be new. Shall this change be for good or not ? is the question which the coming generation must face. And can we doubt that our religion, in spite of all its minor and irritating differences, will play a great part in the new time ? The new and nobler views as to the functions of the State bring the temporal power into closer relation with the spiritual. By taking on herself social duties, by recognising the value of the individual life, by listening to the national conscience, the State has be- come to some extent a preacher of righteousness. It is for the Churches still further to inspire and direct this wholesome movement. We have to persuade them to take their true place, the place indeed of the Prophets of old, as teachers, advisers, fearless in THE MISSION OF THE CHURCHES 59 warning, warm to encourage. Nor may we forget that we are standing face to face with a new power, which holds itself suspiciously aloof from all religious interferences. The question as to how the conscience and heart of the wage-earners may be touched has be- come the most vital of all questions for the Churches. How are we to gain their ear ? how supply their lack ? how raise them to higher levels of principle ? Their dangers are obvious. They take their plea- sures hot. To them the betting-book, the sporting paper, the dog, the pigeon, the horse, are mainly interesting as giving scope for winning and losing money; to them the tavern is often an overwhelming temptation ; their general morality is under little re- straint ; while their minds are aflame with new ideas of which they have but partly grasped the significance. On the other hand, there has grown up among them a very noble outcome of the independent spirit of Englishmen. And as they come to feel their power and what it means, they will, like cool and grave men as they are, recognise the responsibility which goes W'ith power, and will not only become severe censors of the public morality, but will enforce that morality with sternness on their brethren. The women will here take the lead, because it is the women who feel most, and suffer most, when wrong is being done. In town and country alike the future is in the wage- earner's hands : Churches will rise or fall as they accept this fact. Often, even from the beginning, have the Churches 6o /"///■: A' ■^''11' /M/v7V fouf,'ht aj^minst ( 'liristiauity. Tliat of our Isold's clay snrccssrully, as it llionght, cnislicd Him niidor its feet ; for wliilo "tlu> ('oniinon people hv.wd Him i;la(lly,' vSociety l.roii-lil all hw i)n'jmli('os and lior ivliii;ion ai,'ainst Him, and tlioui^lit to block the luMudicont (li«vi>loi>m(Mit of His (oachiniA- by iiailini;- Him to the Cross. And now onee more the C'hurehes have come to a critical point. We are in the ai^^e of the working- man. Nothini;- conhl be more sii^aiilicant than the till(> lal(>ly i^ivcMi to tli(> most i)h(Miomeiial of livinii: men, the I'hnpcMor of (iermany, when they styled liim tli(> " AvbtMter-Kaiser," the Workmen's-Vhiiperor. \\c at U^ast is nnder no delnsioii abont the forces now at work in the world. And shall the Chnrch be less wise? Can we not have the i^race and sim- ])licity to i;-o back to the lirst a.i;vs and preach tlu> (iosju'I of Christ as He r(>ally was on earth — a workini;-man snccourini; and saving working- men/ Or shall wi» still "distrnst the masses," and content onrsclvcs with the older and worn-out system of saving what we call Society ( In old days Chnrch and State worked easily to- gether. S<[nire and Ivector looked W(dl alter their Inunble [Vi(Mids ; they were benevolent, and we respect- ful ; the master provided the long week-day's work, and the chn-gyman directed the softly droning Sunday, which suited well the labour-laden week. The change from this state of things, in regality the greatc^st change tli(> world has ever seen, has gone on silently for about a c(>ntnry, and W(> ari^ far from the eiul of it. There is THE MISSION OF THE CHURCHES 6i yet time for the Churches to show their mettle. Much will depend on the way in which they face the move- ment. Have they the heart and skill to secure the ear of the people ? Can they infuse into their some- what bygone teaching a new interest in the people, now that the people are beginning to have their faculties freshly aroused by a call to new duties? How, for example, will they treat the problem of the new Parish Councils? If they can show that religious and social interests are at one, they have a splendid future before them. For this we must act in accordance with Christ's Gospel, and learn to be the brethren of those who are striving to work out their better life in the social world. It was disheartening to find one of our most eloquent preachers the other day, after sketching a fervid picture of what the future of our Church should be, adding, as the happy result of it, that " we should hear no more of Socialism and Communism, which mean too often a transfer by violence of power to the disobedient, and of wealth to the indolent." As if Socialism and Communism were much about the same thing ! As if the tendencies of the day were mere selfishness and greed of power ! It is the old sweater's view of political economy over again, angry if he cannot without interference coin the workers' lives into capital, and treating all resistance as disloyalty, all claims for fair treatment as rapine. No wonder that the leaders of wage-earning opinion are shy of the " religious world." We are more than suspected of being simply 62 THE NEW PARTY a wing of the capitalist party, and therefore instinc- tively their foes. How can we hope to dissipate the cloud of prejudices on both sides if such language as this resounds from our pulpits'? For this is the way to throw the new movements into the arms of purely secular guides. Churchmen must show that the Christian faith can provide the best answer to the new problems of society; the workers must cast out dislike and suspicion. We have to prove to them that we have a divine message ; they must show that they are not aiming at merely selfish and material ends. There are many grounds for hope. The Churches are surely learning more of the truth of the Gospel, and the workers show more self- control, more sense of the dignity of their struggle, more desire for a higher level of life. The last thing they would wish for would be "the transfer of wealth to the indolent ; " their ceaseless contention being that the redistribution is to be the other way, from the indolent to the workers. And even were they as misguided as some say, have they not an excuse ? The relations of wealth to work are not exactly what our preacher seemed to think. As one travels out of the sweet country into London, one passes through miles of house-roofs, not always poor and squalid, decent rather, and monotonously respectable. One of those saints of God who give themselves to London mission-work once told me that what broke his heart was not the misery but the dull respectability of his people ; they lived in acres of streets featureless, uninteresting, not a THE MISSION OF THE CHURCHES 63 flower in a window, or a spark of colour on the walls or roofs, the only freshness being the merriment of children playing in the road-ways, with the strolling organ grinding out music to which they danced. The grim depths of some of the worse parts of Town seemed to him infinitely more full of life and hope. The level monotony appals. Here and there a great Board School breaks the line ; very rarely some People's Palace or Battersea Polytechnic rouses a gleam of hope ; the brazen-faced gin-palace at the corner mocks our efforts by providing attractive if deadly amusement to the passer-by ; churches and chapels are far apart, stifled and swallowed up. What do the dwellers think about? Does their thought pass beyond the incidents and anxieties of daily toil and life? Is this the true heart of an empire on which the sun never sets ? — districts in which, if the sun never sets elsewhere, it hardly ever seems to rise to brighten the dulness. No question is so vital as this : how are we to bring the sunshine back into the hearts and lives of the English people ? We think of religion from the negative side, for- settins that it has an active life as well. Our Lord came not only to set the captive free, but to make that freedom happy. Vice and sin keep our eyes down ; till they are cured, we say, it were vain to think of higher things. This is the attitude of the Churches ; they live in Lent, and not in Easter-tide. We must first convert ourselves ; must take a larger view of our Lord's nature and relation to us, identifying our 64 THE NEW PARTY Christian life far more with His. It is the spirit-life which must rule the fiesh-life, and keep it in place ; and this spirit-life, our "hope of immortality," rests on the Incarnation of Christ, the revelation to man of the divine and permanent element in his nature. This is the golden thread which must be woven into our drab-coloured lives, strengthening and brightening them ; this gives their true significance to all the ordi- nances of the Church ; it is the wand with w^hich miracles may still be worked. It is this nobility of human nature which must be understood before we can deal on equal terms with our fellow-man. It is when we understand this that we grow strong for good, and stem the tide of evil in the world. For our im- mortality is death to our immorality. Only in Christ, who is our life, we can live the true life among our fellow-men. Champions of old girt on their coats of steel and so prevailed, because the outer skin saved the vital parts within. In our warfare it is the opposite, for our invulnerable gift is the spirit-life within ; with this talisman we venture forth unarmed to conquer in the war with evil. There is an old theory of history, that States like men have their infancy and youth, their manhood and decay. It should be our belief and our most earnest contention, that the Christian element infused into society gives fresh life to it, and such permanence as was unknown in the older world, " The salt of the earth " arrests its natural decay. If our religion is real and alive, it gives life to all it touches. Not by THE MISSION OF THE CHURCHES 65 feeling earth beneath us, but by reaching up to and touching heaven, is our strength renewed. And there- fore, while the statesman proclaims " One man one vote," a formula full of far-reaching hope in the future, the Churchman has also his formula, and that is, " One man one soul," and with this he proclaims the essential equality of men. The political franchise expresses each citizen's right to form his opinions and give weight to them; our charter lifts him to a higher social level; and the divine element in man, through the power of the life of Christ, raises him to higher things in the strength of the true Fraternity. We know that men will never be alike ; yet, as in those problems of the Calculus, in which, because we are dealing with the infinite, we can afford to neglect finite quantities, so the heritage of the divine nature enables us to treat our brethren as our equals, in spite of all human inequalities. Out of this divine brotherhood spring all lovely growths of charity and peace. Through it the Christian faith will bear its part in ennobling the worker, and the Churches will be at one with Society, both striving for the same ends, and both interposing their shields between wayward man and the ills and temptations to which he is exposed. One has seen, here and there, in older days such efi'orts as these crowned with transcendent blessing. The earlier Benedictines, with "Laborare est Orare " emblazoned on their banner of advance, taught their simple folk the benefits of honourable toil and shielded them from curse of war and rapine, building up a ee THE NEW PARTY civilised life, so far as their intiuence could reach ; the good Scottish Presbyterians the other day, heroes and martyrs of the Church of Christ, converted to a happy Christian life the cannibal wildness of the Melanesian Islanders in the true spirit of Christian brotherhood. And now the Churches must also take up new work and deal with pressing social problems from the Chris- tian side. This can only be done by self-sacrifice and sympathy. We have seen in London parishes how much many a sincere and devout clergyman has achieved in this direction. 'J "hey have done it by identifying themselves with the aims of the reformers of to-day, and by bringing religion into the daily life as a motive and a rule. Yet, the Churches still have to learn how to catch the ear of the men, to win their confidence, to guide their aspirations. If we cannot do this, the men will work at their problems for them- selves under the guiding of self-interest, or of a non- religious Socialism, even as we see the attempt being made in other lands. The Christianity of the future must go back to the Gospel, as St. James in his working-man Epistle sets it before us. No doubt much self-denial and faith must be called out, and there must be much blowing of the Gospel ramshorn ere the walls of stubborn Jericho come down, and the Church can enter into her pro- mised land. Still, it is not till she has done this that the conversion of England will be assured. The workers will never believe that we are their " brethren in Christ Jesus," till wc show them in fact that so it THE MISSION OF THE CHURCHES 67 is. Then, when once we have won our footing, the education will begin ; men will learn self-control, a belief in something higher than the interest of the moment will grow up, prudent economics will begin to rule, the hatred of waste, and of all wastes the worst, that desert of the soul, the public-house, will take the place of an indifference bordering on despair ; a happy and cultivated home life, with good sanitary and social surroundings, will become more general ; a fresher pleasure in public affairs, and an interest in the larger world around, will testify to the higher education Church and State have given in unison. These are matters in which, beyond the sphere of religious teaching specially so called, the in- fluences of an enlightened Christianity will touch and affect for good the working-man. The new economics must be understood and accepted ; then the Churches will be able to enforce the truth which underlies the demand for the " Hving wage : " this stem-principle of modern social life is an epoch in the history of man ; may it be the beginning of a new England ! And supposing that the working-man with our cordial help has won his way to this ideal state, and has got his leisure and his living wage, there must arise a further question — What will he do with it? This is the critical question to which also the Churches must give prayerful heed. How much depends on right opportunity, on sound advice and generous help given by a man to his brother! Any one can paint the risks and snares of leisui'e ; 68 THE NEW PARTY the worker is, no doubt, as liable to excess as is the rich fool. We shall have to appeal to the higher nature of man : we must encourage him to resist the waste which comes from the snare of drink. We must help him to become not "rather free than sober," but emphatically "sober because free;" exercising the manliness and independence of his enfranchised life as befits the dignity of labour. The Churches must also do their best to exorcise the gambling spirit, which struggles for wealth without work ; they must raise the standard of respect for women, and cast a fresh and beneficent light on the sanctities of home ; life, each man's inheritance for good or ill, must be developed by our joint effort on pure and wholesome principles, till it can blossom forth into whatsoever is lovely and of good report. Then daily toil will be happy, for it will be the fulfilment of a sacred duty : there will be work enough for all, and all will win the just reward of their labour, with the blessing of a contented home-life. Such a state of things, cry our critics, will only mean a new Toryism ; contented men will make no effort, and the easier world will be not better but worse than the old discontented state. We hope, on the contrary, that the future will compel an entirely new view of political life, in which the older parties will have died out, giving place to good government for its own sake. It is in Christ's presence with us that we hope for these blessings. We look not only for a new heaven, but also for a new earth, in those happy days when men THE MISSION OF THE CHURCHES 69 realise the truth of human brotherhood, and religion is no longer severed from social and political life. Nor may we forget that this holy brotherhood provides also for the full use of the power that women can bring. We must make sure of their willing, eager help, re- cognising how much they surpass us in many fields of work. Their sense of duty, their infinite patience, their noble anger against vice, their scorn of selfish- ness, will be our greatest help. The working-man who turns away suspiciously from the parson will listen readily to the earnest pleadings of a woman. Women are the devoted priestesses of the higher qualities of mankind ; they can infuse into our sacrifices a virtue and influence which we should fail to give ; their earnest grace and simple faith will win the world. Never till they have due scope can we be sure of vic- tory. A French shipmaster, talking to me one day of the differences between the French and English, told me that while he admired the energy, the gravity, the religiousness of the English, he felt, " as one not too Catholic, but as a married man, father of a family," that the blot on our religion was the little honour done to the Virgin Mary in our system ; "for," said he, "she represents the feminine element in life — and where should we be without that ? " He was right thus far : if we neglect the help that woman brings, our efforts will never bear full fruit, our work will lack its best and most gracious sympathies. It is obvious that, if the Churches are to succeed, vast changes must take place in the way in which we „Q THE NEW PARTY deal with life around us. I remember with what boyish amusement we Oxford undergraduates listened one day to our clever contemporary, now Father Benson as he expounded to us his ideas as to mission-work m India He would go thither, he said, and throw him- self unsparingly into the native world, even outdo- inc. the Fakirs in their self-mutilating penances, to show the Hindu how a Christian could be as much in earnest and as self-sacrificing as the most fanatical of their heathen saints. He was convinced that only by entering into their spirit could we touch their hearts. We laughed at him, as perhaps was natural ; yet the spirit that was in him was right, and to that spirit the missions of the Cowley Fathers owe all the success they have attained. The Church at home may be called to a like self-abnegation ; we too may have to go down barefooted into the muddy ways, and to face new and unfamiliar conditions, ways of living, methods of speech and action, if we would convince our brethren that we are really at one with them. It may be that at the price of real self-sacrifice we shall win the power to help them. This movement of religion, as she allies herself with the social life in town or country, and recognises the sacredness of the new sphere of her influence, coincides in time and vies in importance with the change going on in political life. Social needs, the application of the new economics, the pressure of life in cities, the reviving hope which is now being infused into life in country places— all these things call for new combina- THE MISSION OF THE CHURCHES 71 tions in Church and State alike. On this side a true brotherly charity, on that a strict and even-handed justice, should guide the new politics. All that is genuine in the Churches, all that is honest in the Parties, will accept a common base of work, a new and steadfast bond of unity. A new spirit will enter into the old creaking machinery of government ; and it may be also that a new heart will be given to the Churches. Everything points towards a change, the movements of which we are already feeling ; it will test the soundness of our faith and the stability of our State. Perhaps at last we may rally to the primal message of Christianity, " Peace on earth, goodwill towards men," and find in it the gospel of revived and wonder-working Churches, the Charter of the New Party of the coming century. Into details it is impossible here to enter. Much faith is needed, a stout heart to give up much that we care for, a willingness to learn and unlearn, a power of self-coiitrol leading to control of others. The changes impending will be great ; for the world of the coming century will move on other lines. Yet one thing will be the same, unchangeable ; and that is the force of the immediate relationship between God and man. The true regeneration brought into the w^orld by the Son of God, the divine Son of Man, will in the end throw down the barriers with which we Christians have kept one another out of the Kingdom of Heaven. G. W. KiTCHIN. '« What is man horn for hut to he a Reformer— a Re-maker of ivhat man has made, a Renouncer of falsehood, a Restorer of truth and good; imitating that great nature which emhosoms us all, and which sleeps no moment on an old past, hut every hour repairs herself yielding us every morning a neiv day, and ivith every joulsation a new life.'" — Emerson. THE CHURCH AND THE DEMOCRATIC IDEA The perpetual and persistent opposition of the clergy to the Liberal Party begins at last to be understood : and to be understood is at least partly to be forgiven. What seemed at one time to be mere hatred of the poor, and utterly inexcusable, now begins to look merely venial ; for the Liberal Party in its senile decay has come up for judgment, and the judgment of Democratic England is that the Liberal Party is simply the Plutocratic Party, a worse foe to progress even than the courtlier tyranny which it fought against and overcame. As far as Liberalism prevailed, " Man was broken into men," and Mammon was the sole lord left. No doubt the Toryism of the clergy had a base and sordid element in it. The Squire was not only a kindly patron and a pleasant host, he was a bulwark of the endowment. The Churchmanship of the Squire was in return just as sordid, for tithe was to him but the outwork and first bastion of the landed interest, and to be defended as such. But now the Squire is inclined to give up the outwork of endowment to the enemy, and to regard the privileges of the clergy as untenable. The younger clergy, on the other hand, are by no means disposed to act as mere moral police, 74 THE NEW PARTY or preachers np of property. It is not so written in the bond. They feel keenly the distrust and hatred ^vhich their elders have earned for them from the people. They are alive to the fact that there is a social ques- tion ^lodern Christianity does not please them, ihe attempts made by Broad Churchmen to clip the 1 aith to suit the age, to mend modern Christianity by making it more modern, are still less pleasing. Dull and glossv respectability offers no solution of pressing evils. Bishops as yet present neither light nor leading. They have been suckled in a theobgy of doubtful ortho- doxy, and an economy now outworn and superseded. Consequently there is a great and a growing desire among the younger and more active clergy for a more living'' rehgion, a rehgion which shall include a social message, not of gloom and repression, but of life and liope-a real gospel for the poor. Such a faith and such a message are not new in the Church. They are coeval with her foundation, and if the new Democratic Party, when it rises phcenix-like out of the ashes of Liberalism, can but voice and body forth the old social message, then it is sure to gather to itself a large and increasing body of lay and clerical Church- men. The historical and firm-set faith which has been one of the very rocks against which Liberalism has been dashed to pieces, will be the chosen site of the New Party ; and new^ reformers will at last be able to stand cheek by jowl with old saints. It was certainly neither the monotheism nor the speculative theology of the early Church which first THE CHURCH AND DEMOCRATIC IDEA 75 attracted the attention of her critics. The very first persecution she endured in Rome, when SS. Peter and Paul were martyred under Nero, was caused by a revolt against the constitution in favour of 400 slaves. Pedanius Secundus the Prefect had been murdered by a much-wronged slave/ and the whole of his immense household w^ere thus legally condemned to death. A tumult arose among those who felt the stirrings of the new pity. The Senate hotly debate the case, and after the manner of Senates voted Tory, Nero ordered out the troops to enforce the bloody law. The rioters were quelled, and "an immense number" of Christians were put to death for having bred sym- pathy with slaves, and thus having caused the riot.^ Pliny in his well-known letter to Trajan notices that the Christians not only met early in the morning, sang hymns to Christ, and vowed the holy life, but that they ate at one table witJiout any class distinc- tions. And the things which struck Lucian the Satirist'^ about the Christians were that their new mystery was invented by a Palestine criminal, that " the poor devils have persuaded themselves that they will be quite immortal and live everlastingly. Hence the whole body of them despise death, and are quite willing to offer themselves up in sacrifice. Then their first law^-giver has persuaded them that they should all be brothers of one another. When they 1 Tacitus Ann. xiv. c. 42. 2 The successors of SS. Peter and Paul are not at present likely to suffer under a similar misapprehension. 3 De Morte Peregrini, Schmeider, 11, 12, and 13. 76 THE NEW PARTY are once off on this path, they must deny the Grecian gods, and must worship that executed sophist of theirs, and live under his laws. So they do despise them all alike, and hold such property as they have o-ot in common, without any scientific belief." Let us add two more facts. The law under which Justin Martyr, S. Polycarp, and many others died was an old law against Hetcerue, or unions,^ which Trajan had passed to nip disaffection in the bud, and Diocle- tian's pillar claims that he wiped out the Christians who were " overthrowing the Eepublic." So here we have (i) sympathy with the oppressed, (2) an abolition of class distinctions, (3) fraternity, (4) collective pro- perty, and (5) unionism, all charged against the Church by her enemies, looked upon as part of her inevitable teaching and regarded as crimes. Yet strangely enough all these old aims will be incorporated by the Demo- cratic Party in their social reconstruction ; all these things, which struck even outsiders as the prominent tenets of the early Church," will be written large upon the new banners. Perhaps the widest and most far reaching aim of the New Party will be the attempt to redress the hideous inequality of worldly possessions which has divided modern society into people of all dinner and ^ Meaning by this term anything from a dining club to a fire-escape society, from a trades' union to a Radical federation. 2 How very odd it is that Messrs. Morris and Bax should ignorantly slander the early Church by such foolish sentiments as this (from " Socialism, its Growth and Outcome," p. 98) : " Protestantism was a recrudescence of the individualist religion of early Christianity." What can these gentlemen mean ? THE CHURCH AND DEMOCRATIC IDEA 77 no appetite, and those of all appetite and no dinner ; and by this ridiculous disarrangement has brought back into modern life most of the vices, insanity, and want of virility which marked the Roman Empire in its decline. It is not the inequality, but these awful results of the inequality, which make the real social problem. And the remedy which the reformers now seek is the transfer of the powers and properties which have been so disastrously abused from private to public control. That is to say, they support Socialist development, not necessarily going the whole hog or whole herd of hogs at once, but accepting a flitch or even a rasher as a temporary accommodation. In which plan of campaign two things are implied — a destructive criticism of the existing social order, and a constructive method of rebuilding the State in fairer guise. Now both of these things are entirely on the lines of the Church Catholic, and a simple restatement of the faith for which the older Doctors and Fathers of the Church lived and died. Indeed, there is no righteous assault upon overswollen luxury which these writers do not wholly countenance and support. Let us take for our destructive critic one great writer, " the Christian Cicero," Lactantius, whom S. Augustine loved,^ whom Sir Thomas More studied with enthusiasm, and who is quoted perpetually in the authorised homilies of the English Church as " an old great doctor." He is speaking of the rise of society from the primitive peace of Saturn's reign.^ 1 De Civit. Dei., xviii. 23. ^ Divin. Instit,, Lib. v. c, 5. .g THE NEW PARTY - ' Once men would live content with little crops,' as Maro says in his book, which really belongs to our religion — 'None marked for his, nor fenced the land by law ; All brought their earnings for the common use.' " That was because God had given the land for the common possession of all, that men should live a common life, not for mad and frenzied covetousness to snap up everything as its own ; not for any one to lack what was formed for all." Then fearful lest he should have overstept the mark, our author adds, "We must take this as a poetical way of saying, not that there was no such thing as private property, but that men were so generous that they did not lock up the harvests for themselves, nor conceal them in their private hoards, but shared the results of their individual toil with the poor." But to this simple society came wicked Jove, and " * He gave the adders black their poison fell, And taught the wolves to raven,' which means that he sowed hate, and envy, and guile among men, so that they grew poisoned like serpents and rapacious as wolves." Hence justice was exiled, and wars began "not undeservedly. For the worship of God was lost. Good and bad alike forgot to know Ilim. Thus community of life died among men, and the tie of human society was unbound. Then every man's hand began to Ije against his neighbour ; they plotted, they grew to glory in human blood. Of all THE CHURCH AND DEMOCRATIC IDEA 79 these evils the well head was covetousness, which indeed burst forth in contempt of the true Majesty. Not only folk gave no share to others of their own abundance, but they robbed others, and made private plunder of everything. What once even individuals held for the use of all men was now consigned to the houses of the few. To enslave others, they made a point of mastering and collecting the neces- saries of life, and keeping them thoroughly in their clutches, to appropriate the blessings of heaven : not out of humanity ; they knew nothing of that ; but to rake together every instrument of covetousness and greed. Under the name of justice they sanctioned the wickedest and unjustest of laws to protect their own rapine and greed against the violence of the many. Sometimes they got the upper hand by autho- rity, sometimes by force, by wealth, or craftiness. There was no trace of justice in all this, for justice makes for humanity, equity, and mercy. They then enjoyed a proud and swelling inequality. They plumed it above other men, by bodies of lackies, by swords and grand dresses. For this purpose honours were invented, and state uniforms and high positions, to frighten people with swords and halters, and to give some show of lordly right to the obedience exacted from stricken and terrorised people." Thus Jove ended the golden age, and thus at any rate Lactantius under a mythological cloak attacked the individualist tyranny of his time, bringing the poets together to blame Jove for the social inequality and injustice about him, and 80 THE NEW PARTY promising that the newer, brighter faith had come to restore the golden age and to bring back justice to men. The same questioning as to how the gross inequahties arose in our society, the same indignant criticism upon it, a similar comparison drawn between modern civilisation and the rougher, juster, and more natural life of a former time, will put the New Party very much in line with this old Church doctor. We may not now believe that the golden age lies behind us, or that the men of former ages ever "touched the happy isle." Perhaps even in that Lactantius would have agreed with us, for he quotes the poets rather than adopts their theory ; but the main question he raises is this, that the standpoint of even justice is the one from which to judge our social condition. Picture the golden age, and the contrast becomes evident between the present horrible injustice and the fair justice "which came back to us as a sacrament and earnest ^ in Christ." So much for negative criticism. Men dress them- selves up like popinjays in meaningless finery, call themselves by queer names, and pass atrocious laws, because they have acquired more than their share of God's gifts to mankind, and they want to keep their brothers at bay. This idea by itself carries us but a small way. The Liberals saw this, or most of it, and proposed as a remedy that every one should be as unrestrained as possible in the acquisitive part (not the combative part) of his nature, in the hope that ^ Species. THE CHURCH AND DEMOCRATIC IDEA 8i if we all became monsters of covetousness together we should either all get our share of cates and ale, or else be justly punished for our incompetence by starva- tion, or that scientifically meagre diet which nearest approaches thereto, and yet saves the credit of the Guardians. The constructive aim of the New Party will be almost the contradictory of all this. " According to the will of God and natural origin, it is our business to work in the mutual aid of one another," says S. Ambrose ; ^ "to aim in our various callings, for example, to make all advantages common profit, and in scrip- tural language to be helpmeets to one another, whether we do this by study in our calling, by money, or by any other means that the grace of alliance may increase in our midst." If any one objected, as some might have done even then, that such a political and social object would, if it hit the mark, kill much of private enter- prise to satisfy the mere virtue of justice, the saint would have used some very emphatic language. He did tell us that everybody would like to hold the citadel of all virtue — ^justice — did not avarice weaken and pull down the strength of such a great virtue. " Conse- quently, while we try to amass wealth, make piles of money, get hold of the land as our real property, over- top one another in riches, we have palpably cast off* justice, and lost heneficiam communem — social right- eousness. I should like to know^ how any man can be just who is deliberately aiming to get out of some 1 De offic. ministr., § 135. 82 THE NEW PARTY one else what he wants for himself? " ' S. Augustine mourns over all private property whatsoever,' which " inevitably betrays men into pride," and sets rich flesh rearing itself against poor flesh, just as if flesh the first brought anything with it into the world, or could cany anything out with it when it comes to die. " The one object of its greater possessions is to swell with greater pride." The Christian theory of the State, as stated in the Fathers, is by no means the all too prevalent notion of a number of individuals loosely tied together by a geographical line. S. Basil has defined it for us : "A State is an organic whole, of which the parts are men trained out of separate aims into community of life." ^ The individual is to the State what a member is to the body. S. Basil would not have been able to under- stand the meaning of a cry, " The man versus the State." It would have no Christian sense in his eyes, nor even any other sense at all. Consequently he would not allow that the individual could lead a passive and at the same time harmless life, merely possessing things without actively co-operating with his fellow- men, for the good of the whole body. When Dives asks, "What harm do I do by keeping my own?" S. Basil answers sarcastically, "What is your own, pray? Where did you get what you brought with you at your birth? If some person were to take 1 De offic. ministr., § 137. Cf. also § 24, and the desciiijtion of justice, § 136 ; and De Virgin, c. viii. 2 Vol. iv. 1472, 1473. Cf. p. 1200, 9. 3 Isai. c. i. THE CHURCH AND DEMOCRATIC IDEA 83 possession of one of the seats in the (State) theatre, and thenceforth turn out all who went into it, decid- ing that what has been provided for the common use of the public were his private property, that would be exactly like that which the rich people do. They claim prior possession of the common property, and make it private by anticipation." ^ There can be no mistake about the Socialism of this saint. He did not mince matters, or propose these theories as counsels of perfection. To be an unsocialist was to incur the danger of damnation in the eyes of this great doctor of the Eastern Church. "The robber is not even arraigned (at the Day of Judgment), but the unsocialist is condemned." " So far from thinking that the State is bound together and made strong by men who have a " large stake in the country," he thinks the very opposite. "In proportion as you get on in riches, you get off in love," he says.^ S. Basil is a Socialist in his political philosophy, in his social policy, and by experience, because of the spiritual effects of unsocialism, the bad effect, that is to say, which riches have upon character. But though he speaks in the strongest language, he is a consistent Socialist. He does not hound the turbulent city population into disorder, anarchy, and individualist revolt. He does not aim at turning Caesar from his throne before the Church has carried that " organic -whole," the State, through the weak embryonic period, 1 Horn, in illud Lucoe Destruam liorrea, § 7. " 6 dKOLP0)vr]Tos KaraKpiveTai. ^ Horn, ill Divites. 84 THE NEW PARTY and given it at last as a sturdy babe to the light. Or to vary the metaphor, he would not wish to remove the ugly scab from the wounds of human society until the nerves and flesh have grown together beneath it. But when at last the organic whole has become an actual fact, when the Church has united men much, and the severe pressure of our commercial evolution has united them more, then there is no reason why, on S. Basil's own principles, we should stop short at almsgiving, which was the only possible outlet for Christian Socialism in the fou-th century ; or why we should be inefficiently represented by a feeble com- promise, which we call a constitutional sovereign, when it is possible to hear the voice of organised mankind through the Referendum far more certainly and dis- tinctly. Perhaps one of the first united actions of the New Party will be to issue a Declaration of Interdependence, based upon natural fact and divine law. Such a de- claration will be no more than a repetition of S. Chrysostom's perpetual and emphatic teaching,^ that " we stand daily and wholly in need of one another ; " and " if we have this need of one another, and even the necessity of this need does not unite us in friend- ship ; if we were to be independent (^aurapKei?) should we not be untamable wild beasts ? By force and necessity God has subjected us to one another, and we are still, day by day, being welded together." The Liberal Party, whose delight has been in " sturdy 1 Cf. in 2 Cor. Horn. xvii. THE CHURCH AND DEMOCRATIC IDEA 85 independence " and the disorganised scramble of free competition, needed no religion to back it, and believed either in none or else in mere vagne aspirations, or in the commercial Calvinism which emphatically denies that co-operation in things spiritnal is right or pos- sible. If chacun j^our soi must be the rule in the market, so of course it may do for the conventicle. But the moment we pass on to Socialism we feel the extreme need of some subtler force than mere law can give. It is possible enough to make land, canals, rivers, houses, factories, railways, and balloons into public property ; to merge great companies into the greater company, the State ; but we cannot nationalise or municipalise hats, wigs, boots, roast legs of mutton, and false teeth. Plato himself (in the Laws) felt that a Communism which could not communise lips, eyes, ears, and lingers, would stop short of what justice demands. Nations may see to the public oivnership of that small part of the world's wealth which is visible and tangible, but it is religion alone which can counsel and compel the public iLse even of this small part and a fortiori of the many greater parts of wealth which never can be and never will be legally owned by any one or by any public body. S. Chrysostom does not see any difficulty where even Plato smiled and sighed and gave up the problem. He urges us to give up our bodies to the public service, just as those people do with horses who provide war horses for tlie State. They keep no private share in them at all. " In like manner do thou provide thy limbs in the war ao-ainst the devil and the fearful 86 THE NEW PARTY battle array. Keep them not back for thy private uses." ^ Indeed, individualism in religion is the thing most detested by the Fathers of the Church. " xlbove all things," says S. Cyprian, " the Teacher of Peace and the Master of Unity is unwilling that prayer should be made separately and privately, each man when he prays praying for himself alone. For we do not say, ' My Father which art in Heaven,' nor ' give me this day my daily bread,' nor does each man ask only for his own private debt to be forgiven, nor beg for him- self alone not to be led into temptation, and to be delivered from evil. Our prayer is public and common, and when we pray, we pray not for one man, but for the whole people, for with us the whole people is one." "^ This is certainly the theological side of the associative theory, and men who have learnt it in the Church ought not to be hard to convince that it is equally necessary in its civil applications. The task before the Democratic Party is a very hard one, and it is useless to blink the fact. The weight of social injustice to be removed is very great, and con- sequently the friction of the removal and the heat en- gendered will be severe. The utter impossibility of making the poor richer without at the same time making the rich poorer is being brought home to modern reformers. They will soon cease to follow the quacksalving remedies which promise to do these im- possibilities and do them easily for us. Hence comes in 1 Horn, in Ep. ad Rom. c. xii. i. - S. Cyprian, De Orat. Doni. THE CHURCH AND DEMOCRATIC IDEA 87 the bitter and sordid wrangle over material possessions, wherein the truth is likely to be obscured with con- fused noise of warriors and mighty perplexities among onlookers as to the fairness of the fight. Of what immense importance it will then be that S. Gregory the Great's teaching should be understood. He con- siders it to be the mark of an heretic and hypocrite to defend property with acrimony and vehemence. " Where there is this great defensive zeal, there also is a greater power of love ; for the more a man loves earthly things, the more vehemently he is upset at losing them. For we never know how much we love anything in this world until we lose it. There is no pain over the loss of what is held without love, but what we ardently love to hold we deeply sigh over when it is gone. Is any one ignorant that God created earthly things for our use, but the lives of men for His own use? A man is therefore convicted of loving himself more than God who defends private property to the neglect of the lives which are His." " We wish to possess something or other in this world, and lo ! Truth cries to us, ' Unless a man have re- nounced all that he possesseth, he cannot be My dis- ciple.' How then can a perfect Christian contentiously defend what he is now told not to possess ? Therefore, when we lose our private property, if we perfectly follow God in this Hfe's journey, we are eased of a great weight. Now when the necessity of this same journey lays on us the care of material things, we must just submit to some people when they seize them from us. But others. 88 THE NEW PARTY without loss of love, we must resist, not at all from anxiety lest they get our goods from us, but lest by seizing what is not theirs they ruin themselves. Our fear ousht to be rather on behalf of those who take, than our eagerness to defend stupid stuffs. The latter, oven if they are not seized from us, we lose at our death; but with the human beings we are one even now in the Creator's order, and if they try to be amended after they behold the gift of grace. And do we not all know that we should love what we are, more than what M'e use? Then if we for their own good explain this to those who seize our goods, we are not claiming things temporal for ourselves, but things eternal for them. But in this matter we must keep our eyes open to prevent the necessary situation allowing covetousness to steal in upon us, and lest the defence conceived of heat and big with too great force break out into words of hate and base contention." ^ It is this sacramental view of property, which looks at what men have in the light of human character, which can cool the heat which the new reforms will engender. Perhaps, in conclusion, the members of the Demo- cratic Party themselves are divided from the older Liberals by nothing so much as by this, that the objects they set before themselves are not only great and necessary, but they are also holy. They are not only worthy of being written for, voted for, spoken for, and ^ Magna Moralia xxxi. viii. Parisiis. THE CHURCH AND DEMOCRATIC IDEA 89 scuffled for : they are so full of high seriousness as to be capable of inspiring prayer. And here again we find that these very objects have been anticipated by historical Christianity. Out of many possible instances, let us take but one, which will serve to show how entirely the older writers are in touch with the so- called "New Party." Ludovicus Vives, the great patristic scholar, in his prayers selected from ancient writers, has a collect which, though its author is uncertain, was Englished by a bishop for Queen Elizabeth's private prayer book in 1578. It is called "a prayer for them that be in poverty," and, except for its antique cast, might have been written by a devout Democrat, this very year.^ " They that are snared and entangled in the extreme penury of things needful for the l)ody cannot set their minds upon Thee, O Lord, as they ought to do ; but when they be disappointed of the things which they do so mightily desire their hearts are cast down and quail for excess of grief. Have pity upon them, therefore, O Merciful Father, and relieve their misery through Thine incredible riches, that by Thy removing of their urgent necessity they may rise up to Thee in mind. Thou, O Lord, providest enough for all men with Thy most liberal and bountiful hand ; but whereas Thy gifts are, in respect of Thy goodness and free favour, made com- mon to all men, we (through our naughtiness, niggardship, and dis- trust) do make them private and peculiar. Correct Thou the thing which our iniquity hath put out of order : let Thy goodness supply that which our niggardliness hath pluckt away. Give Thou meat to the hungry and drink to the thirsty : comfort Thou the sor- rowful : cheer Thou up the dismayed : strengthen Thou the weak : 1 Private Prayers of Queen Elizabetli, Parker Society. ^o THE NEW PARTY deliver Thou them that are prisoners: and give Thou hope and courage to them that are out of heart. _ Father of all mercies, have compassion of so great misery. Fountain of all good things and of all blessedness, wash Thou away these so sundry, so manifold, and so great miseries of ours wath one drop of the water of Thy mercy, for Thine only Son, our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ's sake. Amen." Charles L. Marson. CHRISTUS INVICTUS " La dove Christo tutto di si merca." — Dante, Par. xvii. 5 1 . Dr. Barrett, speaking in May from the chair of the Congregational Union, said some timely things about the secularisation of the pulpit, which were unfor- tunately in the first place misreported, and in the second place misjudged, by some of the newspapers. There was no occasion to make any mistake, and probably no one who heard the address, with the ex- ception of the reporters, working in their mechanical way, observed even the possibility of such a misunder- standing. There is undoubtedly, as Ur. Barrett said, a danger lest the enthusiasm for social reform, which is the characteristic of nearly all Congregationalist ministers, should frustrate itself by leading the preacher, in his eagerness to assail individual abuses, or to plead the cause of the dispossessed, to forget the divine message of the kingdom of God, which must be the efficient cause of reform. Certainly a Christian minister whose creed begins and ends in the smug notion of "Eight hours' work, eight hours' play, eight hours' sleep, and eight shillings a day," would be better out of the pulpit, for he has not fathomed the mystery of the message he has to deliver, nor seen how impos- sible it is for the hungry human spirit to be satisfied 92 THE NEW PARTY with material comforts, however great, or general, or secure. But the wrong twist which was given to Dr. Barrett's utterances is much to be regretted. No one, I am persuaded, could regret it more than he will himself. Nothing was further from his mind than to call the ministry off from that ardent pursuit of social amelio- ration w^hich is one of the most satisfactory signs of the times in that religious community which Dr. Barrett adorns. To handle these social questions in the pulpit does not necessarily mean to depart from the great fundamental verities of the Christian faith. On the contrary, those verities may, and indeed do, demand the handling of precisely these questions. For what are the facts ? The industrial structure and the social system in England to-day are not based on religion. Quite the contrary. They are based upon Adam Smith and such gospel as he had to deliver to mankind ; and Adam Smith derived his good news from the French Encyclopsedists.