What We Mean

"What We Mean," Liberty, 1, 19 (April 15, 1882), 2.

What We Mean.

Our purpose is the abolition, not only of all existing States, but of the State itself. Is not this a straightforward and well-defined purpose? There can be no mistaking it, and it admits of no equivocation. The least that our enemies can say of us is that we stand in the market-place of thought and action with a square protest and a square assertion.

And what is the State? It is not a thing that can be especially defined by Russia, Germany, Great Britain, or Massachusetts. The State is a principle, a philosophical error in social existence. The State is chaos, rioting under the guise of law, order, and morality. The State is a mob, posited on unscientific premises. We propose to supplant the mob by that true social order which is pivoted on the sovereignty of individualities associated for mutual well-being under the law or natural attraction and selection,— Liberty.

Under this formula we do not, in the best sense of the word, discard government. On the contrary, it is government that we are after. The State is not government, since it denies Liberty. The State becomes impossible the moment you remove from it the element of compulsion. But it is exactly at this point that government begins. Where the State ceases government begin, and, conversely, where the State begins government ceases.

We often hear of a wise parent governing his children by love. Did anyone ever hear of a monarch conducting a State by love? Did not the State originate in a distrust of love and natural selection as the true motors of government? Was not the very motive of the first rulers of peoples the abolition of government? Were they not designing conspirators, who saw that, under a system of natural association, there would be universal well-being and a just distribution of natural wealth and the rewards of labor? In order to enrich themselves and gratify their vanity and love of power at the expense of others, they took advantage of the superstitions element in man, and erected their thrones under cover of the divinity. Their purpose was to supplant government by force, and their machine the called the State.

Now, wherever force takes the place of natural selection and associative mutualism founded on consent, there a State is inaugurated. It may be in the church; it may be in the political State; it may be in the league, the club, the lyceum, as labor union, or the household. It is a State, in that it posits authority and supplements it by force, thus denying government and substituting despotism.

We assert that delegated authority assumed to be vested in any titled or elected person, not excepting God himself, is, in the very nature of the case, a lie, a fraud, and, moreover, a scientific impossibility, since the individual is the only source of authority, and, even if he would, could not alienate from his personality the control of himself by contract. Hence we regard all popes, kings, emperors, presidents, and persons in authority everywhere as impostors and usurpers, and the constitutions, "vested rights," and other lying parchments under which they claim the right to rule as binding only on such as freely give their consent

When we state as our purpose, then, the abolition of the State, the reader must not have in view a forcible raid upon the palace of some king, or a military expedition against same state house, parliament, or arsenal, even though at some later day circumstances should give rise to such incidents in our warfare. What we mean by the abolition of the State is the abolition of a false philosophy, or, rather, the overthrow of a gigantic fraud under which people consent to be coerced and restrained from minding their own business. The philosophy of Liberty can be applied everywhere, and he who successfully applies it in his family in the place of avenging Gods, arbitrary codes, threats, commands, and whips may easily have the satisfaction of abolishing at least one State. When we have substituted our philosophy in place of the old, then the palaces, cathedrals, and arsenals will naturally fall to pieces through neglect and the rust that is sure to corrupt tenantless and obsolete structures.

We should like to be able to better elucidate our philosophy in a larger and more frequently issued sheet. We do the best that we can in the little space at our command. Meanwhile, all the signs of the times promise well, and we go on with our humble work rejoicing,— conquering and to conquer.

William Bailie, "Josiah Warren" (New Harmony Movement)

William Bailie, "Josiah Warren," in George B. Lockwood, The New Harmony Movement, New York: Appleton, 1905.

CHAPTER XXI

JOSIAH WARREN[1]

"A remarkable American, Josiah Warren."

—JOHN STUART MILL.

AMONG the most remarkable characters attracted to New Harmony in community days was Josiah Warren, equally notable as an inventive genius, a social philosopher, and a peaceful revolutionist. He was born in Boston in 1798, of historically famous Puritan stock. Of his parents and early life but little is known. At an early age he displayed musical talents, and, with his brother George, played professionally in local bands. At the age of twenty he married, and soon after set out from his native place to improve his fortunes in the West. He settled in Cincinnati, and gained an honorable repute as an orchestra leader; but he had other interests besides music. Mechanical pursuits occupied his leisure hours, the earliest fruit of which was the invention of a lamp, patented in 1823, which substituted lard for tallow as fuel, giving a better light at a lower cost. Its success was such that the inventor before long was running a lamp manufactory in Cincinnati.

More pressing problems than those of illumination were, however, shortly to arise and absorb the active mind and generous heart of the ingenious young New Englander. There came to Cincinnati in 1824 a visitor whose reputation [295] as the boldest and most successful social reformer of the age was world-wide. When Robert Owen, with a fervor of conviction and inspiring enthusiasm which have never been surpassed, unfolded his plans for the inauguration of The New Moral World, Warren was so much impressed that he decided to join the grand experiment which was about to begin at New Harmony. So, after disposing of his lamp factory, Warren, with his young family, joined Owen and his enthusiasts on the Rappite property, hoping to assist in founding the ideal community which was to usher in a millennium of peace and plenty, brotherhood and happiness, ultimately to embrace all mankind.

Here Warren found a field in which to study the problems of government, property, and industry, together with the relation of the individual to society, such as never before was given to man. During two stormy years of vicissitudes, disappointments, and failure Warren remained with the community, and bore his share of the burdens incident to so pretentious an undertaking. And when he finally departed it was not, like so many others, as an embittered reactionary, but as an earnest, hopeful student who had spent his time to good purpose. As one who had with painful solicitude witnessed the inadequacy of communism to correct the evils of property; and the failure of paternal authority, as well as of majority rule, to solve the problems of government, he had learned an invaluable lesson, and stored up pregnant experience for use in future efforts to grapple with the same vital issues. With Warren the failure of communism was simply a reason for trying another plan of attack upon the existing institutions of society. Like Owen, he never doubted that the "emancipation of man" was possible, and human happiness only a question of suitable social adjustment and the application of what he deemed to be right principles.

Chief among the causes which, in Warren's mind, led to disaster at New Harmony, were the suppression of individuality, the lack of initiative, and the absence of personal responsibility. When everything was decided by authority, or by the will of the majority, each was prone to ascribe the faults of the system to the shortcomings of his neighbors. These defects Warren believed to be inseparable from any social scheme based upon government and community of goods. Even under the most favorable conditions failure would in the long run be assured. He concluded, therefore, that the basis of all future reform must be complete individual liberty. Every one should be free to dispose of his person, his property, his time, and his reputation as he pleases—but always at his own cost; this qualification of the principle is inseparable from it, the core, as it were, of fis philosophy

The New Harmony experience had convinced Warren that any theory of reform, however perfect or plausible, should be put to the test before being offered to the world as a remedy for existing evils. To this end, therefore, he undertook his first experiment, the Time store.

On the 18th of May 1827, there was unpretentiously opened at the corner of Fifth and Vine streets in Cincinnati a small country store, conducted on a plan new to commerce. It vas the first Equity store, designed to illustrate and practicalize the cost principle, the germ of the cooperative movement of the future. When the advantages of the store became known, it proved to be the most popular mercantile institution in the city. The people called it the Time store because a clock was used by the merchant to determine the amount of compensation for his service in waiting upon the customers. The storekeeper exchanged his time for an equal amount of the time of those who purchased goods from him. The actual cost of the goods bought was paid for in cash, the labor note of the customer was given to the merchant to pay for his service. It ran something after this fashion: "Due to Josiah Warren, thirty minutes in carpenter work.—John [297] Smith." Here was the application of the principle of labor for labor, the cost principle, in its most primitive form, which was subsequently modified to allow for the different valuations of the various kinds of labor.

The idea of labor notes originated with Robert Owen, but Warren's application of it was original and proved entirely successful. Though at the beginning the Equity store met with scant encouragement, it was but a short while until it taxed all the reformer's time and energies. The merchant on the next corner soon found himself without occupation, and requested Warren to explain to him the method of conducting business on the equity plan. The founder of the movement was only too happy to assist his rival to convert his place into a "Time store," and delighted to see so quickly an instance of what competition could do in enforcing the adoption of more equitable methods of exchange.

Warren's store was a labor exchange where those who had products to sell could dispose of them, provided the goods were in demand, without having to give the lion's share as profit to the middleman. It was also a bureau for labor seeking employment, and thus served to direct the reformer's attention to the long and useless apprenticeships by which the common trades were hedged around. He wished to disprove the need for long terms of industrial servitude, and this desire led to the idea of a cooperative village. Full of enthusiasm for the principles which he was now convinced would solve the deeper economic problems of society, having tried them in regard to the distribution of wealth, he longed to see them applied to its production.

Robert Dale Owen at this period became interested in Warren's plans, but after much waiting, and a visit to New York in 1830, the Cincinnati reformer decided to prepare, unaided, for a village experiment. He set himself to learn many practical arts, including wagon-building, wood and [298] metal working, printing and type-founding. The first village of Equity was commenced in Tuscarawas County, Ohio, and after a two years' trial was abandoned, owing to the malarial and unhealthful condition of the locality. Many interesting experiments in the industrial and practical education of the young were carried out by Warren, which showed that in this field he was a true pioneer, for it is only to-day that his views are finding realization in the manual training-schools and technical institutions for practical education.

The Peaceful Revolutionist, Warren's first periodical, appeared in January, 1833, but survived only a few months. It was a four-page weekly of conspicuously neat typography, and was devoted to expositions of the principles of equity. So primitive at the time were his resources, and so marvelous his skill and ingenuity, that the plates from which the paper was printed were cast over the tire of the same stove at which the wife cooked the family meals. The printing-press he used was his own invention, and with his own hands he made type-molds, cast the type and the stereo-plates, built the press, wrote the articles, set them up, and printed off the sheets.