^ It was a very dubious gospel, and one in most respects the precise reverse of what had been understood to be the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It had been the teaching of the earlier Gospel, that a man's life consists not in the abundance of his possessions. The gospel of Adam Smith assumed, rather than proved, that wealth, the wealth of men and nations, is, not it is true the precious metals, but the precious metals' worth. A wealthy nation would be one which had much goods stored up for many years, 1 See Martensen's Christian Etliics, vol. ii. p. 136. CHRISTUS INVICTUS 93 a coDdition of things for which the Preacher of the earlier Gospel had little or no admiration. Again, the earlier Gospel assumed that all men would be seeking first '^ the kingdom of God and His righteousness," and that they would bear one another's burdens as the best method of fulfilling the law of Christ, and minister to the wants and suff'erings of their fellows, as the only way of ministering to Him. But the noble gospel of Adam Smith assumed, that all men would be seeking what he called wealth first and foremost — and ought to do so, honest souls ! It assumed that each man would try to get the largest possible share for himself, and justify his conduct by reference to the science so happily discovered, and that no one would trouble him- self about those who went to the wall, for the laws of nature sent the weak to the wall, just as the ass crushed the foot of Balaam, and if the exasperated sufferer smote the laws of nature they would reply, like the ass, that they had angelic authority for their action. Now all this gospel according to Adam Smith, on which our industrial system and our social structure in this last century are built, Avas propounded to the world just at a time when religion was blazing out in an unprecedented individualism. There was a happy concordat established between the preacher and the economist. " You," said the economist to the preacher, " instruct men how to save their souls and make sure of the next world. We will tell them how to make sure of this and to secure their creature comforts." The preacher signed the contract. He had no know- 94 THE NEW PARTY ledge of the prophets whose writings form the inspira- tion of the Okl Testament, and he had lost sight of the pointed teaching of Christ, which forms the approach to all the doctrines of the New Testament. Religion was silent abont mammon, and money-making, and usury, and competition, and the higgling of the market, the things which the Church in the Middle Ages had strenuously endeavoured to control. The pulpit was desccularised with a vengeance. It ceased to touch upon anything which affects this world and its institu- tions. It left its votaries to pile up wealth by the cruellest exploitation of women and children, and feeble, unorganised men. The man who had op- pressed the poor all the week came to church with a clear conscience on Sunday, and was assured that he was steering straight to the heavenly haven if he com- pUed with the demands of the Church ; it mattered not whether they were prescribed rites or formulated beliefs, one thing was sure, they would not affect the realm of business activity, which according to the compact was regulated by Adam Smith. The point which has to be thrust home is this, that the modern commercial world is not the product of Christianity, but the dismal result of Christianity renouncing its function in that sphere, and handing over its responsibility to another, notwithstanding the most explicit teaching of its own inspired Book on the very questions which it agreed to taboo. It is evident, then, that the pulpit must so far secularise itself as to recover the teaching of Christ CHRISTUS INVICTUS 95 and His apostles on the subject of wealth, money- making, and money-using. Until it can venture to speak with no uncertain note on such themes, it had better frankly confess that it is not the Christian pulpit, not the pulpit from which Christ preached His famous sermon, not the pulpit in which anything vital can be said about the kingdom of Heaven coming upon earth. I am not making any criticism upon what the pulpit has preached. No one believes more firmly than I do in the message to the individual, the call to repentance, the necessity of a new birth, the pardon of sins ofi'ered to every believer in Christ Jesus, the hope of glory, the assurance of eternal Hfe. The good news pro- claimed by Wesley and Venn, Romaine, Cecil, Simeon, Rowland Hill, William Jay, John Angell James, and all the noble army of Evangelical preachers, is, to my mind, an eternal requirement of the human spirit. Unless there is such a message for men, all preaching is vain. But my criticism refers to what the pulpit has not preached, the simple doctrine of Christ, the meaning of the kingdom of God, the bearing of the Evangelic precepts on business, commercial principles, and all dealings with money. These things ought our teachers to have done, and not to have left those others undone. Now it is this grand omission of the Church — this base refusal of her noble function to be the foundress of a true society, and the judging Spirit that should preside over all the ways of men — that makes it neces- 96 THE NEW PARTY sary to earnestly warn the disappointed and indignant modern mind against confusing Christ with the Church, or Christianity with the men who suppose themselves to have the exchisive right of interpreting it. It is the danger of the present situation that the Church is making her most audacious claims just at the moment when she has been found out, exposed, condemned. Just at the moment when Christ is moving most victoriously and in the most manifold directions, the Church, which has taken little enough notice of Him for the most part, steps in and claims an absolute monopoly in liim. The very institution which has most misrepresented Him is trying to per- suade the age which has discovered Him for itself, that He is not to be found anywhere except in those tainted and corrupted forms. The key of the present situation is to distinguish firmly and decisively between Christ and the Church. Christ is Divine, the Church is human. Christ is un- worldly — His kingdom can transform the world because it is not of the world. The Church is worldly, and never can transform the world because it is always transformed by the world. Christ never changes, never adapts Himself. The Church changes in every age, in every nation. It takes the guise of the Roman Empire in order to assume the purple. It shapes itself to the semblance of every nation in order to wield the sceptre. It is full of base compliances and worldly wisdom. Its cunning is amazing. Christ scorns material wealth, and has not where to lay His head. The Church is always CHRISTUS INVICTUS 97 plethoric in wealth. It obtained two-thirds of the land of Europe once, and might have gained all, but that the indignant civil powers intervened. It not only possesses, but makes much of possessing, revenues, palaces, benefices, privileges. Christ is the Son of Man in a more wonderful sense than the old dramatist meant, nihil humani a se alienum ijutat. The Church is the great bulwark of social castes and exclusiveness. It is the most comfortable refuge of those Avho have great possessions. Nowhere do they find themselves so much at home; nowhere are they so sure of a fellow-feeling. Christ wished one Avho would be His disciple to sell all he had and to give to the poor. The Church never makes such a demand ; the most she asks of a devotee is to sell all that he has and to give it to her. Frankly, if the Church were a Divine Creation, in the sense in which Christ is Divine ; if it were, even approximately, what Christ intended, what He now approves ; if this big material interest, this institution which holds its equivocal relation to the Liquor traffic, were the authoritative exponent of the Divine king- dom ; the alienation of the European populations, and notably of the English democracy, from Christianity might be justified. But it is not. The credentials are all wanting. AVhat did Christ say about a Church at all ? Very little. There was a side allusion to it in the direction to bring a recalcitrant brother before the assembly of disciples ; and another in the assertion that on the rock of personal confession He would build His G ^S THE NEW PARTY Church. But what else did He say that has the re- n.otest reference to the institution known as the Chmch Nothinc. His speech was all about the kingdom ot God which Cometh not with observation ; or about God as the Father of men ; or about the simple mora- lities of life ; or about His own unique Person, and Divine mission, His power to save those who came to Him and believed, His intention of uniting those who believed in a brotherly fellowship, owning no master, father, or rabbi, but Himself. He dealt in mysticism but not in mystery. His immediate presence with men promised for all ages, rendered these mediatorial agencies of priesthood and churches superfluous. H He wished to summarise His whole message and Gospel, He could give it in one word— I.ove. So far as the Church really presents Christ, repeats and enforces His teaching, labours for His ideas, rea- hses His great thought of wide, universal, redeeming love ; so far as she seeks first the kingdom of God, and lets the good things of this life go ; so far as she promotes "righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost " by purifying our social and industrial life, re- lieving the gloom of the crowded populations, recon- ciling Capital and Labour, and bringing all men to- settlement belonged to the community (the Mark or Vicus), who annually allotted the arable land among the freemen, while the pasture land was both held and used in common." - And another writer says that the Mark system is the sio-n of a transition between the nomadic and the agricultural stage : — ■ "Entre le regime de I'entiere communante de la terre et celui oil commence a se montrer la propriete fonciere privee." '^ How public and private land in England was appro- priated by powerful invading tribes in the pre-Norman period is well known, and may be found in all our books of Constitutional History. How all the land at that period became, broadly speaking, either (i) public [i.e., Folc-land), or (2) private {i.e., Boc-land), is also well known. The conquering chiefs had their pri- vate estates, and land was also divided among the simple freemen, and all the remaining land became the common property of the whole community. Boc-land, or laud conveyed by book or charter, was "land held in full ownership, either as part of an ori- ginal allotment, or as having been subsequently severed ^ Bishop StuV)bs, Constit. History, i. p. 6. - Taswell-Langnread, Con. Hist., ji. 5. 2 Geffroy, Rome et les Barbares (1874), p. 185 ; and Maine, Vill. Com- munities, ch. i, and iii. THE HISTORY OF PRIVATE PROPERTY 123 from the Folc-land, with the consent of the nation, and appropriated to individuals in perpetuity, subject merely to such burdens as the State, in its political capacity, might impose upon its members." ^ Folc-land gradually became terra regis. And we know how, after the Norman Conquest, all land became subject to feudal tenure, with its burdensome incidents, every man holding his land mediately or immediately of the king as lord paramount of the soil.' Since that time no man has been able to have absolute ownership in one square inch of English soil ; he can never be more than a tenant, though a free tenant (or free- holder): he is still subject to the Crown's landlordism. But to return to the time when we first find this separation of landed property from the entire com- munity in favour of one section of it. In regard to many communities, no sharp line can be drawn, no accurate and authentic motive for it given. It was a gradual separation from the co-owner- ship of kinsmen— that is all that can be safely said of it. "This phenomenon springs, doubtless, from the circumstances that the property is supposed to become the domain of a new group, so that any deaUng with it, in its divided state, is a transaction between two highly complex bodies." ^ It cannot be stated that the motive for allotting the land to the smaller group was ever to convey any private 1 Taswell-LangU^ead, Con. Hist., p. 14. 2 Compare the title of sovereignty, Queen of England, not of the Englis/i. ^ Maine, Ancient Law, p. 271. 124 ^^^ ^'^^^' PARTY ownership in it, so for as that smaller group was ^con- cerned, but rather on the basis of convenience.' It was the result of its continually holding the land according to custom that probably gave rise at length to the idea of separate ownership residing in the family. It should, however, be clearly understood that even at this stage property in land does not mean separate individual ownership. The paterfamilias holds all property for the benefit of the family. Nor can it be said that an individual has, at this time, any private property in movables. The paterfamilias, or head of the family, it is true, has power to annihilate all the family if he so pleases— for law is not— but while he does not so please, common custom and natural instinct direct him in satisfying the needs of the whole family, who are, together with him, co-proprietors in all things. Let us for a moment consider the position of such a paterfamilias at this time. Over his children he has the jus vitce necisque, the power of life and death, and consequently complete and uncontrolled power of cor- poral chastisement : — "He can modify their personal condition at pleasure; he can give a wife to his son ; he can give his daughter in marriage ; he can divorce his children of either sex; he can transfer them to another family by adoption ; he can sell them." ~ The same learned writer, in describing the position 1 Division of the land was often by lot. Cp. Num. xxxiii. 54 ; xxxvi. 2. 2 Maine, Ancient Law, p. 138. THE HISTORY OF PRIVATE PROPERTY 125 of the house-chief of a South Sclavonian community, evidently based on the paterfamihas, says — " The administration of all affairs is in his hands : he allots the daily tasks ; he presides at the common meals, and distributes the food ; he reprimands for faults and delinquencies ; he is invariably addressed in language of the greatest respect ; all rise on his enti^ance ; no one covers his head or smokes in his presence ; no amusement or ceremony commences till he appears or announces that he will stay away." ^ Other iUustrations might be given of similar custom among the Celtic race," and the patriarchal families of the Hebrew race and the Indian communities," but enough for our purpose are the foregoing extracts. Such is the position of affairs in the early times before the establishment of a State-system of law, a time when the head of the family or chief of the house is the person who pronounces the Oefxia-Teg, or awards. In this agricultural period we find that, not only is the land held collectively, but the entire community live in long houses collectively owned. These houses are often 100 feet long by 30 feet broad, 20 feet high, and are traversed by a passage open at both ends. Into this passage opens a series of small rooms, in which dwell the married women of the clan.^ They share all things in common. Later, when families increase, and owing to other circumstances, there is a division into ^ Maine, Early Law and Custom, p. 246. ^ See Seebohm's Early Institutions ; Hebrew Bible, passim ; and Maine, Early Institutions, &c. &c. ^ Lafargue, Evolution of Property, p. 22. 126 THE NEW PARTY separate houses, which are not even contiguous, but are separated bv a small piece of land running round each house, just as there was a strip of unused land running round the territory of the whole clan. Still, all things are common ; and this is found to be so everywhere alike among primitive societies.^ We find there was no private property of land among the Jews and Semitic tribes.^ It was mostly the women who laboured in the field ; the men hunted, and brought home plunder, sometimes helping in harvest-time. Moreover, with the separation of small family from family, came also the gathering of a small harvest by each, and the placing this by each in the separate abode. Still all things were common : if one family ran short, the others supplied, as far as it was possible and necessary. Of course, the family of early times does not correspond with that of to-day. Then it included grandfather, father, children, un- married daughters, &c., and married sons and their children. (See Roman "Famiha" in Justinian's In- stitutes.) Mter a time the plot of ground was held by the fathers or heads of the family — hence the terms, patria (fatherland) and ])aterfamilias — through the land not being continually redivided at stated intervals. Women were relieved from the field labour, and slaves substi- tuted — and, finally, bondsmen and wage-labourers. 1 Compare Lewis Morgan's Ancient Society, &c., especially on the Iroquois Habits, &c. - Compare Lev. xxv. 23. THE HISTORY OF PRIVATE PROPERTY 127 In some parts taxation has been the immediate cause of the disintegration of communistic property in the soil ; in others the development of industry and com- mercial capitalism. Continual repetition of similar acts creates habit, and habit in imitating predecessors and those around gives rise to custom ; and customs, in time, establish, in an organised state, a system of law. It is difficult to say when, in the history of states, a system of law, as such, really commences ; but it is easy to note that the acquisition of property by one tribe as against another tribe, and by family as against family, is the cause of a system of law ; and that law is largely, if not wholly, established for the purpose of defining private rights, and protecting private property. In the early dawn of society men have few ideas. Professor Drummond tells us that the people in East Central Africa have no idea of time ; they never do the same thing differently ; and that if a tree fall across a path, they never think of moving it — they ivalk around it} In the face of facts like these it is hard to say how the progress of society occurs. But we can mark the progress, if we cannot account for it. In the period immediately preceding a system of positive law, the germ of individual ownership has been sown in the units of the community ; and the fact of individual prowess in war, and the individual's exer- 1 Professor Drummond, Tropical Africa, p. 57. In every way a charm- ing book. I2S THE NEW PARTY tions and results in the field of the family estate, must in course of time have engendered some idea of the possibility of private property, although at this time all acquired by a filiusfamilias was acquired for the paterfamilias, and through him for the benefit of the whole family. Under a system of law, everything is at first obviously in the hands of the heads of families, and judgments are given and law administered according to the cus- toms they had been in the habit of practising. But under such a system, and as civilisation ad- vances in the society, an energy towards personal free- dom manifests itself, and the history of any such system of law is, broadly speaking, the history of a struggle towards the complete emancipation of the son from the power of the father ; of the wife from the degraded position in the family (as daughter or drudge) ; of the amelioration of the status of woman, whether married or single ; of the facility for enfranchisement of slaves or the total abolition of slavery; of the simplifying of the modes of transfer of private property — and the recovery of the people's laud for the people's use. Indeed, it is the history of a complex construction, and through it all a desire to return to first principles, and to common sense and justice — the last return that a civilised community generally makes. In Rome these issues were never completed ; many side-issues entered and thwarted the main design and the best desires of those who were her bravest, and who died in the cause of freedom. But much was done, THE HISTORY OF PRIVATE PROPERTY 129 much that was iHustnous, and that will for ever stand as a noble ensaraple to those who seek perfect liberty and justice to be administered wisely and well to all men and women equally, without distinction of class or creed, sentiment or sex, power or purse. In England, the struggle is still on, and every year leaves its traces on the statute-books, and they who live in the midst of it cannot afford to pass it by un- observantly. In this struggle for freedom the two systems — the Roman and the English — have in them much that is common and much that is peculiar to each system. To describe either in any degree, the similarities or differences in these systems is a task too huge for so general a survey as this must necessarily be ; but those who care to pursue it, will find it upon such lines as the classification of property,^ its alienability, and the capacity of persons to deal therewith. I may be allowed, perhaps, to illustrate this in one matter. In Rome, the great division of things was into Res Mancijn, that is, " Things which require a Mancipa- tion " for their legal transfer, and Res Nee Mancipi, Things not requiring a Mancipation. Res Mancipi were land, slaves, and beasts of bur- den — in other words, they were "objects of agricul- tural labour, the commodities of first consequence to a primitive people." Such things were looked upon as being of the highest order, and required great and ^ See especially Maine, Early Law and Custom, cli. x. J 30 THE NEW PARTY solemn ccrcmonv to be performed in order to transfer the property in them to another. The category was never extended to any other objects; while Bes Nee Mancipi obvionsly " admitted of indefinite expansion." "Insensibly, therefore, they mounted to an equality with Res Mancipi, and the impression of an intrinsic inferiority being thus dissipated, men began to observe the manifold advantages of the simple fomiality which accompanied their transfer over the more intricate and more venerable ceremonial." ^ And thus a simpler mode of transfer came in, more by custom than by law. In England we have an anoma- lous division of property into Real and Personal. Real property comprises, among other things, lands and tenements ; while Per^wiai property comprises, not only what used to be called " goods and chattels," but also CHATTELS REAL, or leaseholds. In early times there was little Personal property, and it was thought nothing of, while the law was always watchful over the dealing with Real property, which was all-im- portant. But under the influence of commerce. Per- sonal property has assumed a gigantic magnitude, new forms of it being continually added to the category, while its easier and less ceremonious modes of transfer have increased its importance. The gradual tendency has been to raise the standard of Personal property to the level of Real property, and to assimilate the cere- monious and technical mode of transfer of the latter to the more convenient and simple method of the former. • Maine, Ancient Law, p. 278. THE HISTORY OF PRIVATE PROPERTY 131 The importance of the part which this assimilating influence plays in the arena of Property Law is stated thus by Sir Henry Maine : — " The history of Roman Property Law is the history of the assimilation of Ees Mancipi to Res Nee Mancipi. " The history of property on the European Continent is the history of the subversion of the feudalised law of land by the Romanised law of movables; and though the history of ownei'ship in England is not nearly completed, it is visibly the law of per- sonalty which threatens to absorb and annihilate the law of realty." 1 To trace the manner in which the Roman praetor's jurisdiction was used for the overruling of rigid legal technicalities, and for the amelioration and expansion of the crude Civil Law ; to contrast and compare this praetorian influence and its results with those similarly effected by the English courts of Equity ; to follow both into the many spheres of law in which each has evolved a more generous system of administration of justice, seeking the spirit rather than the letter of the law, would be to epitomise the myriad works of many illustrious authors. The spirit breathing throughout both systems of law has been a spirit of freedom, and of evolution from the mysteries of common law to the marvels of common- sense. In England this spirit may be felt in such recent acts as the Conveyancing Act, 1881, simplifying, among other things, the terminology necessary to be used in ' Maine, Ancient Law, ]i. 273. 132 THE NEW PARTY the conveyance of landed property ; and in the Married Women's Property Act, 1882, giving married women greater powers of contract; and in the Married Women's Property Act, 1893, rendering it easier for a creditor to fix a married woman with liability for her separate debts. These are but two instances out of many, but they are sufficient to demonstrate the drift of legislation in the simplification of technical language and the equalisation of parties to a contract, irrespective of sex or marriage. It were possible, if space allowed, to substantiate, by illustration from both these two great systems of law, the truth of the statement made by that writer, so often quoted here, that " the movement of the progressive societies has hitherto been a movement /j'om Status to Contract ; " ^ but we must be content to leave the state- ment with those who care to verify it by research. It may be well seen in the history of the ameliora- tion of the position of a filiusfamilias in Roman society, and in that of a similar amelioration which is taking place in England in regard to the position of women. This is, briefly, the history of private property up to the time of law and civilisation, apart from examin- ing any particular system. Starting from the beginnings of things, we find man's individuality merged in the family or larger community, in which private property has no exist- 1 Maine, Ancient Law, cli. v. THE HISTORY OF PRIVATE PROPERTY 133 ence, but a system of collective ownership and co- operative toil obtains. This is so both in the nomadic and early agricultural stages. When land becomes the basis of society instead of kinship, we discover, both in the result of individual valour and individual labour, the development of private property tendencies. After the establishment of a system of law, we find individual effort and personal independence asserting their claims, and with these a growing tendency to limit some portion of the individualism for the benefit of the other units of the society, and a general separa- tion of the communities as town life advances. We find private property results, primarily, from personal valour and toil ; next, we observe the employment of slaves ; and, finally, of the labour of fellow-townsmen. The stage which follows the agricultural is that of bourgeois property — a kind of property peculiar to modern society. Where landed property has been in the ascendant, there has always been a duty by the lord to his serf or tenant. This we find under the Feudal period in England ; but when capitalistic pro- perty came in with modern times, the proprietor was released from all duties towards his labourers. And here, in Charles II.'s reign — " Landed property, monopolised by the lords, was exempted from all dues towards the State, as the lord had been discharged from all obligations towards his vassals and tenants : feudal property had been changed into capitalist property." ^ ^ Laf argue, p. 12 r. 134 THE XEW PARTY How the yeomanry and the agricultural labourer disappeared I need not stop to relate. The reader may see much that is fruitful for contemplation in our constitutional histories. Carl Marx has described the expropriation of the agricultural population from the land by Scotch and English lords, commenced in the sixteenth century/ encouraged by the rise of the Flemish wool manu- facture. But, whatever has been the speed of private property in land, the private ownership in movables has advanced by leaps and bounds. From the early stage of collec- tive ownership in all things, we come to the time of commercial labour. Originally all movables were in common, but the individual possessed certain things which, unconscious of individual ownership, he carried about with him. From earliest times these were his tools or weapons, or other materials which he per- sonally used for his labour. They were at first insignificant. Every labourer in early times is paid in kind. Then the artificer settles down in the towns or boroughs, where he is welcomed, and acquires by purchase the material to work upon without waiting for it to be supplied. He ceases to work merely according to demand : he works only for sale, and sells his finished work. His trade increases, he takes in apprentices and journeymen to help him — the amount he requires is very small. To resist the power of town aristocrats who held ^ ^larx. Capital, cli. xxvii. THE HISTORY OF PRIVATE PROPERTY 135 the land, the handicraftsmen formed guikls, which pro- tected the workers against landed proprietors on the one hand, and labour competition on the other. Then follows their long story. They produced much that was not needed. The guildmasters had power to ex- clude handicraftsmen. The corporations now became close, and the number of persons in them limited. These journeymen formed associations which were at constant warfare with the guildmasters, who had allied themselves with the municipal aristocrats. The discoveries during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries opened up foreign markets for trading, and the accumulation of funds for the establishment of manufactories by merchants enriched by colonial trading, brought about the ruin of the guilds. All artificers "who had been familiar with all the pro- cesses of their craft," became detail labourers. Com- merce and production expanded the towns and enriched the capitalist proprietor.^ " Capitalist production has advanced from the local and provincial political units to the national political units by creating industrial organisms which could not have been constituted but for the local concentration of production and the decomposition of the process of production." " It is on the basis of the specialisation of industries in the cities that capitalist production was built up." This same writer proceeds to show that capitalistic industry is " in the act of reconstituting the economic unit of domestic production." "' ^ Lafargue, Evolution of Pro]ii,'i-ly. - Ibiil. 136 THE NEW PARTY WorkiniT alongside of all the other forces for the benefit of the capitalist was the change that property underwent in the form of silver and gold. Hence the usurer and the financier of to-day, and the endeavour on the part of every little individual to become a share- holder in some great enterprise, apart from the contri- bution of personal labour. The greater amount of capitalistic property an indi- vidual has, the more power has he to grind his fellows beneath him, and the greater the competition he can carry on with his fellow-capitalists. Who can want a better illustration of this than the coal trade, with its disastrous effects of 1893? To the power of capitalists over the labour market, and the private property in land, and the monopolies of the means of production, are traceable all the misery and havoc of our modern commerce, and the rottenness of the society in which we live. The present condition of affairs calls loudly for a thorough reconstruction of society upon a labour basis, in which every person shall be able to find employment and full scope for his personal abilities, and in which there is an utter absence of the competition that kills. Now, it is often remarked in a tone of unharmonious triumph, that all attempts to reorganise society upon a fairer and more humanitarian basis have failed. This, it may be confidently asserted, is inaccurate. If those who make the statements were earnest in seeking the truth, they would discover that it has not been principles that have failed, but the improper application of them THE HISTORY OF PRIVATE PROPERTY 137 to a given set of circumstances or conditions. More- over, there are to-day societies existing which are not troubled with the system of "every man for his own," and yet are not failures. But each separate case has to be fully and fairly dealt with according to its merits. Plans upon even a small scale have succeeded in Germany, India, and elsewhere. In jNI. Emilc Laveleye's "Primitive Property" are facts which those who rashly make statements would do well to ponder. I need only refer the reader to the example which he gives, in Chapter V., of the system of land division in the forest-cantons of Switzerland — the Allmends of Switzerland. Throughout his book he points out the fact that there are two elements in the right of property : (1) the social, and (2) the individual. In primitive societies the social element prevails in landed property, which is a collective domain, belong- ing to the family, clan, cr tribe ; and of it individuals have only a temporary enjoyment. In the development of private property, the social element is lost sight of. We have to look for our salvation in a reconstruc- tion of society, both as to the soil and the means of production. "We shall come," says Fichte, "to a social organisation of property. It will lose its exclusively private character to become a public institution. Hitherto the only duty of the State has been to guarantee to every one quiet enjoyment of his property. Hence- forth the duty of the State will he to put every one in possession of the property to icliidi his wants and his capacities entitle him." 138 THE XE]V PARTY Now towards any such organisation of property are there any signs among ns ? We think there are. Among others four may be named — 1. The political power of the workers. 2. The tendency of commerce. 3. The State control of many kinds of business. 4. The trend of modern legislation. 1. To the increased political power of the worker — because the greater his power, the more adequately will he be represented in our legislative assembly, and his will effected. 2. The tendency of modern commerce is simply towards co-operation — " more than one-third of the whole business of England, measured by the capital employed, is now done by joint-stock companies, whose shareholders could be expropriated by the community with little more dislocation of industry than is caused by the daily purchase of shares on the Stock Exchange." ^ 3. In the State control of the Post Office, and in its supervision of all the large industrial operations. In the power and scope of the County Council, mani- fested already in immeasurable service, and destined to accomplish much in the future ; to wit, in the control and working of water and gas supply, tram- ways, and the like, for the benefit of the whole munici- pality, instead of for that of a few idling shareholders and directors. In the formation of Parish Councils, ' Faliiau Tract, No. 15. See Sidney Webb, Socialism in England. THE HISTORY OF PRIVATE PROPERTY 139 with power to secure land and allot it for cultivation, among other benefits. 4. The trend of modern legislation is in the direc- tion of democratisation. It started with the Factory Acts ; it has been continued in the enlargement of the franchise, and in the many acts of municipal reform. The Newcastle programme of the present Government leaves it unnecessary to enumerate the various lines upon which we are converging to a common goal. Moreover, can we not detect in the many institu- tions around us— in Trades Unions, in Co-operative businesses, in Brotherhood Trusts— the voice that is calling out for a community in which all will be able to labour without anxiety, and for the common good of all? We have tried the competitive and capitalistic system, and found it a miserable failure, so far as the common welfare of all individuals is concerned. We are on the eve of a re-construction. Systems are never stationary, but shifting, developing, disinte- grating, and then re-combining. Collective property becomes private property, which, heaped up by the capitalistic proprietor, is turned into common property again, administered by the State for the common weal. Collective ownership for the common use will render capitalistic fortunes of indi- viduals impossible, by removing the misery of the labouring community upon which they are dependent. Private property comes from the disintegration of the community ; every step in the separation of clan from 140 THE NEW PARTY clan, and family from family and clan, rendered the inevitability of private property more certain. We must get back to a community-existence — not to bar- barism—based not upon blood-relation, but upon spirit, the spirit of the human brotherhood, in which every one labours for the common welfare of all. The power of alienating land and the means of pro- duction has been the sin of the past. In the future it must be impossible for any to alienate eitJier, because they belong, not to individuals but to the community. Necessity to alienate either will be removed. But it is to be remembered that systems are only systems. " They have their day, and cease to be." We must not under-estimate the value of a system in which private property has had its fullest play. It has demonstrated the muscle of the individual ; it has shown him his limits ; nay, it has given him a sense of his own personality and capacity which he could not, probably, have otherwise felt. But like youth, it is but a step in the evolution of man — in most cases a sad, if necessary, step. We must not censure too severely the system of private property, for through it, and through all systems has been working the Divinity that shapes our ends, rough-hew them as we will. "For," as Mrs. Humphrey Ward says, "man has not been their sole artificer. Throughout there has been working with him ' the spark that fires our clay.'"^ 1 "Marcella." THE HISTORY OF PRIVATE PROPERTY 141 But how will the new order arise ? Note rather how it is arising, by a recognition of the solidarity of the race, the brotherhood of man, the sense of the one great, heaving heart of humanity. By the awakening of the conscience of the community to the fact that no man can live to himself; that all property is held on trust; that no business can be carried on for exclusively individual ends, and be a success in relation to the whole community ; that the life of the one is a stewardship on behalf of the life of the all; and that throughout the All, one heart beats. The new order is arising from within — from the centre of us. Society at large is feeling the pangs of the new birth. The old order changeth, yielding place to the new. All social problems depend for their ultimate solu- tion upon the estimate which man takes of his fellows. Let him esteem him a chattel, and he will fasten fetters upon him, and drive him forth to the field to toil beneath the slave- whip. When the public conscience is aroused, and man looks upon his fellow as man-shaped like himself, his own fellow human being, the fetters are removed, and the slave goes free. Let man value his fellow by the amount of labour he can produce, and he will sweat him from morn till night, under irksome and grievous conditions, for a 142 THE XEW PARTY paltry pittance, and count it doing God service to bury liim when dead. When man comes to esteem his fellow as God- shaped like himself, his own brother— not in canting language, but in living loving reality — and that he is his keeper, his guard, his helper, then, and not till then, the sweating system will cease and the labour of love commence. The value of man !— yes, that is the measure and test of the progress of the nations — the irorth-ship of man as man, as the unit of the whole. Whatever response is made to the question, What think vou of man ? in like measure will be the treat- ment of him. If noble, then noble ; if base, then base. Say that all the systems and plans hitherto conceived and practised in the endeavour to better the condition of any portion of tlie human race have failed ; say that there is no adequate scheme propounded to-day which is practicable ; say that the solution is not to hand which shall lift for ever the burdens of toil from the neck of humanity ; say that the world may never be free from the complexities and difficulties that thwart and mar our onward march — yet. be brave in the love of man, be beautiful in your treatment of him. If he be idle and selfish, love him out of it ; if he be an industrious self-centred capitalist, love him into a nobler purpose of life. Schemes may fail, through many causes — but principles and truths are eternal. Systems will fail and fade away, but true ideas and ideals govern and reign. THE HISTORY OF PRIVATE PROPERTY 143 It is not impossible but that the day may dawn across the sea of time when not one nation only, but the whole human race, shall be federated into one great family, out of which Dis-ease and Dis-order shall die away. In the light of that day, all anxious questions of What shall we eat ? and Wherewithal shall we be clothed ? shall find an easy answer. But in the light of our oivn day, with toiling masses of men and women, and teeming multitudes of weary- working little ones — how long shall the cry go up across our waste-lands and our wildernesses — " Foxes have holes, the bii'ds of the air have nests, but the Son of man hath not where to lay His head 1" Wavier R. Warren. " We are members of one great body : ive are all akin by Nature, ivho hath formed us of the same elements, and ])laced us here together for the same end. She hath implanted in us mutual affection and made us sociable. She hath commanded justice and equity. By her appointment it is more ivretched to do an injury than to suffer one. By her command the hand must be ever ready to assist our brother." — Sei^^ega, Epistle 95. LAND MONOPOLY Eight years ago I attended a meeting called by the Fabian Society to discuss the Crofter Question. All sorts of "advanced" people were there, including Mrs. Besant and Mr. John Burns — the latter, if I recollect aright, fresh from his first encounter with authority at Trafalgar Square. Of the discussion I will not speak, excepting to say that no one suggested any other remedy for Highland grievances than Land National- isation. But before the meeting began, I fancied I saw, among a group of its organisers, a face very familiar to me amid quite other surroundings. Happening to glance at the circular convening the meeting, any doubt I had was set at rest. It bore the signature of the friend I had in mind. I felt bewildered. A moment afterwards, as we were shaking hands, I could not help exclaiming — " Why, , I thought you were a Conservative?" ** Well, and ivhy not ? " said my friend, as he hurried away to discharge some official duty. I don't think we have met since ; not, at any rate, under circumstances permitting political discussion. But that brief exchange of inquiries has remained with me as an influence till this moment. It begat the X45 K 146 THE NEW PARTY hope in me that some day men would grow weary of the strife of party politics, and, turning their spears into pruning-hooks, unite in cultivating the fruits of long centuries of British civilisation — fruits the seeds whereof were planted indifferently by the political ancestors of all existing parties. It caused me to realise more keenly than I had hitherto done that the (Conservative point of view could give to clear-sighted, patriotic men and w^omen as distinct an apprehension of the New Era now becoming disclosed, as could be gained from the heights of advanced Radicalism ; that an appeal to national history and tradition would justify discontent with much in our present modes of government, almost, if not quite, as strongly as an appeal to first principles. Now, in stating the case against Land Monopoly, and for what is called by some Land Nationalisation, by others. Land Restoration, one is especially forti- fied with Conservative, or Constitutional, arguments. Authority is altogether on the side of those who attack landlordism as it at present exists. Authority, I may add, is altogether opposed to that crude and empirical method of solving our land difficulties, called "Free Trade in Land." This latter is, however, a subject that may be conveniently dealt with later on. According to modern notions, if a man buys a piece of land, he buys something which becomes, by the act of purchase, as absolutely his own as if he had bought a coat, a watch, or a box of tools. Should he have inherited that piece of land, there may be sundry re- LAND MONOPOLY 147 strictions by which his dealings with the land are limited. His heirs, and sometimes other relatives, are, as it were, sleeping partners in the property. Still, popular speech shows very clearly how little, for all practical purposes, his possession is affected by these restrictions. For, once that land is under his control, he is called a land oumer ; just as the man who hought his land is called a landowner; just as the man who buys a ship is called a shipowner. But, as a matter of fact — hard, legal fact — no man, woman, or child otvns an inch of the soil in England at this present moment ; and at no time in our history was individual ownership ever recognised by the Con- stitution. "What John Stuart Mill states as an economic doctrine, applicable to the whole world, is confirmed by Froude from the records of our own national history. The former says, " The land of every country belongs to the people of that country." The latter declares (speaking of England) that, "Land never was private property in the sense in which we speak of a thing as our own, with which we may do as we please." These two statements are very emphatic. Still, the average man, when he wants to know what are his rights or duties concerning property, does not go to the theorist or the historian. He never feels safe till he has consulted his lawyer. Here, then, is what the lawyers say about land holding. I quote a modern authority first, because his language is the least technical : — The first thing the Student has to do is to get rid of the idea of absolute oxvnership. Such an idea is quite unknown in English 148 THE NEW PARTY /mo. No ma7i in the law is the absolute oiuner of Ms lands. He can only hold an estate in ^Aem.— Williams (Real Property, 12th ed. p. 17). Next, I will quote some of the earlier authorities :— Si'ELMAN (Pt. ii. p. 2). — The Tenant, or Vassal, hath nothing in the property of the soil itself, hut it remaineth entirely ivith the Lord. Coke (Institutes, p. 488). — All lands or tenements in England, in the hands of subjects, are holden mediately or immediately of the King. For, in the laio of England, we have not any subjects land that is not holden. Blackstone (Commentaries, vol. ii. p. 106). — Allodial 2^roperty no subject in England noio has, it being a received and now undeniable principle in law that all lands in England are holden mediately or immediately of the King. Now there are several expressions used by these authorities which we may profitably examine. The words of Coke, " Lands . . . in the hands of subjects," held of the King, clearly point to the existence of other lands not in the hands of subjects, and therefore common lands. This is a matter of especial interest to the Conservative reformer ; because, until the year 1685 (quite a modern date!) about half the soil of England and Wales consisted of these common lands. Since that time more than 16,000,000 acres have been enclosed, mainly by private Acts of Parliament, so that we have at the present time but 2I million acres re- maining.* Now the repeal of all such Acts could surely ^ "The Financial Reform Almanack" (1887), quoting a Parliamentary return made in 1873, gives the total amount of land subject to Common Rights at that date as 2,632,772 acres. LAND MONOPOLY 149 be urged as a Conservative measure, a reassertion by the people of Constitutional rights.^ Another expression worthy of note is that used by Spelman, viz., that "the tenant or vassal hath nothing in the property of the soil itself." These words, I fear, are responsible to a large extent for the custom whereby the landlord (himself but a tenant-in-chief, remember) has appropriated the farmer's improvements. But they form a double-edged weapon, which can cut into the claims of the landlord himself ; for he cannot be more than a subject, a vassal of his lord, the King. There- fore Spelman's dictum raises, I humbly submit, the important question of the landlord's right to the mineral contents of the soil. The Nationalisation of Mines can, it appears to me, be dealt with absolutely as a Constitu- tional question. Our coal and other mineral resources are, at this moment, legally national property, vested in the Crown as the chief expression of national authority ; and the appropriation of these resources by landlords, by " subjects," for their own enrichment, is simply contrary to the common law. That word " allodial," used by Blackstone, also deserves marked attention by upholders of the Consti- ^ Since writing this, I have found a remarkable contirniation of the view here expressed with hesitation. De Lohne, in his great Avork on " The Constitution of England," si^eaking of the relative importance of the common and written laws, says (chap, ix.) that the latter (Acts of Parlia- ment) " being the result of the united wills of the three constituent jiarts of the Legislature, they, in all cases, supersede both the common law and all former statutes . . . unless they he private Acts." Now, between 1727 and 1844 alone, about 4000 private enclosure Acts were passed, enclosing about 7,000,000 acres ! I50 THE NEW PARTY tution. It means "complete possession" (ocZ = posses- sion, wealth, treasure). In contrast with it stands the word feudal {feoh = cattle money ; od = possession). This word in itself is an evidence of the immemorial practice : payment of a tribute, in kind, by those who used land. But from the chiefs, or jarls, or overlords who took this tribute, there was " value received " by the tributaries in the shape of protection from enemies. Now, as is well known to every school-boy and school-girl (the grown-up British public has, alas ! learnt only too well the art of forgetting its national history), Wilham of Normandy, twenty years after the battle of Hastings, gathered together his vassals to the number of 60,000 at Salisbury ; and, in the words of Langmead, made them " swear allegiance to him, so that they became his men, no matter who had previously been their lord." And, as Professor Stubbs justly remarks, "The oath of Salisbury was a measure of precaution against the disintegrating power of feudalism, by providing a direct tie between the Sovereign and all freeholders, which no inferior relation existing, and binding them to the mesne lords, would justify them in breaking." ^ But, putting aside the question of the Conqueror's motive, the fact remains that, from the memorable hour when that oath was taken, until this present moment, no " subject's land " has been held other than by a feudal tenure from the Crown. Fees may have been reduced or even abolished, the land-tax re- ^ History of England, vol. i. p. 305. LAND MONOPOLY 151 deemed ; yet every day the phraseology of the auction mart rebukes the pretensions of those who now call themselves landowners. For the auctioneer never sells lands. The most that he can offer for sale to any one is, the "fee simple" of land. Here, then, we have the language of the market-place to confirm, if con- firmation were needed, the solemn declarations of our Constitutional authorities. It must be steadily kept in mind, however, that while absolute ownership is thus emphatically denied to any subject, the Sovereign is now owner simply as representing the concentrated power of the nation. The Sovereign is, in short, steward-in-chief of the national estate. Yet the present condition of affairs with respect to this estate might well excite laughter (so grotesquely are facts at variance with the Con- stitutional theory), were it not so charged with evil to the community. For, although there was, nine hundred years ago, and for some centuries thereafter, continual danger to personal liberty, arising from the excessive claims of the Crown, nobody in those days really had any diffi- culty in using as much as he personally needed of the national estate. But in this nineteenth century, when the liberty of the subject is so complete,, when the boast is in every man's mouth that " slaves cannot breathe in England," the bulk of the people are " landless folk," and the Crown's stewardship of the nation's land — while theoretically unimpaired — is to all intents and purposes a sinecure ! ,52 THE NEW PARTY When William the Conqueror exacted that oath at Salisbury, the population of England was, so far as I can ascertain, about two millions. Of this number merely one-eightieth j^mr^, i.e., twenty-five thousand, were carls, or landless folk. England at the present day contains a population of 27,482,104 (census 1891). Of this number 921,316 are landholders/ After multiplying the number of landholders by 4, so as to include their families (4 x 921,316 = 3,685,264), there remains a total of nearly twenty-four millions of English subjects of the Crown who are landless folk ; who are denied their birthright in that national estate of which the Crown is the constitutional steward or trustee. But the true proportions of English landholding are not shown by that total of 921,316 landholders and their families, for, more than two-thirds of the above number,^ are holders of less than one acre each (144,000 acres altogether). On the other hand, more than four- fifths of the soil of England "held by subjects" is under the control of the insignificant total of 37,766 persons ! While dwelling on the constitutional facts relating to land, I purposely limited myself to England, because similar facts afi'ecting the rest of the United Kingdom ^ Vide " New Doomsday Book." 2 Actually, 671,667 persons. But a rental of upwards of ^28,ooo,cxx) sterling was credited to them twenty years ago, when the return was made. So it is clear that the patches of land under one acre thus held are chiefly in towns and cities, and therefore of great value. The Metropolis, however, is not included in the return at all. LAND MONOPOLY 153; are not synchronous. However, it is scarcely necessary to say that feudal tenure now characterises the land- holding of Wales, Ireland, and Scotland, and has done so, broadly speaking, since they severally became part of the United Kingdom. Going on with our statistics, we find the total amount of " land held by subjects " in the United Kingdom to be a little over 72,000,000 acres. The total number of landholders, however, even when we throw in Wales, Ireland, and Scotland, shows but a slight increase. It rises from 921,316 for England alone to 1,173,724 for the whole kingdom, an increase by 252,408. But analysis reveals a much worse state of things with respect to land monopoly in Wales, Ireland, and Scotland than even in England ; for while in the latter country, as has already been stated, 37,766 people monopolise all but a fifth of the soil, in the rest of the United Kingdom the whole soil is under the control of 24,212 "subjects:" with the trifling exception of twelve hundred and ninety thousand acres, just one thirty-third part of the entire area of those countries! No wonder, then, that the Irish, Scotch, and Welsh are so very keen on the land question. It is the battle of ten millions of subjects, by common law entitled to the use of their native soil, against twenty-four thousand subjects, who have managed, at sundry times and in divers manners, to make invasion of the Constitution. As a last example of land monopoly, we may usefully 154 THE NEW PARTY note that the members of the House of Lords, some 540 in number, hold fifteen millions of acres among them, and ten years ago derived a rental of thirteen millions sterling therefrom. One nobleman, the Duke of Sutherland, has twelve hundred thousand acres all to himself. The greater part of this is in Sutherland. It used to belong to the Sutherland clan collectively. "Legal robbery" is the term commonly employed by those who describe the process whereby the clansmen, in the early years of the present century, were deprived of their ancient customary rights, and expelled whole- sale from their homes. They were expelled by their chieftain! and sheep were substituted for them on their native hills. Now, the question may very naturally be asked : if the Constitutional theory of landholding be such as stated, and yet the hard facts of to-day so directly contrary — as shown by the nation's practical exclusion from its heritage, excepting on terms of tenancy — the bulk of the community being tenants of a fraction of the community — if all this be the case, how did it come about, and when ? Only in the very briefest manner can these questions be answered here. The first seeds of modem land- lordism were undoubtedly sown when Henry VIII. dissolved the monasteries. The vast estates (estimated as one-fifth of the English soil) thereby secularised, came under the control of a new set of landlords, who, to quote the expressive language of Mr. Froude, "evaded in all ways the laws of feudal tenure, and LAND MONOPOLY 155 regarded their estates as a commercial speculation for building up their private fortunes. They were looked upon by Englishmen of the other order of things as poisonous mushrooms, the unwholesome outcome of the divisions of the age." ^ So long, however, as the vigorous House of Tudor lasted, the pretensions of these commercial land specu- lators were firmly dealt with. One act in the reign of Henry VIII. prohibited any man from having more than 2000 sheep ; another directed that, on every plot of from thirty to fifty acres, should be a dwelling-house in which a respectable man could live. Under Eliza- beth, acts were passed requiring at least four acres of land to be attached to every cottage, and protecting even the very poorest subject, by giving him what was called a pauper's estate in the land. In short, the Tudors distinctly asserted that the "right of user" by subjects indifferently, was superior to any claim made by particular landlords over the soil. But, after the Tudors came the vStuarts, and with them courtiers finally replaced the stout feudal lords of earlier times. It was when courtierism was firmly established by the accession of Charles II., that modern landlordism and modern rent truly began ; for the first Parliament of Charles II. (1660) did away with "knight" or "sword" service for land, and substituted plough service. Thus was it made possible to render feudal obligations into commercial terms. But even these commercial terms, i.e., the modern ^ History of England, vol. vii. p. 7. 156 THE NEW PARTY land-tax, did not become really operative until thirty- two years later. It is true that, in the *' Convention Parliament," as that of 1660 was called, there w^as a heated debate on the point whether public revenue should be provided by means of charges on land or by means of excise. Ultimately, however, a majority of TWO (151 against 149) decided in favour of excise. Very strong protests were made by various members against the change, and many things were said that to us seem almost prophetic, about its effect upon the national welfare. Still the thing was done, and from that date until William and Mary came to the throne, landholders practically contributed nothing, qua land- holders, tow^ards the maintenance of the Government ; and they had already began their work of enclosing the commons. With the Revolution the battle began again. This time, what I venture to call the " Constitutional Party" in the House of Commons temporarily pre- vailed. What one member said during the debates is well worth recording. Speaking to a resolution (April 2, 1690) "that the Supply be not raised upon land-tax," Mr. Swynfin said : — "As to the arguments against land-tax, I have been here the best part of twenty years, and all the projects would never do ; the way of our ancestors has always been upon land, and they abhorred excise and all other projects. I wish we prove wiser than they. . . . I am not for saving our lands to enslave our joersons by excise." In 1692, as most people are aware, the land-tax was fixed as " 4s. in the pound on the time yearly LAND MONOPOLY 157 value of real property," But the courtiers, in a very- short space of time, managed to nulHfy the effect of those words in italics. For, in the year 1697, no valua- tion ivas taken; so, naturally, the last valuation remained the basis of taxation. For the next hundred years the amount per pound varied — never, however, exceeding- 4s. and in one year dropping to is. Still that "last" valuation remained undisturbed. In 1798 the farce was formally recognised, and a tax of 4s. in the pound on the true annual value of real property a hundred years before was made perpetual ! But the real object of this formal recognition was to get rid of the tax altogether, "By the redemption of the whole two millions," said Mr. Pitt, " he hoped to realise a large sum of money with which to carry on the war with France." The attempt, however, was only partially successful. At the present moment about one million sterling of the land-tax remains unredeemed. This paltry sum is, for all practical purposes, the only link left to show that property in land has been attached to the Crown — as steward-in- chief of the nation — ever since the Norman conquest. It -will be seen then, from this historical review, for the dryness of which I ought perhaps to apologise, how very, very modern is this landlordism, notwith- standing its enormous pretensions. There is really nothing in it for the genuine Conservative, imbued with reverence for the wisdom of our ancestors, to be proud of. In its origin and in its practices it is con- trary to ancient usage. In short, it is a vulgar innova- ,58 THE NEW PARTY tion upon our Constitution, and they are most Con- servative who sternly resolve to destroy it. II. "The annual labour of every nation is the fund which originally supplies it with all the necessaries and conveniences of life which it annually consumes, and which consist always either in the imme- diate product of that labour, or in what it purchases with that produce from other nations. According, therefore, as this produce, or what is purchased with it, bears a greater or smaller proportion to the number of those who are to consume it, the nation will be better or worse supplied with all the necessaries and conveniences for which it has occasion." ^ The above statement of doctrine, made by the father of Political Economy as introductory to his great work on the "Wealth of Nations," is one that no thoughtful man will quarrel with, so far as it goes. Since, how- ever, it does not touch upon that which is a primal condition of all labour, namely land, it clearly cannot be true in all points while the use of this necessary land be from any cause artificially restricted. Or, to put the fact another way, the doctrine cannot apply equally to each member of the nation who labours, unless each member of the nation shall have equal opportunities to use the land on which that nation dwells. Now, let us see how the case stands in the United Kingdom at this present moment with regard to its 1 Smith's "Wealth of Nations," p. i. LAND MONOPOLY 159 ability to produce wealth, i.e., " necessaries and conve- niences for which it has occasion." 1. There is superabundant Land, so the necessa- ries ought to be assured in abundance for the present population. I took pains several years ago to get facts and figures that would enable me to estimate how many people these islands could comfortably keep alive if no more foreign food was to be had. I came to the conclusion that our present land area was capable of supplying douhle our |;7'esen^ population with the necessaries of life. Of course I was laughed at for my pains by those who " knew all about farm- ing." Well, since then I have seen it stated in the press that Sir Arthur Cotton, an officer largely respon- sible for developing the agriculture of India in those districts which have suffered from famine, has declared that "England, suitably cultivated, would produce Jive times the quantity of food required by its present population." Further remark seems needless. 2. There are superabundant mechanical resources in the country, so still the necessaries of life should come easily to all — not to speak of the conveniences — even if we decided to grow no single article of food ourselves, so long as the food markets of the world are open, and we can exchange what we ma^e, through the agency of those mechanical resources, for what we wish to eat. I have it among my notes (I fancy the state- ment was made at the Industrial Remuneration Con- ference, some eight years ago) that our mechanical power, including railways and steamships, was (then) i6o THE NEW PARTY equal to the manual power of one thousand millions of men— that is to say, equal to the manual power of the entire population of the world if all the world were " grown up ! " " The annual labour," then, of this British nation ought surely, under such extremely favourable condi- tions, to cause the individuals who compose the nation to be exceedingly well provided with " all the neces- saries and conveniences for which they have occasion? " But the facts are just the reverse. At the present moment one-fifth of the population have not enough to eat ! Ao-ain, Mr. Herbert V. Mills has calculated that there is " always on the average about six millions, in- cluding workers and their families, among the unem- ployed, most of whom have to depend on some form of charity to support life." ^ Then, of Loudon, where wealth most abounds, it is recorded by the Registrar General's returns for 1888, that 2 2i per cent, of the total deaths took place in workhouses, hospitals, lunatic asylums, and other charitable institutions. This I give as an average year. I might fill pages with illustrations such as these, culled from the works of those who, in recent years, have studied in various directions the problems of our national poverty. But my object here is not to excite sympathy, but to force upon men's minds (I am now addressing those of the Eadical rather than the Con- 1 Poverty and the State, p. 73. LAND MONOPOLY i6i servative temperament) the remarkable discrepancy between the facts of our industrial life and the theory that Adam Smith so distinctly places before us. Now this discrepancy must surely arise from some- thing affecting- the freedom of labour. People do not willingly starve. Hunger will drive them to work, if notliing else will ; and it is a libel on the inhabitants of London to suggest that 22^ per cent, of those of them whose end is nearing prefer to die in the work- house rather than in their homes. We have everywhere the cry of overcrowded labour markets. Why should any labour market be over- crowded? Simply because men lack the freedom to choose hoiv and ivhere luithin their native land they will produce the necessaries for ivhich they have occasion. And we have from grand old Adam Smith the right keynote in those last words. Men naturally work to produce "the necessaries," not to earn ivages. Our modern economists, as well as the man in the street, have blundered into the error of supposing that wage- service is an inevitable condition of industrial life — a kind of natural law. So we get nice little theories about "supply and demand in the labour market" to explain why people can't get work in this direction or that, and why they must accept what wages are offered to them, or starve in idleness. Let us now dismiss this crude notion about wages from our minds, and think only, with Adam Smith, of producing necessaries. In a " new country " it is, as all men readily admit, a fairly easy task to i62 THE NEW PARTY do this. In our old country the thing can't be done, and simply because access to the soil is denied to its citizens : the land is monopolised in the manner described earlier. The labourers who till that land, consequently have to till it for wages. If they do not like the terms in the country, they can try what terms they can get in the towns, and so it is from one form of wage service to another form of wage service that the members of our industrial population are driven, and each movement they make only causes the distress of the whole body of the workers to become more terrible. But supposing the restrictions on the use of the land were removed just to this extent, that each member of the nation who wished to produce neces- saries had equal opportunity to use enough land for the purpose in view. What would then happen? Why, simply this, that nobody would work for wages unless he liked. As a practical consequence the present theory about supply and demand in the labour market would, to use a homely phrase, be " knocked into a cocked hat." Freedom of labour would be attained. There are about 800,000 agricultural labourers in England. Allowing five acres per man, it would only need that four million acres should be at their disposal to clear the whole number of them out of the wage-service market. This quantity of land would be just a fourth part of the common land enclosed during the last two hundred years. Another similar quantity of rural land available, LAND MONOPOLY 163 would make it possible to entirely relieve the con- gestion of the labour market in towns and cities. The population of these could be reduced by more than three millions. I have no wish to argue the question whether a wholesale transference of labour from the wage- service market to the sphere of small-holdings is a thing in itself to be desired. My object at this point is merely to show that the State's re-entry upon no more than a sixth part of the national soil now capable of cultivation, would make it possible to utterly revolutionise the existing rela- tions between employer and employed throughout the length and breadth of the kingdom. But, evolution rather than revolution is, if I mis- take not, to characterise the methods of this new era. Well, the evolution of the worker from the condition of wage slave into that of one to whom is rendered according to his work, can really be initiated without shaking anybody's nerves — and that, by a mere act of legislative boldness. Let me illustrate the pro- cess by reference to a very well understood business — ordinary commercial banking. The banking-houses of London open their doors each morning under an obligation to do that which every one knows to be impossible. They have vast sums in their possession which other people have a right to ; that right can be exercised at any moment, on any lawful day in the year, by the whole number of those who have deposited their funds with these i64 THE NEW PARTY banks. Ill short, all this money is payable "on de- mand." And yet, it is just because of those two words (I am stating a truism) that the banker is never in any dread of having his doors besieged by the people who have claims on him. On the other hand, thousands of his customers, who scarcely ever exercise their right of drawing, are influenced in countless actions of their lives by the mere fact that their claim on the bank will be fully honoured " on demand." Now, supposing every worker in the three kingdoms had in his pocket a document entitling him to "a subsistence unit" (I have suggested five acres) of agricultural land, " o?? demand," is it not reasonable to expect that the result would be peaceful industrial evolution, rather than a sudden disturbance in the labour market ? With the banker, safety lies in bold- ness. He honours all claims indiscriminately. The practical effect is that he is never taken unawares. The actual demand for the money in his coffers varies within limits that he can easily calculate. But a tinkering, hesitating policy in the payment of cheques would soon create a financial crisis. And the nation would, I contend, be acting in prudent businesslike fashion by recognising the claims of individuals to use land, as boldly and freely as the banker does those of his customers. If a sudden rush of farm-labourers from the plough to the small-holding is a thing to be deprecated ; if, following on such action as this, there should be the peril of an equally LAND MONOPOLY 165 sudden exodus from towns and cities of the unem- ployed, those whose characters have become enfeebled through their miseries ; if, so to speak, a disastrous run on the Nation's Land Bank is a thing to be avoided — then should no one be denied his " sub- sistence unit" of Land "on demand." Let us endeavour for a moment to catch a glimpse of industrial society, evolving through the action of some such simple process as the above. Take the country. Here we see the labourers discussing, in their slow staid fashion — at a parish meeting, possibly — what use to make of their newly acquired interest in the soil. Some of them, the younger, more indepen- dent fellows, are all for claiming that " subsistence unit " without delay : to call no man master will be such a luxury. Others, not less independent, but more experienced, have a notion of combining their rights — starting a small co-operative farm ; in fact, they might not need so much land doing this. There has been a man from town in the neighbourhood lecturing about poultry-farming, and bee-keeping, and bulb-growing, and fruit and flower culture, as these industries are managed by the small farmers of the continent. Our group of labourers are pondering the subject. They are not vexing their souls about capital. Not being Political Economists, but merely plain countrymen, they somehow have the idea — stupid fellows ! — that their own qualities of mind and character will be almost capital enough for the purpose they have in view ; now that they thoroughly realise their free- i66 THE NEW PARTY dom to use these qualities for their own profit, and not for the profit of farmer and landlord. The majority of the labourers, however, have decided that they wont use those little documents marked " on demand," until they know what the farmers mean to do The farmers are that very moment discussing this point with the squire up at the hall. They are telling him very bluntly that he can't have his own way with them any longer. The price of labour is going up to about double what it was— and may go further. He, the squire, will have to bear the loss. He must reduce rents proportionately. Further than this, more machinery will have to be used in large farming than hitherto, and the farming itself must be more thorough, if it is to pay at all in competition with the intensive spade farming some of those chaps in the village are going to start upon. So there must be no more nonsense about "a good understanding" being suffi- cient between farmer and squire as an agreement. A fresh start must be made at lower rents and with absolute security. If he doesn't like these terms, well, they, the farmers, must throw up their farms. At the worst, they won't have to starve — for have they not, each of them in his pocket, that paper bearing the magic words, " on demand ] " Of course the squire has to give way. Into what sort of social entity he will ultimately evolve I won't attempt to imagine. Perhaps, when around him there are " none so poor will do him reverence," he will rush to hard work in order to forget the degradation of his position. LAND MONOPOLY 167 But the man does not interest me. I am more con- cerned to impress on the reader that it is by boldly recognising eveiy one's right to enough land to live on, that the conditions of rural industry can be trans- formed with the least amount of disturbance — economic or otherwise. Take now the towns. Here, the value of the " sub- sistence unit of land" may not be easily realised by the workers. " Wages " are to them, as to the fashion- able economist, part of the order of nature ; therefore a "subsistence wage" is what they are blindly seeking, this and shorter hours of labour. They do not observe that both these things tend directly to the increased substitution of machinery for manual labour, whereby the number of the unemployed is added to, however much better it may fare with those remaining at work. Alas ! it is a terribly abortive struggle those are engaged in, who think to lift the industrial popula- tion of the towns by any town-made appliances. It makes one think sadly of the struggle upwards of the poor wretch who is climbing a treadmill. Happily, there is still plenty of country blood in the veins of our urban populations. Indeed, as Mr, Charles Booth grimly puts it, " London is nourished by the literal consumption of bone and sinew from the country." Such, I take to be the case with other indus- trial centres. Now I suggest that the virtues lying in that subsistence unit will first be understood by those town workers who were horn and hred in the villages. Their grasp of the new situation will be strengthened, 1 68 THE NEW PARTY too. by information reaching them from their country relatives about the crushed squire, and so on. Con- sequently they will one day or another come to the resolution to go back to their birthplaces. And then, follo^Ying in their wake, will be the cockney brothers-in- law with their families (match factory girls among these perchance, to be built up in body and mind by country air). Each and all will find their place in the reorganising rural society. Town wits will begin to tell upon country toil. Agriculture will lose its sluggish- ness, and tend towards invention. Upon those workers who elect to remain in the towns, the effect of the " subsistence unit " will soon be manifested. They will be educated into the know- ledge of its true value to themselves by seeing the gaps in the labour market. They will be educated a step further by discovering that the cost of shelter is diminishing around them, partly owing to the smaller demand, partly to decreasing poors rates, &c. ; and I am hopeful enough to believe that education will extend to employers of labour. As they grasp the situation, enlightened self-interest, at the lowest, will teach them that it is useless to dictate terms to wage-earners, each and all of whom can cease at any hour to be wage-earners, by the mere fact of possessing that right to the "subsistence unit." So, employers will be compelled to fraternise with the employed, sooner or later. Such, then, appear to me to be the results, in country and town, of boldly and universally acknowledging the LAND MONOPOLY 169 principle that each man may, at his option, produce for himself the necessaries of life out of the land. The very boldness of the thing is, I repeat, the surest safeguard against any sudden and calamitous changes in the labour markets. At this point it will be convenient to dwell for a moment on two methods of allaying the evils of land monopoly, which have originated with what is termed the "Manchester School." The first is "free trade in laud ; " the second is " peasant proprietary." Looked into closely, they are seen to be mutually destructive. Free trade and a system of bounties cannot very well be established at one and the same time respecting an identical article of commerce. If land can be properly regarded as an article of commerce (and that I deny), then to talk about free trade in it, and in the same breath declare that State credit should be available to give to sundry persons (the suggested peasant pro- prietors) advantages not naturally arising out of free trade, is rank nonsense. But about free trade in land there is scarcely need for argument. Facts will do. It exists in America. One of its products is that monstrosity of civilisation, the American millionaire. Another product is Chicago, of which Mr. Stead can tell us a few things. Then, it exists in our Australasian Colonies. From a corre- spondent in New South Wales I learnt, in 1887, that at that date 513 people owned more than seventeen million acres among them in New South Wales alone. In New Zealand, Sir George Grey and Sir Robert Stout 170 THE NEW PARTY have for years past been striving to connect the evils which /ree trade in land has brought about. In a note with which the latter statesman honoured me a few years ago, he says, "I believe State-ownership of land is the hope of the future. This view I have long held, and regret that in the Colonies so little has been done in this direction." Since about half the alienated lands of New Zealand (I am speaking from memory) are in the hands of a few hundred persons, it is easy to under- stand why " so little has been done." A peasant proprietary, as I have said, involves the use of State-credit. It makes access to the land easy for a few, and throws financial responsibility for the success of the scheme upon the many. And if success- ful as an industrial experiment, which is a point very much open to dispute, then we have a fraction only of the rural population benefited — while they are at the same time thrown out of touch with their less fortunate brethren.^ They, being State manufactured monopolists of land, are expected by Lord Salisbury to become the natural allies of big land monopolists like himself. He approves of peasant-proprietors being created, because they would become more conser- vative.'^ Finally, this method leaves the whole problem of wage-service unsolved. It widens that gap between town industries and country industries, whicb is at the present time such a deplorable feature in our national life. France, with its millions of peasant proprietors, 1 Witness the "Gombeen" men in Ireland. 2 He refers to the modern conventional type, of course. LAND MONOPOLY 171 is suffering as a community more keenly than we are, from the fact that town and country are like two opposed nations. Let us take warning. Moreover, it may be said both of free trade in land and peasant-proprietorship (the former especially), that they distinctly condone those innovations upon the national heritage in the soil — chiefly the work of the last two centuries — which a spirit of true Con- servatism should lead patriotic men to attack. The mistaken notion of ownership in land is already too widely spread. But the very difficulties that now beset the transfer of land are evidences of the nation's original control. The people are interested in having these records clearly before them as the hour ap- proaches for sitting in judgment upon landlordism. Of this landlordism in its full proportions, as it now affects us, I have scarcely yet said anything. I have done no more than to show how it degrades the labouring masses in town and country alike when they attempt that simple, natural duty — which savage man finds to be comparatively easy — namely, of sup- plying themselves, and those dependent upon them, with the necessaries of life ; and I have tried to point out how this wrong could be remedied, if but a trifling encroachment were granted to the nation upon those domains which landlords have grown accustomed to call "their own." But there are moral and spiritual evils lying at the door of the landlord, in regarding which the whole extent of his power must be taken into account. The 172 THE NEW PARTY national character has been warped ahnost beyond remedy by his wicked monopoly. The Komans made gladiators of their captives. In this free England such rude sport as they furnished is forbidden. No, the slaves of landlordism — and they are all the nation save a million, remember — fight each other with spiritual weapons. They compete in the market- place instead of the arena. They play little tricks upon each other, and call this " business." They use such powers as their masters have delegated to them to oppress their fellow-slaves who are less fortunate. The middle-class captives grind the faces of the poorer sort, and just in so far as they are successful do they hope to gain the smile of — a landlord ! They sell their souls to become capitalists — slaves of the very first rank — close allies of the Land Monopolist, looking down with him in unbrotherly contempt upon the more evidently captive multitude ! Oh, it is a pitiable spectacle to see a nation that is ever talking about freedom so unconscious of the fetters it wears ; nay, proud of the slave-owners, those landlords. But, somehow, the truth of the whole matter is slowly being discovered. The spirit of investigation is spreading. Education is causing an increasing number of people to inquire curiously into the uses of things. The uses even of a landlord are being debated by persons to whom, ten years ago, such iuquiiy was rank blasphemy — seeing that the land- lord most distinctly emblemised the " sacred rights of property." LAND MONOPOLY 173 In other directions, too, the hopes of the new era are blossoming to their fruition. Men who have gained material wealth unduly, in consequence of the unjust control over the services of their fellow-men that Land Monopoly has afforded to them, are beginning to feel a little ashamed of wealth so acquired. And the sons and daughters of such men are even more troubled. They have read Carlyle, and the sting of his splendid scorn for rich idlers has roused them to effort of some kind. Mere money-getting does not attract them. Mere benevolence, they somehow feel, degrades both themselves and those who receive. So they are seeking artistic outlets for their energy. Striving after har- mony, the ugliness of life among the working poor has attracted their notice ; and they have tried to soften this ugliness by means of East End picture-galleries and so forth. All praise to their efforts ! In their igno- rance they knew not what better thing to do. But fuller knowledge of the awful realities of life among the working poor is slowly coming to those who at first sought no more than escape from leisured idleness. They have begun to perceive that ugliness must persist under present conditions. So their minds have been turned towards the examination of causes. Thank God, the younger rich are, day by day, getting nearer and nearer towards the truth of the matter. They want to see society whole — at harmony with itself in every member. It cannot be very long now before they realise that, for them especially, there is no escape from the solemn verity, " Physician, heal thyself!" 174 THE NEW PARTY Perhaps the day also is not far distant when, in- fluenced—nay, let us say, converted— by slaves of their own households, who have thus gone forth to be whole- somely instructed among the poor, even the landholders of the country may begin to see the evil they have done and are doing to their fellow-subjects, the people of the three kingdoms, and in bitterness of heart cry out, " God, be merciful to us, miserable sinners ! " One final word, which I respectfully address to my fellow-toilers who have striven these ten years and more to make known the truth about Land Monopoly, and to hasten the day when the land shall be restored to the nation's control. We all of us need to keep our ideals high. In the hurry of discussion, too much stress is often laid, I fear, upon the material losses to the community of the present state of things ; upon the material gains that would accrue from the change we advocate. The spiritual losses and gains, however, are, to my mind, infinitely more important. Landlord- ism has done much in making us a " nation of shop- keepers." Let us take care lest its abolition leave us no better — with still no worthier ambition than that of getting on. However vast may be the changes in the future in the relations between employer and employed, these changes will not do much for the true welfare of the nation, unless there be realised by all classes what Wordsworth has said — " The world is too much with us : late and soon, Getting and spending, we lay waste our powei'S." LAND MONOPOLY 175 Still, the getting and spending instinct cannot be brought well under discipline while men and women are debarred from access to those higher influences which rural sights and sounds, fresh air and simple pursuits, spontaneously afford. We as a nation need to be countrified anew. We need to be brought into touch with nature. Great cities have been correctly described, I think, as " abscesses of our civilisation : " not simply the physical, but moral and spiritual health suffers by too long continuance therein. If, then, the next generation, and the next, are to reach to higher planes of civilisation, strenuous efibrt should be made to dignify rural life, to spread the people out upon the land ; so that, instead of London and Birmingham and Glasgow and Dublin holding the chief place in popular esteem, the glory and strength of the future nation shall be its innumerable villages. William Jameson. " Labour and distribution should be collectively or- ganised ; everij one should receive for a fixed amount of labour a fixed amount of capital, ivhich would constitute his ])roperty according to right. Property ivill thus be vnade universal. No person should enjoy superfluities as long as anybody lacks necessaries ; for the right of prop)erty in objects of luxury can have no foundation until each citizen has his share in the necessaries of life.'' — Johann Gottlieb Fichte. THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE The science of Political Economy has now guided, and often governed, the civilised world for near a century, but it may be doubted if the world is much the better for its guidance. AVe are, indeed, as nations, enormously richer than we were ; but this is clearly due for the most part to the growth of physical science. During this century, steam power has developed from infancy to manhood, and has sup- plied us with millions of slaves, more docile than the best trained animals, more powerful than the giants and genii of Eastern fable. It has been calculated that for every man now engaged in physical labour there are the equivalent of ten steam men at work, and that by means of labour-saving machinery we do fifty, or, perhaps, a hundred times as much effective work per man as could be done a century ago. Now we know that for many centuries before the invention of the steam-engine the men of England supported them- selves in rude plenty without any excessive labour, although they had also to provide both necessaries and luxuries for a vast body of idle nobles and fight- ing men, just as they do to-day. There were, of course, periodical famines, but perhaps no worse or more frequent on the average than those which, 177 M 178 THE NEW PARTY despite all the resources of civilisation, still occur in Russia, India, or Ireland. In England, four hundred or five hundred years ago, the ordinary work -day was eight hours, and the labourer had abundance of such food and clothing and shelter as at that time he felt the need of. According to the standard of living at the time, he lived in comfort and in plenty, with time to spare for rest and recreation. Can that be said of the whole body of our labourers to-day ? Yet, if we had been truly guided, if we had had a true political economy, when, in course of time, we obtained the inestimable advantage of labour-saving machinery equal in its effect to fifty times our whole working population, the entire body of labourers should have had shorter hours of work, more abundance of the necessaries of life, and a larger share of the com- forts and enjoyments required by our higher civilisation and our higher standard of living. There is, however, ample evidence to show, not only that this is 7iot the case, but that, in proportion to the amount of wealth they produce, labourers, as a whole, are far worse off than they were from two to five centuries back ; in other words, the contrasts of riches and poverty, the gulf between rich and poor, is greater — far greater — than ever before in the world's history. Now, if political economy has not caused, it has certainly done nothing to prevent, this gross inequality in the distribution of wealth. It is for this reason that everywhere, to-day, it is being denounced by THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE 179 thinking men as a false science — as a delusion and a snare — as an ignis fatuus, leading men away from the paths of happiness and true well-being, and guiding them towards the quagmires of unhealthy- competition, poverty, and discontent. The important question we have now to consider is, therefore, whether our legislators and our social re- formers are on the right track; whether they have been hitherto conducting us along a road leading to general well-being, or in the very opposite direction ; whether our political and social arrangements are calculated to produce, or have, in fact, produced, a reasonable amount of happiness for the mass of the people ; whether they are such as to render it possible for all the inhabitants of our country to secure satisfaction of the barest physical wants — good food, decent clothing, warm and healthy dwellings, without which it is a mockery to expect that general intellectual and moral elevation which alone constitutes true civilisa- tion. In view of the notorious fact that thousands, nay, millions of our people, cannot obtain these elementary necessaries of a reasonably comfortable existence, we ask, Do we not require a new science of Social Economy, in the place of the old and alto- gether insufficient science of Political Economy ? Let us now, shortly, consider the causes of this lamentable failure. How is it that a science which has been so highly elaborated by so many able men, has yet led to no adequate beneficial result ? The early writers on the subject found a number iSd the new party of erroneous ideas guiding countries and governments in their dealings with each other. Money was looked upon as the chief form of wealth, and there was a great dread of more money going out of a country than came into it. The mutual benefit of trade be- tween countries was not recognised ; and it was thought necessary to interfere by restrictive legisla- tion, in order to benefit ourselves and injure other nations as much as possible. The price of food and other necessaries was believed to be determined by the sellers. Hence, to prevent them from charging too much for their wares, the selling price of many articles was fixed by law ; and the same was done with the rate of wages, and the rate of interest. The early Political Economists saw that these, and many other interferences with trade, industry, and com- merce, were altogether unnecessary and injurious ; and they endeavoured to explain in a rigorously logical manner ivhy they w^ere injurious. From doing this they were led on to investigate the nature and origin of all the facts and phenomena of trade and commerce, of supply and demand, of wages, interest, rent of land and profits, of money value and price ; why some things have great value but little price — as air and water, while other things are very dear but have little real value — as gold and diamonds ; and these inquiries were found to be often so complex and difficult, that there came to be a sort of fascination in them ; and, just as mathematicians find great intellectual pleasure in working out problems merely because THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE iSi they are difficult, or because they form part of a more extensive investigation of mathematical principles, so eminent men devoted themselves, one after another, to working out, in the greatest detail, all the problems of Political Economy. Hence a science became estab- lished, built up step by step, corrected and improved by successive writers, and, because it undoubtedly exposed many errors, it was adopted by capitalists and legislators as an almost infallible guide to the best and surest methods of increasing the "Wealth OF Nations." Now, it is not asserted that there are any important errors in Political Economy as a science. On the con- trary, it is, no doubt, mainly true, and for our present purpose I will admit it to be wholly true. I will admit, also, that it corrected many errors of kings, Sfovernments, and merchants, and led them to a more enlightened policy towards trade and commerce. So far as this w^ent it did good work ; but this work was done long ago, and it has for some time past produced nothing but evil, because it has been held to be what it is not— a guide to the Well-being, as well as to the Wealth, of nations; a science that would, if strictly followed, lead to the greatest happiness of the whole community, as well as to the accumulation of enormous riches by the successful few. Political Economy may be defined as the science which enables capitalists to secure the maximum pro- duction of wealth. It does secure this result, but it also (under existing social conditions) ensures that i82 THE NEW PARTY the wealth created by the labour of the many shall be enjoyed by a comparative few. So long as the wealth is created, it takes no heed who has the wealth. Further, it altogether ignores the social or moral results of this wealth accumulation, except that it decidedly favours its use to produce more and more wealth. It ignores altogether any rights of those who create all the wealth to the greatest share, or even to any share, in the well-being and happiness the wealth is capable of producing. Again, it never discusses any questions of right or wrong in social and political arrangements ; it recog- nises no such thing as Justice, either in the acquisi- tion, the production, or the distribution of wealth ; it never questions any social or political arrange- ments, except those which are of a fiscal nature, but takes them as it finds them, treats them as fundamental facts, and then shows how, under exist- ing conditions, the greatest quantity of wealth may be created. Coming to details, it treats capitalists and labourers as necessarily distinct bodies, usually summarised under the neutral terms, "capital" and "labour;" and it shows how "labour" can be employed by "capital" to produce the maximum of wealth ; but it does not trouble itself about who gets the wealth, or whether either capitalists or labourers are really benefited by the increased wealth they produce. On exactly the same principles the Political Economy of the slave-holding states of North America discussed THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE 183 the best methods of treating the slave population, in order to produce the greatest amount of wealth for their owners. The various questions of education, religion, marriage, food, hours of labour, and punish- ments, were discussed from this one point of view, just as, in the first half of this century, and to some extent even to-day, the factory system, in its relation to the " hands " and their children, was discussed from a similar point of view. It has been boldly maintained before the recent Labour Commission, that it is a good thing in itself for children — of course only for the children of the poor — to get up at five in the morning to work in a factory, to which they have often to walk a mile through rain or snow ; the afternoon being spent at school. Political Economy — speaking always of the science, not of the men who write upon it — is not disturbed by the wider and ever- wider gulf that, with the increase of wealth, separates rich and poor ; by the increasing uncertainty of employment arising from the massing together of vast bodies of labourers, wholly dependent on capitalist employers for their daily bread ; by the unnatural and unhealthy lives of the poor so massed together in towns and cities ; by the ever-increasing waste of labour in the production of useless, trivial, or even hurtful luxuries, which is an inevitable result of the increasing numbers of the idle rich ; by a system which causes much of the wealth created by the labour of one generation to be employed in enabling many thousands of the succeeding generation to live in 1 84 THE NEW PARTY complete idleness, often resulting in vice, and even in crime. ^ Surely a science like this — so narrow in its scope, so powerless for good, so utterly divorced from all considerations of morality, of justice, even of broad and enlightened expediency — should be treated as a bhnd and impotent guide, which, if any longer fol- lowed, will lead us on to social and political ruin. It is the reaction against the teachings of this narrow and unpractical science, and its proved use- lessness as a guide, that has led so many good and humane men to advocate some form of Socialism as the only remedy for the evils which seem inherent in our present social system. Socialism, as depicted by its most able advocates, is very alluring ; but whether or no it will be an ultimate development of human society, there can, I think, be little doubt that it will not, in our own country, constitute the next step in human progress. The mass of men are not yet any- where sufficiently educated, either socially, intellectu- ally, or morally. For some generations to come, indivi- dualism will probably prevail, but ever more and more permeated by mutual helpfulness, and systematised co-operation, till, in every class of society, the well- being of all will be considered as essential to the happiness of each individual. Our great English writer and friend of humanity, ^ It is not asserted that all Political Economists have ignored these questions, but merely that they do not come within the sphere of Political Economy as a science. THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE 185 John Stuart Mill, was profoundly impressed with the evils of our present social system, though very doubt- ful whether any form of Socialism or Communism would not be a remedy worse than the disease. He says — '• If the choice were to be made between Communism, with all its chances, and the present state of society, with all its suffering and injustices ; if the institution of private property necessarily carried with it as a consequence that the produce of labour should be appor- tioned as we now see it, almost in an inverse ratio to the labour — the largest portions to those who have never worked at all, the next largest to those whose work is almost nominal, and so in a descend- ing scale, the remuneration dwindling as the work grows harder and more disagreeable, until the more fatiguing and exhausting bodily labour cannot count with certainty upon being able to earn even the necessaries of life — if this or Communism were the alter- native, all the difficulties, g]-eat or small, of Communism would be but as dust in the balance." Most of US will, no doubt, agree with this powerful statement, but I believe there is an alternative. Leaving out of consideration, therefore, for the present, any question of Socialism, I shall endeavour to point out by what steps we may attain to a system of Social Economy which, while securing many of the beneficial results of Socialism, will preserve all the advantages of individual self-dependence and healthy rivalry, and Avill so educate and develop social feelings, that if any ad- vance in the direction of Socialism is then desired, it will no longer be impracticable. We see, in the case of the South American republics, that the freest political institutions work nothing but evil when men are unfitted for them ; and the constant revolutions and i86 THE NEW PARTY wars, bloodshed and oppression, in those ill-governed countries, should warn us against attempting forcibly to establish any system of social organisation for which the masses, whether of the rich or the poor, are not yet fitted. In seeking for the foundation of a true Social Eco- nomy, which shall secure to labour its just reward, and enable every man who will labour to obtain all the necessaries and comforts, and many of the luxuries of life, I find it in the great principle of Justice and of the Equality of Opportunities for all adult members of society. It seems to me self-evident that any funda- mental injustice or inequality in the opportunity to oain a livelihood cannot lead to good results, and cannot be the permanent condition of society. Guided by these principles, let us endeavour to dis- cover the causes of the present unequal distribution of wealth, and the consequent absence of general well- being and contentment. It is a fundamental fact that all wealth is the result of labour intelligently applied to natural products or aided by natural forces, or, as comprising all these — to land. Labour, Land, and Intelligence combined are, therefore, the sources of all wealth. Capital is usually claimed as one of the factors of wealth-production, but this is to obscure the issue. Capital is itself wealth — is itself the result of labour and intelligence applied to land — is, therefore, only a secondary, not a primary, source of wealth. Of its uses and dangers we will speak presently. THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE 187 Now, as wealth can only be produced by means of Land, on which to exert Labour and Intelligence, and as no man can exist without the use or consumption of some portion of wealth, it necessarily follows that, unless he has the opportunity or the privilege to use some portion of land, or to obtain some of the pro- ducts of land, he is denied the right to exist. Hence, equality of opportunities implies the right or privilege of all men to a share in the use of land ; and as, when the land of a country all becomes private property, this right cannot exist, therefore private property in land is condemned as a fundamental injustice — as a denial of equal opportunities, privileges, or rights. I will not now pursue this particular question further, but, in the light of the principles asserted, will endeavour to show the causes of existing Social Inequalities. One of the more immediate and remediable causes of these inequalities is, that labourers are dependent on capitalists for employment — for the very power of doing any productive work, by which alone they can obtain food and other necessaries. They have usually no means of support but wage-earning; when this fails they are destitute and helpless. They are not, there- fore, in the position of freemen, since they are depen- dent on others for the permission to labour — for the opportunity to earn even a bare subsistence. Now, in order to remedy this evil, in order to make the labourer really a free man, he must be placed in a position to work, either alone or in association with i88 THE NEW PARTY his family or his fellow-labourers, without the necessity of waiting till some capitalist has need of him. To ensure this, he must, in the first place, have a sufficiency of land attached to his dwelling from which he may directly obtain the bare food to support life when his usual work fails, and may also have a per- manent home from which he cannot be driven at the will of any other man. He must also have some home industry to employ profitably the spare time, or the hours which would otherwise be wasted, of himself and his famil)^ Lastly, he should have his regular trade or employment, which he should exercise either on his own account or in co-operative association with other workmen, not as the hired wage-thrall of a master capitalist. This, of course, implies that men must no longer live crowded together in great cities, where the labourer is altogether removed from contact with productive nature, and is helplessly dependent on the capitalist for permission to labour, and, therefore, for permission to live. The many evils of great cities have been pointed out by the moralist and by the social and sanitary reformer, but they have been looked upon as necessary products of civilisation — as the results of a tendency in human nature — as needful for economy of production and of distribution. Looked at from the standpoint of the capitalist and the speculator, this is true. Great cities give them an unlimited comm.and over labour, and the greatest facilities for gathering into their own pockets the wealth which other men THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE 189 create ; but to the very same extent they are a curse to the labourer, who necessarily loses what the others gain. Even on the question of economy of production due to huge factories and minute division of labour, there is much to be said on the other side. For here, again, the economy is all for the capitalist, the waste and loss for the labourer. The individual capitalist discharges a hundred or even a thousand men when he no longer wants them, or works short time, or lowers wages — all economical for him, but a terrible loss for the thousands or ten-thousands of workmen, who are thereby rendered compulsorily idle ! I prefer the economy which gives the labourers constant work, even if the capitalist gets rich less rapidly, or even not at all. Again, the many factories concentrated in great cities require an army of men to be engaged in the distribution of their products ; and every hand these products pass through takes a profit out of them — all causing a loss to the great body of workers, first, in the diminished wages they receive, owing to the com- petition of dependent labourers, next, in the higher price they have to pay the retail trader for the goods they themselves have made. But if population were more uniformly distributed over the surface of the country, with multitudes of small industries and small factories belonging to asso- ciated workmen, then a large portion of this army of middle-men distributors and speculators would not be required, the producer and the consumer would usually 190 THE NEW PARTY deal together at first hand, and this great saving might entirely balance the saving by production on a larger scale. The common argument against any suggestions of this kind is that it is a step backwards, that it is im- possible to return to hand-labour and small industries ; and we have the usual comparisons of the old hand- loom and the modern power-loom, of the old spinning- wheel and the modern spinning-mule. But this is simply throwing dust in our eyes, and is entirely beside the question. All the resources of invention and im- provement for more than a century, all the marvellous discoveries of science, have hitherto been utilised in the interest of the capitalist alone, not in that of the workman. They have all been applied to machinery adapted for use in huge factories, because it was the capitalist who required them, and it was his interest to get his profits on the largest possible scale. But directly there is a demand by small manufacturers and by single w^orkmen, science and invention and mecha- nical art will work for them, and will provide machinery adapted for small associated workers and for cottage industries, just as it has provided the beautiful sewing- machines and knitting-frames and type-writers for use in the smallest dwelling. In like manner, so soon as there is a demand for it, there will be no difficulty in supplying mechanical power to work these machines as easily as water or gas are supplied now, either by compressed air, or water, or by electricity, so that every workman may be THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE 191 able to start his machine at a moment's notice, and pay only for the power he actually uses. Under this system he might carry on at once an out-door and an in-door trade, employing profitably much of the time now wasted by bad weather, by long winter nights, by weary tramping to and from the factory ; and at the same time obtaining health and vigour by the change of labour, by the freedom of his life, and, above all, by the invigorating fact that he was his own capitalist and his own master, and that the whole value of what his labour produced went into his own pocket. Here, again, are many distinct sources of economy. We have human labour saved, wasted time utilised, health improved, and happiness increased — a true moral and SOCIAL economy which, when once it is fairly tried, will be found far to outbalance the mechanical economy derived from making thousands of men and women the mere slaves and adjuncts of machinery, under conditions involving monotony, disease, and discontent. Just as surely as free wage-labour has always been found to be superior to slave-labour, so surely will it be found that the independent self- employing worker will far surpass in efficiency him who works only for fixed daily wages paid him by a master. The next great source of remediable inequality arises from the way money can be and is manipulated, so as to enable ever-increasing numbers of men to live in idleness, supported by the labour of those who work. This result is so often denied that it may be necessary 192 THE NEW PARTY to explain and illustrate the fact. It is continually asserted that men who possess money, and spend it, do good to the community by employing labour ; while it is often urged that the poor or the workers could not get on without such men. It is, therefore, neces- sary to go to first principles. Let us suppose an island, cut off from the rest of the world, but which produces all the food, clothing, and luxuries necessary for a happy existence. Let us sup- pose the inhabitants to be all workers, all having the use of such portions of the land as they require, for which they pay a rental to the State, which suffices in lieu of all taxation. They use gold and silver money to facilitate exchange among themselves, just as we do. Now let one of these men discover a hidden treasure of fabulous amount. He keeps it secret, but leaves off work, and henceforth is able to buy everything he wants. Let a hundred men each find a similar treasure, and follow his example. Are the people of the island anv richer for this treasure spent among them ? Are they not, on the contrary, poorer, since the hundred men who before worked are now idle, and all that they eat and drink and consume has to be provided by the labour of the rest? This illustration serves to show that when rich gold and silver mines are discovered in a country and are largely worked, the result is a positive injury to the general population ; for all useful and necessary articles become dearer owing to the metals by which their value is estimated becoming more abundant ; while the THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE 193 number of labourers in some other occupations being proportionately diminished, causes an independent rise in price of some products. The enormous production of gold and silver in Australia and North America during the last forty years has certainly been one of the contributory causes of the widespread poverty and hardship that continues to prevail in England and the United States. But let us suppose another case. There are many streams on the island, some large and some small, from which all the inhabitants get water ; but many of the smaller streams rise in springs on private farms or gardens, and flow through them to the sea ; and, as there was plenty of other water, these small streams were recognised as belonging to the occupier of the land for the time being. Now, there came an earth- quake which disturbed the strata, and stopped the flow of one of the larger brooks, and people had to go a long way for water, unless they could use the small streams flowing wholly through private grounds. For the use of these streams the owners demanded a toll, and obtained it. Then other brooks dried up, and the need for water became greater, and all who had streams in their private grounds increased the toll ; and then they laid on the water in pipes, and charged highly for it, and gained enormous wealth, which they spent pro- fusely. They hired numerous men and women to be their servants, and others to make costly clothes and ornaments, and jewels, and to attend to their horses and dogs, their carriages and yachts ; till at last half N 194 THE XEW PARTY the population of the island were employed in provid- ing luxuries and pleasures for the few water-owners, and the other half of the population had to work twice as hard as before to obtain the necessaries of life for the whole population, and to pay the heavy water-rates. Now, this is exactly a parallel case to that of the ownership of land, especially in great cities, where the landlords' wealth ever increases as the growing popu- lation has ever greater need for this first necessary of existence, but whose increased wealth is due to the tax (called rent) they are enabled to levy on the rest of the community. Surely these cases show us that the more idle and luxurious rich there are in a country — the more money is spent in display, and fashion, and reckless ex- travagance — the worse off the working-people of that countiy riuist become. Sophistry may disguise it among the complex workings of modern civilisation, but when- ever the case is reduced to its simplest elements — as I have endeavoured to reduce it in the illustrations just given — we see that wealth and poverty are strictly co- relative, and that whenever the first increases greatly in the hands of individuals, the poor must also increase, either in their numbers or in the average intensity of their poverty. These illustrations have also brought out very clearly — what all the best economic writers admit — that money, whether gold, silver, or paper, is not wealth, but only an instrument for facilitating the exchange of wealth ; and we Mill now consider the abuse of money, by which men who produce THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE 195 nothing, and do no useful Avork, are yet enabled to acquire great wealth, and to keep their descendants for several generations living in idleness. True wealth or capital consists of useful products of every kind, and is eminently perishable. The primary necessary, food — forming, perhaps, at any moment half the real wealth of a country — lasts only a few days or months ; another large portion, clothing, lasts but a few years, and then perishes ; dwellings, furniture, and machinery last longer, but require continual repairs or they soon cease to be serviceable ; even our most solid forms of wealth — roads, bridges, canals and railroads — also need repairs, and often require to be altered or reconstructed to meet new wants or changing condi- tions. Now these things, and such as these, comprise all real wealth, and we see that they are all either perishable or require constant supervision and repair or alteration, to keep them in serviceable condition. Hence, a man who had produced or had acquired such wealth as this, could not derive an income from it without continuing to bestow on it some care and labour. He could not safely live in idleness and expect his property to retain its value, still less could he secure from it a perpetual income on which his heirs for many generations could securely live in idleness. But money enables him to do this, and more than this : it enables him often to increase his wealth two-fold, or ten-fold, or even a hundred-fold, without doing any service to his fellows, or anything to increase the useful or real wealth of the communitv. ,ge THE NEW PARTY Why is this possible? Surely there must be some- thing wrong when the mere instrument of exchange takes the place of real wealth— becomes enduring instead of perishable— produces a certain and per- petual income without labour, whereas the true wealth which it represents could only at best produce an uncertain income by means of continuous attention and some cost of labour. This is a vital question for all real workers— those who by their labour produce the wealth of the com- munity—because the present system leads to a con- tinual increase of those who are able to live in idleness on invested capital, producing, apparently, perpetual incomes ; and their increase necessarily makes the workers poorer than they otherwise would be. Just consider for a moment. Every year surplus wealth is created, passing usually into the hands of rich men ; and if any portion of this surplus wealth can be safely invested to produce a permanent income, then the number of those who can and do live upon such incomes year by year increases. Now, as there is no other source of wealth in a country than the labour and intelligence of the workers applied to land or its products, the larger the share of that w^ealth which can be obtained by idlers living on invested money, the smaller will be the share left for those who produce the wealth. It is, therefore, of vital importance to the workers to find out the source of this great evil, this power of accumulated wealth — in its real nature perishable — to take away from them an ever larger and THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE 197 larger share of the fresh wealth which they daily and yearly create. This is a question which is not discussed in works on Political Economy or Finance, since the unlimited increase of the wealth of capitalists is considered to he an unmixed blessing. We must, therefore, study the problem for ourselves, and we shall find its solution in the widespread system of credit, on which modern commerce, and social improvements, and government institutions are alike made to rest, and which is as the very breath of its nostrils to modern capitalism. It is this gigantic system of credit — or more properly of indebtedness — which furnishes the numerous oppor- tunities for investment by means of which realised wealth is able to prey perpetually upon labour. It is this, also, which affords the opportunity for gigantic and reckless speculation, by which a few capitalists and financiers make great fortunes, while many suffer loss, and the whole nation is proportionately impoverished. Whether it is Government debts for war purposes ; or railroad, canal, or water-company bonds ; or State or municipal loans for public improvements, the system of borrowing money on interest is both unnecessary and injurious. If the purpose for which the money is required be an honest, useful, and remunerative purpose, then, as may be easily shown, a loan is un- necessary. If it is required for a dishonest purpose, if it is worked by financiers and speculators for pur- poses of individual profit and plunder, then a loan is doubly injurious, inasmuch as it offers opportunities 198 THE NEW PARTY for dishonesty, while it permanently impoverishes the mass of the people, who are taxed to pay- the interest. I have said that in the case of a genuine, useful, and remunerative public work any loan is unnecessary, and I will now explain this by means of an actual example. In the island of Guernsey some years ago a market- place was much wanted, and the Government of the island having determined to build it, issued notes, inscribed "Guernsey Market Notes," for £i each, and numbered from one to four thousand, ^4000 being the estimated cost of the market. With these notes the Government paid the contractor, the contractor paid his men, and the men bought all the necessaries they required, as the notes were a legal tender in the island. They were used to pay rent, to pay taxes, and for all other purposes. When the market was finished, it immediately produced a revenue, and this revenue was applied to redeem the notes ; and in ten years all were redeemed, and henceforth to the present time the market returns a considerable revenue to the Govern- ment of the island, which goes to reduce taxation ' and all this was done without borrowing any money or paying any interest. Now here is a principle, applied on a small scale by a small self-governing community, which is capable of a very extensive application. All remunerative public works could be executed by some such method ; while if it is urged that some works, like sanitary improve- ments, are not directly remunerative, it may be replied that this is usually because the benefit of such works THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE 199 is allowed to be absorbed by individuals instead of accruing to the community. This is because in- dividuals possess the land in our towns and cities, and every sanitary improvement effected at the public expense increases the value of this land. In fact, no public improvement of any kind can be made in a city without increasing the value of the land, so that there is a double motive in urging on costly, and, per- haps, unnecessary, improvements — ^jobs are effected by financiers and contractors, while the owners of land know that, however much the ratepayers may suffer, thei/ are sure to be benefited. Here is surely another indication that the land of every municipality, or other local community, which grows in value owing to the increase and the expenditure of the whole population, should belong to the community and not to private individuals. The subject, however, which we were more particu- larly considering was the doing away with those funds and investments by which money is made to produce a perpetual income. Now, when, as in Guernsey, there was no permanent debt created and no interest paid, there was no "stock" to speculate in and no income derivable from it. Here, then, we have a double advantage over the usual mode of creating interest- bearing debts, which indicates that w^e have discovered an important principle, w^hich is applicable to almost every case of public improvement. Let us take the case of railways, for example. These are usually con- structed under legislative acts, empowering a company 200 THE NEW PARTY to take the necessary land to build the line and to Avork it for the profit of the shareholders. This plan has led to the greatest possible amount of mischief. Lines have been made where not Avanted ; speculation to an enormous extent has been encouraged ; huge monopolies have been created ; shareholders by thousands have been ruined ; while the last thing considered has been the general interest. During the last great American railway mania it has been esti- mated by Mr. Atkinson that railway-construction went on four times as fast as the increase of produce to be carried by the railways, thousands of miles of railway being made long before they would be wanted, involv- ing loss in a great variety of ways, and being, in fact, one of the causes of recurring depression of trade. If, on the other hand, no such power had been given to companies, but, when public opinion in any State or country demanded a particular line of railway, it had been constructed by means of Railway Bonds created for the purpose, bearing no interest, and serving as legal currency within the State till they were all re- deemed and paid off out of the profits of the line, then no speculation would have been possible. It would have been no one's interest to build unnecessary and unprofitable lines, because so soon as this was done the bonds of the particular line would have little chance of being redeemed ; and as they would be a legal tender, they would soon be all paid in as taxes, and the Government — that is, all the taxpayers — would have to bear the loss. This Mould check further railway- THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE 201 making for a time, and thus prevent useless expendi- ture in the interest of speculators and contractors. On the other hand, every railway that returaed any profits at all would steadily redeem its bonds, and then the whole of the future profits would go to reduce taxation or to make railway travelling free. It would thus be the interest of every one that no railways should be made that were likely to be worked at a loss, because that would lead to a depreciation of the bonds, and thus be a loss to the whole community. But it would be equally every one's interest that all really use- ful and necessary lines should be made, because, besides the direct benefit, the bonds would be quickly redeemed and the profits of the line would enable the general taxation to be reduced. Water-works, gas-works, public parks, new streets, and all similar improvements could be executed on a similar principle, the only safeguard required being that no large improvement should be undertaken in any town or district till the preceding one had been completed and had begun to redeem its bonds out of its genuine profits or proceeds. It has now, I think, been made clear how all public works and public improvements may be effected by public credit, properly so called, instead of by public debt, involving far less risk of loss, no permanent charge on the community, but leading, on the contrary, to a continuous reduction of taxation, and cutting away the very foundations of the system by which the financier and speculator are now enabled to plunder the "working people. 202 THE NEW PARTY Tuiniiii: now to another branch of the same subject — the great system of private indebtedness and trade credit, which leads to so much ruin and misery, so much fraud and robbery, whether by means of bogus companies, wild speculation, or fraudulent bankruptcy, it seems probable that this may be best dealt with by simply disestablishing it, that is, taking away from it the protection of the law. Many eminent men, including some great lawyers and even judges, believe that it would be well for society if the State recognised no debts, except for work done or goods supplied to be paid for on delivery. Everything in the shape of loans or advances without security, or goods supplied on credit, should be made at the lender's or seller's risk — should be really debts of honour, not recoverable by any legal process. It would, in every case, be a question of personal credit and trust. Character thoroughly established would be essential to obtain credit or a loan, and thus, both reckless trading and fraudulent bankruptcy would become impossible. Limited-liability in trading associations should be abolished. True old-fashioned partnerships, in which the partners are associated by mutual knowledge and similar interests, would take the place of " com- panies," in which some of the partners or promoters are mainly interested in robbing the rest ; and with the abolition of these "companies" would be removed a gigantic means of speculation and fraud, which, as we have seen, not only injures individuals, but indi- rectly plunders the whole industrial community. THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OE THE EUTURE 203 We have now briefly discussed the two great prin- ciples of true Social Economy, by which, if carried into action, Labour would be entirely released from the tyranny of Capital, and, for the first time in history, re- ceive its full and just reward. Socialists believe that this can only be effected by the whole capital of the country becoming the property of the State, and by all indus- tries being worked by the State. This, hoAvever, is a question of the future. What is here proposed is an immediate and practicable first step, which would gradu- ally extinguish capitalists as a separate class — first, by enabling every worker to become his own capitalist, either singly or in association with his fellow- work- men ; secondly, by abolishing that system of universal indebtedness which affords the machinery for bound- less speculation, and enables money to breed money — a thing which the great Greek philosopher, Aristotle, condemned as the most justly hated and the most unnatural. Just in proportion as these methods were brought into operation great capitalists would find their position more and more untenable. By the diminution of public debts and those of great companies the means of speculation and permanent investment would diminish, and ultimately cease ; while, on the other hand, the growing independence of workers, becoming their own capitalists and their own employers, would steadily diminish the supply of wage-labour and as steadily raise the rate of wages of those who continued to work for employers. Then would be seen a most marvellous and beneficial 204 ^^^ '^'^^^^ PARTY change in the relations of capital and labour. Instead of labourers everywhere seeking work, and usually being obliged to accept employment on the capitalist's terms, we should see capitahsts and employers every- where competing for a supply of labour, and offering high wages, short hours, and a share in the profits, in order to secure it. Capitalists who were not manu- facturers would be everywhere seeking investments, and would beg to be allowed to furnish associated labourers with capital, receiving instead of interest a small share of the profits. It will perhaps be said, this is a very fine picture, but how is it to be all done without a revolution ? Let us endeavour to answer this question in a few words. The workers are everywhere in a majority ; and in America, England, and many other countries, they have now the power in their hands (if they will but unite) to effect any political and social changes they think advisable ; and if they take care to work only on the lines of justice and equality of opportunities, they will receive the earnest support of many of the best writers and thinkers of the age. The first thing to be done is to obtain the land around all cities, towns, and villages. This may be effected by a law giving to every community, large or small, the power to take any land now used for agri- cultural purposes at agricultural value, such land to be let out to any of the citizens who need it for personal occupation, on a secure tenure, subject to increase of THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE 205 rent when, by growth of the community or other pub- lic cause, the vahie of the ground rents increase. This would at once check the rapid increase of land values in towns, which is in large part the result of monopoly, and afford that secure footing for the labourer which is the first essential to his progress. To prevent the fur- ther appropriation by individuals of land-values created by the community, all ground-rents should be valued at moderate rates, and the owners granted terminable annuities for the amount ; either for a limited number of years, or for the life of the present owner and his next living heir; so that all farther increase of land-values in cities and towns would accrue to the municipality. This would secure the " unearned increment" of land-values to the community which creates them, on the principle advocated by John Stuart Mill, and would effectually stop further land- speculation. In the matter of public and private indebtedness the first step will be to return representatives who will see that all public reproductive works are carried out by means of special bonds to be redeemed out of the pro- fits arising from the undertaking. When by these means, and by the revenues arising from the increased values of building lands. State and INIunicipal taxation is diminished, and the State credit increased, the rail- ways, &c., may be successively taken and the share- holders dealt with in the same manner as has been proposed in the case of the landlords. In this way all the great public works, which ought never to have been 206 THE NEW PARTY allowed to become private property, may be acquired, one by one, by the community, ^yithout the need of any interest-bearing loans ; and thus one great means by which so many men are enabled to live by specula- tion that is, really on the labour of other men — will be abolished/ The inevitable result of these changes will be that rents wall fall, the rate of interest will fall, taxation will diminish, and wages will rise. By means of these several advantages workmen w^ho wish to work for themselves will soon be able to save the small capi- tal necessary to do so ; while those who wash to w^ork in associative co-operation, after saving half the capital required, wall probably be able to get the other half free of interest, on the security of a small share in the profits. Of course, any such proposals as these will be vio- lently opposed by capitalists and their friends. They will tell us that it will bring about the ruin of the country' — meaning the diminution of their wealth and power. But such opposition is to be expected, for even Adam Smith, the father of Political Economy, tells us that, "The interest of capitalists is ahvays in some respects different from, and opposite to, that of the public. " And Ilicardo, the second great leader of the Political Economists, assures us that, " There is no gain to society at large from the rise of rent ; it is advantageous to the landlords alone, and their ' The method of carrying out these lefonus lias been more fully explained in the writer's article on "Economic and Social .Justice," in Vox Clanmntinm,. THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OE THE FUTURE 207 interests are thus permanently in opposition to those of all other classes." As to the objection that the raising of our working- classes to a condition of general comfort and well- being would involve the loss of much of our foreign trade, it is the merest bugbear that ever was put forward in the interests of the wealthy classes. There are two amply sufficient answers to this objection. The first is, that with all our workers in a condition to command the necessaries and comforts of life, home consumption w^ould increase so enormously that foreio-n trade would be of comparatively small importance. As an indication of what this increased consumption is likely to be, we may recall the fact that we now import a hundred and fifty millions worth of foods, all products of this country, and all capable of being produced in the country when our land is thoroughly cultivated by men who reap the harvest for themselves. If only half of this amount were produced, the money being almost all spent on home manufactures would to that extent replace foreign trade ; and if to this Ave add, say forty, or even twenty, pounds a year increased income to each of our ten million workers, we shall arrive at a total of increased consumption that would go far to render a large foreign trade altogether un- necessary. But, quite independent of this enormous increase of home consumption, there is another answer to the objection, which ought to be still more conclusive to the objectors, because it is the answer of Political 2o8 THE NEW PARTY Economy itself. Yet our political writers and our legislators are either ignorant or conveniently forgetful of this, when they urge that the adoption of a general eight hours' day, or a general rise of wages, would render it impossible for us to compete with other countries for foreign trade, and try to persuade the workers that any such change would in the end be ruinous to themselves. But in Mill's "Principles of Political Economy" this very question is argued at great length and with marvellous cogency, and his results are held to be indisputable and form an essential part of the modern science of Political Economy. First, in Book III., chap, iv., he shows that wages are not an element of value, except in so far as they vary from one employment to another. In chap. xvii. of the same book he shows that cost of production does not regulate international values, the profitable interchange of commodities between difierent countries being determined, not by their absolute, but by their comparative, cost of production. Then, further on, in chap, xxv., he discusses the effect of wages on the competition of countries in foreign markets, and states, as a general conclusion : " General low wages never caused any country to undersell its rivals, nor did general high wages ever hinder it from doing so.'^ If any one will carefully study the chapters which lead up to this conclusion, he will be forced to admit that it is correct, and it is, in fact, one of the acknowledged results of that science to which the capitalist and the legislator continually appeal when it serves their pur- THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE 209 pose. But in all the discussions for many years past as to shorter hours or a general rise in wages, I have never seen a single reference to it, either in the press or in Parliament ; but, on the contrary, the exploded bugbear of "loss of foreign trade" has been, and still is, perpetually put forward, and, in their ignorance, accepted by many of the workers, as if it were a truth of Political Economy, instead of being its very opposite ! Let us now briefly summarise the methods by which the horrible inequality in the distribution of the wealth which is annually created by the working portion of the community can be remedied ; and to such as may think my proposals too radical I commend the dictum of J. S, Mill, to the effect that, when gigantic evils are to be remedied, small measures and petty palliatives are useless, for such measures do not produce even a small effect ; they usually produce none at all, or even increase the evil, I propose, then, as alone adequate to grapple with the evil : — 1. That the land must be devoted to the use of all on equal terms, and especially to those who are willing themselves to cultivate it. By doing this we shall bring about a more equable distribution of the popula- tion, a maximum of production from the soil, and a far closer relation between producer and consumer. This will be true economy, and will most certainly conduce to morality, to health, and to happiness. 2. We must also aim at abolishing the relations 210 THE NEW PARTY of capitalist and labourer, of master and workman, by insuring that each labourer may himself become a capitalist; that in all small industries the employer and employed — the maker and the consumer — shall deal directly with each other; while manufacture on a larger scale may be effected by numerous associations of workmen utilising their own capital and labour. 3. And, lastly, we must check individual indebted- ness as a means of carrying on business, and cease to enforce the payment of unsecured debts ; while we must gradually get rid of all the funded debts of kingdoms, states, cities, and companies, because they inevitably lead to hurtful speculation, to the growth of million- aires, and the plunder of the public. If some such fundamental remedies as those now suggested are not adopted, or at least fully and freely discussed with a view to their speedy adoption, the perennial struggle between capital and labour will continue with ever-increasing intensity, and the far more drastic proposals of Socialists and Communists, involving perhaps immediate confiscation of property and widespread ruin of individuals, will certainly gain increased support, and may ultimately be forced upon the legislature by the united power of labour organisa- tions and social reformers. But to avoid this danger, no petty palliatives, no extension of the sphere of charity, will suffice ; and I claim for my proposals the character of true conservative reform, inasmuch as they are calculated to bring about THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF THE FUTURE 211 a more equable distribution of wealth and of well- being with a minimum of social disturbance, and by methods which are strictly equitable, and are founded on the great principle of the equality of RIGHTS and OPPORTUNITIES for all the citizens of a free community. Alfred R. Wallace. "^ regard for their oiun security compels all free states to transform all around them into free states like themselves, and thus, for the sake of their oivn ivelfare, to extend the empire of cidture over barbarism, and freedom over slavery .'' — Johann Gottlieb Fichte. KESTORED SCOTLAND It would serve a good purpose, we think, if for a season we could get away from the storm of political passion which surround the simple and innocent words " Home Rule," to consider some of the higher aspects of historical and political life. The student of history must be struck with the extraordinary activity displayed by small peoples, and the amount of work they have done for the progress of the human family, as compared with the great empires that have held sway over such multitudes of men. Palestine, Egypt, Greece, the Italian Republics of the Middle Ages, the Dutch Re- public, and last, but not least, Scotland, have done so much for art, literature, science, and religion, that there must be something in the form of society in these small states particularly favourable to the growth of genius. To cover the whole subject, however, would go far beyond the limits of this Essay, so we will con- fine our attention to a brief sketch of the history of Scotland, and show reasons, in our opinion, for the pre- servation of the national life of that singularly gifted country. As we must, in such a sketch, refer to the wars between England and Scotland, we may at once state that the feeling of ill-will engendered between the two peoples by centuries of war and mutual injuries 214 THE NEW PARTY inflicted has happily now left not a single atom of rancour between the two peoples. We are brothers now, the only rivalry between us being who will do he most to promote the welfare of their respective peoples In this there is a singular contrast between Ireland and England, which can only be accounted for by the failure of Ireland to maintain her independence. The kingdom of Scotland claims to be one of the oldest, if not the oldest monarchy in Europe. Erom a volume of the Scottish Acts of Parliament, published at Edinburgh in the reign of Charles the Second, we note a table of all the Kings of Scotland, beginning with Fergus the First, who is said to have reigned 330 years before the birth of Christ, and to have been a contemporary of Alexander the Great. There is no doubt there is a great deal of fable mixed up with the early history of Scotland, and we only refer to it now to demonstrate a fact that there has been a kingdom of Scotland stretching back till it is lost in the dim mists of tradition. Nor was this ancient people who so stubbornly asserted their independence barbarous and illiterate, as some ignorantly suppose ; for at a very early date in their history they embraced the pure doctrines of the Chris- tian religion, and established a native Church of their own, the Culdee, which was afterwards extinguished by the more powerful order of the Roman priesthood. This early Church gave birth to St. Patrick, the mis- sionary who converted Ireland. When we come nearer to the times of authentic history, we find, in the reign RESTORED SCOTLAND 215 of Alexander III. in the thirteenth century, that Scot- land had attained to a proud position of advancement in learning, art, and science. In that reign there flourished two remarkable men — Michael Scott of Balwearie and Thomas of Erceldoun, the former a philosopher and student of nature, an ancient Dar- winian, the latter a poet and Romancer, whose works formed the delight of the polite society of his day, and w ho was a favourite not alone in Scotland, but in most of the countries of the Continent. Sir Patrick Spens was the Lord High Admiral, and we have reason to believe that Scotland at that remote period was as much in advance in the art of shipbuilding as the Scotland of the present day is over other nations. Such was the state of Scotland when the unfortunate death of Alex- ander plunged her into a sea of woes, and gave rise to centuries of war between England and Scotland. The attempt of Edward the First to conquer Scotland brought out the stuff that was in the people, and gave birth to the noblest patriot the world ever saw — Sir William Wallace. Such a life as his could only have one end — martyrdom ; and to England attaches the eternal shame of putting him to a cruel death after he had fallen into their hands by the action of the traitor Menteith. The battles of Stirling Bridge and Bannock- burn are the two greatest military events in Britain. It was the vindication of right against might, and had more to do with the formation of British character than superficial observers care to admit. It is not necessary for our purpose that we should dwell upon 2i6 THE NEW PARTY the three hundred years of war between Scotland and England. The effect upon the former country was to strip her of everything but freedom. The Scottish people were poor beyond anything ever dreamt of in our day and generation, but they illustrated the fact that riches is not needed to make a people great. During these terrible stormy times the Parliament of Scotland framed a set of laws that have stood the test of time, and are to this day the admiration of the jurist of Europe. They meted out equal justice to all men, pro- tected the poor from the oppression of the rich, re- strained the criminal, and encouraged the virtuous in grood deeds. As far back as 1616 education was not only free, but compulsory, a position not attained in England till the nineteenth century. The titles of these Acts are so instructive and honourable to the Scottish nation that we quote them here in full : — " SCHOOLES." "That all Barrens and Free-holders of substance put their eldest sons and Airs to schooles, to learn Latine and Arts and Jure, that they may understand the Laws under the pain of twentie 2'>ounds. "That all schooles, and colleges, be reformed and none admitted to instruct the youth privately or openly bvit such as shall be tried by the Superintendents and Vesitours of the Kirk." "Ratification of the Act of Council, tenth December 1616, for planting of schools and the Bishop of the Diocesie with consent of the Heretors and most part of the Parochiners, or if the Heretors refuse with consent of most part of the Parochiners to lay a stent on every plovigh for maintenance of the said Schooles and Letters, are ordained to be direct at the school -master's instance, &c. And RESTORED SCOTLAND 217 if there be any complaint the Lords of Council are to hear and determine. "That none be admitted to teach any public school without Licence of the Ordinary." Not only were schools provided for, but care was taken that there should be competent Teachers pro- vided to give instruction, and no one was permitted to set up a school unless he could prove he was competent to perform the work. The wars of the Covenanting times were simply the vindication of Scottish independence against the intrusion of the English Church, for side by side with the political war between the two countries there was an ecclesiastical war. The Bishops of the Church of England at a very early period of our history did their best to subject the Scottish people to their dominion, and when James and his son, Charles, became Anglified Scots, this ecclesiastical war was renewed. The Pres- byterian Church was too republican and democratic in its forms of government to suit the taste of the despotic James. From that quarrel sprang our modern liberty. The Parliament of England got timely aid from the Scots, which enabled them to overcome the Cavaliers, and establish the Commonwealth. The rigid, and in some respects senseless, rule of the Puritans brought about the Restoration, and for a time arrested the progress of freedom. The Revolution which put William and Mary upon the throne opened up a new era in our history. The Presbyterian Church was firmly established as the State Church of Scotland. 