The years prior to 1842 were devoted mainly to mechanical pursuits and printing inventions. About 1840 Warren constructed the first press that was ever used to print newspapers from a roll. The following description of this mechanism is from an editorial which appeared February 28, 1840, in an Evansville paper:

"The first number of the Southwestern Sentinel is the first newspaper probably in the world which was ever printed on a continuous sheet. Our press or printing machinery is the invention of Mr. Josiah Warren, 0f New Harmony. He has brought a series of experiments extending through fine years to a successful close, and this machine, which he calls his speed press, is one of the results." [299]

Unfortunately the innovation was opposed by the printers, who saw in its labor-saving power a menace to their interests. They deliberately threw the press out of gear at every opportunity, and at length so exasperated the inventor that he came one day to the Sentinel office, had the press hauled away, and deliberately broke it to pieces.

Typographical inventions continued, however, to occupy Warren's attention. His purpose was to extend his stereotyping inventions to all varieties of printing, illustration, and artistic reproduction. His improvements in this field he termed "universal typography."

The Indiana Statesman, of New Harmony, under dates of October 4, 1845, and March 7, 1846, contains flattering accounts of the progress and utility of Warren's inventions. His typographical plates were durable, cheap, and had a smooth, glassy surface, so like stone that the inventor termed them "stone-types." He claimed that the facility with which illustrations could be got up, the rapidity of stereotyping and printing them, together with the durability of the plates, justified the expectation that they would ultimately supersede woodcuts, steel-plate and copper-plate engraving and printing, and lithography. The process included printing in colors, besides a result similar to what is now known as half-tones.

While it is doubtful if Warren ever received an equivalent for his ingenuity, labor, and outlay on these inventions, at which he worked during the larger part of his life, it is certain that his methods were utilized by others, and the world is accordingly the gainer by his improvements. The processes now in use for the finer class of stereotype work are based upon his discoveries. The latter years of his life were devoted to studies and experiments with a view to perfecting his inventions, and his final results, it is believed, were not made known to the world, nor rendered available when death terminated his labors.

The New Harmony Time store was opened in 1842. At [300] first it encountered strong opposition at the hands of interested rivals, but its beneficial influence was soon felt in a fall of retail prices throughout the surrounding country. Of this, his second store experiment, Warren wrote :

"Whatever may be thought of the hopelessness or the unpopularity of reform movements, I will venture to assert that no institution, political, moral, nor religious, ever assumed a more sudden and extensive popularity than the Time store of New Harmony. But it was principally among the poor, the humble, and the downtrodden. None of those who had been accustomed to lead, none who had anything to lead with, offered the least assistance or aid, nor scarcely sympathy, though they did not attempt to deny the soundness of the principles. . . . When all the stores in the surrounding country had come down in their prices to an equilibrium with the Equity store, the custom naturally flowed back again to them, and the next step was to wind up the Time store and commence a village."

Warren next turned his ingenuity to the production in 1844 of an original system of music, denominated by him "Mathematical Notation," designated on scientific principles to accomplish in the representation of harmonic sounds a similar service to that performed by phonography in the representation of the elements of speech. The author printed the bock by his newly perfected universal typography, and, as may still be seen by a copy preserved in the library of the New Harmony Working Men's Institute, it was a beautiful example of his stereotyping process, reproducing his own handwriting in delicate copper-plate. Dr. Mason, a musical authority of that day, admitted the comprehensiveness and simplicity of Warren's musical notation, but believed it would be a hopeless undertaking to attempt to supersede the universally accepted system.

About this period Warren received seven thousand dollars [301] for his stereotyping patents, and such a wave of financial prosperity revived his desire to found another Equity village. For this purpose he secured land near New Harmony, but abandoned it for more favorable prospects in Ohio. The village of Utopia was founded by Warren in 1847 about a mile above Claremont, a Fourierist community which had just then come to grief. Unlike the latter, there was no common ownership of property in Warren's experiments. Each family owned its own lot and house (after it was erected), but the members of the village cooperated in all cases where it was mutually advantageous to do so. Warren's efforts were for those whose only means was their labor force, and his purpose was to demonstrate that such people, with free access to natural resources, could, by exchanging their labor on equitable terms, by means of labor notes, build their own houses, supply their prime necessities, and attain to comfort and prosperity without dependence on capitalists, or any external authority, for the means of life.

Utopia went on progressing in a quiet way for many years. It was the policy of the settlers to avoid publicity, and to refrain from encouraging outsiders to visit or to join them. One of the pioneers, E. G. Cubberly, in October, 1872, while still residing in his original home in Utopia, wrote: "The labor notes put us into a reciprocating society—the result was, in two years twelve families found themselves with homes who never owned homes before. . . . Labor-capital did it. I built a brick cottage, one-and-a-half stories high, and all the money I paid out was nine dollars and eighty-one cents—all the rest was effected by exchanging labor for labor. Mr. Warren is right, and the way to get back as much labor as we give is by the labor cost prices; money prices, with no principle to guide, have always deceived us."

It may naturally be asked what became of the village. Why did equity villages not multiply? Why did the pioneers [302] keep from the public as far as possible all information concerning them? To such questions no satisfactory answer in a few words can be given. Owing to the high price of the surrounding land, most of the settlers, after about four years, moved from Utopia into Minnesota, where land was cheap and abundant.

Leaving the scenes of his labors in Ohio and Indiana, Warren in 1850 visited New York and Boston, and, by means of a quiet propaganda, succeeded in around the interest of many earnest people in the individualistic form of cooperation advocated by him. He met the brilliant writer and reformer, Stephen Pearl Andrews, who henceforth became Warren's most ardent disciple, and the literary exponent of equity. Andrews' Science of Society, an exposition of the sovereignty of the individual, and cost the limit of price, has probably done more toward calling the attention of independent thinkers and reformers to Warren's philosophy than anything ever put forth by himself, and is by far the ablest statement of the "principles" which has yet appeared.

As a result of Warren's activity the Village of Modern Times was founded in 1851. The site was on Long Island, forty miles by railroad from New York City. The soil was considered worthless, but this did not deter the enthusiasts of equity. They came by ones and twos, and gradually began to clear the ground for market-gardens, meanwhile building themselves houses of such pretensions as their limited resources permitted. About a hundred souls had settled on the ground when the New York Tribune began to feature the colony and create a publicity as undesirable to the settle as it proved to be annoying. The newspaper notices brought many visitors, some to stay, mostly ignorant of the ideas on which the village was founded. True to their principles, which allowed equal rights to all in natural opportunities, the pioneers refrained from taking any steps to exclude the newcomers, [303] so long as they did not invade the rights of others. This devotion to principle had, however, its drawbacks, though in the end it proved a self-corrective. One man began to advocate plurality of wives, and started a paper to support. his views. Another believed clothing to be a superfluity and not only personally practised his Adamic vagaries but inflicted them upon his helpless children. A woman who would not have passed for a model of physical perfection, displayed herself in male attire, which gave rise to the newspaper comment that "the women of Modem Times dressed in men's clothes and looked hideous." Still another woman had the diet mania so severely that, after trying to live on beans without salt until reduced almost to a skeleton, she died within a year. Whereupon the newspapers declared: "The people of Modem Times are killing themselves with fanatical ideas about food." These were some of the burdens the real settlers had to bear because they acted on the non-invasive principle, and accorded liberty to do even the silliest things, believing that experience, and the application of personal responsibility in allowing things to be done at each one's own cost, would work the surest and most effectual cure.

Despite the persistent misrepresentations and the withering slanders to which the colony was subjected during its earlier years, the pioneers prospered. But after reaping so much of the undesirable fruits of notoriety, the name was changed to Brentwood, under which appellation it is still known.

Writing to an English friend in 1857, one of the settlers, Edward Linton, asks: "You have been here, sir, and I ask you, considering the natural obstacles to overcome, if you ever saw greater material success attained in. so short a time by the same number of people without capital, and with only their hands and brains to operate with, under ah the disadvantages of habits formed by a false education and training. . . . And as it regards individual [304] and social happiness and the entire absence of vice and crime, I am confident this settlement can not be equaled. This is, emphatically, the school of life. It is what has been learned here, infinitely more than what has been done, that constitutes what I consider the greatest success of the settlement. What has not been done is, I think, of far more consequence than what has been done.

I would rather that my children would live here and have the advantages of the society and practical lessons taught here, than for them to have what is called an education in the best institutions of learning in the world."

Linton's tribute to Warren in the same letter can not be omitted: "But whether I ever live to see the practical realization of the principles or not, here or elsewhere, I never can feel sufficiently grateful to the unostentatious man whose remarkable and peculiar constitution of mind enabled him to discover the most subtle and sublime truths ever made known to man for his self-government and the regulation of his intercourse with his neighbors. In my own person and in my own domestic affairs I have been incalculably benefited."

Broad avenues, tree-shaded streets, pretty cottages surrounded by strawberry-beds and well-tiled gardens, formed the outward appearance of Modem Times. The occupants were honest, industrious, and had learned to mind their own business, while readily cooperating with their neighbors for mutual advantage. They were free from sectarian dissensions, law-courts, jails, rumshops, prostitutes, and crime. No one acquired wealth save by his own industry. Long afterward the people who lived there during the years that the principles of equity were the only law among citizens, looked back with regret mingled with pleasure on those pioneer days of effort to achieve a higher social ideal.

It should be remembered that the equity villages did [305] not fail in the sense that New Harmony, Brook Farm, and numerous other similar experiments failed. The Modem Timers had no trouble over property or forms of government. Each owned his house and land, and by mutual understanding political or civic authority was dispensed with. None felt responsible for the failure of his neighbors, and only aggressive or invasive action was resented by combined action. The panic of 1857, which in New York City alone threw upward of twenty thousand people suddenly out of work, shattered a manufacturing enterprise that had been successfully begun in Modem Times. Before the effects of the ensuing industrial depression had cleared away, the country was in the throes of civil war, and all hope of success was for the time dissipated.