3i8 THE NEW PARTY In the controversy over the Church in the present . day there is a great mistake in comparing the Estab- lished Church of Scotland ^Yith the Church in Ireland and Wales. These churches were the English Church in Ireland and Wales ; had the Scottish Covenanters failed they would have been in the same position. The Church of Scotland is the Church of the people of Scotland in the same degree as the Church of Eng- land is the Church of the English people. Had that grave political blunder— we would be justi- fied in calling it a crime— the incorporating Union of 1707 not been made, there is little doubt that Scotland would have attained her present position one hundred years earlier. What benefit did that Union bring to Scotland? None! What evils did it bring? Innumer- able ! It destroyed free trade ; it rent the Church into hostile and bitterly opposed factions ; it gave rise to absenteeism ; it produced two bloody wars, one in 171 5 and another in i745- They are generally called re- bellions, but it would be more correct to style them protests against the loss of their Parliamentary rights. It took nearly one hundred years for these ferments to settle down, and it was only at the close of the eigh- teenth century, and the beginning of the nineteenth, that the people of Scotland had an opportunity of turning their attention to the development of the re- sources of their country. The honourable place Scots- men have taken in these victories of peace is so well known as to need no further reference on our part. A hard, laborious life, and a struggle with adversity, RESTORED SCOTLAND 219 makes strong men, and what is true of individuals is true of nations. Never had a people a more terrible training than the Scots, but their capacity to make their mark in the world is due to that training. The day of adversity is past — it remains to be seen how we will bear prosperity. It is here that there is so much to fear. The Parliamentary arrangements for Scotland are such as to preclude any healthy national feeling. The whole machinery of government removed four hundred miles from the capital, and mixed up with the business of a world-wide empire, renders all intelligent government in Scotland impossible. The people, unable to direct the public life of their country, have let it drift in London, and our members have been content to ally themselves to the various English parties. The pursuit of wealth has engrossed the minds of the middle classes in Scotland, the pursuit of pleasure in England of the upper classes, and the last remaining hope of the national life lies with its working population. The national spirit is all but extinct, so that the Scotland of to-day is inhabited by a race of mean men, rich in houses and lands, but poor in spirit. Unless the efforts of those who desire to restore our Parliament and national life be successful, the glory of Scotland will be a thing of the past, and, like the Greeks of the Middle Ages, a Scot will be the byword and scorn of Europe. The primary aim, then, of a Scottish Nationalist is to restore to his country her Parliament and executive government, and here we cannot help quoting a sentence from a letter 220 THE NEW PARTY we addressed to Mr. Gladstone in 1886 on the Home Kule Question as pertinent to our present remarks. •' I humbly submit that the extinction of the Nationality of Scotland would not only be a great evil in itself, but a serious blow to the British Empire, for the spirit of a people once broken, their genius will decay, and the fame of their former history will only give a sharper sting to the scorn with which they will be deservedly treated. Material prosperity will be a poor salve for the loss of honour, for it is conceivable that a nation, like an individual, might be very rich, yet steeped to the lips in infamy." It is then to arrest this decay that the Scottish Nationalists are so earnest over Home Rule. The restoration of self-government to Scotland is only a means to an end, and here it would not be amiss to pause and consider what are the true func- tions of government. When we submit ourselves to law we surrender a portion of our liberty, but it is only to secure the greater portion. If every man did that which he thought good in his own eyes we would have licence, not liberty. But for all that, the less Government interferes with individual liberty the better. The law should, of course, protect the weak from the strong, but it is equally clear that the strong should not be subjected to the caprice of the weak. The true busi- ness of Government is to preserve order, and secure that each individual shall have freedom to exercise his talents to the best advantage. Governments as a rule have the major part of their time taken up either in RESTORED SCOTLAND 221 wars of offence or defence, bnt by the federal arrange- ment proposed for the British islands all snch questions will be managed by a British Parliament, as well as all the external business of the United Empire. For the first time then in history the Scottish Parliament would be enabled to give its exclusive attention to those social questions that bulk so largely in the well-being of a people. While laying down no dogmatic opinions on the many schemes that reformers and would-be reformers will press upon such an assembly, we may be permitted to point out some of the more crying evils which afHict the body politic. One of the most signal marks of the failure of civilisation is what is technically called the lapsed classes. While wealth, luxury, refinement, and splendour abound in our midst, we go down to the slums of our large cities, and we are appalled at the squalor and misery in which thousands of our fellow- citizens live. While trade is flourishing and fortunes are being made, these unhappy creatures are always the same. If you inquire at any of them they will tell you the times are cruel bad, and that they can find no work to do. You exert yourself to find them work, and perhaps succeed in getting some benevolent em- ployer to give them a chance. The result is generally the same, they are incompetent, idle, or depraved, and are discharged in a few days. The most melancholy feature of this class is that they bring into the world multitudes of children to live a cheerless if not a criminal and degraded life. The demagogue makes 222 THE NEW PARTY capital out of the misery of these poor creatures : he points to the palaces of the rich and then to the hovels of the poor. Look, he says, upon this picture and upon that, and pours out a whole flood of pernicious nonsense about the hard-heartedness and selfishness of the upper classes. While it may freely be admitted that the well-to-do classes know little of the manner in which their poor neighbours live, it is equally certain that many heroic efforts have been made to raise the lapsed. Not unfrequently these efforts have done more harm than good, and seeing this the workers throw up their hands in a kind of despair. From this class spring the habitual offenders, to look after which our police are chiefly required. We do not now refer to the criminal classes, but to petty offenders, drunken- ness, assaults, and petty thefts. Time after time they appear in our pohce courts, and are fined or imprisoned till such sentences become a mockery of justice and positively cruel. They have lost all restraint and are morally insane. A session of Parliament would not be ill spent in devising some means of reclaiming these poor creatures. We have reformatories for children, we need them as much for adults. Scotland has round her shores many islands, one of which could be made a natural place of detention where, with pure air and kindly treatment, they would be taught self-respect and industrious habits. To restore the labouring population to the soil, and arrest the flow of country people into our large towns, would also be a very proper subject for a Scottish RESTORED SCOTLAND 223 Parliament to consider. It is alleged that our High- lands have been depopulated to make sporting ground for the stranger. These are matters of proof, and no consideration for the owners of the land should prevent an Act being passed to enable a virtuous peasantry to live upon the soil of their native country. Laws that have been enacted in restraint of natural laws should be abolished. Primogeniture and entail are notable examples, but something more seems to be needed to procure a proper distribution of wealth. In France a man is not allowed to disinherit his children unless for certain well-defined offences against parental rule, which has to be proved to the satisfaction of a judge. The result of this beneficent law is, that there are fewer large fortunes and less abject misery in France than in this country. To promote sobriety, and check the pernicious ex- cesses of our countrymen, would naturally claim the attention of the legislature. To guard the interests and protect the lives of our toilers of the sea would be held to be the imperative duty of every Scottish Govern- ment. The catalogue might be stretched out indefinitely, but we have shown, in what we have stated, the kind of business that would fall to the National Assembly. Man has other than mere material wants ; he has spiritual as well as corporeal desires, and the Govern- ment that ignores these, misses the most important part of its business. Among the other evils that fell upon Scotland by the incorporating Union of 1707, the migration of some of her best sons is by far the 224 ^H£ ^'^^^' P'-^^TY worst. The coiintr}- has been drained of its intellec- tual force, and thousands of eminent Scotsmen have o-iven their life's work to the service of England. They have been drawn to London by an iiTesistible force, and the fame of their exploits, as well as the material advantages, has been reaped by a country that neither gave them birth nor education. We do not hesitate to affirm that Scotland has lost more from this source of evil, this invidious conquest, than from any other calamity that has befallen her. The British Government, in their relation ^o science and art. have acted the part of barbarians. While millions are annually lavished upon preparations for war, and vast sums and princely fortunes are made by law or arms, literature and art is left to struggle with the uncertain- ties of commerce, which having no higher aim than the accumulation of wealth, will bestow a richer reward upon the author of a silly novel than on the creator of an epic poem. It is no disparagement to the English to say, that the Scots are a more spiritual people than they are. The large infusion of Celtic blood in their veins gives a fire to their genius, which is less apparent in the more phlegmatic Englishman. It is then a reason- able expectation that the vScottish Government would devote a considerable amount of its energies and wealth to promote the intellectual and spiritual side of our nature. The wealthy patrons of art would re- turn to the capital of their country, and the private palaces they would occupy would at once stimulate RESTORED SCOTLAND 225 architecture, while the sculptor and painter would adom the interior of their homes. The romantic site and present graces of Edinburgh would inspire their genius, while the beautiful stone of which the city is built, would give permanence as well as grandeur to their conceptions. The music of Scotland, for the most part Celtic in its origin, has been considered by competent judges to be of a high order of merit, but of late years the fi-eaks of fashion have consigned these gems to the amusement of the vulgar. While in no way disputing the merits of the more stately music of Germany and Italy, it seems to us the exclu- sive study of foreign models is not the way to cultivate the art of music in Scotland. Genius must find its inspiration from its every-day surroundings ; and were encoui-agement given to the art in the capital of Scotland, and the musical Professor in the chair founded by General Eeid, himself a Scottish composer, supplemented by able teachers, a Scottish opera would spring up in our midst. The well-known lyrical genius of our poets would surely provide something better in the shape of words than the trash to which some of the finest music of the continent is set. While music has such charms that few can resist its influence, the dramatic art appeals to a wider field of thought and feeling. From certain adverse circum- stances, that highest branch of the art of poetry has had Httle or no existence in Scotland. The Scottish Government would not be slow to take a lesson from France, and establish a State theatre after the Theatre p 226 THE A'£ir PARTY Franoais, whose efforts in promoting the dramatic art have been so successful, that half the theatres of Europe live by adapting their works to their own stage. This age, above all others, has been noted for its scientific attainments, its mechanical inventions, and the power by which the forces of nature have been made to be the servants of man. Scotsmen have not been behind the inhabitants of other nations in this good work, but too often their labours have been lost to their country. It would not be too much to expect our Government to encourage these men of genius to stay at home. There arc many waj's in which they could win fame and fortune in Scotland. Electricity is admitted by all to be the coming force which will supersede steam. The configuration of Scotland, with its numerous cascades and rapid llowing streams, seems formed by nature for the manufacture of electric power and the establishment of factories where no smoke would pollute the air. Rugged and bare are the granite peaks that stand out against the sky, barren and bleak are the moors that he at the foot of the mountains where the brown water oozes through the peat moss. The howling wind, the cry of the plover, the whirr of the grouse, alone disturb the silence of this wilderness. Such is the aspect of three-fourths of Scotland, and against such obstacles have our horticulturists and foresters had to fight, and in addition to these evils a sour and fickle climate. It is a stern school, but they have RESTORED SCOTLAND 227 learned their lesson well. These experts tell us that our climate would be softened, the bleak and barren glens clothed with beauty, if they were planted with the hardy trees they know so well how to rear. It is an effort beyond the power of private enterprise ; the Government must do it or it will never be done, for no present gain could be expected ; future generations of Scotsmen would reap the harvest which we un- selfishly prepared for them. With Scotland's Parliament and Government restored to her, with her nobles residing in their own capital, with her Church united in bonds of amity and peace, with the talent and genius of her sons devoted to the honour and glory of their country, Scotland would take her place among the great nations of the world, jjreat, not because of their numbers, but by reason of their virtue. Not Paris, nor Berlin, nor Rome, nor any other capital in the world, would be superior to the romantic seat of Scotland's genius. Fighting a noble battle against ignorance, superstition, and vice, a page in the history of the world would be written such as has not been seen since the age of Pericles. Is this the day dream of an enthusiast ? If it be so, and such dreams visit us during the watches of the night, then may we sleep on for ever ! Charles AVaddik. (iLKNIFFKR HOUSK, EdINP.IRGH, j,tli April 1S94. " The ivliole freedom of man consists either in sjnritual or civil liberty . . . and advancements of every person according to his merit ; the enjoyment of those never more certain, and the access to these never more o]Den, than in a Free Commonwealth. Both of which, in my opinion, m^ay he best and soonest obtained, if every county in the land ivere made a kiiid of subordinate Commonalty or CommomveaJtliJ' — Milton. THE VOICE FROM THE RURAL WILDERNESS (Wiltshire) One afternoon this spring a choral service, by the aggregate parish choirs of perhaps the most thoroughly rural diocese in England, was attended by a throng that even Salisbury Cathedral could not give full admittance to. The prophetic song of the mother of the Carpenter of Nazareth was chanted by the fresh voices of upwards of tw^o thousand young people, mostly children of the rural worker, and floated among the arches in notes of triumph. As reverberating down the aisles the words caught the ear — " He hath put down the mighty from their seats, And hath exalted tlie humble and meek. He hath tilled the hungry with good things. And the rich He hath sent empty away;" one could not but feel how woefully unfulfilled they were as regards the lives and prospects of many of the singers and their families. Then, too, the beautiful fane itself, fairer and fresher and more stable after six or seven centuries than many a Victorian gothic monstrosity after less than as many decades, aroused the thought that if we are no longer successful minster-builders we may, if we will, build shrines no less worthy and, in a real sense, divine. If, in the near 230 THE NEW PARTY future, the homes that dot the landscape with dilapi- dated picturesqueness were to be replaced with others, not necessarily less artistic without, but capacious and comfortable, and wholesome within, as fit, in short, for the habitation of human beings as the kennels of Badminton and Quorn are for hounds, we shall effec- tively serve those with whom the Carpenter identifies Himself It is, in some such spirit, we would invite attention to the case of the rural worker. By those, who, at the present time, are eloquent concerning the woes of the laixdlord and the farmer, resulting from the miserable condition of agriculture, we are given to understand that the labourer is enjoy- ing a state of freedom and prosperity never before heard of, which moreover would be wonderfully in- creased if the Giovernment could be induced to reduce all charges on the land and favour Fair Trade and Bi-metallism. A glance, necessarily brief, at the economic history of the labourer, however, scarcely bears out this roseate view as to his present status. The golden age of the labourer was undoubtedly the latter part of the fifteenth century. Then fifteen weeks' work enabled him to abundantly provision himself and his family for twelve months. Thence to the end of the eighteenth century, when, although his fare was meagreness itself, his expenses exceeded his income by ;^I2, 13s. a year, his history is one long record of the most tyrannical oppression at the hands of the landed classes, who were ably supported in their miserable work by the farmers and the parsons. Now the coinage was VOICE FROM THE RURAL WILDERNESS 231 debased, causing a rise of 1 50 per cent, in prices, while the rate of wages remained the same. Then the guilds were broken up and their capital seized. Again the usage was introduced of fixing the labourers' wages at quarter sessions, always at as low a rate as possible, and heavy were the penalties should a man attempt to demand a higher rate than that fixed. By various common enclosures the labourer was robbed of his heritage in his native soil. The old poor law indeed professed to befriend him by finding work, but the so- called help was worse than a mockery — it degraded his manhood, because it made a life-long pauper of him. The Law of Settlement tied him to the soil, and a prohibitive Corn Law starved him amid abundant harvests. During the same period the landlords, while clinging to all their rights, and indeed magnifying them, gradually divested themselves of their hereditary liabilities and ancient services, transferring those dues, 7iot the benefits, to the shoulders of the poor by means of the indirect taxation of the Excise, &c., and, to quote Thorold Kogers — " To crown the Avhole, the penalties of felony and conspiracy were denounced against all labourers who associated together to better their lot by endeavouring to sell their labour in concert, while the desperation which poverty and misery induce, and the crime they suggest, were met by a code more sanguinary and brutal than any which a civilised nation had heretofore devised, or a high- spirited one submitted to." During this period, while the plight of the labourer was a growing woe, the landlord's rents went up by 232 THE NEW PARTY leaps and bounds. The plea so often heard to-day, that higher rents and prices would mean higher wages, cannot, at least under the current economy, be justified by the story of the past. It should be borne in mind that land which, in the "Golden Age" before referred to, was let at 6d. per acre, was in 1770 let at los. per acre, a rise of twenty times ; whilst during the same period the price of wheat had risen six and a half times, and the price of labour only three and a half times, which, moreover, included the extra earnings of harvesting. Later on, from 1770 to 1850, rents rose to 35s. per acre, and in the northern counties, owing to the spread of manufacturing industry, the wages of the labourer during the same period increased 100 per cent. This rise, however, was only local, for in the purely agricultural counties, such as Wiltshire, wages remained absolutely stationary. Thus we are confronted with the fact that, while the great improve- ments in agricultural methods permitted an increase of over 300 per cent, in rents, those improvements did not benefit the southern labourer one iota. During the period 1 850-1 872, there was a further average increase of rents to the extent of 26^ per cent., during which time there was also an increase of wages by 35 per cent.; but it should be remembered that while the increase of the rental was on a previously high one, the increase of the wages was on what was literally semi-starvation. To sum up the tale of four hundred years, agricultural rents rose eighty- eight times, while wages rose but six times. As Gibbins VOICE FROM THE RURAL WILDERNESS 233 states, " The enormous rise in rents was not by any means due solely to increase of skill in agricultural industry, but was largely derived from increased economy in production, or, in other words, from the op- pression and degradation of the agricultural labourer." It must be admitted that of recent years there has been a great reduction in agricultural rents, but before the proper value is reached a still greater fall must take place. In the ." sixties" and early "seventies" many thought that the only essential to make a fortune was to take a farm, the necessity of understanding the business of farming being quite a secondary considera- tion ! As a natural consequence, whenever a farm was to let numerous applicants offered almost fabulous rents in their endeavour to outbid each other, and the landlord for the time-being reaped the benefit of this keen competition, whilst the bona fide farmer, who found himself either compelled to pay a greatly in- creased rent or give up the farm at a loss, was the one who suffered. Soon, however, it was found impossible to pay the high rents out of profits, and so they had to be paid out of capital. The result was that the farmers, owing to their growing poverty, became increasingly unable to cultivate the land properly. Undermanned and labour-starved farms, in consequence of the holdings being too large for the available capital, became more and more the rule. The crash came very soon. The landlords found, too late, that high rents had not only ruined the farmer, but, M'hat touched them more nearly, their land had, in consequence, greatly de- 234 THE NEW PARTY preciated in value. We need not be surprised that now'-a-days many farms are to be let at an exceedingly low rental, as the landlord is only anxious to let them to any man wilhng to invest his capital in them, and bring the land into a proper state of cultivation, and thereby increase value. Such a tenant will inevi- tably find that in the end his rent will be raised, and all the improvements he has made will ultimately be for the sole benefit of the landlord. Meanwhile, during this period of agricultural depression, the labourers have been drifting to the towns and mining districts. In spite of their depopulated condition, the villages still show a number of able-bodied men out of work during the winter months, and that great curse, the uncer- tainty of employment, seems likely to be more keenly felt in the near future, unless remedial steps are taken by the local authorities. From statistics carefully collected from about seventy parishes, the wages of Wiltshire labourers, including all extras such as harvest money, average about iis. 6d. per week. In this con- nection, however, it must be borne in mind that the little extra money obtained at harvest time, about which so much is written, means longer hours and much harder work on the part of the labourers, who inform us that twenty or thirty years ago the extra money was considerably more than it is at present. The nominal wage is about los. per week all the year round, although in many villages the men only earn 9s. per week during the winter months. In the " Red Van" report for 1893, published by the English Land VOICE FROM THE RURAL WILDERNESS 235 Restoration League, are to be found some most interest- ing liabourers' Budgets, showing how the wife expends her husband's weekly wage. One is given of an East Wilts labourer who is earning tlie sum of los. a week. Besides the labourer and his wife there is a family of seven children : The Peasant's Budcet. Rent . Bread . Flour . Tea . Butter Sugar Bacon Cheese Meat . Milk . Coal . Oil, candles, soap, &c. Beer and tobacco Insurance Club . Total It will be noticed that meat and milk are not taken, and no allowance is made for clothes, boots, &c. These latter are usually paid out of the extra money earned at harvest time. The children also now and then are able, at the expense of their educa- tion, to earn a few shillings, which help to make up the difference between income and expenditure. As a rule, however, a labourer witli a young family runs X. ft. I 4 6 4i 4 I 8 I 7 none none 10 7h -,1 -> J 236 THE NEW PARTY considerably into debt, and the earnings of the chil- dren, as they grow np, go to pay off old liabilities. Many a shopkeeper is compelled to write off a number of his accounts as " bad debts." We now come to the matter of the labourer's home. Usually his cottage consists of one living room down- stairs with two small bedrooms above, although cottages with only one bedroom are not uncommon. The ceilings are low, and the rooms are very draughty. In wet weather the bedrooms soon get thoroughly damp, as few of the roofs are in good condition ; sometimes, indeed, they are so bad that umbrellas have to be hung over the beds to keep off the rain. Frequently families of ten or twelve are compelled to huddle to- o-ether in two miserable rooms, for which the sum of one shilling a week is paid. A low rent certainly, but is the accommodation worth more 1 The room or loft, in which the younger members of the family sleep, is too small oftentimes to admit of bedsteads, and, in conse- quence, beds are made on the floor for the occupation of the children, — often well-grown lads and lasses. In some cases, owing to poverty or the difficulty of getting a cottage, a young married couple have to find accommodation in what may be termed the common sleeping-room. The effects of this promiscuous over- crowding, moral and physical, are deplorable. With the best disposition in the world, it is utterly im- possible in such cases for the laws of decency, not to say modesty, to be observed. In more than one village the writers have been assured that there is VOICE FROM THE RURAL WILDERNESS 237 scarcely a girl of fifteen who has not " gone wrong," and the records of the police courts are witness to the fact that incest is more common in the rural districts than may be supposed. It may be asked, Where is the Medical Officer of Health? Now and then he is in evidence in cases of notorious outbreaks of fever due to overcrowding. That he too seldom does inter- fere is due to the fact, not that he is callous or indifferent to the evil, but that being appointed over a small area, whether urban or rural, and at a miserably inadequate salary, he cannot afford to incur the risk of unpopularity with his best paying patients, by calling attention to the unsanitary condition of their property. This opinion of the writers is confirmed by a private letter, addressed to one of them on this very subject, by a chairman of one of the rural sanitary authorities of the county, in which he says : — " It, the state of things described, shows the unwisdom of appointing men to that office (i.e., Medical Officer of Health) who depend on private practice, and I have long seen how desirable it is that such an appointment should be for so large an area and salary, as would make him inde- pendent of local or undue influence, and most capable men have told me there is no difficulty in getting such, one saying he would prefer a 2^ublic appointment of four, five, or six hundred pounds a-year, to a countrv practice of the same or larger amount." The tenure of the labourer's home is a matter de- serving of careful attention. In many villages, nearly 238 THE NEW PARTY all the cottages are in the hands of the farmers, who, being able to turn out the occupants at a fortnight's notice, have a power over their labourers which they use as a means of lowering wages, of restraining them from taking a prominent part in political or social movements, and in other ways practically reducing them to a state which has most of the evils, and none of the advantages, of serfdom. A frequent result of this insecurity of cottage tenure is to deter the labourer from taking an allotment which is a yearly holding. As a result of the poverty or indifference of the landlord, and the farmer having often but a yearly tenancy, the sanitary conditions of many of the cottages, apart from those before referred to, are simply disgraceful. Drainage is often an unknown quantity, and the water supply inefficient or polluted, or both. Man has been defined as a recreative animal ; but for the villager, there is practically no provision made for wholesome amusement. In a few villages there are some good reading-rooms, but these are very rare. The only means, as a rule, of recreation and social inter- course is the public-house, the interior of which is generally not lovely, either from an artistic or other point of view ! This being so, it is not surprising that the strong temptation to spend their evenings there has had a veiy bad effect on the labourers in many of the villages. As the results of Mr. Charles Booth's inquiry into the whole matter of the aged poor will doubtless be VOICE FROM THE RURAL WILDERNESS 239 more or less familiar to most of our readers by the time these pages meet their eyes, we do not purpose to enter into this part of the subject. Suffice to say, the prospect of the aged labourer and his wife is sad and cheerless enough to touch every heart whose sensibi- lities have not been deadened or staled by custom. Sometimes after upwards of forty or fifty years of faithful service on a farm, notice to leave the cottage home is served because the house is needed, and indeed is the only one available for an efficient successor to the old people's labours. Then there is no refuge except the already too crowded cottage of a son or daughter, or the chill discomfort and homelessness of the workhouse. Such, briefly and imperfectly, but, to the best of our endeavour, truthfully, is the history and present state of the condition of the agricultural labourer, whose toil is or ought to be, and, under proper conditions, might be the strong foundation upon which the wel- fare of the country should rest. What are the pros- pects of the betterment of those conditions ? Let us see. From the Parish and District Councils the labourer has been led to expect great things. It is much to be hoped that he will not meet with sore disappointment. In villages where trade unionism is strong, and the men have been accustomed to think for themselves, good results are sure to take place. In those villages, however, where no union exists, and where the men have been coerced to being led by the nose, they will, at 240 THE NEW PARTY anyrate for some time to come, go on much as they are at present, and the trinity of squire, parson, and farmer will continue to manage, or rather mismanage, affairs as of old. This will the more certainly take place in some villages, owing to the petty jealousy, easy to understand, though to be deplored, that is rampant in their midst. There are too many labourers who, as a consequence of distrust, partly due to ignorance, partly to fear, will neither take a prominent part in local matters themselves nor support any of their fellow - labourers who may be willing to take the lead. Education will doubtless in time break down this great barrier to progress ; but until the labourers have learned, through their common brotherhood in misfortune, need, and aspiration, the lesson and neces- sity of unionism, jealousy will prove a most serious stumbling-block. The entire dependence upon their employer, the farmer, consequent upon the tied cottage system, will also prove an obstacle to the free action and expression of opinion on the part of the labourer at the parish meeting or Parish Council. If the new Act is to succeed in fostering local patriotism, it must be supplemented by some measure giving the local authority power to acquire existing cottages and erect new ones where requisite, and let them to the labourer with complete fixity of tenure, so long as the rent is paid, as is the case in Ireland to-day. ' Then, too, the Parish Council should have powers to erect mills, smithies, implement works, and so forth, and, with the gradual extension of allotments and small hold- VOICE FROM THE RURAL WILDERXESS 241 ings, it might purchase and let out at a reasonable hire those more expensive agricultural machines, the need of which would become greater as the principle of co- operation spreads, as we hope it will, to the tenants of small holdini2:s. This communal holdinsr of threshers, steam-ploughs, &c., is in practice in Belgium to-day, to the great advantage of the small farmer. As paving the way in this direction, we are convinced that a practical acquaintance with the principles of co-opera- tion would be of immense advantage to the rural labourer, and should hail with satisfaction an attempt to establish a co-operative store in every village. The necessary committee of management would be a capital training of its members in business methods and affairs in general. The temptation of running into, some- times, lifelong hampering debt would largelv be re- moved, and the obligation of cash payments for the necessaries of life would bring pressure to bear on those farmers who only pay fortnightly, and sometimes even then not in full. We have, moreover, evidence that the presence of the manager of the stores, indepen- dent of farmer or parson, has been of great advantage to a village, quickening its activity and life. Doubt- less, in some localities, there would be a good deal of apathy and prejudice to be overcome on the part of the cottager, but difficulties only exist to be over- come, and the advantage in ever}- way, educational and economic, is so patent as to be worthy of per- sistent agitation and endeavour. In every county there should be agricultural schools Q 242 THE NEW PARTY and colleges, access to which should be made easy to the children of the labourer, and where they, well looked after as to food and health, should learn the most advanced systems of practical husbandry, the making of implements, and cognate branches of agri- cultural industry. A\'hile on eveiy hand the landlord and the large farmer tell us that farming does not pay, the holder of allotments tells us it does pay. One example out of many may suffice. In a district where farms are let at 7s. 6d. per acre, and even then going out of cultivation, labourers have acre allotments, situ- ated neither on the worst nor the best land, in a rather exposed situation, and for which they pay ;^2 per acre, and they, on mixed crops, make a clear profit of from ;/^5, I OS. to £6, I OS. per acre. The results lately pub- Hshed as to the small holdings on Lord Carrington's estate, in another part of the country, confirm us in the opinion, founded on the fewer instances that we are conversant with in Wiltshire, that, given a real interest and secure tenure of the soil, the labourer, gradually transformed into the small holder under the local authority, will again restore productiveness to the land, and prosperity to agricultural pursuits — a pro- sperity, not the selfish monopoly of any overlord, but his own — and, through him, a substantial blessing to the nation at large. While recognising the need for allotments for the labourer under present conditions, we do not disguise from ourselves the fact that they are but means by which the already overworked worker, by further toil. VOICE FROM THE RURAL WILDERNESS 243 seeks to obtain some portion of his unpaid earnings. The classes in present possession of the land have shown a growing unfitness for the high trust com- mitted to them, as is evidenced by the present agri- cultural breakdown. The people, as a whole, must gradually resume their rights in the soil, and perfonn those duties which ineptitude, greed, and arrogance have passed by. We look forward to the time when communal farming of the nation's laud shall be the rule, and when the children of the present down-trodden peasant shall bring their strength and wisdom, and secure independence to remunerative work on the sun-kissed hills and the fertile vales. Then, when the earth is recognised as the Lord's, and the in- heritance of all His children, and not merely of a handful of grasping landlords, shall she yield her abundant increase for the welfare of all, and the wail of the labourer change into a happy song of joy and hope. Moreover, we dream of the time when the man- sions and palaces amid the fair parks, at present but the intermittent stopping-places of their possessors, shall be inhabited by happy communities of earnest workers, or become the peaceful retiring homes of their declinins^ years, and sometimes the guest house of the city toiler who will there seek recuperative rest amid the songs and silences of nature. For, and as our final word, we would emphasise our growing conviction, confirmed by constant and familiar intercourse with the Wiltshire peasant, that, behind all the just discontent with his present economic conditions, there is a feeling that not 244 ^^^ ^^^^ PARTY merely is he starved physically and robbed materially, but, moreover, he is thereby dwarfed intellectually and morally, and robbed of manhood. On his behalf, we appeal to the higher statesmanship to help him in his search for a fuller and more gracious life. E. Potter Hall. John S. Hamilton. OUR MANUFACTURES {From three points of view.) I . The Master's. " O LET US make more of the beautiful glaze ; It is so pretty, and how it pays ! If it gives the makers a fatal fit, Why, we don't compel them to work at it. But if they didn't, they'd starve, you say ; Well, you mustn't look at it quite that way ; You bring it too near you, some distance off, You never would notice the toiler's cough;" (Or young lives mixed with the polished stuff) " Ours the enamel most in vogue ;" (Respectable, showy, and smooth as a rogue) " O the beautiful glaze, O the beautiful glaze ! One must live, you know, and it pays, it pays ! If a man the church of his God endows With a part of the income that grows and grows From an honest and useful industry. Goes in too for philanthropy, He's sure to be saved when he comes to die — That's if he believes what a Christian should — Though our nature's corrupt, you may call him good. 246 THE NEW PARTY " O I'm sorry to hear that girl is dead, But it's nonsense about the poison of lead ; My wife sent her some stuff when she seemed to be failing, And every one knows the cause of her ailing. Why, we've complied with all the rules Laid down by the experts in government schools ; But civilisation ever grew By the many giving their lives for a few ; Consult your science ; unjust, or odd, That's Nature's law, and the will of God. Then we've mostly girls of the lowest class, Or those who've come to a terrible pass, But they're all from a healthy neighbourhood ; None are engaged whose health's not good. For delicate women could never grapple With our — but excuse me, I'm off to chapel — You ask what Christ would say to it all ? Ah, but you are so very unpractical ! Our parson's preaching about the slaves, And we're sending out the Book that saves ; But the horrors are more than one can stand ; Thank CTod, we live in a Christian land !" 2. The Workman-Lover's. " A strong girl coffined in her teens , She lies where yonder blinds are down . Her death a legal murder means, Though that the murderers won't own. OUR MANUFACTURES 247 A poor weak widow was the mother, Who slaved and slaved for children's food ; Too young were sister and boy-brother To help that eldest of the brood, Who earned fair wages at this work, And trusting in her strength and youth Laughed at the danger, she'd not shirk. But mineral poisons feel no ruth. They kill with torture ; first she seemed Drowsed when she came home at night ; Yet standing at the door, they deemed. Would freshen her up a bit ; and light Her song as ever was, they said, As she stood breathing the pure air. There on the doorstep ; more than bread And tea and butter was the fare On the table where they sat. * The wage of Alice makes us rich, * And Joe and Nell are growing fat ; ' So they laughed ; one only hitch There was, that she was growing thin, Trembled oft, and writhed with colic ; Bloodless grew the rosy skin, Dull she sat who used to frolic, And with the children change glad sallies At the social meal ; then numb Her fingers felt : ' What ails tha, Alice ? ' The widow asked ; ' tha's mostly dumb, Who was the life of all ; tha task Is killing tha, tha must not go, 248 THE NEW PARTY For parish help I'd rather ask, And what I did then, I can do. Hard pushed, I asked it once ; rude, rough They spoke to me ; of course the Board Is down on such as me ; enough ! To lose my child I can't afford/ " But go the girl would ; soon the hand From the wrist hung, helpless fell ; The doctor couldn't understand, He said, her illness very well, (That's the man the firm employ) Though he gave it some queer name. Over the cause of death they're coy. These doctors — 'tisn't far to seek — Why he attended Mary Lamb- Poor thing, she only died this week. And Polly Smith ailed much the same. Last, she foamed in fits ; then died, My girl ! and I knew not till now : Next week she would have been my bride ; She told she ailed, but not the how. Only another common life To glut the famine of our god, Civilisation ; I my wife, These child bread-winner lose ; we plod Along the old shrine's worn sacred ways, Nor note the pavements underneath. Where dance the virtuous joys we praise. Are human toilers done to death ; But Trade demands Her poisonous glaze. OUR MANUFACTURES 249 And O how well it pays, it pays ! Die, love-light from a maiden's eyes, Into that enamel smooth, Flash there in advertising lies ; A very fair re-birth, in sooth ! We flourish, feeding on the youth Of those low virgins, vampires all, A viler kind of cannibal ; For though the State in mockery Provide cap, mask, and overall. Still our victims droop and die. The mothers, weeping by the daughters, Cleanse their corpses from pollution ; They whom the manufacture slaughters, Crave a kindly hand's ablution, For even the Coroner forbade The Attendant in the court to shake Out clothes on those young bodies laid, Whose pores drank in the lethal cake Toil-drops with powdered poison made. Ah ! soft luxuriant hair whose wave My fingers loved, defiled with dust, More deadly than drink Borgia gave To satiate revenge or lust ! Her hair was powdered thick ; you know Court ladies used to wear it so. Her breast was white a month ago. They soiled it with their mortal crust. Yet her heart remained like snow ! The vile blue line is on her gums, 250 THE NEW PARTY Where she lies there stiff and stark ; Can the doctor, when he comes, Deny that ugly murder mark 1 But if soldiers in the breach, Forlorn hopes, in their desperate deed, By free consent of all men, reach To heights heroic, though none heed. These martyred maids are heroes ; each Gives herself for human need." 3. The Poet's. A vision of sweet English girls Haunts me ; on a sunny lawn They play lawn tennis ; the fair curls Flying, their fresh face like dawn. Young eyes, clear, luminous, innocent. But now a ghastlier vision scares My senses ; yet my gaze is bent Still on English girls ; each wears A long dun cloak, her head's enwound With a red kerchief ; o'er her mouth A muffling woollen gag is bound, That makes her gasp with painful drouth, Athirst for air to breathe ; corpse-white Her bloodless face, her eyes a flame Between the muffler and the bright Head-crimson ; up a ladder came Girl after girl, and on some rude Plank platforms, one above the other. OUR MANUFACTURES 251 Each, like a phantom, silent stood, Till, while the devil's dust-storms smother, From packed shelves of a monstrous stove She snatched baked dishes of white lead ; Then down the ladder see her move. Both her arms and her young head Burdened with that load of death. As she would dash from burning house Her goods, she tore them ; while beneath Behold ! what dread twin Shapes arouse, And fan her zeal to furnace heat ? Their eyes how terrible to meet ! That Demon is called Mammon, yonder Stands Hunger ; and they goad to graves More mercilessly than for plunder Arab driver of black slaves. Mute human offerings bound for Death, Our hideous gods inhale your breath, Who burn your own lives in censers, Rich savour for the doom dispensers ! And now the whole a mighty tree, Like Igdrasil, appears, whose fruit Those fair pure girls, all gaiety, Grows from murdered maidens, root That bears them ; so the mandrake plant Men feign, when pulled, makes plague-fraught moans From underground ; here grief and want Give veritable human groans, With very curses in their tones ; Whose less fair berry is the man, 2 52 THE NEW PARTY Full paunched, sleek-faced, with wealth ill-made' From that stored acid, lead, and tan, Whom much admiring townsmen bade Make also laws in Parhament. Him in a cliff-girt place I heard Address the citizens who sent Him thither : "England's might would gird The world with her imperial arm, More races at her breast would warm Ever, grow from shore to shore " — I feared Her cankered at the core With him, and his white slaves, forbore To join the mob's acclaiming yell. When he mouthed how all was well With our great Empire ; awful fell, When human folly spake no more, The Mountain-voice, reverberate sound From hoary, hollowed rocks around. But these are lives of small account, forsooth, Make no demand on our refinement's ruth ! They are mere lowly, needy, desperate people. Ah! yet, He claims, whose name beneath your steeple Ye take in vain, robed ranters of the church. However breath of Rumoair may besmirch. Each for his sister, lost lamb, wounded one, For whom on earth he made Love's holy moan. Yet Christian manufacturer and priest Deem girls like these mere refuse (though the least Of these in sooth might well have been Christ's lother) m< OUR MANUFACTURES 253 Whom Devil's dust may innocently smother. Yea, and our greed foredooms the race, the unborn By dire death-tortures to be racked and torn ! They glorify their Christian Empire-State, But I who have seen the plague-spot, weep and wait, While Chi'ist repudiates with solemn scorn The pastors false who crown His lambs with thorn ; He turns his back on high cathedral naves, To kiss the turf upon their nameless graves. RoDEN Noel. " Hie equality of citizens, which commonly ^produces an equality in their fortunes, brings lolenty and life into every part of the body-politic, and extends them throughout the ivhole." — Montesquieu. THE RIGHT OF PEODUCTION Every morning each of the dock gates in this district (Canning Town) is besieged by hordes of gaunt and anxious men, struggling for the chance of a few hours' work. Every morning thousands are turned away, heartsick and weary, to spend another day in en- forced idleness. The Board of Trade returns show that more than three thousand of the dockers, &c., on the lists of the London Dock companies are idle daily. As these are, I am told by the leaders of the men, only about 25 per cent, of all those who seek employment, it is a moderate estimate that at least 10,000 men at the different London docks are each day without work. Every morning vast numbers of more skilled work- men tramp many miles in search of work. At home the wife is hoping and praying that she may not hear her husband's step until the evening. Day after day, week after week, often month after month, he returns dispirited and weary, thankful if he has earned a shil- ling or two at an odd job to eke out his slender store. Meanwhile his home is gradually dismantled, his ward- robe disappears, and he himself becomes more and more unfit to do the work when at last, if at all, it is found. 256 THE NEW PARTY Now there is nothing like this hopeless search for work that will not come, this daily kicking the heels at the street corners in helpless vacuity, for breaking down not only a man's constitution, but his character also. It is easy to say that it is the idle and ineffi- cient, the economically worthless, who are out of work. Grant for the moment that it is true. The question still remains — why are they apathetic? why are they drunken ? why are they economically valueless ? True, we now and then find a man of college education and good opportunities among the most " submerged," who has paid the penalty of his own faults ; but the great mass have been either born into this condition or ground into it by sheer adversity. Search out the cause of drunkenness, of inefficiency, of apathy, before you thank God you are not as the crowd. Moreover, it is not true that all, or nearly all, are of this descrip- tion. I know personally many men who are sober, upright, and skilful, who yet are " superfluous," and in the mass I have found such touching traits of unselfish helpfulness as would put many of us in better circum- stances to shame. It is utterly false to say that the reason for their being in this condition is in themselves. When they go from place to place in search of work the answer is " There is no work for you to do," if indeed it is not a simple " Get out of this," accom- panied too frequently with a hearty curse ! What does this " no work to be done " mean ? Are there not millions of rickety insanitary hovels to be replaced by healthy homes ? millions of men, women, THE RIGHT OF PRODUCTION 257 and children who need to be better clothed and shod ? millions of mouths crying out for more regular and nourishing food ? millions of grates in winter that lack fuel? and millions of other wants of body and mind that need human labour to satisfy them ? The fact is, these men are unemployed, not because there is no work, but because no man can get a j^rojit by hiring them. But why should they be hired? Why should they not set about satisfying their own and each other's wants ? Alas ! because they are barred from the land, the source of all production. Did they attempt to use the thousands on thousands of acres that are lying idle, the " private owners " would have them clapped into gaol for trespassing. They may not work on the land their God has given them, and must meanwhile pay rent for the few feet of space they must occupy, or, branded as paupers, be kept in confinement at the nation's charge, a burden instead of a help to themselves and their kind. Not only on the "out of work's" does this denial of access to the land press so grievously : but because no man is allowed to produce for himself, there is no real standard of wages. If they could do so, the value of a man's produce when working for himself at the source of production would be the minimum wage he would accept, and it would be a just one, founded on natural laws. But cut off from this, his wage is de- termined by simple pressure of numbers, artificially produced, and bears no necessary relation whatever to the value of his work. R 258 THE NEW PARTY It is, then, private ownership of land that presses so hardly on the mass of men. What is there to justify this ? If it be indeed a just thing, then all we can do is to bear it as best we may ; but unless it has a clear and unassailable defence, it is obviously a grievous iniquity, that ought not to be tolerated for a moment. Now, as soon as the moral right is examined, the claim breaks down in a moment. All serious econo- mists agree that " the essential principle of property being to assure to all persons what they have produced by their labour and accumulated by their abstinence, this principle cannot apply to what is not the produce of labour, the raw material of the earth" (Mill, Bk. II., c. 2, § 5). No man can claim the right of having brought it into existence, and it is not too much to say, that even the improvements that have been made in it have, in the vast majority of cases, been made by other people's labour and other people's money. And if there is no natural right of private ownership, there is no right of acquisition, since this can only be by conquest, bequest (including gift), or purchase. Con- quest is no right, but an atrocious w^rong, and both gift and sale are invalid, if the giver or seller has no right of ownership in the thing given or sold. There yet remains one possible justification, that, though theoretically indefensible, it might be found to produce the best practical result. Does it ? The facts show quite the reverse. (a.) It has not made the best use of the land. There must certainly be something wrong in a system which THE RIGHT OF PRODUCTION 259 allows millions of acres to be idle while millions of people are in want. Only when the land is all used and made to support the greatest number possible of people, to produce the greatest amount of food, &c., can you begin to talk of " over population." Under private ownership this limit has never been ap- proached, yet we have the millions of unemployed, and the other millions of underpaid. The fact is, private ownership of land does not even aim at this end, but merely seeks the greatest margin of profit for the individual. It is more profitable to raise half the produce if the expenses are reduced by a still greater proportion. Take a historical instance. In the fifteenth century landowners substituted sheep-farming for tillage. This so greatly reduced the number of persons employed on the land that Sir Thomas More calls English sheep " devourers of men," and further points out that this was the reason " why victuals be now in many places dearer." But the landowners were happy. The land supported fewer people by its produce, but it gave them a larger margin of profit. So it has been all through. Land has been starved of labour, that the farmer might have more margin wherewith to pay his rent. It is the reason why so much land is not cultivated to-day ; it would support starving families — it will not' pay profit and rent in addition. {h.) It has artijicially limited the market for other industries. It has placed the chief gains of production in the hands of a few, who soon satisfy their need of 26o THE NEW PARTY staple commodities. But the many who are debarred have sore need, but no money to pay for what they require. It is true that this accumulation in the hands of a few creates a market for expensive luxuries that might not otherwise be produced ; but it would be far better for the nation if the staple commodities for which there is a natural, and therefore steady demand, were purchasable by the millions according to their need. Trade would be far better if all in- comes were near the average of even only ;^200 a year, than it is with a few recipients of thousands or millions, and a mass of people in indigence. We should not then have the ghastly mockery of a plethora of goods in our warehouses just when the needs of the people are the sorest. (c.) It has separated men most injuriously into classes. Those who "toil not, neither do they spin," but take the lion's share of the national wealth with- out themselves producing aught, are regarded as the " upper classes" — superior people, with titles of honour and accumulated privileges and prerogatives, while a stigma is thrown on those who soil their hands and clothes with honourable labour, or furrow their brows with earnest thought, if they do so for the purpose of earning a living. (d.) It spoils the character of all. The so-called "independent" people (fe., those altogether dependent on other people's labour) have the strongest tempta- tions to idleness, luxurious vice, and pride. Those who are successful in trade and organising industry THE RIGHT OF PRODUCTION 261 are subject to forces that tend to make them grasping, callous to suffering, and apt to overreach. The great mass of workers are placed in circumstances that make for deterioration — physically, from hard toil and lack of proper food ; mentally, from lack of education and opportunity to exercise their faculties ; socially, from the resources of recreation being so largely restricted to the public-house and the vulgar music-hall ; morally, by being often in conditions that make even decency impossible ; spiritually, by these causes combined and the necessary convergence of all their thoughts on the sordid needs of the moment. (e.) It has made machinery a curse instead of a blessing. All labour-saving inventions should set men at leisure to enjoy life, and develop their finer faculties ; but because the mass are cut off from the right of pro- duction, and compelled to wait upon those who hire them for a profit, machinery, by giving larger profits, displaces human labour, and the men have then a holiday in ivhich to starve. {/.) It gives unjust power to afeiv, ivhich necessarily leads to the grossest tyranny and 02)2^ression. For proof of this see Alfred Russel Wallace's " Land Nationali- sation," and read history generally. There are few men who can resist the evil effects of possessing unjust power over the lives of their fellows ; and in the case of the landlords it has too often led to most brutal acts of wholesale expatriation, with confiscation of results of the tenant's labour, under most revolting circumstances. 