In July, 1854, while living at Modem Times, Warren began the publication of his Periodical Letters, a record of the movement and further exposition of the principles, which were issued with more or less regularity until the end of 1858. He spent the winter of 1855-'56 visiting his old friends in Ohio and Indiana. After 1860 he returned no more to the Long Island village.

The reformer's activity declined with advancing age. Several years were spent quietly at Cliftondale, near Boston, and in 1873 he went to reside with his friends, the Heywoods, in their home at Princeton, Massachusetts. Here he wrote and printed his last production, Part III, of the True Civilization series, giving "practical applications" and the "facts and conclusions of forty-seven years' study and experiments in reform movements through communism to elementary principles found in a direction opposite to and away from communism, but leading directly to all the harmonic results aimed at by communism." Equitable Commerce, his first book, containing practically all his views, was first published in 1846, and was several times reprinted. [306]

The last months of Warren's life were passed in Boston at the house of his early friend, Edward Linton, where he was cared for in his last illness by kindly hands. Kate Metcalf, one of the pioneers of Modem Times, nursed him to the end, which came on April 14, 1874.

---

[1] This chapter is the contribution of Mr. William Bailie, of Boston, who has made a searching study of the life and services of Josiah Warren, and is the best informed authority on the philosophy of that remarkable man.

State Of Things in 1833 [on the Peaceful Revolutionist]

"State Of Things in 1833," Reformer and Christian, 13, 3 (Apr 1833), 34.

STATE OF THINGS IN 1833.

A paper has been commenced in Cincinnati, Ohio, entitled "The Peaceful Revolutionist." The following extract will serve to show the views of the editor.

“The present state of society, whether we look at home or abroad, is that of general agitation and confusion.

“Confidence in Legislators is rapidly diminishing.

“Every government in the civilized world is tottering: and society like a ship in a dark tom pest is torn and tossed by contending elements—the power of men at the helm sinks into the weakness of babes—our shattered fabric is no longer manageable, and we are evidently drifting towards same unknown destination.

“From one end of society to the other we hear the clash of revolution, and the watchword is Liberty! Liberty! Liberty! There is a chord in every human breast that vibrates with the sacred sound, but alas! only with the sound.

“Where is liberty in practice?—Where is it understood? Where does any organization of society permit its existence?

“Revolution has succeeded revolution; change succeeded change; age has succeeded age in struggles for Liberty. Liberty! has been the battle cry, and Liberty! the last sound that hung upon the dying martyr’s lips—yet, liberty still is but a sound.

“It refers to no condition in civilized life; it has no archetype in society: but like sweet music in the death of night, it bursts upon the car, and enchants the soul only to die away, leaving us nothing but the memory of a departed sound.

"But, Liberty is the vital principle of human happiness, and human nature seeks its level; and society can never knout peace until its members know Liberty.

“But it can never be realised under any organization of society now known to us—nor can it be attained upon any of the principles upon which society is now acting.

“Whether the theories of society are ever to be put in practice—whether justice is ever to take up its abode among us—whether Liberty is ever to be understood and enjoyed in society, are questions which yet remain to be determined.”

Remarks on the foregoing.

The only government that can establish liberty on a true basis, and render mankind happy, is that of the stone mentioned in Daniel, cut out without hands. This government will ere long begin, and will break in pieces and consume all other kingdoms, and stand forever. The turmoils and commotions that are now beginning in the world, will prepare the way for that divine government which will be without any imperfection, and extend over the whole earth.

Frances Wright, Wealth and Money - Pt. 1

Frances Wright, "Wealth and Money," Free Enquirer, 2, 48 (September 15, 1830), 382.

EDITORIAL.

NEW YORK,

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 25, 1830.

[The following article, the first of a course of numbers which my sister editor intends to supply to our readers, was written on board of the vessel while clearing out of the bay. She has forwarded to me by the last arrivals several numbers in continuation.] R. D. O.

WEALTH AND MONEY.

No. 1.

What mean those bits of stamped gold and silver,
And graven notes issued by chartered bankers?
What are they? Of what use? By what right issued?
What use? They buy the earth, and all thing on it.
Buy men and sell them too. By what right issued?—
When usurpation dropt the sword through fear,
He put them forth as wealth, and called on law
To sanctify the cheat.

Economy of human life. New Edition.

Were not the organization of society such— if the term organization can be employed where all order and design seem wanting— were it not such as to throw all man’s interests into opposition, how easily might the interests of all be secured! Where there is a scramble there must be both confusion and bad feeling; and what is there on the face of the globe but scramble; and, as all the world knows, but confusion and bad feeling? Well! but as this is every where, and has been, so far as our records extend, through all time, what hope or what possibility is there that it should ever be otherwise! Much hope, and as we deem, every possibility. Because error has prevailed to this hour, it does not follow flint it must prevail for ever; because the fogs of ignorance take long to dispel, we are not to assert that the sun of knowledge cannot dissipate them. Experience supplies every argument to the contrary. Errors are less numerous, certainly less terrible, than they have been; ignorance, if still wide-spread, is light and transparent to that of past ages. And see we not, in every science, that a new and ever accelerating ratio of progress is apparent? See we not also, that there is, in each, some first principles, slow to be discovered, but which, when once distinguished, give the clue to the labyrinth, dissipate every difficulty and render advance safe, easy and agreeable. Why should we deem that the restless curiosity and eagle-eyed intelligence of man must be dead and blind only in the path of his own happiness? They have been so to this hour. But are there no first principles now developing, by which, in the path of morals, he may reach at truth as he has in chemistry or mechanics? We think so. We think man is even now distinguishing that his worst sufferings spring out of a few errors, no ways difficult to rectify, and that his happiness must be secured by a few arrangements, simple in their nature, but omnipotent in their consequences. Two present themselves at the first glance as indispensable—general, universal and industrial education; and an improved circulating medium, that should be in truth and fact, what money now only pretends to be—the fair representative and not the substance of wealth.

Of these two great rectifiers of existing evils the latter will be a result of the farmer; but, although until all are producers (of something or another useful and in common demand, whether by operative or intellectual labor) we cannot all be interested, equally and evidently, in creating an honest representative of human productions, still we conceive that the two must and will, more or less, be developed together, and work in unison towards the reform of society.

Before engaging in an investigation whose practical importance must strike every thinking mind, I could wish our readers to pose in quiet and calm review the general state of society as existing around us all, and each to consider his own particular situation as one of that mass denominated society.

Is he rich? Does he live upon the hoarded gain of his ancestors or his own? Is he free from all anxiety lest the same should pass away from him? Banks fail and so do states. But, without such convulsions, a thousand accidents may throw him aground when he least expects it, and leave him—to what? That which, perhaps, he never felt, but which he may see every day if he cast his eyes around him—poverty, with every evil in its train.

Stands he high in some learned profession? Is he popular? fashionable? successful? Have not others been the same and closed their eyes in a prison?

Is he in good business? Does he drive a thriving trade? How long may fortune favor him? How soon may one false calculation interrupt his prosperity, or competition reduce his gains to a cypher?

Is he a hard-working man and in good employment? On what security holds he the continuance of his hard-earned daily bread? May not laborers multiply, the demand for labor decrease, or the price of labor full? Let each and all run through the past, present and possible future chances of their condition and answer to themselves if they have been, are or have the prospect of being, without care?

This question, it is taken for granted, will be soon answered. Let the reader next seek the causes of this insecurity, and (to put him on the scent) let him examine if it depend not on the nature of money, the mode of its tenure and the fluctuations to which it renders every thing liable?

He must suppose, however, that money was not intended to produce but to prevent fluctuations. It was intended, we may reasonably admit, to supply a universal standard—a fair and fixed estimate, to which the value of all articles might be referred, and by which their real value might be known at a glance; by means of which also wealth might be distributed over the earth, and a fair equivalent for the wealth so distributed secured to its owner.

Has money produced these results?

Before the answer can be supplied, two preliminary questions present themselves.

What is wealth?

And who are its owners?

F. W.

[To be continued.]

Josiah Warren, Reply to E. C.

J. W., "Reply to E. C.," Free Enquirer, 2, 42 (Aug 14, 1830), 332.

For the Free Enquirer.

REPLY TO E. C.

It gives me much pleasure to answer any objections or enquiries which, like the above, are made in the spirit of honesty and candor; and I wail endeavor to do so as far as experience has furnished me with the power; but further than this, (as it would be merely theoretical) T should prefer to leave to future experiment.

You ask for the detail of our practice in Cincinnati, or an, answer to several questions or objections proposed. You must be aware that, as the exchange of labor is the basis of society, a delineation in detail of all its ramifications must be the work of time and well-chosen opportunity: besides, I might, in so doing, weary you with a perusal of ideas already familiar, and omit those which most require illustration, or proof. This view of the subject induces me rather to answer objections or enquiries as they may arise, so that when they cease to be offered, the subject may be considered sufficiently explained.

Objection 1. The shoemaker feared that the Magazine would require a larger stock than his capital could furnish, and that a large assortment to suit all tastes would depreciate by lying on shelves. Answer. This was obviated with us by making only such as the demand called for; which demand was made known at the Magazine by a report for that purpose.

Objection 2. "One could work only eight months in the year at his trade, and therefore could not exchange equally with those who would work all the year." Answer. Upon the principle of Equal Exchange, competition is annihilated; therefore all motive to keep each other ignorant for the sake of profit is destroyed, and he who could only work eight months at one branch, would be freely taught by others any other branch at which he could work the remaining four months, and he would pay his teacher only for the time employed in teaching him. In this manner we have had printing, shoemaking, tayloring, blacksmithing, and some other branches, in a few hours or days, put within the reach of those who, by the common practice of serving seven years apprenticeship, had been induced to suppose they were too old, or too young, or too dull, to learn to be useful.