262 THE NEW PARTY (g.) It is very largely the cause of the evils of capi- talism. To-day the wage of labour is determined, not by the vahie of the results, but by the number of others competing for the same employment, frequently goaded by need into lowering their standard of living. If these were not deprived of their right of working on the land, the numbers competing in other employments would not be so great, and there would be no need for a man to accept less as wages than he could produce on his own account. Further, great numbers to-day- are compelled to borrow the means of production, and pay heavily for the use thereof. But they could get the means for themselves if not debarred from the source. It is obvious, then, that the power of "exploitation" that is now associated with the possession of capital would be at least greatly diminished if all had equal rights to work on the land. I do not by any means assert that reform of the land question will completely solve our industrial problem. Personally, I am con- vinced that we cannot stop short of socialising the means as well as the source of production. But since individual ownership is undoubtedly the cause, to a great extent, of the evils of capital, and we cannot say to what extent until we have had experience, we must attack the evil of private property in land first — then we shall see more clearly what are the next steps. This is a serious indictment against private owner- ship. Indefensible in principle, it produces the worst economic and moral effects. I want to lay stress on THE RIGHT OF PRODUCTION 263 the moral side especially. It is no mere question of expediency, no item of " doctrinaire politics." Here are millions of people cut off from the land " which the Lord their God has given them," some starving for lack of work, others with far too much work and too little pay, while a few have possession of the land from which these have been excluded, and enjoy far more than their share of national produce, without doing their share of work. Some of my working men friends are in the habit of using plain language over this : — " If a man takes what isn't his, that's robbery, and he's a robber ; there's no two ways about it." It is true, it is robbery, and the sooner we recognise that the better. The only reason we hesitate to affix the term "robbers"— an ugly word- to landowners, is because they have been born into the system, and have not the intention of robbery. But if they will not look fairly into the case to see if their " ownership " is righteous or not : if they will not consider the claims of the poor whom they are keeping out of their just inheritance : if they are content with the arrogant boast of wrong — "My fathers fought for it," or any other claim that ignores the fundamental question of justice : if they moreover persist in retorting "robbers" on those who desire simply restoration to the people of what is their right ; though we may refrain from applying the name our- selves, how will they escape condemnation from the Eternal Spirit that calls all things by their simple names ? 264 THE NEW PARTY It is one of the evil consequences of the iniquitous system that the mass of those most wronged are too ignorant and apathetic to be capable of studying and understanding the cause. While a steadily growing number of working men are vehemently demanding redress of this wrong, the multitude go on their way seeking only employment for the hour. Moreover the great majority of middle-class traders are so ex- hausted by the exacting demands made by their busi- ness upon their time and brain-power that they read and think but little for themselves, content to follow that newspaper or party leader to whom chance or temperament has attached them. But of these leaders we do expect something better than the argument used about mines by the Home Secretary a little while back: "Because they were stolen from the people some generations ago, that is no justification for the people stealing them back now ! " Then has right no part in this, or does simple posses- sion constitute right to the lawyer-mind of the Home Secretary 1 Or is it because so many of our law- makers are either landowners or expectant landowners, or relations of landowners, that, while the bitter distress among thousands and thousands of our fellow-citizens is leading to starvation and suicide, the land question is carefully shirked in this manner? Access to the land is what the people want ; all who know the evil plight of our people to-day agree, what- ever their politics, "we must get the people back to the land." Give then the land back to the people, and be THE RIGHT OF PRODUCTION 265 not frightened if the righting of a hoary wrong make some little disturbance, or cause a little inconvenience. But let it be remembered it is access to the land we want. Reformers can hardly be too grateful to men like Henry George and Alfred Russel Wallace for the way in which they have brought the matter before us. But each has failed to touch the real evil. For instance, Henry George says, "It is not necessary to confiscate land — it is only necessary to confiscate rent." He argues that this would abolish all taxation save that paid on land values, that it would force all land into cultivation, and that the " surplus " workers would be absorbed by the greater cultivation of land and the expansion of trade. This is what fails to convince us. There is no necessary connection between the amount of national expenditure and the gross rental of the land, although in the United Kingdom they do happen to be about the same just now ; the rent might decrease and the expenditure increase. But we leave this minor objec- tion, and also that in many cases it would indeed be confiscation, not of land, but of the legitimate wealth many had exchanged for land, under the sanction of present law and public opinion ; that it is rent that presses so hardly on the agriculturists, and it would make little difi"erence whether paid to Government or a landlord, and pass to the fatal one that it does not necessarily give access to land, on which depends the right of production. We have seen that individual ownership means cultivation for individual profit 266 THE NEW PARTY merely, and that this is often best achieved by reducing labour to a minimum. It does not matter who takes the rent ; if land is to be cultivated for individual gain, there is no guarantee whatever that labour will be absorbed by the opening up of the land now idle. It may very probably simply lead to an enormous extension of labour-saving machinery, and the profits, going as before to a comparatively few, will have little or no effect on our staple mar- kets. It is not so much the rent as the land itself we want. Alfred Kussel Wallace has given us a most equit- able plan for solving the confiscation difficulty. It is usually argued, as the Home Secretary argued, that to do anything but pay full market value for the land would be robbery, and that to do this would lay a burden of taxation on the people too grievous to be borne, and we are left on the horns of a dilemma — if we leave the land in private hands we suffer; if we acquire it ourselves we suffer equally. But Mr. Wallace's plan is that the nation should take over the land at once, and give the present owners annuities equal to their average rental calculated over a term of years. This injures no living person ; it cannot cost the nation a penny more than at present, and as the owners die out the annuities revert to the nation. Moreover, under wiser management, the return of the land ought to be far greater, so that without injuring any, we gain greatly, simply by cutting off an entail that is founded on injustice, and will do no real good THE RIGHT OF PRODUCTION 267 to those who inherit it. With all this one cannot but heartily agree. But Mr. Wallace would still leave the land in the hands of individual occupiers, which is open to the same objection as before. Owner or occupier, it makes no difference ; so long as the land is cultivated for individual profit, there will be an irresistible tendency, not to draw labour on the land, but to displace it ; and the real problem is not how to acquire rent, but how to give to all men the alternative right to labour on the land. Sometimes an objection is lodged against this as absurd. You cannot, it is said, put everybody on the land ; there is not room for them. Well, even this is doubtful ; it is calculated that close farming, done for produce and not for profit, would support more than our present population. But of course that is not the question. The more people who live on the land the greater the demand for manu- factured goods. Those only would go to the land who could do better there than in other things. The balance would soon be found. There are two ways of efiecting this ; either the nation would organise the national farming, providing a place for all who desired to work, and seeing that the produce was equitably shared among the workers, or it would have to be done by free co-operative associa- tions, according to the plan of Dr. Hertzka, about to be tried in Freeland. Under this scheme no one could be debarred from working on any farm, nor could he debar others. Consequently all who desired to work in a given place would have to associate and work co- 268 THE NEW PARTY operatively, receiving of the produce according to the labour they had each contributed. The details may be found worked out in Dr. Hertzka's book, " Freeland." I have no space here to follow out the arguments and justify them against objections. It is not fair to ask of reformers that they should be able to foresee every detail, nor that they should produce a plan which will obviate all inconvenience. No wrong can be righted without sacrifice, voluntary or forced, but the continuance of the wrong is a greater evil still. There is no doubt that many people who have hitherto been "independent" may be required to work for their living ; what is that to the fact that at present millions of people (this is sober truth) cannot get a living at all ? It may be true that there will be fewer millionaires to endow picture galleries, museums, hospitals, &c. ; but the community will be better able to provide these for itself. It is true that fewer people will maintain large numbers of servants of different grades ; but these servants will be able to engage in really productive labour. It is true that there will not be the same market for expensive luxuries that there is at present ; but there will be millions of consumers added to the markets for staple produce. It is true that the Church will lose its endowments that de- pend on land ; but the people will be better able to support the church of their faith by willing con- tributions, and moreover will be more willing to do so when it ceases to denounce as " immoral " the attempt to restore their rights to the people. It THE RIGHT OF PRODUCTION 269 is one of Time's ironies that what was denounced in most unsparing terms by the Fathers of the Church is now indulged in and supported with equal energy by their present representatives. It is further true that country seats of great families may prove too costly to maintain without the present rent-roll, but our workhouses and prisons will go also. I do not say that abolition of individual ownership of land will make men saints. I do say that to it is due nine- tenths of the idleness, drunkenness, and vice that lead to crimes punishable by law. They are not all saints who have never been in public-house or prison. More- over, when industry is free, and to all men is given both the necessity and the opportunity to work for their living, the power of morality and true religion will be less trammelled in their power to mould men's character for good ; there will be room for man's native nobility to grow. Free the land, and undreamt of reforms will naturally follow in all industries. We shall be freed from idlers of all kinds, from the tramp to the club lounger ; the pauper and the millionaire, equally unnecessary and harmful, will disappear — not abolished as oneii, but transformed from monstrosities into useful citizens. But the root of all is this. We pray daily, " Give us this day our daily bread," and many fail to get it. It is not that God does not send it ; the land He gave is abundantly fruitful for all, and the powers He set in man abundantly able to gather in the harvest and increase it a hundredfold. God has not failed, but because men have laid their hand on 270 THE NEW PARTY that which they have not produced, and have said ^'Mine" of that which is not theirs, we have millions of brothers and sisters whose daily bread never reaches them, being intercepted on the way. May God speed the Right and the New Party. Will Eeason. LONDON'S "PAUPER" CHAOS The spirit of progress and reform has manifested itself in no uncertain manner with regard to the question of the poor during the last few years. Evidence of this is given by the quantity of talking and writing, by an increasing interest in guardians' elections, and the attention shown to the subject by eminent statisticians and authorities on economics, as well as by the appointment of the Labour Commission, the Commission on the Aged Poor, and conferences on poor-law matters convened by the London Reform Union. The New Party will be untrue to the faith that is in them if they fail to avail themselves of the opportunity which the new spirit brooding over the country afiords of attempting to bring into order the bewildering chaos in which the "pauper" gropes to-day. We here con- fine our remarks to London. The number of authorities administering the poor laws is almost as large as the number of orders of the Local Government Board. The overlapping of authority, the confusion of duties, and the inextricable and circumlocutionary maze of procedure, are only comparable with the miles of red-tape, tons of seal- 272 THE NEW PARTY ing-wax, and acres of foolscap used by these various authorities. The system, or rather the absence of it, is frequently alone responsible for the unsympathetic, nay, often brutal treatment that a shrinking, timid, unwilling applicant for relief receives from an irritated and impatient official, who, under a more rational, less chaotic order of things, might be humane and con- siderate. Take a typical case. A sober, industrious, respect- able widow, left with five or six children, ages varying from a few days to eleven or twelve years. The husband recently buried with his club or life in- surance money. She, penniless, with nothing in the grief of her despair but the love of her children to comfort her. The tidy, comfortable, but poor little home, their home ! all but gone. Dreading parish relief, and knowing that to get it she must apply to a relieving officer, who report says is an ogre. Driven by sheer starvation, she applies. She is under sixty years of age. She cannot comprehend an anomaly of law which renders it impossible for the relieving officer to grant her relief outside " the house " without breaking that law. Friction is at once set up ; her ignorance begets his impatience ; ill temper on both sides increases, and the maternal instinct induces her to fight for her children like a tigress for its cubs. She gets a loaf or two of bread '\for the children," and is told she must see the guardians. The anguish and horror of the anticipated offer of "the house," of LONDON'S "PAUPER" CHAOS 273 inevitable separation from her children, and their separation from one another, are the worst possible preparation for the ordeal. The guardians, to begin with, cannot tolerate out- relief. They have sat for a long time, seen numerous applicants, are jaded and impatient to get to the re- freshments awaiting them at the ratepayers' expense. The woman appears with her children — they must attend — then ensue painful scenes of weeping, charges of harshness against the relieving officer and against the attendant having kept her and her poor fatherless children waiting in the cold yard. Relieving officer resents, attendant retaliates, guardians angrily try to maintain order. The poor woman, almost exhausted, stumblingly states her case — the officer, angry, will not assist her, and the guardians stand on their dignity and that of the law — "must observe the orders of the Local Government Board," and offer " the house." Uselessly, with more tears, she pleads for assistance outside, for the guardians to take one or two of her children. But they are obdurate, and angrily tell her there is nothing for any of them but " the house." The result of this phase of the poor law is that tempers have been lost, wrongs committed which the system alone made possible, and the woman carried from the board-room fainting, followed by her weeping children, to the horrors of " the house," from which, it is more than likely, they will never return. Or, on the other hand, she steels her heart, takes her tongue between her teeth, and leaves to seek for s 274 THE NEW PARTY work ! Seeks it, and finds starvation ! Ultimately sells her body for unholy purposes to keep from starva- tion the children born in happy wedlock; children who, in their turn, will probably go through the same experience after she has ended her existence in a suicide's grave. "Temporary insanity" a practical and hard-headed London jury will give in such a case as their verdict ; but the verdict of reformers must be that it is permanent insanity for Londoners to allow widows and orphans to be treated in this manner. The writer has witnessed scenes like this. He knows the case of a widow, with several children, who, after being bandied about from the relieving officer to the guardians, thence to the relieving office, fainting on her way, and yet again to the guardians, a month after her first application to them was granted out- relief simply because it was discovered she was suffer- ing from cancer ! The weekly census of London's "paupers," issued on the day this was written, shows that on the last day of the fourth week in March 1894 there were 99,885 "paupers" in receipt of relief — 63,854 indoor, and 36,031 outdoor — whilst 1215 "vagrants" also received relief. Add to this the thousands in our lunatic asylums, infectious hospitals, imbecile asylums, and training ships, and London's "pauper" roll, ac- cording to Baron Halkett (who has specially studied the poor and the problem of poverty), reaches the awful total of 117,000. This means, states Mr. Charles Booth (another LONDON'S ''PAUPER'' CHAOS 275 eminent authority on the subject), that of London's millions one out of every five persons will die a " pauper." It further means that one out of every four persons in London over sixty-five years, and one out of every three persons in London over seventy years of age will die a " pauper." It must also be observed that London's " pauper " roll increases continually. During last year about 7000 were added to it, the exact figures being for the present week this year (April 1894) 99,885, while for the corresponding week in 1893 they were 93,067. They exist — they do not live — between the four blank walls of infirmaries, workhouses, w^orkhouse schools, and casual wards. They comprise young men and maidens, old men and women, children and infants in arms, spiritless, hopeless, crushed creatures, branded " paupers," and feeling every man's hand against them. These 1 1 7,000 " paupers " are looked after by thirty Boards of Guardians, members of which are mostly owners of property having a strong desire to keep the rates down. In fact, till recently property was the qualification for guardianship of the poor, Keformers were completely foiled in their attempts to get on these Boards. From these Boards are elected, by the guardians themselves, fifty-four members to the Metro- politan Asylums Board, which is comprised of seventy- two members ; the remaining eighteen being nominated by the Local Government Board. This unrepresen- tative body spends annually upwards of ^300,000, and its expenditure is continually increasing. In the 276 THE NEW PARTY south-east of London, the South Metropolitan School District Managers, who look after themselves and the "pauper" children at Sutton, Witham, and Heme Bay, who spend upwards of /; 35,000 annually— always increasing too— are elected by the guardians belonging to the five Boards comprising the South Metropolitan School District. Some of these managers are not even guardians, and are under the control of no one but themselves. Above these bodies — the thirty Boards of Guardians — the Metropolitan Asylums Board and the South Metropolitan District School Managers — stands the Local Government Board. This is a government department. Its President is a Cabinet Minister. It has supreme power over other poor law authorities, controls the most petty details, can issue orders and give or withhold consent to proposals made by these bodies ; and in no case can a poor law servant be engaged, have his salary fixed, or be discharged, even for the most flagrant ofi'ence, without its consent. It practically decides the whole policy of poor law matters. Its President and permanent stafi" cost the country ^165,521 annually; but as its power and authority are exercised over other than poor law matters, all this sum cannot be charged to the account of the " pauper." The total sum raised by the poor-rate and Treasury subventions for the poor in 1892 was ^18,087,817; but as a portion of this was spent for other than poor- law purposes, the cost, roughly, of English and Welsh "paupers" was ^11,000,000. According to Baron LONDON'S "PAUPER" CHAOS 277 Halkett, it is rather more than this, while London "panpers" alone cost ;^2,436,ooo. But one of the evils of the existing chaos is that the "panpers" do not get this vast sum. For instance, during the year ending Lady Day, 1893, Camberwell Parish (with which the writer is fairly well acquainted), Avhose "pauper" roll at this moment is exactly 6700, spent ^38,2,$'/ on indoor poor. Of this sum establishment charges, salaries of officers, interest and repayment of loans, &c., swallowed up ^20,079, leaving ^18,278 for the food, clothing, coal, gas, soap, &c., to be distributed among 1456 indoor "paupers." This amounted to ^12, iis. each per year, or just under 5s. each per week. The salaries and cost of maintaining officers took ^9226. There are 106 officers, including 30 scrubbers and washers. None of these are overpaid, especially the scrubbers and washers, who are mostly recruited from out-relief widows. They really get about los. per week in food and money ; but include them as officers, and divide the ^9226 by the 106 officers, and they get ;^S'/, OS. 9d. each per year. So that the officers get seven times more than the "paupers," or, in other words, it costs 33s. 6d. per week an officer to spend 5s. per week per "pauper." There is still ^10,853 to account for, and as it was spent in rent, interest, and repayment of loans, the only conclusion one can come to is, that the landlord and capitalist get almost as much assistance from Camberwell Parish as its indoor " pauper." The same parish during the same period spent in 278 THE NEW PARTY relief of out-door "paupers" ^13,862. The salaries of officers, rent of stations, &c., &c., consumed ;^289i. The 3571 out-door "paupers" had ^10,971 between them, or exactly is. 2d. each per week. Another iniquity — the greatest perhaps connected with the present chaotic state of things — is the want of " pauper " classification. There are only three classes of "paupers" — "old and infirm," "able- bodied," and " children." Any person over 60 years old, man or woman, is an " old and infirm." Any person, man or woman, over 16 and under 60 years old is "able-bodied," and all under 16 are "children." The poor law says they are, therefore they must be till the doctor says they are something else. All under these various designations — virtuous and vicious, de- serving and undeserving — are subjected to a common rigid treatment. In each class all get up at the same time, go to bed at the same time, are fed at the same time. They are all fed alike in each class too — so many ounces of bread, meat, and potatoes, and so much thin gruel, or apology for tea, as the dietary scale directs. All the food is served out in weighed or measured quantities, without regard to capacity or state of appetite. The waste caused by this insane, cast-iron rule is enormous, as even a "pauper" can refuse to eat or drink his own or any one else's leavings. Then, again, each section is herded together in special wards. Untold misery is thus inflicted on many a refined, sensitive nature, by incarceration with LONDON'S "PAUPER" CHAOS 279 vicious, and often criminal companions, whose chief source of amusement is to torment such. What irony ! what refined cruelty ! to shut up a sculptor with men just out of prison, and to submit a doctor of divinity in his old age to the same treatment, in the same apartment, as a born and bred "pauper!" Such cases are known to the writer, and instances could be indefinitely multiplied. The tortures the separated mothers and children endure are past description. Imagine some thirty or forty, or even fifty infants, confined in one ward ; without a mother's love or care; under the charge of one nurse, who may or may not have a motherly or sisterly instinct towards a " pauper " child. Such a state of things is not human, yet it exists in London's " House " of to-day, for London's poor, to London's shame. Or again, think of the children (or as many of them as have survived this treatment) at one of the parish or district schools, barrack-like in design and discipline. Here they are herded together in wards day and night. Their education they get from teachers who may be good, bad, or indifferent. The law does not require their qualifications to be set forth in certificates of proficiency, and therefore when these children reach sixteen years of age their edu- cation is such as a child in the first or second standard of a Board School would rightly and justly despise. This herding together in the enormous wards 280 THE NEW PARTY renders ordinary supervision difficult, and such as children need, impossible. The examples of children of vicious parents, the corrupting influence of heredi- tary taints and sensual passions, are only too powerful, and boys and girls of a tender age in these establish- ments are guilty of such deeds as it is unorthodox to mention. To this state of things is due many outbreaks of skin and scalp disease that frequently assume epi- demic proportions; whilst it is well known that ophthalmia prevails to such an extent that it often baffles the skill and energies of the resident doctors to prevent and cure it, others being called in to assist them. What mother's heart does not bleed at the picture ! The state of things with regard to the " able-bodied," both men and women, is appalling. Conceive, if pos- sible, what proportion of the 99,885 " paupers " con- stituting London's roll is made up of them ! Many are deserted wives, with painful lives behind and before them ; ruined servant girls, characterless and hopeless ; whilst many thousands are decrepit old-young men and women, worn out through vicious habits, often contracted in "pauper" schools, half imbecile or half idiot. Think of the many more thousands, men and women, strong and sturdy, fit to work, but refusing to do it ; living at this end of the social scale (the example set them at the other end of it) at the expense of the workers; glorying in it, and priding themselves, like one who recently said — "I've never done any LONDON'S "PAUPER" CHAOS 281 man out of an honest day's work yet, and I won't either ! " Then again, there are the warriors and veterans of labour — honest men and women, old before their time with toil and care — the maimed, the blind, the lame and halt — those worsted in the hard struggle for existence, overtaken by sickness, pushed out of house and home by the fierce competition of these modern times, their little business, it may be, swallowed up by some gigantic " grabbing " concern. And there are those there through drink. These have been purposely left till last, because, contrary to the generally accepted opinion, their number is the least. Mr. Charles Booth, in " Pauperism and Endowment of Old Age," page 3, gives a table showing the principal causes of pauperism at Stepney Union. Out of 634 cases drink directly caused 80 cases, or 12.6 per cent., and was contributory to 84 more. " Altogether," he says, " only 25 per cent, are returned as afifected by drink." His experience agrees with the writer's when he ascribes sickness, lack of work, acci- dents, and old age as being the chief causes. The employment these " able-bodied paupers " are put to is as senseless as useless — to many degrading. Oakum-picking and stone-breaking are the employ- ments mostly favoured by guardians, but some vary it with corn-grinding and wood-chopping. In some quarters it is beginning to enter the consciousness of guardians that the "pauper" might just as well be doing something to produce some of the things he 282 THE NEW PARTY consumes. Such is the present state of things, and remedies must be forthcoming. What are these remedies to be ? No half measures, no trumpery expedients, no paUiatives will do. The whole state of things must be changed and replaced by something more humane and humanising — some- thing that will tend to elevate the "pauper" into a man. The Local Government Act, 1894, has opened the door by abolishing property qualification for guar- dians and the plural votes. This must be followed up, and further changes made. We must have a popularly elected London Poor Law Council, as suggested by Mr. Sidney Webb in his "London Programme." This must occupy the same high position with regard to poor-law matters as the London County Council does in the matters it deals with. The Poor Law Council must absorb the Metropolitan Asylums Board, and all minor bodies now controlling poor-law affairs. It might be supervised in money matters by the Local Government Board ; but as that body has outgrown itself, and is not parti- cularly democratic, the Poor Law Council must relieve it of many petty details in which it now harasses and rules the London Board of Guardians. District Com- mittees, elected as local managers of Board Schools are, would inquire into cases, and carry out the Coun- cil's decisions and regulations. Workhouses and all their kindred institutions must he abolished. The buildings need not be demohshed ; they might serve as hospitals, libraries, museums, or LONDON'S "PAUPER" CHAOS 283 even as municipal workshops ; but what is known as the workhouse system must cease. Old age pensions must be provided for all over sixty years of age. The pension must be a fixed sum, regu- larly paid, and such as will keep the pensioner in decency and comfort in his or her declining years. These pensions must be universal. The loafing duke must be as free to claim as the languid docker, and the merry duchess as the menial drudge. The State must provide the fund by graduated income-tax alone, and administer it from the Imperial Exchequer through the post-office, or, as Mr. Charles Booth suggests, through local banks. For the really able-bodied work must be found in municipal workshops and on farm colonies, where they at least shall be compelled to produce as much as they consume, or treated as criminals. For the infirm, whether old or young, arrangements must be made by London's Poor Law Council to place them in almshouses or cottage homes, where they may be free to go and come, and where, instead of officials doing all for them, such as they can do for themselves they may do. These shall be places in which it will be possible for a home to be enjoyed instead of a prison life. For London's sick, a London Hospitals Board must provide, as also advocated by Mr. Sidney AVebb. It is estimated nearly i\ milhons is expended in London on the sick poor, one-third of which is already pro- vided by rates. This Board must be popularly elected, 284 ^^^ '^'^^^' PARTY take charge of the kmatics, imbeciles, and all the sick poor. It must also supervise, inspect, and audit ac- counts of "medical charities" and endowed institu- tions. " Private venture " hospitals must be abolished, and " London must systematically undertake the care of London's sick." London's "pauper" children must be boarded out in the country, and cared for by the various School Boards. As the nation's educational authority, they have all the machinery at their command to commence giving "these little ones" as good an education as other children under their charge, and they must be called upon to teach them a trade, so that their start in life may be of the very best. London's "pauper" population is thus theoretically provided for. Although it may be long before it be practically accomplished, progress is certain. The task is not an easy one ; prejudice, tradition, and custom die hard. Official opposition is always vigor- ous, and even the "pauper" himself renders reform difficult. Officials and guardians of the old type believe the world would be incomplete without a workhouse ; it is a part of their solar system, and it is not an easy matter to convince an old "pauper," either male or female, that even the abolition of the "workhouse garb" would be a desirable thing. The writer has heard it said by " paupers " that when they go out in clothes like other people's, he or she loses gifts of drink or money because they are not known as "paupers" without the badge. Again, a woman who LONDON'S "PAUPER" CHAOS 285 has been in the workhouse for years came into posses- sion of a legacy bringing her in about eight shillings per week. Eather than commence life on her own account she remains in " the house," and pays the guardians seven shillings weekly to maintain her. The difficulty of the work to be done should be an inspiration to stronger determination and effort to accomplish it ; and although it may appear desirable that the reforms longed for should be effected by a stroke of the pen in the tick of the clock, yet con- sideration will show that nations and cities get such improvements as the community are ready for and demand. Demos is awake. He is now shaking off the effects of the opiates administered by the capitalist and poHtician. The Board School, his club, and Trade Union Society have at least been contributory causes to his awakening, but his education in poor-law matters is by no means complete. To this the New Party must devote themselves. Education, as well as being a revealing agency, is also a creative energy, and it must be the means by which order shall be evolved out of London's "pauper" chaos. Alfred Foster (A London Guardian). ''And all that believed were together, and had all things common ; and sold their 'possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need!" — Acts ii. 44, 45. THE SOCIAL WOKK OF THE UNDIVIDED CHURCH " To liug the wealth ye cannot nse, And lack the richer; all may gain — Oh lilind and wanting wit to choose, Who house the chatf and burn the grain I And still doth Life with starry towers Lure to the bright divine ascent — Be yours the things ye would : be ours The things that are more excellent." — AViLLiAM Watson. To those who imagine that Christianity was founded in the sixteenth century, the statement recently made by a leading Nonconformist minister, that it has failed to establish a Christian democracy, may be intelligible. But to those who have reached a broader view of history, and an intelligent sense of the evolution which alone is the test of a society and a faith, such a remark is not coherent. For as a matter of fact the Church has been founding a Christian democracy ever since the Divine Democrat of Nazareth founded her, and set a handful of working men to preside over her interests. And that " schism-creating spirit of selfishness which is setting class against class," to which Mr. Thomas Nicholson alludes as the evidence of her failure, was in effect the result of that selfishness- creating spirit of schism, which broke up practical Christianity for three centuries by substituting class- 2S7 288 THE NEW PARTY sects for the one social Church. Still, although it is true that the two main fallacies which obscured the Church's socialism, other-worldliness and religious individualism, were the effect of Protestantism, it must be remembered that a certain amount of the destruc- tive work which Protestantism effected had become inevitable and necessary, and that liberalism, both in politics and religion, had a great work to do, and though alien to Protestantism triumphant, has become possible partly through the power of Protestantism suppressed. It was the spirit of schism which destroyed at the Keformation the socialism which the Church was building up. And the Church (which is the whole body of Christian people), when she was divided was tainted in all her sections by this spirit. The Ultra- montane irreconcilable was nearly as sectarian in his view of Christianity as was the creed-maker fresh from Geneva. And he was nearly as anti- social. If Calvin was the first to throw to the winds the mediaeval condemnation of usmy, he was accompanied almost simultaneously by the Jesuit casuists. So it was : nor can we explain the singular collapse of the inspired and imperishable Church by regarding as the whole Church our own little section of her Poman, Anglican, or Protestant. The collapse was due to commercialist individualism, which, having through the separation of classes made acute the abuses that are always abroad in some form or other, then proceeded to stereotype the abuses and perpetuate the class-distinctions by SOCIAL WORK OF UNDIVIDED CHURCH 289 making division a kind of religious duty, and spiritual selfishness the mark of a " saint." It is very easy to see how a divided Churcli loses its social character. In tlie first place, sects can never rise above class and national distinctions. Once re- move the unity of the Church, and the gentleman, the tradesman, the labourer, the Scotchman, the Welsh- man, the Englishman, and the Irishman, must all have their own particular religions, and ehiss and national divisions are made inconceivably more bitter and more wide. At the present day in Loudon the classes go to church, tlie bourgeoisie go to chapel, and the masses attend a trade-union demonstration. If they all worshipped together, and belonged to one Church in which priests from all classes ministered, how long would it be true that one-half of the world does not know how the other half lives ? How long would it be possible for the well-to-do to eat bread that is made under the murderous conditions that we know ; or to have their clothes washed by laundresses who, with families to attend to, have often to work 80 hours a Aveek, in a temperature of 75"^, for twopence an liour ? The second reason for the unchristian unsocialism of a divided Church is even simpler. A house divided against itself cannot stand ; and the sections of a divided Church, instead of spending their energies to combat the world, the flesh, and the devil, were using themselves up in the attempt to exterminate each other. Thus from being social the Church became polemical. "NMiilo tlie bitter struggle of the Reforma- 290 THE NEW PARTY tion was engrossing the best men in England, the labourer was decaying unhelped : the king was robbing him by debasing the currency, and confiscating the funds of his trade-unions (on the plea that they were " associated with superstitious uses ") ; the lords were robbing him by seizing and rack-renting the lands of the monasteries (between one-third and one-fifth of the whole country) ; the trading classes were robbing him by what Professor Ashley calls " that remarkable out- burst of the spirit of self-seeking in the sixteenth century," "the unabashed pursuit of individual profit" which "now comes into view and ceases to be ashamed to use its strength." And the Church has forgotten her duty, and is losing her power with her unity ; instead of feeding Christ's lambs. Catholic is burning- Protestant, and Protestant is hanging Catholic. Just when the Church is most wanted, when individualism is seething around her, she is weak, distracted, rent asunder ; and the pitiful process goes on, so that before the end of the sixteenth century the wage of an agricultural labourer is half what it was at the begin- ning. No wonder that Crowley wrote at this time : — " This is a City In name ; but in deed It is a pack of people That seek aftei^ Meed ; For officers and all Do seek theiv own gain. But for the wealth of the commons No man taketh pain. SOCIAL WORK OF UNDIVIDED CHURCH 291 An hell without order I may well it call, Where every man is for himself, And no man for all." Latimer, who gloried in the new regime, yet conkl not fail to notice that — " In tymes past men were full of pytie and compassion, but nowe there is no pytie, for in London their brother shall die in the streetes for cold, he shall lye sycke at theyr doore betwene stocke and stocke — I can not tel what to call it — and peryshe there for hunger." Yet Latimer, in the same sermon on " The Ploughers," unconsciously gives the reason for this ghastly selfish- ness of Christians. All his reforming energy is devoted to the destruction of certain religious practices of which he disapproved ; to him the Christian ultimatum is no longer God or mammon ; the devil to this childish bigot is no longer the author of oppression and self- seeking, but — " Where the Deuyl is residente, that he may preuaile, up with all superstition and idolatrie, sensing, peintynge of ymages, candles, palmes, asshes, holye water, and newe seruice of menes inuenting." Is it surprising, then, that the revival of socialism and the yearning for " reunion " are such close allies ; that the "high-church" party, with its passion for unity, is being saturated with social enthusiasm ; and that among those Nonconformists who are Socialists the '"' dissi- dence of dissent" is already discarded ? 292 THE NEW PARTY The First Effects of Christianity. But, to return to Mr. Thomas Nicholson. The Church, so far from having failed, was, I have said, growing into a fair and stately " Christian Democracy " when the enemy came upon her, and with the wedges of caste, mammon, and soul-selfishness, reduced her speedily to splinters. " Doomed to death, though fated not to die," she is by nature imperishable, and the time of her reunion will come. Meanwhile it is consoling to think that the three centuries of the individualist heresy are but a short time in her his- tory, and that they represent indeed the time that it usually takes a heresy to work itself out. Of course her task was by no means completed when the interruption came. Social evolution proceeds slowly, and when we consider what sort of a world it was that the infant Church began her work in — Athens with four-fifths of her population in slavery, Rome, Corinth, Carthage still worse ; the greatest and best philosophers believing the workman to have only half a soul, and excluding him altogether from their schemes of reform, and all now rotten and efi'ete ; when we consider what sort of peoples she subsequently con- verted — fierce, savage races at the very beginning of their civilisation — we cannot but be amazed at the rapidity of her work. Why, Mrs. Besant is so pleased with her new friends the Hindoos, that she tells us that their religion has been decaying "for thousands of years," without ever thinking that this is a rather SOCIAL WORK OF UNDIVIDED CHURCH 293 leisurely way of enlightening the world ! Yet the Church, a social Democratic federation from the out- set, is recognised at once as a levelling force : her first apostles, "these," as they are called in the Acts, "that have turned tlie world upside down," announce in the most simple and natural manner truths which were undreamt madness to the wise of the day. The Fathers, who have left books almost as sacred and valuable as those of the Apostles themselves, actually intensify and systematise the extreme socialism of the earliest Christians. And when the Church, having included huge nations of half-civilised bar- barians, is more clogged in her levelling work, her influence is just as unmistakable and as thorough. A handful of missionaries are planted in the midst of savage and chaotic x\nglo-Saxon tribes in 597. In five centuries slavery disappears, and curiously enough the very two reforms which ]SIr. Thomas Nicholson hopes the New Democracy will one day give us, and upbraids Christians for not having discovered, are accepted commonplaces. For " the cruel law of supply and demand " ^ is unheard of, while " the living wage " is at the root of all social life. 1 When the increasing complexity of society gave the law of "supply and demand" more chance, the popular conscience (through the Gild System) still prevented its operation :— " It was thought to be wrong that a man should secure a profit merely by shrewdness in taking advantage either of temporary fluctuations in supply and demand, or of the ignorance of his fellow-men ; contributing nothing himself to the value of the connnodity, but selling it again, as it was phrased, "in the same kind."— Ashley, "Economic History and Theory," ii. p. 31. 