Objection 3. "One said that his tools coat more than those of another trade" &c—Answer. The wear and tear of tools, machinery, shop-rent, &c. is estimated as so much labor consumed in the production of the articles, and adds so much to their prices.

J. W.

Equal Exchange of Labor - July 17, 1830

"Equal Exchange of Labor," New York Sentinel and Working Man's Advocate, 1, 44 (July 17, 1830), 1.

---. The Free Enquirer, 2, 39 (July 17, 1830), 308.

Equal Exchange of Labor.—In conversing lately with a gentleman from Ohio, our attention has been called to a principle which has been partially carried into effect, our informant tells us, in the city of Cincinnati—viz: the Equal Exchange of Labor.

This expression did not at first convey to us, and probably will not to many of our readers, any very distinct or definite idea. But further explanation threw more light on the subject; and, without expressing any decided opinion on the practicability or probable effects of the principle in question, we think it, at least, well worthy of careful examination.

We have already given our reasons for the opinion, that any system of reform based on a community of goods, is not calculated, (at the present time at least,) to afford relief from the oppression of riches and the degradation of poverty. It tends, indeed, to equality, but it tends also, to a curtailment of human liberty; and it demands a sacrifice not only of individual interests, but of individual independence, which in the present generation, would probably lead to idleness and consequent dissatisfaction, and in any generation, might be found to impose an unnecessary and injurious restraint on the feelings, pursuits, occupations and tastes of the individual.

Such is our opinion of the Community System, as it has been called. We cannot perceive that it is practicable.—We wish we could; for it has much that is in accordance with the best feelings of our nature, and much that is attractive to the friends of equal liberty to recommend it. But we do not see its practicability; nor do we see, that, if practicable, it would leave sufficient scope for the free exercise of those varieties of individual character, which give to society much of its pleasure and interest.

The principle advocated by our Cincinnati informant seem to us, (from a cursory view of it,) at once more practicable, and more in accordance with the spirit of individual freedom. He proposes no association, no society, no general rules to apply to all characters, however dissimilar, and to all tastes, however opposed. He proposes only, that, by gradual and voluntary consent, men should agree, in all their commercial intercourse with each other, to buy, sell, barter or exchange, on the principle of labor for equal labor.

Thus, if any article, say a pair of shoes of a given quality, require the expense of (raw material included) say, ten hours labor of an average workman, that pair of shoes should be worth—not two dollars one day and perhaps three dollars the next, just as the market may rise or fall—but worth ten hours; and should be exchanged (among those of course, who may feel the justice of the principle, and agree to follow it out in practice,) for any other article requiring, on an average, the same number of hours to produce it.

Thus all articles would be estimated by time, not by money, silver and gold among the number.

This plan proposes the making out of a list of all the staple articles of consumption, estimating their cost in time, and affixing that time cost as their real value. If, to produce the article, much preparation (in the form of apprenticeship, college education, &c.) be indispensable, justice points out that this preparation, (as involving loss of time) should be taken into account, in making out these estimates. Our informant thinks however, that as the mysteries of all professions have hitherto greatly exaggerated the difficulties of acquiring them, the above would form but a small item in the sums total.

Our first objection to this plan was—but we will throw our objections and the gentleman’s replies into dialogue form, preserving, as near as we recollect, the exact substance of the conversation.

Objector. This proposal of yours offers no reward for superior skill and industry.

Informant. I beg your pardon. It offers the just reward for both. If a man succeeds in making, in two hours, a pair of shoes as good as another makes in twelve, he receives double for his skill and industry. If the shoes sell for ten hours, he receives ten hours for six, while his less industrious or less skilful neighbor receives only ten hours for twelve.

Objector. But, at least, you provide no adequate reward for genius and intellectual attainments

Informant. These would find their own value. Genius is seldom avaricious; and it is not a monied reward which gives the spur to the higher order of intellectual powers. It is true, that lawyers might not be able to make it appear that two hours head-work beside a desk deserves the same reward as twenty or two hundred hours of the laborer in the corn-field: but there would be no great harm in that.

Objector. But, as the whole is voluntary, a lawyer might ask in the same extravagant proportion as he does now.

Informant. Certainly, he might ask it; but only if he refused to submit to have his labor estimated according to the principle of equal exchange, and, if other men fell into the plan, and he refused to follow their example, it would afford strong presumptive evidence, that his profession is one of unjust extortion.

Objector. There is presumptive of that already.

Informant. True; but it does not sufficiently come home to men’s feelings. If a lawyer charged a thousand hours for a week’s work, while all men know, that a week (day and night included) has only a hundred and sixty-eight hours, the very sound would be startling. I think that the mere habit of so calculating would be of infinite service in producing equality of remuneration for labor.

We had many other objections, some of which lid not appear to us so satisfactorily answered but the length of our article admonishes us to conclude for the present.

E. C. to Josiah Warren - on equal exchange of labor

E. C. [communication], The Free Enquirer, 2, 42 (August 14, 1830), 332.

For the Free Enquirer.

Messrs. Editors

Your correspondent J. W. has touched upon a subject which has often occupied my thought within the last six months, namely, the exchange of labor for labor on the principle of equal rights. I am thoroughly satisfied, that if the direct exchange of labor for labor were generally put into practice, the means of obtaining the necessaries and even the luxuries of life, would be made so easy that few or none would resort to dishonest measures. want, or the fear of want, to ourselves or our children often tempts, and sometimes impels, men to resort to immoral means of obtaining riches.

A society was forming last spring, in this city, for beneficial purposes. I endeavored to draw the attention of their committee to this subject, and attempted to give an outline of the advantages they might derive from it, but it was objected to by them, on these grounds; one said, "I keep a boot and shoe store; in order to fit every foot, and suit every notion of the members, it would be necessary to supply their store with as large an assortment as I keep in my own, which would be inconvenient as to capital, and the goods would damage by lying on the shelves." Another said, he could not work at his business over eight months in the year, consequently he should not be willing to exchange time for equal time with another who could work twelve. Another objected; his tools cost some $200 or $300, and therefore he could not think of exchanging labor for labor with the tailor whose tools cost only $5. Such were the objections made; and as the subject was new to me (having read nothing, nor conversed with any one acquainted with it) I had to attempt to "feel a path through the surrounding darkness," as I might; my ideas therefore being very crude, I failed to make the thing interesting to them, from the want of sufficient clearness in my explanation; still, I was satisfied that if the exchange of labor for labor could be put into operation, it would be found exceedingly beneficial, not only to the producing classes, but also, in the event, to those who are now the distributing classes.

If any thing had been wanting to convince me of the benefits to be derived from a direct exchange of labor, the following answers to two questions put by myself to a farmer a few days since, were sufficient to produce that conviction. “What do you get for butter? Answer: “10 cents a pound. What do you give for soap?” Answer: “12 cents.” The farmer then asked; “what do you get for soap?" Answer: “5 cents; what do you give for butter? Answer: “15 cents.”

Is it not evident that in this small exchange of a pound of soap for a pound of butter and vice versa, they lost 12 cents, and the go-between made the sum of twelve cents. The manufacturer gets for his labor, on the pound of soap at five cents only half a cent, while the farmer pays an addition to the cot of the raw material of which the soap is made 9 1-2 cents and the other gets only one fifteenth of it: consequently he loses fourteen fifteenths of his labor. The butter cost the farmer in expenses, say fine cents, in this case he loses four fifths of his labor. The difference on other goods may be less, or more; whether more or less, it ought to be sufficient to rouse the producing classes from their lethargy into enquiry. When their thoughts shall have been directed to this subject, they will soon begin to enquire “what shall we do to be saved” from this loss of labor?

If your correspondent will go into details of the practice of the friends of reform in Cincinnati, or otherwise answer the above objections, he will render a benefit to society, and also much oblige

E. C.

A Working Man - on Equal Exchange of Labor

"A Working Man," [communication], New York Sentinel and Working Man's Advocate, 1, 51 (August, 11, 1830), 1.

FOR THE NEW-YORK DAILY SENTINEL.

Messrs. Editors:—In one of your late Nos. you had an article on, in my opinion, one of the most important subjects that can occupy the thoughts or man, namely, the exchange of labor for labor. This is a subject which has engaged my thoughts, more than a little, for some months, and I long since came to these conclusions, that industry can never be fully rewarded but by a direct exchange, conducted on the principle of equal rights; and that if such a mode of doing business were generally put into practice, it would be the means of almost annihilating vice, since it is well known that many of our vices arise from the desire of amassing wealth, by which, we hope to save ourselves’ and our children from want, and to obtain that respect in society which is, unfortunately, accorded to the wealthy, however dishonestly they may have acquired their riches, and is too often withheld from the honestly industrious.

Who are they that create all the wealth in the world? The farmer, the manufacturer, and the mechanic. Who enjoy the least of it? Those who do the labor, and ought therefore to be richest.—How are they deprived of their just reward? By their ignorance they allow, and even assist, the speculating thousands to fleece them of their earnings: There are the wholesalers, and the retailers; the bankers and the brokers; the carriers to and fro, and the innumerable et ceteras, all adding to the cost without increasing the value; to do away with all these go-betweens, they ought so to locale themselves as that every man may dispose of his own productions directly to the consumer.

What should we think of that large family, or of that small colony, who, having the means of producing all their wishes could desire by the four or five hours daily labor of each individual, were foolishly persuaded by a part, to work 12 or 14 hours a day, and suffer a thousand corroding cares, leading to vice, and sometimes enduring want; and all this in order to allow a part of their society to live in idleness and wallow in luxury? Should we not think they were worse titan idiots? Yet equally foolish are the producing classes of all countries; in this country, however, they are beginning to open their eyes and to see that “all is not gold that glitters."

If to enjoy abundance through life be the desire of men, they can have it by three or four hours daily labor, on the principle of labor for labor; and it is only so much exercise as is necessary to health; and when put into practice there will no longer be seen, or seen only as the monuments of folly, the rich man’s palace and the poor man’s hovel, for every man may, if industrious, have a handsome house and beautifully furnished. If to enjoy all these comforts and also to hoard up “the root of ail evil,” or in other words, to put a viper in their own bosom, be the desire of the productive part of society, let them still exchange labor for labor, at home, as before, but in addition work six or eight hours a day more; they will then produce two or three times more than they can consume, which they can sell to any foreign country that will buy it, and as it may all be considered gain, so they may undersell even the English in their own ports.

In order to convince your readers of the benefits to ho derived from a direct exchange of labor, I will relate a short dialogue which took place lately between myself and a farmer.

Myself—What do you get for butter? Ans. 10 cents per lb. What do you give for soap? Ans. 12 cents per lb.

Farmer—What do you give for butter? Ans. 15 cents per lb. What do you get for soap? Ans. 5 cents per lb.

Here we discover that in the exchange of a lb. of butter for a lb. of soap and vice versa, the Farmer lot 5 cents, and the manufacturer 7: if the manufacturer makes only ½ cent on the soap at 5 cents, then, in this case, he lost 14-l5ths of his labor. If we suppose the butter to have coat the farmer, in expenses, 3 cents per lb., there remains 2 only for his labor, in this case, he loses 5-7ths of his labor. If the producing part of society were generally to make similar enquiries to the above, they would soon put an end to all speculation, or, as it may be called, roguery: and having done that, they would not need to petition the legislature for “Universal Education," they would have the means of education in their own houses; and the tables would be so completely turned on the non-productive, that they might have to become the petitioners, and the others be, in estimation, what they are now in reality, the nobility of the land.

A WORKING MAN

Josiah Warren and Equitable Commerce: A Bibliography

Josiah Warren and Equitable Commerce: A Bibliography

[1821.01] "Weekly Summary," The Plough Boy, and Journal of the Board of Agriculture, 2, 52 (May 26, 1821), 415.

Josiah Warren, "Explanation of the Design and Arrangements of the Cooperative Magazine which has Recently Been Commenced, Western Tiller, 8 communications from June 1 to July 27, 1827, signed "A Late Member of New Harmony." [Also appears as "To Friends of the Social System. [CINCI]

Philanthropos, "Time-Magazine," Saturday Evening Chronicle

---, ---," New Harmony Gazette, Dec. 26, 1827. Vol. 3, No. 12, p. 94.

Josiah Warren, "A Letter from Josiah Warren," Mechanics Free Press (May 10, 1828), 2. [CINCI]

J. W., [letter on Robert Owen], The March of Mind, 1828. [CINCI]

J. W., "From 'The March of Mind'," New Harmony Gazette (Sep 10, 1828, p. 365) [reprint of article above]

Josiah Warren, "Time System for Labor Exchange," Western Tiller (5 articles) ­ Sept/Oct 1828. [CINCI]

[1830.01] Josiah Warren, Reduction in the Cost of Printing Apparatus, Cincinnati: Warren, Josiah, firm, 1830 [broadside. 34 x 11 cm.]

[1830.02] ---, ---, The Free Enquirer, 2, 20 (March 13, 1830), 157.

J. W., "To the Friends of the Equal Exchange of Labor in the West," Free Enquirer, 2 (July 17, 1830), 301-2.

J. W., "Improvement in the Machinery of Law," The Free Enquirer, 2, 38 (July 17, 1830), 300. [Josiah Warren?]

"Equal Exchange of Labor," New York Sentinel and Working Man's Advocate, 1, 44 (July 17, 1830), 1.

---. The Free Enquirer, 2, 39 (July 17, 1830), 308.

"A Working Man," [on equal exchange of labor], New York Sentinel and Working Man's Advocate, 1, 51 (August, 11, 1830), 1. [note: compare with next item]

E. C. [communication], The Free Enquirer, 2, 42 (August 14, 1830), 332.

J. W., "Reply to E. C.," Free Enquirer, 2, 42 (Aug 14, 1830), 332.

J. W., "Social Experiment," Free Enquirer, 3, 18 (February 16, 1831), 137.

Workingman's Advocate: Warren listed as agent:

Apr 28, 1832-May 25, 1833: Cincinnati (w/ James Underwood)

June 1, 1833-Sep 12, 1835: Tuscarawas

[1833.1] Josiah Warren, ed., Peaceful revolutionist, Cincinnati, Ohio: Peaceful revolutionist, 1833-1848 [Monthly; Vol. 1, no. 1 (Jan. 1833)-v. 1, no. 4 (Apr. 5, 1833); v. 2, no. 1 (May 1848).] [partial contents]

• Vol. 1, no. 1 (Jan. 1833)
• Vol. 1, no. 2 (Feb. 5, 1833)
• Vol. 1, no. 3
• Vol. 1, no. 4 (Apr. 5, 1833)
• Vol. 2, no. 1 (May 1848) [Indiana Historical Society]
• ?, ? "A Brief Outline of Equitable Commerce," Boston Investigator, 21, 52 (April 28, 1852), 4. [note: from The Peaceful Revolutionist]

J. W., "Written on Hearing of the Death of Camilla Wright," Free Enquirer, 5, 18 (February 23, 1833), 144. [poem]

[1833.03] "State Of Things in 1833," Reformer and Christian, 13, 3 (Apr 1833), 34.

[1836.1] Josiah Warren, Introduction to a new printing apparatus, adapted to the wants and capacities of private citizens. Trenton, Tuscarawas County, Ohio : Josiah Warren, 1836.

[1841.1] Josiah Warren, Manifesto, New Harmony, Ind.: J. Warren, 1841.

Josiah Warren, Herald of Equity, Cincinnati – 1841

Labor Prices broadside – 1842

Gazette of Equitable Commerce, vol. 1 no. 2, dated New Harmony September 1842, 8 pp.. Pretty familiar stuff on the Time Store, EC etc.

[1843.1] Josiah Warren, A new system of notation: intended to promote the more general cultivation & more just performance of music, New Harmony, Ind.] : Warren, 1843.

[1844] Josiah Warren, Letter on equitable commerce, New Harmony, Ind. : Warren's Amateur Print., 1844. [16p. Caption title and some of text in letter press; remainder of text in engraving or stereotyping to reproduce Warren's handwriting./ Letter, addressed to G. Soward, Hopedale, Milford, Mass., dated New Harmony, Ia., Feb. 1844. Imprint, Warren's Amateur Print., at end of text. Ind. Hist. soc.]

A Collection of the Most Popular Church Music Written Upon Geometric or Scientific Principles (New Harmony), 1844.

1845-6: contributions to the Indiana Statesman, New Harmony (Feb 1 1845; March 7 1846); and a series of engravings: July 4; Aug 16; Oct 11; Dec 27 1845; Jan 31; Feb 14, 1846.

[1846.1] Josiah Warren, Equitable commerce: a new development of principles, as substitutes for laws and governments. Proposed as elements of new society. New Harmony, Ind., 1846. [OLINK]

[1846.2] "A New System of Notation," American Journal of Music and Musical Visitor, 4, 19 (Feb 16, 1846), 47.

Josiah Warren, "Improvement in Compositions for Stereotype-Plates," US Patent #4479, April 25, 1849.

[1846.4] "A List of Patents Issued from the 14^th March to 11^th April, 1846," Scientific American, 1, 49 (August 27), 1846, 1. ["To Josiah Warren, of New Harmony, Ind., for improvement in composition of stereotype-plates: patented 25^th April."]

[1847.1] John Pickering, The working man's political economy: founded upon the principle of immutable justice and the inalienable rights of man; designed for the promotor of national reform. Cincinnati : Stereotyped in Warren's new patent method by Thomas Varney, 1847. [OLINK]

[1849] Josiah Warren, Equitable commerce : a new development of principles, for the harmoneous adjustment and regulation of the pecuniary, intellectual, and moral intercourse of mankind : proposed as elements of new society. Second edition. Utopia, Ohio : Published by Amos E. Senter, 1849. [GOOGLE]

"Lecture by Josiah Warren," Boston Investigator, 18, 37 (January 17, 1849), 3.

"The People's Sunday Meeting," Boston Investigator, 18, 37 (January 17, 1849), 3.

---, Boston Investigator, 18, 38 (January 24, 1849), 3.

---, Boston Investigator, 18, 39 (January 31, 1849), 3.

---, Boston Investigator, 18, 40 (February 7, 1849), 3.

---, Boston Investigator, 18, 41 (February 14, 1849), 3.

---, Boston Investigator, 18, 42 (February 21, 1849), 3.

"Mr. Warren's Lecture," Boston Investigator, 18, 38 (January 24, 1849), 3.

[notice], Boston Investigator, 18, 39 (January 24, 1849), 3.

[notice], Boston Investigator, 18, 40 (February 7, 1849), 3.

[notice], Boston Investigator, 18, 41 (February 14, 1849), 3.

[notice], Boston Investigator, 18, 42 (February 21, 1849), 3.

"People's Sunday Meeting," Boston Investigator, 18, 43 (February 28, 1849), 3.

"The People's Sunday Meeting," Boston Investigator, 18, 43 (February 28, 1849), 3.

---, Boston Investigator, 18, 46 (March 21, 1849), 3.

"People's Sunday Meeting," Boston Investigator, 18, 44 (March 7, 1849), 3.

"Equitable Commerce," Boston Investigator, 18, 44 (March 7, 1849), 3.