294 THE NEW PARTY It is a pity that the Christian poetry of these early times is not better known. I quote two extracts from Mr. Abbey's excellent transcriptions, and, by way of throwing in relief their splendid social and religious feehng, I print them side by side with two very popular stanzas of modern commercialist religion. The ancient verses are by Cynewulf (probably Eighth Century), and by an unknown writer somewhat later in date : the modern verses are by Messrs. Moody and Sankey and Bishop Christopher Wordsworth respectively : — The Old. " Warder and wielder, Maker of man, Come, and Thy mildness Tenderly show ! All of us need it : We Thy mother's kin, Yearn to Thy mystery . . . So may Thy handiwork. Moulder of men, With right arise Into the heavenly. The noble realm." The New. " I am so glad that our Father in heaven Tells of His love in the Book He has given ; Wonderful things in the Bible I see : This is the dearest, that Jesus loves me. I am so glad that Jesus loves me, Jesus loves me, Jesus loves me, I am so glad that Jesus loves me, Jesus loves even me." SOCIAL WORK OF UNDIVIDED CHURCH 295 The Old. " A little while The leaf is green, then falloweth again, Falleth to earth, and turneth to its dust. E'en so shall fall they who work sin on earth, Who live in guilt, who hide their costly hoards. And guard them strongly in their fastnesses. Thereby to gladden fiends." The New. " "Whatever, Lord, we lend to Thee Repaid a thousand fold will be : TJien gladhj will tee (live to Thee, Who givest all." The Christian spirit had then effected something which contrasts favourably with modern popular religion in those two or three centuries ! I will now review the social achievements of Christianity during the period of its greatest supremacy — from the Norman Conquest to the sixteenth century — prefacing my review with some warnings. In the first place, though the Church did create (as I shall show) a wonderful amount of socialism in these few centuries, she had not achieved everything; if it had not been for her own weaknesses and corruptions, the rise of the in- dividualist religions would have been impossible. In the second place, it must not be forgotten that this period was an age of development like every other, that the spirit which produced the moral and religious revolution in the sixteenth century was of gi-adual 296 THE NEW PARTY growth. The " Gild System," for instance, was inchoate in the Norman period, and had become the nursery of the bourgeois class when Tudor times set in. Lastly, the old-fashioned reader must be warned that social history is a recent revelation, and he must be prepared for surprises. The doings of the handful of ambitious nobles, and of the succession of selfish monarchs, have little significance in the history of the people. The wholesale murders of "stark" men, like the Norman Conqueror, did indeed affect the people, but the executioner was not busy with the common folk in this period, and events like the Wars of the Roses, which decimated the aristocracy, hardly aflected the lives of the workers at all. Underneath the drum and trumpet history of our school-books, the real life of England moved on, unnoticed till the revival of social interest called up a new band of investigators. The Witness of Akt. Five centuries after the landing of 8t. Augustine, we find, in spite of the traces of barbarism, in spite of the roughness of the life, and of the advantages which the great and powerful still retained over the people, that in the social life of the masses all the principles of our new democracy were being practised, that the good things which most people, in common with Mr. Thomas Nicholson, hope to realise in the dim future were in fact arrived at tln'ough the supremacy of the SOCIAL WORK OF UNDIVIDED CHURCH 297 Church : so that our most inspired social prophets find in these times, as Mr. Ruskin does in mediaeval Venice, or Mr. William Morris in mediaeval England, the materials for a future millennium. Modern science, modern literature, the complete liberty of thought and action for the moneyed few, have been the contribu- tion of later ages, and will make the socialism of the future a fuller and freer thing than that of the past. But it must be remembered that these good things have hitherto been the privileges of the privileged. There was no renaissance for the masses of the people ; the invention of printing brought no culture or refine- ment to them ; the discovery of unknown continents only added to the number of their masters ; and, in Professor Thorold Rogers' words, " the freedom of the few was bought by the servitude of the many," so that "advanced" men like Fletcher of Saltoun, " an ardent republican for a narrow class, suggested hopeless slaveiy as the proper doom of the labourers." In the ^liddle A":es culture, and such comfort as there was, were far more equally distributed, and shared in a far more brotherly manner. And what that culture was we may judge from the wonderful spontaneity and beauty of domestic art. Books were few, but the vast book ot nature was not then shut off from the toiling masses — " One impulse from a vernal wood May teach you more of man, Of moral evil and of good, Than all the saj^es can," 29S THE NEW PARTY writes Wordsworth, whose motto, " Let Nature be your teacher," represents the return to the older ideas just as truly as does the Oxford movement in religion, or the Pre-Eaphaelite movement in art, with its outcome of socialist craftsmanship. No amount of cheap litera- ture can raise the moral tone of the masses, while our modern streets and homes — and most of all the streets and homes of the well-to-do — are what they are, so mean and lying and pretentious, so degrading in their effects that we have most of us lost the very power of feeling the deep degradation they inflict. What our condition is can be judged, not only by our popular ideas of what is true and beautiful and amusing, the things we stare at in the street, the wretched penny- w^orths of scrappy dulness we buy to read, but most of all by the contemplation of the faces that we meet, whether in Regent Street or the Commercial Road, Now the truest record of what a people loves and delights in is to be found in the popular art ; and especially in architecture, for, as INlr. Bosanquet truly says, " Architecture, more than any other art, is an index to the happiness and freedom of the people." Yet, while at the present day it is not possible to raise "the faintest scintilla" of spontaneous art in any working class centre, in the Middle Ages it seemed impossible to produce anything that was not beautiful. The buildings, the ornaments, the articles of their common daily use remain the pride of the cultured few, and altogether outside the ken of the " civilised " man in the street. Nor was the work of these times SOCIAL WORK OF UNDIVIDED CHURCH 299 the product of a small cultured class : our unapproach- able country churches were built and adorned by the village mason and the village carpenter. The im- mense bearing of this upon the life of the working man is of supreme importance. Modern labour, that is the life of those around us, is a dreary, hateful round of unlovely toil ; labour in those days was for the meanest craftsman, the continual joy of creation, the varied life in the close bonds of fellowship, and amid beautiful surroundings of the artist whose happy lot it is to love the work he does and to make others better and happier in doing it. This may sound ideal enough, but it must be remembered that the extant results of it all are ideal too, not only in Venice and Florence, in the dreamy artisan t^uarter around the streams of Amiens, in the glorious old towns of Germany and the Netherlands, but in homely England as well, there are the same marks of freedom and originality, of honest work and its result, a common delight in the pure joys of life. Competition, which to every true and thoughtful man makes the horror of modern life, was unknown. The Christian ideal, by which men can live even as the flowers without anxiety for the morrow, the ideal of labour by which every man can produce his best, and by virtue of his daily work without grasp and struggle earn his daily fair reward, these had been in great measure attained. The dread of poverty, which to-day even more than the greed of gain, makes the workman's and the tradesman's life a 300 THE NEW PARTY harassing round of drudgery, and prevents all but a fortunate few from giving serious thought to any- thing but money-making — this was not felt. Man's object then was not the scraping together of the treasure which is his bane. Labour became so suc- cessful and so powerful because the Church, by her constant condemnation of usury, prevented the modern expedient for the exploitation of labour, and made it impossible for an idle capitalist class to suck the blood of the workers. " Avarice " was everywhere recog- nised to be one of the seven deadly sins, and the word was not construed then in its modern narrow sense, but was made to include (as the ancient manuals for the Confessional prove) every attempt to gain more money than was necessary for a man's station in life. The type of man that now receives the highest honour and power amongst us no doubt existed then, hut he ivas kept doivn; and competition, which now sets a premium on the worst, the most unsocial and un- christian forms of ability, meant then the honest rivalry of men bent on the production of strong, useful, and beautiful wares. The Agricultural Labourer. But after all it is mainly by its agricultural conditions that this budding Christian democracy must be judged. For the agricultural labourer represented the masses in days when only one-tenth of the population lived in the towns. From the establishment of Christianity SOCIAL WORK OF UNDIVIDED CHURCH 301 lip to the end of the "Golden Age" of labour in the fifteenth century, we find conditions which, brought up to date, would almost satisfy the aspirations of Edward Carpenter, or "Nunquam." In the small space at my disposal I can only glance at these conditions, but a hasty treatment will be intelligible in these days when even politicians understand that the Parish Councils Bill is nothing but the taking up of the threads of the Christian democracy where they were broken off by modern " progress." At once we are confronted with "joint labour," a collectivist though primitive method of agriculture : " all agriculture," says Mr. Gibbins, " was carried on collectively by the tenants of the manor." The villein was, it is true, tied to the soil ; but the soil was also tied to him ; he had perfect security of tenure (in spite of the influence of pagan Koman Law), and it is only as our period advances that he acquires any desire to rove. The lord is bound by his duties, as the villein is, and, in spite of the social gulf, shares in the roughness of his life ; but, putting the lord on one side, there was an equality that would make the English peasant or the American " farmer " gape with astonishment. Indeed, it is a remarkable fact that, as the "free tenant" arose, the conditions of life became more and more unequal. The Court Baron was attended by all ; and, while now the landlord lives apart, and the farmer dwells in his separate homestead, the landlord in those days was in the midst of the manor, where all the other " classes " dwelt side by side in neighbourly fashion. In about 302 THE NEW PARTY one case out of three the land was held by the Church, and as a general rule the parish priest belonged to the same class as his parishioners, so that when we hear from middle-class writers of "priestly tyranny," it is the representative of the people quelling the aristocrat, or preventing money-grubbing, through the confessional. The agricultural labourer was not a wage-slave as he is now. He lived out of his own land and lived extremely well, while he worked a certain portion of his time on the lord's demesne in return for his pro- tection. Our modern " Christian democracy," which is only now beginning to nibble at the idea of small allotments, will be some time before it has reached a condition of things such as existed in these old times, when the larger portion of the cultivated land was divided into inalienable allotments for the peasant, when there was abundance of common land, and the farmer did not exist. And, while the best of our modern landlords exact a higher rent for allotments than for the farmer's land, under the feudal system the villein lived practically rent-free. There was no rent in the economic sense of the word. The villein paid a small tax on the land, just as the lord did, and in return for that he had, besides his ample holding, free pasture on the extensive common land (which the gentlemen of England had not then enclosed), free forage for his pigs on the rough land, free fuel from the forest-land, and the right of snaring wild animals, an ancient right now represented in the person of the poacher. No wonder that destitution was almost un- SOCIAL WORK OF UNDIVIDED CHURCH 303 known, in spite of the reckless and indiscriminate generosity of the monasteries, and that the need of a poor-law was not felt till the sixteenth century ! Even when in the fourteenth century a class of " free " labourers had arisen, they often held two or three acres at the traditional mediseval rent of sixpence an acre ; and Professor Thorold Rogers has discovered that the artisans too had often land which tliey cultivated as a bye-industry. Sixpence, by the way, was the amount that an artisan in the fifteenth century earned in a siugle day, when a labourer earned fourpence (fancy an agricultural labourer paying his year's rent with a day and a half's work !), and sixpence was about the cost of the maintenance of a labourer for a whole week. From 1200 to 1400 the average hours for all labour were 8h a day, from 1400 to 1500 an eight-hour day was the average; before the year 1600 this had risen to g^, to 10 by 1700, to 12 before 1800, and at the beginning of the present century to 16 hours a day. I take these figures from some tables of Professor Ely, from which it also appears that, reckoning prices and wages at their real values, and setting ten shillings a week as the cost of living for a family of five per- sons, the following were the wages of an agricultural labourer: — 1250, 15s. a week ; 1320, 12s.; 1430, 25s.; 1480, 28s. ; by 1600 this had fallen to i is. ; during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the wage fell to 8s., rose to 12s., and fell to 8s. again ; at the beginning of the present century it actually was 7s. a week ! 304 THE NEW PARTY About 1830, the period when social and religious indi- vidualism began to decay, it rose to 9s., and has been rising ever since. From the same source I learn that a carpenter's wage was 30s. in 1400, 38s. in 1500, I2S. in 1600, and i8s. in 18 10. Is not this enough to show that the "Via Dolorosa" of English labour began, not in the earliest times, as a recent writer has supposed, but at the period when individualism and separatism destroyed the integrity of the Kingdom of Christ : and that it recovered just at the time when the crass uncultured stupidity of other-worldly individualism was beginning to melt away before the double attack of Keble and Newman, of Kingsley and Maurice? Trade-XJnionism. "Commercial Morality" seems to those who, like Mr. Carter, have investigated the matter, an almost hope- less dream. But yet the Merchant Gilds, which arose in the eleventh century (on the basis of the " guild " or religious benefit society that existed before the Con- quest), by placing the common good before individual interest, by insisting on " the maintenance of fair dealing and of a high standard of quality in the goods sold," and by fostering the brotherly feeling which was never far absent in every department of life, have proved that it is not impossible. And Venice, where the Plimsoll shipping legislation was anticipated, where a glorious prosperity was found identical with a strong collectivism ; and Florence, where the blacksmith sang SOCIAL WORK OF UNDIVIDED CHURCH ^o J^D Dante's lines at his work, and the most cultured citizens lived over their shops, are standing examples of what a nation of shopkeepers can be under Catholic condi- tions. But we must hurry on from this fascinating subject to glance cursorily at the Trade-Unionism of the Middle Ages in the short space at our disposal. From 1563 till 1825 (that is, during the triumph of indi- vidualism in religion and social life) the Trade-Union was, in Professor Thorold Rogers' words, " effectually proscribed." But in the Middle Ages it flourished, and that in a form closely akin to the "New Unionism" of to-day ; and it actually enjoyed the power, so much desiderated by modern labour, of framing its own bye- laws or " gild-statutes," which were made binding by law — even the "rattening" of contumacious members, i.e., the confiscation of a blackleg's tools, was allowed. A point like this shows what an immense amount of lee- way modern labour has yet to make up. In fact the two classes which are now left to take care of themselves, the public and the workers, were in those days the very classes that were protected : wages Avere kept up, hours were kept down, work was secured for all workers, and the production of scamped or adulterated work — " false work," as it was nobly called — was made as impossible as our fallen nature will allow.^ Trade- 1 " The tendency of modern competition is to sacrifice the pi-oducers ; to assume that so long as articles are produced cheaply, it hardly matters what the remuneration of the workman may be ; but the gild legislation kept steadily before itself the ideal of combining good (piality and a price that was fair to the consumer, with a fitting remuneration to the workman." — "Economic History and Theory," ii. p. 169. U 3o6 THE NEW PARTY union uniforms, banners, processions were then as common and as beautiful as they are now uncommonly ugly. The infirm and the bereaved were provided for. The craft-gilds owed their strength to religion, their apprentices were admitted in Church, they had their own chapels, their own altars, and their own services. Even women (for sweated female labour was unknown) were admitted. So strong was the brotherly feeling that a journeyman in his wanderings could find lodg- ing and food and work by applying to his union in a strano-e town. And Mr. V.'illiam Morris tells us (though his authority is not given) that ploughmen's gilds existed to give heart to the modern agricultural labourer. Strangest fact of all to modern minds, there was till the end of the Middle Ages no proletariat, that is, no permanent class of wage earners who are always at the mercy of the capitalist. "In the fourteenth century," says Professor Ashley, "a few years' work as a journey- man was but a stage through which the poorer men had to pass, while the majority probably set up for themselves as master- craftsmen as soon as apprentice- ship was over." And even when a small proletariat class had arisen, "for some time the 'servant' was rather the subordinate companion, the assistant of the master, than his employee ; " there was " no social gulf," and the "servant" earned "at least half as much as his master," Thus every master-craftsman had been an apprentice, and every apprentice rose to be a master. Think of that, ye labour-leaders, who SOCIAL WORK OF UNDIVIDED CHURCH 307 fancy that you are inaugurating something novel and unknown to the " Christian democracy," that yet was toiling for you through all those dark and forgotten centuries ! The master -craftsman was independent, except that he was not allowed to sweat, or swindle, or work at night, or on Sundays. He was free, except that he was rigidly prevented from becoming a capi- talist, so much so that among the Flemish weavers no master was allowed to own more than four looms. More Modern Ideals. It is indeed almost impossible to find any modern ideal of labour that was not realised during the integ- rity of the Church. Most of these have already been touched on. But a few more may be noticed. Holi- days are most necessary, both for the solidarity and happiness of labour, as our May Day organisers know well, and Sir John Lubbock has been almost canonised for ffivino: us a fourth '"bank holiday." But before DO mammon had taken the place of God in the nomen- clature of the national holiday, there was abundance of holidays, for every "holy-day" was then a holiday. May Day included, and the people, besides their merry- making, were continually reminded of the truths of religion, and of those recurring changes in Nature which now in our large towns we forget. I was Oliver Cromwell who abolished these holidays as being " superstitious." Then the apprentices petitioned and managed to secure the second Tuesday in every month ; 3o8 THE NEW PARTY but this holiday, no longer maintained by the Church, soon fell into abeyance. Besides "May Day," and the limitation of hours, there are two other objects which the great international meetings of socialists always proclaim — the abolition of our terrible standing armies, and of our system of huge isolated nations. The mediaeval ideal of a great sacred world-empire composed of small federated nations and city-states, obstructed as it was by the ambition and brutality of monarchs and nobles, bears a close resemblance to the political scheme which all socialists feel to be of the first importance ; while the standing army and the conscription, grim comments on our fancied freedom, were altogether foreign to the older system. Another modern standing army, that of the unemployed, was also unknown ; and though there was squalor enough, and sudden outbursts of cruelty, the chronic misery and the chronic pauperism of modern life was not felt. Two especially unprotected and unorganised branches of labour, which are attracting much attention just now, challenge immediate comparison with " Merrie England " — the bakers and the factory girls. Thorold Rogers has discovered that in the Middle Ages women were paid at the same rate as men : while bakers' gilds were among the earliest to arise, bakeries were every- where under close municipal inspection, and in many towns there were municipal mills and municipal bake- houses. SOCIAL WORK OF UNDIVIDED CHURCH 309 The Best is yet to Be. But, it will be objected, as there was still a proud aristocracy and a powerful king in most places, modern democratic socialism had not been reached. This is true, and it is also true that class distinctions were accepted as the natural order of things by theologian and moralist alike. But it must be remembered that the Church had only been at work for ten centuries, and that class distinctions, unavoidable under any system but that of perfect and long-established social- ism, were a necessity in a state that was being slowly redeemed from barbarism. Mrs. Besant, who has recently gone out of her way to defend the caste-system because it is connected with Hinduism, declares that such permanent class-distinctions must continue as long as humanity endures. And though the Church, which has always held to the idea that we are all one man in Christ Jesus, and has secured at any rate an ideal equality by infant-baptism, could never sanction so monstrous a doctrine as this, yet she had to make the best of the Angles and Normans her lot was cast among. And indeed the laws of heredity and the exigencies of life warn us that class-distinction will be the last evil to disappear before the millennium. But that radical cause of our present social disease, the separation of classes, was unknown in the Middle Ages, when lord and labourer lived side by side. At present the construction of our towns is a devil's 3IO THE NEW PARTY sacrament of the modern schism between rich and poor, and your middle-class liberal is just as deter- mined as any aristocrat not to live in a district that is defiled by the presence of the proletariat. The Liberal leader, whom the world knew as Lord Hartington, confessed two years ago at Whitechapel that he had never been to the East End before. Li fact, until the Church of the Oxford Movement began to throw a bridge from East to West, the schism was almost com- plete. It may be safely asserted that the condition of things under which 1,400,000 persons in London alone are either in " chronic want," paupers, lunatics, or criminals, would be impossible if London were built on the model of a mediaeval city. The rich man in the Middle Ages gave alms to an extent that would now raise a plutocrat to the calendar, and he risked his life far more than the humbler people. At the present day the extent and fatal effect of our class-divisions may be judged from the infantile death-rate statistics, by which it appears that while 18 per cent, of the children of the upper class die before they are five years old, the workers lose 55 per cent, of their babies. Nor must we forget that a true democracy is even yet before us. We have not yet regained the spirit which, when the common lands were first enclosed in the sixteenth century, and the monastery lands given to private owners, stirred the people to incessant fence - levelling and open revolt. The terrible social facts which are now coming to light about America show SOCIAL WORK OF UNDIVIDED CHURCH 311 that "Democracy" (even when spelt with the biggest of D's) may become the worst engine of class oppres- sion and glaring inequality of wealth.^ No one would seriously contend that the present English House of Commons really represents the people; and in 18 16, before the social awakening had begun, we find that, out of a House of Commons numbering 65S, 417 "re- presentatives" were returned by 267 persons, 144 of whom were peers. Indeed, England had never been at the mercy of kings till the Tudor and Stuart periods, nor under the iron heel of an aristocracy till the "Revolution," which established the untaxed land- lord for a century and a half. True Democracy, which was growing up strong and honest in the trade-unionism and local self-government of the Middle Ages, is now being taken up, just about where it was left off, by the Labour Party. And the Church was a constant influence for equality. Through her, and through her alone, could the peasant rise, and owing to her any one who hadbrains could obtain a fit education, and an opportunity for using them, which placed him in intellectual eminence far above the lord. 1 This is what Mr. Edward Bellamy says :—" The (loveruiuout of the United States and of the States is not now the popular Government. It is run by what are called ' our business interests,' that is to say, the moneyed interests. It represents great aggregations of money, and not the popular will. According to the mortgage statistics of this last census or calcula- tions based upon them by Mr. George K. Holmes, special census agent for that subject, it is shown that nine per cent, of the American people oivn seventii-one per cent, of the i^ropertij in the country, leaving l)Ut twenty-nine per cent, to be distributed among the remaining ninety-one per cent, of the people. It is that nine per cent, of moneijed men who (jovern the conntrif.' 312 THE NEW PARTY To her offices came all alike, in her buildings all wor- shipped together, in her ministry all classes were united. And her religious orders prove that whenever a man thought of the highest Christian life, he thought in- stinctively of the most advanced form of communism that has ever been put into practice. Owing to her supremacy, and to the fact that Christians had not then lost the habit of confessing their sins ; cant — that modern substitute for religion — seems to have been un- known. For though she did not exclude the publicans and sinners, as did the later sectarianism, and though adhesion to her was so general that Plantagenet London had a parish church in every street, yet on the whole men practised what she preached. " Far into the fifteenth century," Professor Ashley tells us, the ordinary business man shared, and the law en- forced, her feeling against interest, and when he committed the Protestant virtues of " thrift " and " self-help," he had to confess it before a represen- tative of the people's Church under the deadly sin of Avaritia. " No such sustained and far-reaching attempt is being now made, either from the side of theology or from that of ethics," says the same authority, "to impress upon the public mind prin- ciples immediately applicable to practical life." The doctrine of the united Church was that " God and the labourer are the true lords of all that serves for the use of man. All others are either distributors or beggars;" and in a manual of 1450 the priest is instructed to tell his parishioners not only that usury SOCIAL WORK OF UNDIVIDED CHURCH 313 is sinful, " to lend twelve-pence and to have thirteen- pence," but that to sell an article at too high a price is just as bad. Three centuries after this there was accepted as a matter of course another and very different doctrine, that of Adam Smitli, which tauglit that merchants ought to seek their own without any thought of the public weal, since an " invisible hand" always overrules their selfishness for the common ad- vantage. It is as no mere praiser of times past that I have put together these principles of an earlier and happier labour world. I would help to shame an age that is pampered with self-praise. I would show Christian folk that, if they will but forget their sectarianism, their vested interests, narrow prejudices, and hole- and-corner traditions, they can claim for their Divine Master that position as the great Emancipator wliich He held in times past, which He holds now in spite of His followers. It is useless to object that modern society is much vaster, and modern production far more complicated, than in those earlier and simpler times. I know it, and to me it is an additional argument for that federal home-rule which all Socialists are agreed upon ; an additional condemnation of modern " Chris- tianity " for having failed to adapt itself to new conditions ; and an additional proof that the moral influence of the Church is necessary, for without her that revolution in character, which must abate the grow- ing demands of luxury and bring men to love a simpler and more natural life, will be impossible. History 314 THE NEW PARTY does advance. God has a plan of human progress. And, though my heart refuses, I can yet see that the three centuries of chaos and indifference from which we are just emerging had their work to do ; and that the long travail of Labour has made possible a new and happier system, when " all shall be better than best ; " when all that the Church wrought for labour shall be recovered ; and men shall look back and see that they are living a life as far above that of the Middle Ages as those forgotten times were above the long dull centuries of unregarded toil that preluded the advent of the Workman of Nazareth. Percy Dearmee. FACTORY GIRLS A STUDY of the factory girl of yesterday, to-day, and to-morrow would be a very large order indeed, were it not for the fact that her yesterday has been so brief, and her to-morrow is so uncertain, that it must partake of the nature of prophecy. The course of evolution which has made us a great industrial country has also displaced women from their former position. Whether this is to be regretted or welcomed is the subject of many arguments. It must be remembered, however, that although great changes have come to women, all other circumstances have changed in the same degree. The serf, the peasant, and the soldier of the past are now realising that birth and heritage are not the only passports to power and mastership. The good woman of the past, with her characteristic virtues of humility and sweet content, would feel lier- self very much out of place now. If she previously had no possibilities or ambition to rise above her station, neither was it likely that she would or could sink lower. Education, which has spread alike the knowledge of good and evil, has been granted only a degree less to women than men. The responsibility that education 3i6 THE NEW PARTY has imposed on us is beyond reckoning, and we cannot live as we used to in our ignorant days, even though we are but slowly realising our new conditions, and we have yet to discover what are the extent and boundaries of our duties and lives. Factory girls, or, to be technically correct, working girls, are in all stages of development, and every grade is full of unaccountable surprises. It is very difficult, therefore, to describe the characteristics of the fraternity (our language lacks the feminine gender) by a general outline. There is a broad line distinguishing factory girls proper from other working girls, that is, young ladies who go to " business." There is also another section earning their living at a "trade," who would feel slighted at being called factory hands. All of these, again, are quite distinct from the " professionals." Although there is a social distinction between the working girls of a "trade" and "factory hands," the conditions of life are in many respects very similar. From the earliest age at which children begin to take any interest in school, the main object seems to be to scrape through the prescribed standard, so that they may go to work. The compulsory Education Act has not been in force long enough to make much difference in the education of our parents, and while some are proud that their children should obtain all that is possible, others are jealous, and treat with contempt the knowledge they cannot understand. Among the extremes of hard-working parents, father FACTORY GIRLS 317 is either at work or looking for work, and mother is occupied and anxious to make the most of everything for the present — getting odd days of work at cleaning and charing, and perforce irregular in her attendance to the children's home and requirements. At a very early age the children are expected to be handy at something. From ten years of age they begin to be on the look-out — boys for places among the shopkeepers, and girls to mind babies and do a little cleaning and sewing in the evenings and on Saturdays. It is the girls, of course, who must stay at home ^hen mother wants any help. If a census were taken throughout the schools of this sort of child-worker, the result would be very surprising to some people. As soon as the young ones are old enough to be above the supervision of the School Board officer, they must look to themselves for all their needs. This is the reason that factory girls are ignorant, and when we are inclined to wonder what the School Board have been about that girls of sixteen or twenty years of age can scarcely write their own names, we must remember that it was their work and not their schooling which absorbed their interest and energy, the one being continuous, and the other being entirely dropped at the earliest possible age. There is not much consideration as to the kind of work for which they feel adapted. A neighbour or a "mate" (factory girls always have girl-mates) tells them that the foreman is taking on hands at a certain factory, and they go to take their chance at the factory 3i8 THE NEW PARTY «-ates one mornins;. It does not matter in the least that they know nothing of the work. All that is necessary is that they must be content with next to nothing for a few weeks, and after that earn what they can as piece-workers. Dealing with girls of no education, but frequently a rough and ready intelli- gence, the discipline of factories is of a rough and ready sort. The subdivision of labour makes it easy to get girls at any time, and turn them off or transfer them to other departments as required. The foreman has to keep general order and to regulate the work, but the piece-work system is their whip to industry. It is difficult to get at an average of wages for the year, or the proportion of out-of-work time, because girls so frequently change their work. Their average for a week's work in the factory is about eight shillings a week, which does not leave much margin for ex- penses during out-of-work seasons. When they get the "sack" or leave their work, they must take the first that offers. One instance I can mention is a type of many others. A girl at the age of ten years began by minding babies, but did not like it, and so got work herself at making mouse-traps. This was not at a factory, but a small workshop, where about a dozen children were employed. As soon as she looked old enough, she was taken on at a biscuit factory to put sweets on the top of fancy biscuits. From that she went to work at mouse-traps again, then as a packer in a confectionery factory. She was next engaged to FACTORY GIRLS 319 learn fur-sewing at three shillings a week for a whole season. When the season ended she found work at making tin match-hoxes. " Larking " with another girl got her the " sack," and she was taken on at another match-box factory. From that she went to tin toy making, and afterwards to tin-plate works for higher wages. Here she had nine shillings a week day wages, and stayed till the factory was burnt down. The confectionery season being busy then, she soon got work, and being handy and quick to learn, was transferred from one department to another ; and then went to another confectionery factory where she stayed nearly three years, being employed chiefly in cutting lozenges and making samples of fancy sweets. A strike at the factory ended her employment there. She tried several other confectionery places, but could not get the price she asked for her work, and then went to a neighbour to learn the sewing-machine for warehouse work. The work, however, was too iiTegu- lar, and fetching and carrying the bundles from the warehouse to the neighbour's room was heavier than factory work, and so after filling in some time with cleaning empty houses for a house agent, she got work as a tea-packer. This she was obliged to leave after a few months on account of ill-health brought on by the strong odour of the tea. Depression of trade at this time made work very difficult to get, and after trying rag-sorting for a day or two and getting odd work at house-cleaning, she resumed the tin-work a few months ago. She is now doing well according to 320 THE NEW PARTY her own account, being advanced from the cutting press to the work of putting together coal-scuttles, fenders, &c., bending and riveting the various parts together. This is how a factory girl's life was spent from ten to twenty years of age. She wishes now that she had learnt a trade which by skill would be permanent, but she is too old to begin again at that sort of work. A woman stands no chance in a factory against young workers who do not require so much money. Age makes no difference in the price paid for work, and experience is not required. It often happens that an exceptionally sharp youngster will earn much more than an average woman, but she learns by experience that it does not pay in the long run, because it only makes room for reductions in prices. Strikes are by no means so uncommon among girls as some think. Sometimes only a few are affected, and sometimes the whole of the workers in a factory will make a stand. These are never heard of outside the immediate district, being over in two or three days at most, and always resulting in a failure. It is impossible to get a permanent trade organisation among such a shifting mass of workers. There is no lack of intelligence to see the necessity of it when occasion arises, but the various attempts have at present resulted in a few spirited ones being victimised, and shortly after becoming workers in some other factory of another trade. This, however, does not prevent the successful FACTORY GIRLS 321 organisation of those who work at some of the more constant factory work. In some cases factory girls may continue to live with their parents when they start to keep them- selves. Their lodging is provided for them as long as they bring in four or five shillings a-weck regularly, but if the payments get into arrears, they expect to be treated the same as any other lodger. Either from choice or compulsion, girls will fre- quently take lodgings for themselves. Two or three will occupy one room, which they rent for about three or four shillings- a-week. The work of keeping it clean and doing the necessary washing is arranged between them. If the factory at A\hich they work happens to start at 6 A.M., they turn out in the morning without any food, taking with them bread and dripping, or something that has been prepared the night before. This, with some weak tea, is for their breakfast at eight o'clock. Dinner is most frequently taken in the factory, only a few having a home-cooked dinner ready for them. Some live a distance away, and those who do all for themselves have no dinner that needs cooking. There is not much variety in this meak Perhaps four girls will club together for twopence worth of cheese and a pennyworth of pickles and half a loaf, which will come to just one penny each. A favourite dinner is a pennyworth of fried fish and a ha'porth of potatoes. Others will have a pint of soup, a bloater, or a sausage witli bread. X 322 THE NEW PARTY For twopence they ought to get a good dinner, and cannot afford that every day. The street or factory is just as convenient for a dining-room, and it is only a matter of taste as to which is preferred. Those who begin work early leave at 5 or 5.30 p.m., and so their next meal is taken at home. They very often like to have a little relish then with some weak tea fresh made. The young girls will go out in the evening with their girl- mates or will meet their young men, but they generally expect to meet some one who will treat them to a drink, and it is not uncommon for them to find a place in a music hall or variety theatre once a week. The penny show is patronised when this is not attainable. Women with children can always find means of occupying their evenings, and there are many girl- mothers among the factory workers. Legal marriage is a matter of form that some are tempted to dispense with, believing for a few years that the men mean to be true to them. The girls do not expect to give up factory work when they set up a home, but two together can get along better, they think, until chil- dren come round them. The men of their class, who are labouring men getting a job here and there, take the opportunity some time of going to another town for work, and the girl-mothers frequently do not hear of them again. Sunday morning is the time of general tidying up, and cooking a bit of meat-dinner, which usually con- FACTORY GIRLS 323 sists of boiled bacon or scraps of mutton and beef at threepence or fourpcnce per lb. fried or stewed, and a few potatoes. The working clothes are mended, patched, or washed, ready for Monday morning. This is how six shillings or eight shillings a week is spread over the expenses. Tallymen or canvassers know the busy times of certain trades, and that this is the time to provide for clothes. Dress pieces of bright colours and doubtful quality are offered at a convenient rate of payment. Enough material to make a dress can be paid for in twelve weeks at sixpence per week, and some one will make it for another few shilhngs, paid in instalments. Their hats, feathers, boots, and calico are all paid for in the same way. A little variety is when a sufficient number subscribe for similar articles to pay for one each week, and then the girls cast lots as to who receives it in turn. There is excellent principle shown in the way they will keep up their payments even if they should change their work-place. It is very rare that girls will attempt to shirk their contract, but it sometimes happens that when pay-time comes they will be in- volved in more than they can meet. It may be that through time lost they do not receive a full week's wages. Then they have recourse to the "boot" man or his equivalent, according to the technical term of the trade. Factory workers can always rely on being accommo- dated with a shilling or two for the consideration of a penny per week for every shilling borrowed. This 324 THE NEW PARTY is a common way of providing for a Bank Holiday. They cannot go out in all their bravery, for which a good portion of their wages is mortgaged for weeks to come, without a couple of shillings to start with, so twopence a week goes to the obHging "boot" man until they are able to put down two shillings and pay him off. Once in his clutches, however, it is not so easy to get out again. Unpaid interest gets added to capital, on which interest is again de- manded, until the two shillings becomes five or ten shillings. Then desperate efforts are needed. Girls will often declare that if they can get free they will never do it again, but the weekly payments for things of necessity must be kept up. Sixpence here and there and the rent absorbs all the week's wages, and on Monday morning they are obliged to borrow a shilling for food during the week. Trouble through illness or accident is mostly pro- vided for by " gatherings " among the factory workers, and a girl is thought very mean if she does not contribute a penny at such times. There is not much preparation needed. One of the girls will stand at the factory gate at pay-time w^ith her apron held out. One or two other girls will stand by her to see that no one passes through without knowing the facts. The money collected is carefully counted in the presence of several others, and handed over to the girl in trouble or to her acknowledged representative. Space will not allow a description of many interest- ing incidents to be found in the lives of various classes FACTORY GIRLS 325 of factory workers ; of their timidity when alone and their boldness in company ; of their seeming callous- ness and genuine good-heartedness, and of their strict adherence to their own code of honour. This sketch is not intended, however, to satisfy curiosity, but to awaken an interest. Fashionable " slumming " only petrifies and repels the object of curiosity, but a careful examination of the causes of all that is deteriorating our present generation of mothers is most necessary. There is very much that is robust, independent, and womanly in the honest factory girl which needs encouragement to develop, and there is much also in their conditions of life which roughens the surface of the diamond beneath. The "New Party" has assuredly a great future before it. Comparatively speaking, a new element is only wanting, a few years of education and develop- ment, for the young working women of Great Britain to become one of the most powerful agents in the reorganisation of society. Unfettered by precedent, they will make their own freedom, and through them, the freedom of a nation of workers, when once they obtain a political independence in the same degree that industrial independence is forced upon them. Give them the vote and the power to make the laws that govern their broadened lives, and, to quote the words of a hard-working woman, " the men will jolly well soon find out that they've lost a good servant," and what the men have lost the State will gain 326 THE NEW PARTY Servants they have been, fellow- workers they are, and comrades they will be, but in the meantime old preju- dices have to be broken down and new ideas built up, and the New Party will not find greater difficulties to conquer nor greater or more lasting results than these women voters of the future will yield to it. Frances Hicks. THE NEW PARTY : ITS PRINCIPLES, ITS HOPES, AND ITS IDEALS. *' Man is more than constitutions : better rot beneath the sod Than be true to Church and State, while we're doubly false to God. Our country claims our fealty— we grant it so ; but then, Before she made us citizens great Nature made us men." So wrote James Russell Lowell in the old dark days of American negro-slavery. I do not pledge myself to his theology, broad as it was ; but if in his lines I may translate " God " by the highest ideal of a true humanity, then his virile words are a fitting motto for that New Party of the people, whose care it shall be to abolish that physical, social, and mental slavery, which the old political parties have barely touched with the tips of their fingers. In this transition age one thing is clear — the old parties are doomed. In no sense whatever were they founded on any definite coherent principle of liuman life ; and now that that life is being stirred, if vaguely, yet deeply, by conscious aspirations and by newer hopes, the political and social constitutions by which a portion of the nation has enslaved tlie bulk of tlie people, must inevitably give way to the broader and nobler ideals which are surely being evolved by the gradual growth of the social conscience. The old 328 THE NEW PARTY Toryism is dead, and the new Toryism will die, for stripped of its false colours of spurious democracy, it is still the party of privilege, and privilege can have no place in the humanity of the future. The old Liberalism of Manchester and her prophets, whose creed was the buying of human labour in the cheapest market, and the selling of its product in the dearest, is now the scorn of every righteous man. The newer political Radicalism, whose basis is " equality before the law," but whose outcome is a rampant individualism, with competition for its god and worldly failure for its devil, misses altogether the ethical bond of human brotherhood, which is the only true mainspring of human life, and so it will never solve the human problem. The newest party of all — they whose hearts are touched by the sorrows of men, but whose heads have not yet grasped the full significance of social economics, who are standing with one foot on the old world and the other on the new, striving to reconcile the individualism of yesterday with the collectivism of to-morrow — an impossible task — can only w^ait at the sate of the new social Eden. Each and all of these must give place to the new Democracy, who, by slow and painful evolution through toil and tribulation, will presently find their way to the Promised Land of a grander national life. Church and State, as we know them now, are but the poorest imaginings of partisans ; instead of developing, they cramp the possibilities of humanity. They are based on false conceptions of the real functions of individual existence and social ITS PRINCIPLES, HOPES, AND IDEALS 329 organisation, and the New Party will find its truest strength in the building up of that new civic and national order, whose only aim shall be the care and culture of true women and noble men. Condemn the old parties as we may, they yet roughly and in the main reflected the average level of national thought. Much talk have we had of our " Glorious Empire," but an empire of commercialism as it has been is not the fittest training-school for the best physical, mental, and moral life. For generations society has been based and founded, not upon principle, but on the violation of principle. He would be a daring man who w^ould attempt to prove that justice, freedom, and brotherhood were the guiding, ruling ideas of our political institutions or of our social order. But all life, individual and national, must be vain and fruitless which has not these as the moulding power. And so here we come to the cardinal, fundamental principle on which the New Party will have to be built— The Abolition of Slavery. A strange phrase for this " free " country and tliis " free " century, but man is more than constitutions, and constitutions and institutions which liinder tlic all-round development of the human being are haviug their day, and soon must cease to be. To this principle the newer social conscience is awakening. How can there be justice in human life when there is continual inequality of opportunity I 330 THE NEW PARTY Without such justice how can there be true freedom ? And is real brotherhood possible, except in a social order in which justice and freedom are the pillars of the state 1 To the attainment of these the New Party must bend all its energies, for all other questions are comparatively minor and insignificant which leave un- touched the bed rock problem of civilisation. Materially the problem stands thus. If I own the means by which another man must live, I own him, body and soul. I own his body, for he must, in some shape or form, ask my permission to labour, and try as we may to conceal the fact under the name of freedom, such a state of things is really physical slavery — a slavery tempered, it is true, by fierce struggles for freedom, but carrying with it ever, and inevitably, the class war. I own his soul, for in the long run slave power carries also with it slave tyranny — that in its turn means mostly greed for wealth, and the ultimate result in our present social order is that low material condition of life in which the masses of the people have to exist, which not only enfeebles the body but degrades the mind. Said Matthew Arnold, " Our present social inequality materialises the upper class, vulgarises the middle class, and brutalises the lower class ; " and the old parties have failed utterly and completely, because they have been based upon the practical recognition of this in- equality, which means the ownership of the many by the few. Translated into the technical language of political ITS PRINCIPLES, HOPES, AND IDEALS 331 economy, the ultimate principle of the New Party will be the abolition of private property in the means of production, transit, and exchange ; their ownership and control by the whole community in the interests of all ; in a word, the establishment of the Co-operative Commonwealth. To this end certain practical things will have to be done, not as the end, but as the means to the end. Nationalisation of land and capital will not entirely wait till these are accomplished, for the practical and the ideal will progress side by side. But we may begin with — Adult suffrage, every man and every woman, married or unmarried, having a voice in the making of the laws by which they are bound. The largest possible development of the movement for shortening the hours of labour. The limitation of child labour, and the stringent im- provement of the conditions of the labour of women. The housing of the poor in commodious, artistic, and, as far as possible, co-operative municipal dwell- ings. Free, compulsory, secular, and technical education for all classes of the community, with the free meal in the State schools. The municipalisation and nationalisation of gas, water, trams, railways, and docks. Direct employment by all public bodies of labour in all their departments with no sweating. And most important of all, the collective employ- 332 THE NEW PARTY ment of the unemployed, nationally and municipally, in town and in country, on useful public work, at a reasonable, living wage. Side by side with these will go the opening out to the people, in towns and in villages, of every possible avenue of culture, of science, of art, of literature, and this will embrace physical as well as mental develop- ment. With this also will inevitably go the direct control of the liquor traffic. Questions such as DisestabHshment will be settled in the natural order of things, and in some way the power of the House of Lords will be limited. One day all hereditary authority will vanish. What does all this mean? That the fundamental principle of the New Party, Collectivism, runs through all its minor programme, and that the principle em- bodied in that programme, that the people should own themselves instead of being owned, will be established by it, and will be ultimately worked out into the com- plete nationalisation of land and capital. And this is our hope. Many will go far upon the road with us, but at the last will turn their backs upon us. That is to be expected. But there must be no mistake about the end which the New Party of the People will have in view, nor as to its ultimate ideal. It looks almost brutal to say that some will have to be worse off in order that more may be better off, and this may seem a low material way of looking at the question, but behind that lie the great principles of human life, which to those of us who try to look ahead, are the moving and ITS PRINCIPLES, HOPES, AND IDEALS 333 compelling force in the effort to alter physical condi- tions. True it is that the best man's life will never consist in the abundance of the things that he pos- sesseth, but in the use he makes of them ; l)ut it is also true that the way in which a man obtains his abundance will make or mar his character. The >s'ew Party will succeed if it bases itself upon the simple definite idea, that the only justification for society at all is that it should exist for the purpose of developing the highest and the best qualities of every man, woman, and child within its borders. And so its watchword must be the uplifting of the corporate conscience by the ennoblement of the individual life. Impossible under present conditions, but new conditions must make the possibility. Let this be clearly apprehended, and then at last we shall reach that true liberty, that true equality, that true fraternity, which in the very highest and noblest sense will mean the true sisterhood of woman, the real brotherhood of man. Herbert Burrow^s. " The People at large may aliuai/s quash the vain pretensions of the feiv hy saying, ' We collectively are richer, wiser, and nobler than you.' " — Aristotle. THE ADVENT OF THE PEOPLE " The human race is born for the few." That old and evil saying of the lloman has been oftener acted upon than formally professed ; but even its formal profession by those who have had the direction of human affairs has been the rule rather than the exception. Governments, policies, and institutions have gone on the supposition that the things men care for and ought to care for, the things that make life worth living, in a word, are only accessible, in the nature of the case, to the few, and to the few only on condition that they can force the many to toil and suffer for them. If that man is a slave whose life is not regarded as an end, but only as a means to another's end in which he has no direct interest ; if that man is a slave whose root instincts of self- preservation and shrinking from pain are enlisted by external compulsion, against the free development of his own life, and on the side of its subordination and subjugation to the lives of others— if, I say, this man is a slave, then the highest industrial and intel- lectual outcome of ancient and modern civilisations has been built upon slavery. Though the praises of a simple life have been sung, partly as a salve to the conscience of the luxurious, partly