"The People's Sunday Meeting," Boston Investigator, 18, 44 (March 7, 1849), 3.

[advertisement], Boston Investigator, 18, 44 (March 7, 1849), 3.

---, Boston Investigator, 18, 45 (March 14, 1849), 3.

"People's Sunday Meeting," Boston Investigator, 18, 45 (March 14, 1849), 3.

"People's Sunday Meeting," Boston Investigator, 18, 46 (March 21, 1849), 3.

"Equitable Commerce," Boston Investigator, 18, 49 (April 11, 1849), 3.

"Equitable Commerce," Boston Investigator, 19, 2 (May 16, 1849), 2.

[notice], Pittsburgh (Pa.,) National Reformer, May?, 1849. [reprinted in next entry]

[notice], Boston Investigator, 19, 2 (May 16, 1849), 2.

"Equitable Commerce," The Literary Union; a Journal of Progress, in Literature and Education, Religion, 1, 14 (July 7, 1849), 218. [This contains the same extract as Boston Investigator, May 16, 1849, above.]

"Josiah Warren—and 'R. H.'," Boston Investigator, 19, 12 (July 25, 1849), 2.

"Letter from Josiah Warren," Boston Investigator, 19, 21 (September 25, 1849), 3.

[notice], Boston Investigator, 19, 21 (September 25, 1849), 3.

S. P. Andrews, "Phonotypy and Phonography, or Speech-Printing and Speech-Writing," Boston Investigator, 19, 22 (October 3, 1849), 4.

Josiah Warren, "Equitable Commerce. No. II," Boston Investigator, 19, 23 (October 10, 1849), ??.

Josiah Warren, "Equitable Commerce. No. III. What Constitutes the Just Reward of Labor?," Boston Investigator, 19, ?? (October ??, 1849), ??.

Worker, "A few Words about 'What Constitutes the Just Reward of Labor'," Boston Investigator, 19, 28 (November 14, 1849), 1.

Josiah Warren, "Equitable Commerce. No. IV," Boston Investigator, 19, 29 (November 21, 1849), 2.

List of New Publications Received, The Massachusetts Quarterly Review, 9 (December 1849), 158. [Equitable commerce]

M. P. S., "A Letter from Utopia," Boston Investigator, 19, 52 (May 1, 1850), 3.

"Improvement in Printing," Scientific American, 5, 40 (Jun 22, 1850), 316.

[1851.1] "Literary," The Independent, 3, 111 (January 16, 1851), 16.

[1851.2] Stephen Pearl Andrews, "Equitable commerce. Cost, the scientific limit of price," The Merchants' Magazine and Commercial Review, 24, 3 (March 1851), 332.

"To Reformers," Liberator, 21, 37 (September 12, 1851), 147. [advertisement for Science of Society]

---, Liberator, 21, 38 (September 19, 1851), 151.

---, Liberator, 21, 41 (October 10, 1851), 163.

"New Principles of Reform," American Phrenological Journal, 13, 6 (June 1851), 137.

[1852] Josiah Warren and Stephen Pearl Andrews, Equitable Commerce: A New Development Of Principles As Substitutes For Laws And Governments Proposed As Elements Of New Society, New York : Fowlers and Wells, 1852. [pdf]

[1852] Josiah Warren, Practical Details In Equitable Commerce: Showing the Workings, in Actual Experiment, During a Series of Years, of the Social Principles Expounded in the Works Called "Equitable Commerce," by the author of this, and "The Science Of Society, " by Stephen P. Andrews. Volume 1, New York : Fowler and Wells, 1852.

---, ---, New York : Fowler and Wells, 1854. [Labadie Collection]

Peter I. Blacker, "Equitable Villages," The Commonweal, ??, 1852.

Peter I. Blacker, "Equitable Villages," Boston Investigator, 21, 38 (January 21, 1852), 4. [note: from The Commonweal]

Josiah Warren, "A Brief Outline of Equitable Commerce," Boston Investigator, 21, 52 (April 28, 1852), 4. [note: from The Peaceful Revolutionist]

"'Modern Times'—A New City," Boston Investigator, 22, 9 (June 30, 1852), 4. [note: from The New York Sunday Times]

G., "Communism the Only Alternative," The Circular, 1, 39 (August 4, 1852), 154.

"Publications," The Massachusetts Teacher, 5, 10 (October 1852), 319.

Peter I. Blacker, "American Socialism," Boston Investigator, 22, 25 (October 20, 1852), 1.

Peter I. Blacker, "An Outline of Equitable Commerce," Boston Investigator, 22, 36 (January 5, 1853), 1.

["card" relating to Modern Times], New York Tribune, April 4, 1853. [See next entry]

[notice], The Circular, 2, 41 (April 6, 1853), 162.

Edward F. Underhill, "Cost the Limit of Price," Liberator, 23, 41 (October 14, 1853), 164.

Peter I. Blacker, "The Golden Rule," Boston Investigator, 23, 26 (October 26, 1853), 3.

???? 23, 14 (August 3, 1853), 2.

"To Correspondents," "J. T.," Texas.—A letter addressed to Mr. Warren at Modern Times, L. I., Thompson's Station, N. Y., would be sure to reach him.

Positions Defined. Village of Modern Times (leaflet), 1854.

"As Usual!" Boston Investigator, 23, 41 (February 8, 1854), 2.

Josiah Warren, "Explanation," Boston Investigator, 23, 43 (February 22, 1854), 2.

"Paine Celebration at Modern Times, N. Y.," Boston Investigator, 23, 45 (March 8, 1854), 1.

Josiah Warren, Periodical letter on the principles and progress of the equity movement, Thompson P.O., Long Island, N.Y. : Josiah Warren, 1854-?

• Vol. 1, no. 1 (July 1854)
• Vol. 1, no. 2
• Vol. 1, no. 3
• Vol. 1, no. 4
• Vol. 1, no. 5
• Vol. 1, no. 6
• Vol. 1, no. 7
• Vol. 1, no. 8 (March, 1855)

• 2nd series, Vol. 1, No. 1 (Boston, Mass., September, 1856) ["Our institutions, like all others...]
• 2nd series, Vol. 1, No. 2 [Hollis, Harvard]
• 2nd series, Vol. 1, No. 3 (1856:Dec.) [Wisc. Hist.]
• 2nd series, Vol. 1, No. 4
• 2nd series, Vol. 1, No. 5
• 2nd series, Vol. 1, No. 6 (Sept.1857) [Hollis, Harvard] [Showing the Practical Applications of the Principles of "Equity."]
• 2nd series, Vol. 1, No. 7
• 2nd series, Vol. 1, No. 8
• 2nd series, Vol. 1, No. 9
• pt. 3, no. 1 (1873)

Peter I. Blacker, "Individualism Versus Institutionalism," Boston Investigator, 24, 16 (August 16, 1854), 2.

[1855] Equitable Commerce, Boston : s.n., 1855. [ Signed, author of "Equitable Commerce."--P. 4./ Caption title./ Account of New Harmony under Robert Owen and a castigation of Equitable Commerce, issued by the New England Association of Boston, 1855./ Reproduction: Photostat.]

Equitable commerce, a proposal for the abolition of trade by the substitution of equitable exchange, in a series of papers communicated from the spirit-life, Boston, New England Association of Philanthropic Commercialists, 1855. [36p.]

Peter I. Blacker, "The Government Mania," Boston Investigator, 25, 1 (May 2, 1855), 2.

Peter I. Blacker, "Submission to the Will of the Majority," Boston Investigator, 25, 9 (June 27, 1855), 2.

Peter I. Blacker, "Secret Societies," Boston Investigator, 25, 10 (July 4, 1855), 1.

Common Sense, "The Sovereignty of the Individual," Boston Investigator, 25, 17 (August 22, 1855), 2.

"Equitable Commerce," Liberator, 25, 37 (September 14, 1855), 146.

John Orvis, "Equitable Commerce Association," Liberator, 25, 38 (September 21, 1855), 150.

John Orvis, " Equitable Commerce," Liberator, 25, 39 (September 28, 1855), 154.

"Free Love," The United States Magazine of Science, Art, Manufactures, Agriculture, Commerce and Trade, 22, 6 (November 1855), 204.

William Pare, Equitable Commerce as Practised in the equity villages of the United States of North America: a paper read before the Statistical Section of the British Association at Glasgow, September, 1855, [London] : printed by Harrison and Sons, 1856.

"To Correspondents," Boston Investigator, 25, 48 (March 26, 1856), 3.

"Slavery and Freedom," Southern Quarterly Review, 1, 1 (April 1856), 62.

William Pare, "Equitable Villages in America," Journal of the Statistical Society of London, Vol. 19, No. 2. (Jun., 1856), pp. 127-143.

Peter I. Blacker, "The Perpetuity of the Union," Boston Investigator, 26, 9 (July 25, 1856), 2.

A. C., "Social Reform Movements," Boston Investigator, 1857

"Commerce Tract," [Dual Commerce Association], Boston, July, 1858. [12 pages. Noted in 1859.1.]

[notices of Dual Commerce Association in Boston papers, including Boston Herald, September-October, 1858; store established in basement of Hotel Pelham, under management of T. J. Lewis.]

[1859.1] Dual Commerce Association. The Dual Commerce Association: its Experience, Results, Plans & Prospectus : First Report. Boston, Mass.: Dual Commerce Association, Jan. 1, 1859.

"Dual Commerce Association," The Circular, 8, 4 (February 17, 1859), 4.

"The Unitary Home," The Circular, 8, 12 (April 14, 1859), 4.

[1860] Josiah Warren, Written music remodeled, and invested with the simplicity of an exact science, Boston : J.P. Jewett, 1860.

[1861] Josiah Warren; A. C. Cuddon, The principle of equivalents: a subject of immediate and serious interest to both sexes and all classes of all nations, [Long Island, N.Y.? : Josiah Warren? ; London? : A.C. Cuddon?], 1861 [16 p.]

Josiah Warren, Modern Education. Long Island, NY, 1861. leaflet (2 pp.) dated December, 1861.

Josiah Warren, Modern Government and Its True Mission, a Few Words for the American Crisis. n.p., 1862. signed "A Counsellor," March, 1862.

[1863] Josiah Warren, True civilization an immediate necessity, and the last ground of hope for mankind: being the results and conclusions of thirty-nine years' laborious study and experiments in civilization as it is, and in different enterprises for reconstruction, Boston : J. Warren, 1863.

Josiah Warren, The Emancipation of Labor. Boston, 1864

Josiah Warren, "A Letter to Louis Kossuth," Boston Investigator, 33, 41 (Feb. 17, 1864).

[1865] The Principle of Equivalents. The Most Disagreeable Labor Entitled to the Highest Compensation, n.p., 1865.

Moncure D. Conway, "Modern Times, New York," Littell's Living Age, 30, 1106 (Aug 12, 1865), 244.

[1867] Josiah Warren, ed., The quarterly letter : devoted mainly to showing the practical applications and progress of "equity." Cliftondale, Mass.: Josiah Warren, 1867-

[1869.1] Josiah Warren, The former title of this work was "Equitable Commerce", but it is now ranked as the first part of True Civilization: a subject of vital and serious interest to all people; but most immediately to the men and women of labor and sorrow ... Part 1, Clintondale, Mass., The Author, 1869 4th edition [of Equitable Commerce]

[1869.2] "New England Labor Reform Convention," The Revolution, 3, 3 (January 21, 1869), 1.

[1869.3] Josiah Warren, "Woman and the Money Question," The Revolution, 4, ??
(July ??. 1869), 29.

[1869.2] Truth, "Cause and Effect," The Revolution, 4, 4 (July 29, 1869), 52.

[1869.3] "Labor for Labor," The Revolution, 4, 5 (August 5, 1869), 71.

[1869.2] Josiah Warren, "Superficialities," The Revolution, 4, 6 (August 12, 1869), 83.

[1871.1] E. D. Linton, Political platform for the coming party, Boston : [s.n.], 1871. [10p]

[1871.2] Josiah Warren, Response to the call of the National Labor Union for essays on the following subjects : 1. The specie basis fallacy : 2. Strikes : 3. Co-operation : [etc.] / Boston : [s.n.], 1871. [8p]

Controversy w/Andrews in Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly. July-Sep., 1871

Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly, September 9, 1871

Josiah Warren, "The Motives for Communism—How It Worked and What It Led To," Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly, IV, 14 (February 17, 1872), 6.

Josiah Warren, "The Motives for Communism—How It Worked and What It Led To—Article II," Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly, IV, 15 (February 24, 1872), 7.

Josiah Warren, "The Motives for Communism—How It Worked and What It Led To—Article III," Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly, IV, 16 (March 2, 1872), 6.

Josiah Warren, Letter to The American Workman (March 2, 1872).

Josiah Warren, "The Motives for Communism—How It Worked and What It Led To—Article IV," Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly, IV, 17 (March 16, 1872), 5.

Josiah Warren, "The Motives for Communism—How It Worked and What It Led To—Article V," Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly, IV, 22 (April 13, 1872), 4.

Josiah Warren, "The Motives for Communism—How It Worked and What It Led To—Article VI," Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly, IV, 23 (April 20, 1872), 5. [listed as "IV"]

Josiah Warren, "The Motives for Communism—How It Worked and What It Led To—Article VII," Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly, IV, 23 (April 27, 1872), 4.

Josiah Warren, "The Motives for Communism—How It Worked and What It Led To—Article VIII," Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly, V, 2 (May 25, 1872), 14.

Josiah Warren, "The Motives for Communism—How It Worked and What It Led To—Article IX," Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly, V, 5 (June 15, 1872), 3.

Josiah Warren, "The Motives for Communism—How It Worked and What It Led To—Article X," Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly, V, 19 (April 12, 1873), 3.

Josiah Warren, "The Motives for Communism—How It Worked and What It Led To—Article XI," Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly, V, 21 (April 26, 1873), 3.

[1873] Josiah Warren, Practical applications of the elementary principles of true civilization to the minute details of every day life : and the facts and conclusions of forty seven years study and experiments in reform movements through Communism to and in elementary principles, Princeton, Mass. : J. Warren, 1873. [NWRD]

Josiah Warren, Letter to E. H. Heywood. Princeton, MA, 1873.

Josiah Warren, Money: The Defects of Money Are the "Roots of All Evil." Charlestown, MA, 1873.

Josiah Warren, "A Few Words to the Pioneers," The Word, (Princeton Mass., July; followed by a series of articles in subsequent issues.

Josiah Warren, "The Cost Principle." Index, 4 (Dec. 11, 1873), pp. 504-5.

Josiah Warren, "Josiah Warren's Last Letter." Index, 5 (Apr. 30, 1874), pp. 207-8.

Josiah Warren, "Labor the Only Ground of Price." Index, 5 (May 28, 1874), pp. 260-1.

letters from E.G. Cubberly in The Word, III (May, 1874), 3; (September, 1874), 3; (June, 1875). 3.

[1875] Josiah Warren; Stephen Pearl Andrews, True civilization; a subject of vital and serious interest to all people; but most immediately to the men and women of labor and sorrow, Princeton, Mass., B.R. Tucker, 1875 5th ed. [of equitable commerce]

J. H. Cook, "Way-Marks," The American Socialist, 3, 31 (August 1, 1878), 246

[1938] Stephen Pearl Andrews, Josiah Warren, The sovereignty of the individual, Berkeley Heights, N.J. : Freeman Press, 1938

[1952] Josiah Warren, Manifesto (a rare and interesting document), Berkeley Heights, N.J., Published & printed by the Oriole Press, 1952

J. Felix, Jesus of Mammon?

J. Felix, "Jesus of Mammon?," supplement to Isador Ladoff, American Pauperism and the Abolition of Poverty, Chicago: Charles H. Kerr, 1904, 217-230.

SUPPLEMENT

JESUS OR MAMMON?

BY J. FELIX

"I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, make straight the way of the Lord."

Crying aloud against the blasphemy of those who devour the exploited laborer, and for a pretense make long prayers and give alms in His name! Crying bitterly from a wilderness of contradictions against a society which, teaching the young in the doctrines of the Redeemer that it is more blessed to serve than be served, to give than to receive, vet supports a system under which those who will not devour must chose to be devoured! Crying piteously to those who profess His religion of love to come boldly forth and help make the paths straight, that love may walk without brutality and lead humanity to that kingdom of God, where love may be a living law instead of a dead letter. Will ye never know the Master's meaning when He warned you against offending the little ones Will ye never perceive that when ye teach a child to love neighbor as self, in honor to prefer one another, "that all these things shall be added," that righteousness and truth and honesty of dealing are sure paths to happiness and success in life and then push that innocent soul out into a world of greed where money is power, where every path is closed to those who try to practice what you teach; will ye never learn that in doing this ye give mortal offense to His lambs? Can ye not see that only by throwing all your energies into the effort to do away with conditions which make a Christian life a practical impossibility can you escape the terrible sentence of the children's Christ? It were better ye had a millstone tied to your necks and ye were even cast into the sea where it is deepest. Come, brethren, let us reason together. Do you not, fellow Christian, dread for your children and all posterity that which has been your fate? Surely not all who claim to follow "in His steps" are despicable hypocrites! Surely my brothers and sisters of the faith are all as honest and sincere as am I. That being so, they must suffer as I do. They, too, must feel at war with themselves. They, too, must feel lone and weary and heartsick at their vain endeavors to live the Christ life. Surely I am only a son of man and not the only son of man to feel the horror of subjection to conditions which make His way a practically impossible way. To be sure He said that there would be terrible suffering and many bleeding hearts and estrangements of kindred for His sake and the coming of His kingdom. Oh, but He also made a promise. He never said that poor humanity must forever be at war and suffer everlastingly. He bade us make straight the crooked paths. He commissioned us to remove all obstacles. We are to overcome Mammon and the greedy horde of his worshippers. We are to clear away the institutions which legalize the oppression of the weak by the powerful, the enslavement of the poor by the rich. We are to open wide the gates, smooth the road and clear away the encumbrances of the usurer and exploiter so that a man may live by the sweat of his brow without stealing the wage of his neighbor. So that man may love his fellowman without starving his own family. So that we may pray for the success of all our fellows without dreading that one man's gain is another man's loss and that other man may mean ourselves. Do you think it wise to make a living God appear under necessity of starving one that another may be blessed with untold wealth? Did "Our Father in Heaven" provide for the growing of only one-half enough bread to go around? Or are we countenancing a system which enables one man to seize the share of ten so that we may build almshouses, prisons and poor relief stations for the other nine? Listen to my cry! Pardon much use of the personal pronoun. It is a personal story. My hope is that it is common to so many, that it will help answer some of these burning questions. Oh, I am sure my appeal is not going to be in vain. Though I am without wisdom or influence or power, I have love, boundless, all prevailing, devouring love. Love is God. Will you defy my God? Will you withstand the power which brought forth and sustains the universe? Will ye say to love, "Get thee hence?" Ye cannot resist. Even out of my wilderness ye must hear my cry and respond to my call. Ye could jeer at logic and refuse to reason, but love ye can neither conquer nor ignore. There is no danger. In an age when a threat to violate the so-called rights of property arouses more feeling and louder protests than the wanton destruction of thousands of lives, the bold proclamation of a rule of love without profit must attract interest if not respectful attention. Is it a wonderful thing that one who professes to follow Jesus of Nazareth should feel love impelled to help and cheer every living fellow soul? Must not a sincere follower of the Great Lover of Children the originator of the religion of the rights of tile lowly, and the weak be wrung at heart to see innocent childhood sold for gain and virtue sacrificed to Mammon? Arc you surprised that one who drinks of the cup and eats of the bread in "remembrance of Him" should be in love with all the universe? To me this seems natural, but oh it is so hard to be consistent! The rich and the poor may worship together. They may profess the same love of God. The high and the low lift their voices in praise and thanksgiving to the good loving Father in Heaven and then the rich go out to exploit the poor, to defraud the other rich, the high to oppress the low, the low to displace the higher. Do they associate together, cline and live together? Are they friendly and helpful to each other, seeking each other's company and cultivating a close fellowship in preparation for the future co-existence which they profess to be looking toward in a paradise of Loving bliss? Certainly not. They are in constant antagonism. The poor want to be rich and the rich want to get richer for fear of becoming poorer. Practically every Christian strives with all his might for gain. Yet Christ taught that material wealth was such a bar to entrance into His Kingdom, that only the miraculous intervention of God could save a rich man. Did Christ lie when he said that? Are we all hypocrites I tell you neither does the Lord's word fail nor are we all hypocrites We are living in a state of chronic violence. I speak not of those who scoff at all religion. I am not addressing those who openly avow themselves devoted to no cult or creed save that of self. I am appealing to those who would follow the King of Truth and live by the gospel of Love. Who will, but cannot? The Christ said violence must come but woe to him who brings it. I say, woe also to him who maintains, countenances and fails to exert himself to defeat violence. He is equally guilty with him who causes violence. The worst of all violence is that which offends against the laudable aspirations of youth to follow in the steps of Him who said, "Little children love one another!" You have to live in a world where man is arranged against man. You toil for bread amid conditions natural to beasts of prey. You teach your children that. "Love is the greatest thing in the world." When the child begins to reason you show it that money is the indispensable thing. Oh listen to the cry of one who like many of you has been faced by the questioning, innocent "why" of a son or daughter. The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. The harvest is white for the cutting. Why stand idle? Why do ye linger? Come forth in the power of His might. Come in the name of the King of Truth. Come in the name of Love of Humanity. Come for the sake of the Martyrs of countless ages who cry from the past at the danger of seeing the priceless heritage, the fruit of all their sacrifice and struggle, lost through our selfishness and indifference. Come for the sake of posterity which will surely call us to account! Brethren, we must think and work! We must Thank, Trust and Work in Love, without ceasing to make His paths straight, to take away the barriers, so that generations to come may call us blessed while they walk in the paths of righteousness, of love, of service one to another without fear. We must follow the pointing of the finger which shows the better way. We must make possible the glorious prophecy that the Lion, the strong, shall lie down with the Lamb, the weak, to shelter, protect and raise instead of oppress and devour, to be loved and trusted instead of hated and feared. Ye believe in God? Then ye must believe in this. The Christ did not die for a theory but for a truth, sublime but most practical. If we fail to join in the battle for this truth we make of Him a mockery, and the truth for which He died will yet prevail in spite of us. Listen to one crying in the Wilderness! Make His paths straight. The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand, take heed when it comes lest ye be found among the generations of vipers, hypocrites, children of Mammon.