as an antidote to dangerous 336 THE NEW PARTY discontent, and partly in a half sincere restlessness and dissatisfaction in the " enjoyment " of the prizes of life, yet none the less the ideal which men have steadily set before them, and for which they have worked and even prayed, will be found to involve two things : First, that a great deal of hard work and drudgery should be done in order to supply them with the means of enjoying a life worth living; secondly, that they should not be called upon to do that work themselves. "The human race is born for the few." If I am not one of those few, the art of life is to become one of them ; if I am one of them, the art of life is to retain my place. And the art of government is to keep the primary impulses of the many either on the side of "Law and Order," or in subjection to it ; ^ that is to say, to make it seem more possible to the masses to preserve their lives, and gratify their imperious primal instincts, by making themselves subservient to the life of their betters than by seeking to develop their own lives as an end. All that conduces to make them " useful," as a means of ministration to the lives of their betters, has been lauded by religion and morality of the official type as virtuous, while everything that, without serving this purpose, tends to make their lives " enjoyable," as ends in themselves, has been denounced as vicious. Once more, " The human race is born for the few." ^ I use "Law and Order" as a singular, taking a singular verb and pronoun, on the analogy of the mediaeval use of " God and Nature " with a singular verb. THE ADVENT OF THE PEOPLE 337 I do not think it can be questioned that this creed marks the prevailing temper which has actuated the men and the classes who have hitherto had the direction of the resources of the human race, but it has been by no means universal or unchallenged. A protest has always been raised, and has always been more or less effective, on behalf of the lives of the masses regarded as ends rather than as means ; and wherever the spirit of any true social religion — as distinct from a purely personal religion such as that of the Stoics — has been strong, there the doctrine has been preached and believed, that there is a life worth living, intrinsically accessible to all, and that the human race is not born for the few. The progress of civilisation is to be measured by the growing strength of this belief, and its growing influence in the actual direction and conduct of affairs. We, of the new Democracy, do not believe that the misery, the degradation, or the exclusion of the many is the price that must be paid for the happiness or the exaltation of the few, or for their entrance into the heritage of humanity. We believe not only that there is a life worth living, intrinsically accessible to all, but that that life is more worth living than the life now secured by the happy few at the cost of the " infiniti guai," the countless wailings, of the banished many. The favourite refuge of the apologist for the exist- ing order is that the higher forms of culture, and the finer tone and temper of personal life, would inevitably be lost if deprived of the carefully prepared soil and 338 THE NEW PARTY the stimulating conditions which are provided for their nurture by the existence of the privileged classes ; so that a successful attempt to secure a more even dis- tribution of the burdens and the privileges of life Mould result in a lowering of the tone of life itself; and a hasty and selfish grasping at the fruits of our present civilisation would sacrifice the future advance of humanity by destroying its very conditions. Now, so far from admitting this, we assert the very contrary. What is this high and beautiful life that is so precious that the tears and blood of humanity are a cheap price for it ? Surely not the mere life of elegance and fashion ? Is it, then, the life of scholarship and artistic culture ? Or is it the life of scientific investi- gation? Or is it the life of the affections? Or is it the life of religion 1 It is true indeed that the higher reaches of such life will never be attained except by the higher sort of men, and most true that they are now reached only by a very few of those to whom the whole range of material and spiritual possibilities lies open. In fact, the present system has conspicuously failed to produce any class of society the average member of which lives a life of the intellect, of the artistic sense, the imagination, or the affections, which can be said to be intrinsically noble, or to be worth preserving as an earnest and as an incentive to give us assurance of that heritage to the possession of which humanity is called. But that a more equal distribution of wealth would result in such a life being reached by still fewer, and on a lower level even THE ADVENT OF THE PEOPLE 339 by those few, runs counter to the most fundamental article of the creed of all true social religions, and most of all to Christianity and the religion of the new social movement which is stirring everywhere, but is fullest of hope and faith in England. It is our belief, on the contrary, that in every branch, and under every aspect, life will be richer and nobler when art, scholarship, science, and religion have been rebaptized in the democratic spirit. Scholarship will be redeemed from its pedantry; art will be saved from its cliquishness and affectation ; science will be broadened in its speculative and ennobled in its practical aspects ; and personal religion will be saved from its selfishness and its isolation, when the in- vigorating, purifying, and exalting influence of a wider and happier national life has been felt by them all. Only let us attempt barely to conceive of an art and a religion having their roots in the actual lives and aspirations of a strong and hopeful people, giving utterance to their joy and sorrow, their aspira- tions, their experiences, their faith and love, their memories, their admiration, their passion. What a feeble and futile thing our art of the studio seems in the face of such a vision. It is true that what we call art now needs a special training to appreciate it. It is true that the attempts to bring it to "the poor," or bring them to it, however amiable and however desirable, have something hollow and hopeless about them ; but this is because our art is bloodless, and is not fit to be appreciated by the masses of our 340 THE NEW PARTY countrymen, not because the masses of our country- men are inherently incapable of appreciating art. It is true again that scholarship in the technical and narrow sense is only to be achieved by the few. But what then? A few scholars are quite enough. It is time every scholar understood that studies which never bring him near to the life of ordinary and unlearned humanity, and never give him results that can be vitalised for them and made to charm, enlighten, or enlarge their minds, is essentially on the level of an amusement or indulgence, innocent and perhaps bracing, but a merely personal matter having no social significance and no social dignity or beauty. If all scholars realised this we should get rid of the in- suflferable pedantry and priggishness of scholarship ; we should understand that " study," in the narrow sense, is only one way, and that an indirect one, of getting at life ; our scholars would be more modest, more open and broad minded, more human, and our scholarship would be more fruitful and more vital. The fruits of scholarship would be ripened and gathered by the few, but enjoyed by the many. And so through the whole list. With more leisure and comfort for the masses, and with the binding neces- sity on the part of the more gifted sons of humanity to keep in touch with the life of their brethren, we believe that every branch of knowledge and of art would take a new flight, that the affections would be purified and exalted, that religion would be deepened, broadened, and transfused with gladness, and that just in propor- THE ADVENT OF THE PEOPLE 34 » tion as the access to life should be more freely opened, the quality of life would be raised. And moreover, we believe that in all these directions the new demo- cratic movement has already given some earnest of the fruits that it will bear when it has reached its strength. The plea of the privileged classes is in reality a plea to be left in a hothouse instead of being brought out into the open air ; a plea to be allowed to play at life instead of living ; a plea to be allowed to belong to a clique instead of to a nation ; a plea to suck an unwhole- some life out of the veins of others instead of drawing health and strength straight from the sources of life ; a plea to make literature, art, and scholarship into the amusements of luxurious indolence instead of the utterance of a people's life, and to replace prophets and apostles by the private chaplains of such as can afford to keep them/ The democratic movement of the day is based on a new confidence in the broadening and deepening power of fellowship, bearing with it a heightened sense of the 1 Should this essay by chance fall into the hands of any hona-fide believer in the doctrine, that culture is dependent for its preservation upon the existence of privilege, let me earnestly exhort him to hasten, while there is yet time, to do what in him lies to make it independent thereof. The classes into whose hands the direction of affairs is rapidly passing are by hypothesis incapable of appreciating the beauties of culture, and can hardly be expected therefore to sacrifice their own coarse pleasures to the preservation of the hotbeds in which culture is grown. It only remains for us, the cultivated and threatened classes, to endeavour to give our own culture such robustness as may enable it — like the Jewish religion when Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Jerusalem— to survive its severance from its native soil in club-land, and purify and develop itself in the Babylonian exile of Whitechapel or Battersea. 342 THE NEW PARTY possibilities of life, a new vision of the promised land, and a renewed faith in the kingdom of God on earth. In a word, it is a new Messianic movement. But if we turn from such general ideas and con- siderations as these to contemplate the actual facts of the Labour movement, we are told at once that in place of a lofty ideal and a new sense of the glory and the meaning of Kfe, we shall find a frankly material and selfish struggle, sordid, suspicious, and ignoble in its spirit and in its methods, and strictly bounded by material advantages in its aim. " Those who have not," we are told, '' envy those that have and desire to oust them. That is all. The rich have exactly what the poor want, and are exactly what they would like to be. There is no new interpretation of Hfe whatever, no new ideals, and no new possibilities. It is merely that the masses of Englishmen, rightly or wrongly, believe themselves to have discovered that they have hitherto been engaged in getting certain things that everybody wants for others, and that they have determined they will henceforth endeavour to get them for themselves instead. This is extremely natural ; and human nature being what it is, we need not be surprised that the Labour movement does not know the meaning of such terms as gratitude or chivalry, that workmen pursue their aims with reckless disregard to all interests except their own, that no combination spreads an inch further than the strictest principles of selfishness warrant, that frequent signs THE ADVENT OF THE PEOPLE 343 of sheer envy are discernible, and that anything Avhich seems to humble or injure the privileged classes is welcomed as in itself an advantage. All this is per- fectly natural. We accept it and make no complaint. Only it is a little ridiculous to call it a new Messianic movement and proclaim it as a new gospel." Now, in the first place, it is well fairly to consider how the Labour movement would stand were all this true without qualification. Suppose it is true that the things which people have always striven for, and which the privileged classes have got, are the best things there are to get, and suppose it is true that the poverty and suffering that men seek to escape are the worst evils to which flesh is heir. Then surely we must give our sympathy to the Labour movement, because a more even distribution of wealth would obviously relieve misery so intense that it would be more than a compensation for the loss of enjoyment at the other end by which it would have to be purchased. By a well-known law that lies at the basis of all sound consideration of social phenomena, each successive application of wealth to the supply of the wants of the same individual becomes less and less effective as a producer of satis- faction — at any rate after a certain point has been reached. This is but the celebrated, though grievously misunderstood and misapplied, "Law of Diminishing Returns " again. If I have a fixed piece of land, and ply it with successive doses of capital and labour, then, after a certain point, each successive dose will cause a less than proportional increase in the yield of the land. 344 THE NEW PARTY If I have a fixed amount of labour and capital, and ply it with successive doses of land by spreading it over a wider and wider area, as long as I am cramped for space each successive increment of land will largely increase the yield of my labour and capital ; but after a certain point has been reached, then each succes- sive addition of land will cause a less than proportional increase in the yield of my labour capital and labour. Just in the same way there is a law of decreasing returns of comfort and happiness when a man is plied with successive increments of wealth. The difference of comfort between fifty pounds a year and a hundred and fifty is more than the difference between a hundred and fifty and two hundred and fifty. And just as a dose of capital subtracted from the cultivation of a piece of land well supplied, and devoted to a piece crying out for more, would yield a greater result, so a portion of wealth subtracted from the man who has five hundred a year, and given to the one that has but fifty, would thereby increase its efficiency as a pro- ducer of well-being. Robin Hood's methods were open to legitimate objection on various grounds, but his principle that wealth taken from the rich and given to the poor was thereby rendered more socially efficient was above all suspicion on the score of economic sound- ness. If, then, we can grant the postulate of the Labour movement, viz., that organisation and legislation can really affect the distribution and incidence of labour and of wealth, it follows that even if the progressive accomplishment of its aims should leave the individual THE ADVENT OF THE PEOPLE 345 and society just as sordid, just as selfish, just as sen- sual, just as material as they now are, it would never- theless be a movement that might claim the sympathy of all disinterested and benevolent persons, as calcu- lated to increase the sum of human happiness, measured by what men agree to consider the appropriate test. Is it not a fact that, even setting aside all ideas of a noble or ideal human life, and thinking of man simply as an animal, that the mere weight and mass of animal sufi'ering in the world is appalling, and — if it can in any way, or at almost any cost, be relieved — intoler- able ? Any movement which gives promise of a mere material improvement in the lot of the many at the expense of the few, should command our unqualified sympathy ; and more especially so when the very con- ditions under which the battle is fought make it impossible that the victory shall be won without the exercise of those qualities of self-restraint, perseverance, mutual confidence, and administrative integrity, which are the best guarantee that when won it will prove substantial. Nevertheless, it remains true that if all we can look for is a mere redistribution of the means of life without any raising of life itself, then, though humanity and justice alike call upon us to support the Labour move- ment, yet it will be hard to sustain any lofty enthu- siasm in the cause. A feeling akin to contempt will mingle with our pity of the lot of humanity, a dash of scorn and bitterness will be thrown over our work, and we shall be under the constant temptation to sever our 346 THE NEW PARTY own lot from that of a sordid and grovelling humanity, to seek our own salvation in an Epicurean or a Stoic religion, according to our temperament, and lose our hold of the Christian or social religion that is content with nothing but the salvation of the world. But now, having asked ourselves what would become of the higher aspects of our work should we accept the cynical representations of the Labour movement as merely selfish and material, let us go on to ask our- selves what its overt acts ought to be, suppose it really is a religious movement having its roots in a new sense of the worth and the meaning of life. I for one have not a moment's hesitation in saying, that if it is indeed a new Messianic movement, in the presence of which we stand, its utterance ought to be, and must be in the main, just w'hat it is, viz., a claim for less work and more wages, a claim for better conditions of employ- ment and a larger share in determining them. " The docker's tanner," " the living wage," " the eight hours* day," "the graduated income-tax" are the natural watchwords of the new movement, however exalted its spirit, and however clear its perception of the fact that " man does not live by bread alone." On this point there should be no doubt or confusion in our minds. The things that are most important and the things that are most necessary are not the same. Man is both a material and a spiritual being. It is the things of the spirit that matter, but it is the things of the body that are most urgently, unintermittently, and ruthlessly necessary. It is one of the great and THE ADVENT OF THE PEOPLE 347 pregnant principles constantly insisted on by Augnste Comte, that the higher is always dependent upon the lower, so that the lower may exist without the higher, but the higher cannot exist without the lower. The higher matters most, but the lower is the most neces- sary. I may have something to eat without being a saint, a poet, an artist, a lover, or a friend ; but I cannot be a saint, a poet, an artist, a lover, or a friend unless I have quite recently had something to eat. Wc are constantly reminded — generally by people who do not know what it means to be short of food — that the things that really make life worth living are not to be bought with money. Most true ! But neither are they to be had without money. Let us have done, once for all, with this miserable cant about the sordidness of material demands and material cares. Food, shelter, and clothing are money. AVithout these we can neither think nor feel, we can neither hope, nor love, nor pray. Gautama himself could not have meditated under the Bodhi tree and become the Buddha unless he had had "money" — unless, that is, his bowl had been filled. Jesus could not have preached his glad tidings unless he had had "money" — unless, that is, certain women of Galilee had fed him. It has been said — and it should be written in letters of gold — " the kingdom of comfort is not the Kingdom of God." Most true doctrine, and most fitting for these troublous times ! Let the rich and comfortable, who are alarmed and shocked by the material spirit of the movements of the day, take heart. If they are perchance robbed of some 348 THE NEW PARTY or of many of their comforts, they will not thereby be banished from the Kingdom of God! And let the comfortless take warning; in gaining some greater measure of comfort they will not have gained the Promised Land of a true humanity, or entered into the Kingdom of God. But the denizens of that King- dom must have a certain number of cubic feet of air, a certain amount of wholesome food and drink. They must have clothes to wear, and houses to make into homes, and some respite from the cravings of their bodily needs in which to taste the joys of learning and of loving, which make the life that is life indeed. In order that they may get the things that matter most they must first secure the things that are most neces- sary. Surely, then, we may say, on the one hand, that even if the Labour movement is purely material, it neverthe- less deserves our undivided sympathy in its aims and objects, however hard we may find it to sustain our enthusiasm ; and, on the other hand, that if it is indeed the greatest religious movement that the world has ever seen, if it is indeed the summons to humanity to enter upon its heritage, it must needs speak, and speak loud and long, the language of material demands. But though our estimate of the true spiritual character of the Labour movement will not turn our sympathies away from it or towards it — for they must go out to it in any case — yet it will indefinitely afiect our hopes for humanity, and we must watch with strained anxiety for all indications of the way w^hich THE ADVENT OF THE PEOPLE 349 the stream is flowing, and must ourselves be conscious of a responsibility and an opportunity such as the world has not hitherto known, in so far as we have any power or influence in shaping the ideals and guiding the spirit of the British democracy. Can we give ourselves any sure answer to the question whether that democracy is fundamentally inspired by motives that promise a regenerated future ? I shall not attempt any answer, but I shall, in conclusion, present a few considerations which appear to me to be of vital moment. No one will deny that the British workman renders at any rate a lip service to the august name of Justice. The question of questions for the future of England and of humanity is the question, whether that lip service represents a service of the heart ; whether the demo- cracy really loves justice, or only finds her a useful and a creditable ally ; whether it is that we desire to have justice on our side, or that we desire to be on her side. There have been many definitions of justice, and I am not about to give another. But I have always been fascinated by a mediaeval conception that justice consists in the preservation by man of that balance established by God and Nature between capacities and opportunities. If we look at society as it now is we see capacities starved of opportunity alike by excess and by defect of wealth, and our cry for justice is not a cry for a dead level, but a cry for the opening up of opportunities — opportunities of command, and not less precious opportunities for service ; opportunities 350 THE NEW PARTY for giving where genius has granted the capacity to give, and opportunities for receiving where that capacity, not less blessed, has been vouchsafed ; opportunities for admiration and for enjoyment ; in a word, opportunities for " the toil and the gain of living." This is the meaning of our cry for justice. The privileged classes have an instinctive dread of it, and the masses an instinctive confidence in it. The few, unless exceptionally high-minded and en- lightened, have a secret fear that justice may be against them, and may rob them of the things they love. The many know that they can only gain by it. For, as has been finely said, "the many know that they cannot live by plundering and oppressing the few. The few are by no means sure that they cannot live by plundering and oppressing the many." And so the people love justice. But do they love her because she does, or is expected to do, something for them, or do they love her with a love which will make them do something for her ? Every phase of the Labour movement brings it to the test in this matter, but I wish to insist on one special aspect of the question. The struggle that puts the British workman in command of his own destinies also puts him in command of the destinies of hundreds of millions of the " subject races," and makes him directly responsible for the bearings of our civilisation upon the progress, the morals, and the happiness of the Native races that fringe our huge and growing domain. Is the British Democracy not only prepared THE ADVENT OF THE PEOPLE 351 but determined to give to the weak that justice which in its growing strength it demands for itself? Hitherto the history of Race oppressions has been still more horrible than the history of Class oppres- sions ; and the nameless horrors that have been recently reported from the Southern States of America give us only too dreadful proof, that where race ani- mosities run high, a free and self-governing Democracy may sanction and publicly indulge in cruelties as ghastly as those which have branded the names (jf ancient and mediaeval tyrants with deathless infamy. Our own recent record of dealings with Native Races shows how readily the sense of humanity and justice is dulled where a higher and a lower civilisation come into contact. Whether in the course of the next twenty or thirty years we call in opium and rum as our allies in clearing the ground of a few more tribes of Africa or the remote East ; whether we again invite chiefs to friendly conference in order to seize or murder them ; w^hether we smoke helpless and un- resisting victims out of their caves of refuge to slay them when they come forth ; whether we harry women and children to death, suffer the armed rapacity of < bartered traders to wage private war with our resources at their back, and "weave a web of force and fraud " over our colonial domain — whether, I say, we do or do not all this, may make but little difference to the whole sum of wrong and misery that man has wrought on man since the world was ; but it will be of crucial significance as marking the real tone and 352 THE NEW PARTY temper of the British Democracy, and as testing the sincerity of its professed love of justice. If in fighting for its own rights, the people of England forgets its duties, if commercial interests are suffered to control our colonial policy unchecked, and the one " interest " that a statesman can safely neglect continues to be the interest of justice and mercy, then the Democracy may indeed move on to victory, but it will be a victory without glory, and with no promise for the future of humanity. And that member of the privileged classes who declares that his sympathies are with the people, and who throws in his lot with them, but has no care for their duties and their honour in the discharge of this mighty trust, thereby declares himself a mere demagogue, whose heart never beat with a pure and disinterested love of his fellows, and whose sympathy with suffering and wrong is conditioned by the posses- sion of the franchise. As Arnold Toynbee stood addressing for the last time the people that he loved, and for whom he lived and died, when the hand of death was already upon him and he was uttering the words that proved to be his last legacy to us, he ended his picture of the reforms which he hoped might gladden England, with an appeal that showed how well he, at least, under- stood the true problem of civilisation. When we have solved, he said, the great problems of our own recon- structive social administration, nay, as we are deter- mining to solve them, "we shall as a nation try to redeem our past ; we shall try to rule India justly ; we THE ADVENT OF THE PEOPLE 353 shall try to obtain forgiveness from Ireland ; we shall try to prevent subject races from being oppressed by our commerce ; and we shall try to spread to every clime the love of man." My report sets forth that these dying words of Arnold Toynbee's were received with loud cheering. Did those cheers indicate a mere dramatic and abstract sympathy, or were they an indication that the advent of the Democracy to effective power will mean the advent of the era of justice in the exercise of the might of England ? With the answer to this question are bound up the true significance of the domestic reforms for which we all watch as they that watch for the morning, the possibilities of a truly human life for our people, the hopes of the coming of God's kingdom on earth. Philip II. Wicksteed. " For unto luhomsoever much is giveii, of him shall he much required : and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ash the more.'' — Luke xii. 48. WHAT TO AIM AT In every city there is misery made manifest, but doubt- less there are numbers who never notice it, or, if they do, and feel it, they hurry the thought of it out of their heads impatiently. Well-to-do people are apt to prefer to know nothing of the awful needless suffering which is going on everywhere around them, and if the fact of it is forced upon their attention, they resent it. It is as if they claimed it as a right that their own tranquillity shall be left undisturbed whatever happens to others. They acknowledge no fellow-creature with a claim to call upon them in times of trouble, and they feel no impulse to tender help. Such people are maimed creatures, bereft of spiritual grace, and de- ficient in the human attribute of heart. They sacrifice the great joy of relieving pain in order to secure the empty ease of not knowing what others suffer ; but they do not succeed altogether, because it is dithcult to live and not know. The important truth takes them unawares at inconvenient times, and disturbs them in spite of themselves. Women, especially, object to have their sense of pleasure disturbed by painful thoughts, and they are ingenious in making excuses for themselves. They raise their selfishness in this to the dignity of a duty by describing it as an 356 THE NEW PARTY effort to keep their minds pure. If one half of humanity does not know how the other half lives, it is because the one half would rather not know ; and if the knowledge is forced upon them, they are ready with reasons to relieve themselves of any necessity to help. They harden their hearts into the belief that if people are miserable they have only themselves to blame for it, and therefore it serves them right. The utter inability of the average man or woman to go back to first causes is disheartening. No universal progress will be made until the general tendency to consider effects while causes are let alone is con- quered. It is an ordinary defect in people that they are not radical. Take the commonest case in the heart-break of life in London, a sign that is for ever on the surface, made manifest in all its pathetic misery. You arrive at a big terminus after an easy journey. A porter secures a cab for you, puts your luggage upon it, and you are carried off in comfort to your destination, where either the kind of com- fort and consideration you can buy await you, or else the welcome of home. There is interest of a casual kind in everything you see by the way — the state of the streets, the glimpses of great shops, the faces and dresses of men and women. But by degrees you become conscious of a figure, now on this side, now on that, keeping pace with the cab, a gaunt shabby creature, with shoulder-blades sharpened by want, and haggard eyes looking up always anxiously at your luggage ; the figure of a man who, ten chances WHAT TO AIM AT 357 to one, began life handicapped by his constitution, and never had a chance to repair the error of nature, if, indeed, it could be repaired — one of those who should not have been born. Life for such is of necessity one long illness, full of suffering, mental, moral and physical, dull or acute. From King's Cross to Kensington he follows your cab, and leans against your gate panting till you alight. He has kept up with your horse in the hope of securing a shilling, probably the only chance he has had that day, and, just as probably, you drive him off with objurgations on cab-runners and good-for-nothing people generally. You can afford to keep a servant to carry your luggage up. The horse that brought you is sure of a feed for his work when he has done it, and sure also of the merciful knacker to put him out of his pain when he is past work ; but the human derelict is expected to starve and live. For a man in his physical con- dition that race to keep up with the horse was a severe effort ; had its object been the preservation of your life instead of his own you would have called it sublime, but as it is, you see nothing in it but a nuisance that should be stopped. You support the rotten social system which is responsible for the reck- less production of such specimens of humanity, but when one comes as a consequence to trouble you, you evade your responsibility and turn him from your doors. You either do not know, or cannot com- prehend, or arc not sufficiently far advanced to take a right view of the cause of which he is only one of 358 THE NEW PARTY the unfortunate effects. All evil is preventible, but it must be attacked at the outset. It is a waste of time to trim the tree of dead branches when the trouble is at the root. The starving child raising a poor little pinched pathetic face for help is to be cared for when it has come, and so is the cab-runner, or the inveterate corner-man with his debilitated con- stitution which makes prolonged exertion impossible, and reduces him to live on fitful spurts of energy ; each in their way is an object which would have filled Christ with compassion, but among the sect called Christian, what they cause for the most part is curs- ing. Some, of course, will be found to help, but how few ever think of asking, while doing so, why does such misery exist? What is the cause of all this suffering? Even those who harden their hearts with maxims on the subject of indiscriminate charity, are not necessarily cruel people — only, for the most part, wanting in finer feeling, unthinking, or cowardly. The cabman who brings one home on a bitter night must stay out hours longer to make up enough to pay for his cab, let alone feed himself and his family. The chances are that he is an honest fellow doing his best ; but his fare has no sympathy with him. He grinds him down to the last sixpence, and then goes warmly to bed himself with all the greater sense of comfort for having saved that sixpence. The lady looks with loathing at the woman in the street, not caring how she comes to be there, and certainly not willing to acknowledge that she may be as little to blame for WHAT TO AIM AT 359 the temperament and circumstances which have resulted in her degradation, as is her ladyship to be praised for those which are responsible for her own elevation. There must be something radically wrong to account for each separate heartbreak about us ; and the wrong will never be righted until we inquire into causes and inaugurate an attack upon them. This is the province of the Isocrat. Experience warns us to beware of any movement that threatens the graces of life — it is the disgraces we are bound to remove. When a man swaggers on the assumption that he deserves credit for not wearing a dress-coat, he is simply wrong-headed. The dress-coat is certainly the badge of a class, but that is the only mistake about it. There is nothing so refreshing after a day's work, or more refining in the family, than for the workers to change their working clothes ; they get into the habit of laying aside their wearied and worried thoughts with them, and as they slip into the dress they associate with rest, they naturally assume a suitable attitude of mind which is in itself a refreshing relaxation. The business of the day is done, and now comes leisure, mental and physical, to enjoy the evening hour with a book, or game, or song, a quiet pipe and chat — simple pleasures which are every human being's due, and should be within their reach, whatever their occupation. Beware, too, of any man or woman who considers an act of courtesy a servile thing. If we would receive respect we must pay it. Respect to whom respect 36o THE NEW PARTY is due cuts both ways ; and not to pay respect to others, argues an outcast from the category of those who have earned the right to be respected. What we should aim at is not to deprive one class of the refinements of life, but to extend them to all. No one who would " lower the mountain to the plain " is a true reformer. Let us level upwards. It is by oppression that labour has been made to mean lack of gentlehood ; but that it should continue to do so is not consistent with any movement that calls itself progressive. The rich say arrogantly that manners are of slow growth, and it is only in the third generation after the acquisition of wealth that a man is polished enough to be presentable. Families which have held property for generations form a class in which charms of manner have become hereditary from long cultiva- tion, and these people maintain that manner is of slow growth because, when they come into contact with certain specimens of newly rich men who have been brutalised by a sordid and selfish struggle to wrest more than their share of money from their fellow workmen, they find them off"eusive. But gentlehood is a matter of the mind, and not necessarily a matter of money or position at all. The conductor of an omnibus who, in all the worry and fret of the long weary day, keeps his temper with unreasonable pas- sengers, and never neglects the kindly courtesy of opening an umbrella for a woman, or helping a dis- abled person in or out, is a gentleman born ; and if he is deficient in the finishing touch of polish, the WHAT TO AIM AT 361 shame is to the community which has made no oppor- tunity for him to acquire it. The chances are that he woukl have taken on something more sincere than the superficial surface-polish common in society — the thin veneer of which so soon shows itself for what it is, especially in the familiar friction of domestic life. The good manners which come of heart and high principle are the invariable outcome, not of an upper class, but of a higher nature. The noblest are always the kindliest and the most considerate. Those who offer roughness as a proof of honesty, if they are not to be suspected, are at all events to be avoided. Courtesy is a Christian quality, and workers should prove their right to it by cultivating it in all its subtle delicacy. The divinely human Christ, the Son of Mary the carpenter's wife, was distinguished by nothing more conspicuously than the exquisite kindliness of His gentlehood. The dignity of His grand simplicity ; the calm deliberation with which He spoke, and the high- bred restraint which He imposed upon Himself when they reviled Him and He answered not again, came of the certainty of His perfect sincerity, and are attri- butes within the reach of every honest man. And so also the graces of life should be, and will be, when the disgraces are removed. This is the task which men and women working together, and in honour pre- ferring one another, each giving something which the other lacks, have to accomplish. Sarah Grand. " When a nation modifies the electorial qualification, it may easily he foreseen that sooyier or later that qualification uill he entirely aholished. There is no more invariahle rule in the History of Society, for after each concession the strength of the Democracy increases, and its demands increase ivith its strength''' — De Tocqueville, vol. i. p. 67. ON TPIE VERGE OF CHANGE *' We are on the verge of a great change," say the members of the New Party. "Change!" answers the learned Liberal; "we are always on the verge of a change." "Change!" cries the more learned Radical; "life consists of links of changes." " But there are changes and changes," say the mem- bers of the New Party. "The change of a moment, and the change of an epoch. It is the change of the epoch upon the verge of which we stand." " But what great change ? " "First, moral; and because truly moral, then mate- rial ; and because truly material, then moral. Or, to repeat it — first, spiritual, and because truly spiritual, then physical ; and because truly physical, then spiri- tual — the one acting upon the other as inevitable laws." That is the coming change — a change that carries with it the largest political program that has yet been presented by the fulness of life itself to those who live. Life seen in its healthy conditions, whether in the wild animal or the civilised man, has two prime forces — it is difficult to say which comes first and which 363 364 THE NEW PARTY second, and wliich is the outcome of the other — namely, Love and Labour. Each after its own kind loves by labour ; each after its own kind labours in love. Hours of weariness may come, but in due course the spiritual impetus of love comes — the love of the young, the love of kith and kin, the love of life, the love of justice and right, and back we go to labour at material things with mind and muscle, in partner- ship with God. This is high talk for a political program ; but it is not too high for the good time coming and the signs of the times when the pretences of the politician and the professions of the priest shall alike be cast off, and the true union of the moral and material, the spiritual and physical, and of Love and Labour, shall come in their stead. We have Liberal " opinion ; " Ave have even ad- vanced Liberal " conviction ; " nay, Ave even have Radical " conscientious conviction " — and yet the old machine creaks round the same old constitutional circle, Avith the same old incumbrances, noAv Avith Liberal Avould-be speed, but clogged by Lords material so material that they Avill not act upon spiritual things, and Lords spiritual so spiritual that they cannot act upon things material ; and noAv Avith the heavy squirean jog-trot pace of Toryism very much at its ease ; noAv Avith a dislocating jerk from the Irish, noAv a nudge from the Scotch, noAV a timorous hint from the Welsh, and noAv a shrug of indifference ON THE VERGE OF CHANGE 365 from the snng and comfortable John l>ulls of well-to- do Britain. In the meantime the hourly lives in tens of thou- sands of homes are less homely, less happy, with less of the necessaries and the comforts of existence than by their labours they have a right to have. What then is wanted to make the old machinery work? or to make new machinery that will? A Political Eevival which shall be religious, spiri- tual, moral — so religious, so spiritual, so moral, that it will either convert the Lords spiritual and the Lords material to conscientiously give freedom to others, or for the others to give world-wide freedom to them. What is wanted is a I'olitical Eevival which shall form a lay parliament outside of the official parlia- ment, a lay church outside of the official churches, and teach the spiritual and material lessons of the time to both. We have had politics for politics' sake ; we have had religion for religion's sake ; science for science's sake ; literature for literature's sake ; and art for art's sake; but we now want politics for justice, religion for right, science for happiness, literature for love of humanity, and art for the practical social pleasure of all in the most commonplace things of life. For this political and religious revival we want tlie common conception of Labour as Labour completely changed. This is fundamental. The common con- ception of Labour, as shown by practical rc;5ults, what- 366 THE NEW PARTY ever may be the affected theory of men in their fine moments, is that Labour is more or less a degradation sinking into lower and still lower degrees of degrada- tion the nearer you get, forsooth, to the primary kinds of labour without which human life on the planet could not be. This misconception of the degradation of labour runs through all classes. Idlers have it ; even workers have it. The aristocrat looks down upon the professional man and merchant ; the professional man and the merchant look down upon the tradesman ; the trades- man looks down upon the mechanic ; the mechanic looks down upon the nondescript general worker ; the nondescript general worker looks down upon the so- called lower labourer, however necessary to the very existence of the individual and the State that so-called lower labourer might be. This is absolutely wrong. Life depends upon labour. That law alone elevates all necessary labour, however rough, however hard, above degradation. If it is no degradation to eat bread, it is no degradation to prepare the ground, and sow the seed, and reap the harvest. If it is no degradation to eat off a plate and on a table, and with a knife and fork, it is no degradation to be a maker of plates, tables, and of knives and forks. If it is no degradation to walk through clean streets, it is no degradation to brush them. And yet in various degrees, by various classes of people, and in various ways, even necessary labour is ON THE VERGE OF CHANGE 367 treated as something unworthy of right recognition ; whereas, the harder it is, the rougher it is, the more fundamentally necessary it is for the life of the in- dividual who helps to form the State, the more it should be valued in the true spirit and prized at its true worth. This higher conception of the fundamental value and even sacredness of labour is at the root of all future re- form. It affects the land, the rent, the wage, the life, for it touches the spiritual and material relationship of man to man, and of men to the State. We cannot move further along the line of modern progress without that higher conception of all labour in relationship to all life. We have got as far as we can go with our half-and-half political convictions, our indefinite moral principles, and our debilitated religion. Blank indefiniteness blocks the way. Blank indefi- niteness in the majority of those who vote and conse- quently in the majority of those who sit in Parliament affects all the questions of the hour. The priest, the politician, the poet, the scientist, and the artist must join hands and teach the primal necessity of labour before food can be got, or clothes can be made, or houses can be built; they must teach that irrevocable inter-dependence of one kind of labour upon another which unites the toil of the stoker in the fire-hole of the ship to the calm judgment of the captain on the bridge in that co-operative effort to cany goods and passengers from port to port ; and but for which co-operative effort in tlie roughest and 368 THE NEW PARTY humblest detail your board of directors might direct in vain. The New Party must teach not the degradation of this labour as compared with that, but the sacred dignity of all labour. They must show that the very humblest animal in the economy of the universe has liberty for the perfection of life after its own kind ; that for example the mole has a cave dwelling com- pared with the palace of the bee, but each has a per- fection of its own kind in its own sphere : which cannot be said of modern man. I have never seen a mole as worn, bent, and wrinkled as an agricultural labourer ; nor a bee as pale or as husky as a confectioner's baker. Nor have I seen an ant, restlessly busy though she is, as dull and fagged as a seamstress ; while a pigeon or a pheasant is always better clothed than the poulterer's assistant ; and the fish is always cleaner than its monger. Even a cooped menagerie lion has a more wonderful beauty as a lion than its trainer has as a man ; in the same way that the horse in its own line is much superior to the groom in his. Nay, even a table that is polished henceforth has a superior existence to the human being who gave it its clean face ; the engine is housed and "kept" in a better state than some of the men who helped to make it ; and the brushed street is cleaner than the poor scavenger. This is wrong. Nature, indeed, must allow the mole, the bee, the ant, the pigeon, and the lion — yes, even the polished table and the well-kept engine — a certain fulness of life, which one man, intercepting the neces- ON THE VERGE OF CHANGE 369 saries and comforts of existence, does not allow to another. Natnre gets perfection by keeping an equitable poise — not too little cflfort and not too much ; not too little food, and not too much. The table wants so much polish and so much friction ; give it too much of either and it will go dim. The engine wants its due share of cleaning and its due share of steam. Give it too little of either, and it will not work ; give it too much steam and it will burst. Even if a lion had five hundred jackals daily supplying him with unearned increment, he would become demoralised — the glutton of the jungle, the idler of the lair, the king of the forest, who ought to be deposed for virtue's sake and the good of the race. It is time to return to a study of Nature as a cor- rective. We want some of the simplicity of Nature, and a good deal of her stern justice as well. Man's life has become too much an art — a fine art — a super- fine art — a false art — ves, an artifice. Method leadine: to money is almost everything, and motive almost nothing. In these days almost everybody is an artist, and trying to see what new financial effect he can get out of somebody else. Old and new silver are the favourite tints. The studies in copper are left to the people. The result is labour, hard labour, sometimes labour in vain. We hear of " return to the land." By all means. That is one way of returning to some of the simplicity of Nature and to some of its justice. But we must 2 A 370 THE NEW PARTY return to it through that higher conception of Labour. Without that higher conception leading to higher convictions upon that fundamental law of Labour, we will return to the land and repeat the same mis- take with new puppets worked by the old strings. Reflection comes first, then conviction, then action. To leap over reflection and conviction to action means re-action, the result of the fear and panic of ignorance. Give those who have the votes knowledge, make them reflect, convince them, and then you get action as inevitable as law because it is in harmony with law. How then to convince ? Through that moral element which is in us all, but encrusted by the Social creeds of conventionality, as the Spiritual element in the churches is encrusted in the Sectarian creeds of conformity and non-conformity ; as the sacred mystery of existence within the material is encrusted in the categorical creeds of Science ; as the inevitable purpose of the parable is encrusted in the cants of literature ; and as the mystic beauty of the imagination by means of the physical is encrusted in the creeds and formalisms of art. We want to shake oft' these encrustations. They are old clothes. Let those who are of the New Party socially live in harmony with their convictions ; let the preacher who is of the New Party speak out ; let the scientist who is of the New Party be frank ; let the writer who is of the New Party avow his purpose ; and let the artist who is of the New Party get and give inspiration by means of his theme. ON THE VERGE OE CHANGE 371 Then we shall not have to wait long. The voice of the people will then truly be the voice of God, and when that is heard, who dare block the way with the pigmy prejudices of man ? Without that voice of the people you may threaten the Lords, and they will laugh ; you may threaten the priest, and he will still pray by rote ; you may threaten the landlord, and he will still raise the rent ; you may threaten the employer, and he will still pay the hand- to-mouth wage ; but with that voice as the voice of a conscience pricked not by its own guilt but the guilt of others, you have the trump of judgment. But that voice of the people is not one voice. It is many. It is complex. How is it to be raised ? By the full unity of the forces which in separation and in partial unity have in their own dim way been groping towards good, and have groped half way. We have had centuries of the separated forces of Keligion, of Philosophy, of Science, and of Art. Keligion, to gain ground, has utilised Philosophy, Science, and Art; Philosophy, to gain ground, has utilised Religion, Science, and iirt ; Science, to make headway, has used Religion, Philosophy, and Art ; and Art, to keep pace with events, has used Philosophy, Science, and Reli-