You want to know what all this means ? You demand something more definite than passionate exclamations? You shall have it. At the bottom of all this wilderness of contradictions and inconsistencies of our social fabric there is a primal cause. That cause is to be found in the desperate effort to cling to a worn out system of morals and economic ethics. With our advance in the mechanical arts and improvement of the means of production, unparalleled in the. history of the world, the system of law governing the relations of man to mall and regulating the award and distribution of the said production have remained practically at a standstill. Instead of keeping pace with the advance on the one hand in the art of production, by adapting the system governing the producer to that of the changed conditions, we are stubbornly refusing to recognize that which may have been of social and political economy under former conditions have become the most damnable lies. Political equality has become a dead letter. In place of chattel slavery a system of exploitation has sprung into existence and shelters itself under a system of laws originally intended to guarantee the rights of the individual. The result is that the condition of the large mass of productive toilers is one in which they suffer all the evils of chattel slavery without any of the mitigating advantages of that institution. It is not merely the assertion of a fanatical devotee of an ism to say that the foregoing statement is a fact. One has only to have the very common experience of being compelled to seek or hold the employment necessary to earn daily bread for self and dependents, to learn how bitterly true it is that those who live by the sweat of the brow are the victimized creatures of him who holds the purse strings. This being a fact, what wonder that the worship of Mammon is the only one which enlists serious devotees? Time was when a man willing to work could take his little kit of tools and go out into the world with the assurance that at least a fairly equitable portion of what he produced would be his. Nor did the worker need dread that for the chance to work, to produce, he would have to bargain away not only the greater part of his product but even his personal freedom. Little by little the cunning of the workman and even his physical strength became less and less a factor of importance in production. The introduction of labor-saving machinery constantly reduces the percentage cost of manual labor and increases that of plant and machinery. Now, while it is an undisputable fact that labor-saving machinery results in improving the material condition of the people at large, it is equally indisputable that under the present system of exploitation it gives the employing, the capitalistic element, enormously increased power. There is no doubt that a large percentage of the people, even the wage-working people, enjoy material conveniences and even luxuries unthought of before the extensive introduction of labor-saving devices. There is also no doubt that the percentage of product retained by the producer has suffered great decrease from the same cause. This condition leads to so-called over production and those periods of industrial depression are commonly known as Panics. A panic is not the result of over production. Panics and hard times are the direct result of a gradual withdrawing of the purchasing power from the producing masses. As an illustration we will suppose that, through the improvement in machinery a man receiving two dollars per day is able to produce ten dollars worth of shoes, he has added to the supply ten dollars worth but is only able to purchase two dollars worth. If millions of people produce more than they can purchase in the same proportion and the residue is absorbed by a small non-producing minority, the time must come at more or less regular intervals when both the product and the purchasing medium will be concentrated, a few hands will possess all, with the many impoverished. Then comes the so-called slack in the market. Money becomes cheap because industries are at a standstill. This piling up of produce and idleness of capital is not the result of over-production. If there was real over-production and just social distribution there would be no want and starvation. Want and starvation are rampant at times when the product of labor finds no ready market. When corporations declare the greatest dividends and the capitalist talks about prosperity based on enormous profits, then a panic is near at hand. This must be so because the larger the percentage of profits, the less is the percentage of purchasing power left in the hands of the producer, who is also the consumer. Now, at the bottom of this lies the fact that the introduction of machinery has compelled the producer to join with many of his fellows in the use of expensive equipment which in turn is controlled by private individuals who have all the power of life and death without any of the responsibilities to which even the veriest despot of a potentate must yield consideration. All of this enormous advantage depends on a man's having money. It is not wonderful then that men will go any length to obtain that which gives them a chance to exploit, i. e., eat up their fellows instead of being eaten and exploited by them? Yet the very fact that the getting of wealth is only a choice of dilemmas makes it impossible for the possessor of wealth to be happy. No sooner does a man accumulate large wealth and proceed to use it for the purpose of exploiting his fellows, than he in turn becomes the object of universal attack. To defend himself against the onslaughter and keep possession of his power he must brutalize himself (if he has not already done so in the getting), and his fear and suspicion of his fellows destroys all chance of happiness. We see by all this that we have arrived at a high stage of productive advancement, but that our system of social distribution is entirely wanting in serving the best interests of humanity, rich and poor alike. The poor are compelled to compromise themselves and harden their hearts in order to live and even partially respond to the claims of those dependent on them. The rich likewise must steel themselves against every human impulse and choke off every high aspiration lest they be thrown back among the poor. How little chance is offered by such conditions to practice the love law of Jesus Christ, those who have conscientiously tried to do so, can best make answer. If, therefore, conditions are such as to make a consistent Christian life a practically impossible life, ought not every Christian bestir himself to remedy the evil?

You ask how can this be done? In the first place, you and I, dear brother, must clear our minds of all prejudice. We must take on a spirit of unselfishness. We must look upon things through the eyes of earnest, devoted love for the truth. We must try to see things and not without fear as they are, as He saw them and not as we have become accustomed to see them. We must learn to distinguish between might and right. We must learn to look through the laws of conventionalities of man and see the law of God, of Nature, of Love! They are one and the same. Having done this, what do we see? We see the law of God made of no effect. We see that the advance of civilization has brought with it also a great forward stride in the methods of Mammon. The very truths upon which all advancement is based have been cunningly construed to blind the masses and make their victimization easier. The "divine" right of rulers feudal and paternal institutions, chattel slavery and all other crude devices of former ages by which the few sought to live upon and tyrannize the many, have been ripened and developed into the perfectly effective modern Giant Capitalist. The sacred (?) fetishes of the rights of property, usury, capital, have developed into a perfect system of exploitation such as only modern civilization could produce. Under a system of laws which seeks to establish the right to get by whatever means is available and which makes sacred the right of the getter to keep what he has, regardless of the common weal, Mammon has indeed become king, and to be poor in possessions is to be worthless of consideration. This is, if ye will hear it, the short reign of that Father of liars which the Master said must come. The cure for this state of affairs, the defeat of this Mammon of unrighteousness, the freeing of humanity must come through the abolition of private ownership of the means of production. The means of production must be returned to the people. The product of labor must be assured to the producer. In other words, if we would make material conditions and social environment such as to permit of the consistent following out of the precepts of the Christ, if we would make the natural law of love a possible practice of daily life, if we would do away with the present rule of envy, conflict and Mammon, we must bring about the introduction of Socialism. We have too long stood aloof; we have been befooled too long by those who wrongly think their interests at stake, to think that Socialism is a form of anarchism, the fruit of abnormal brains equally wedded to a destruction of religion, law and order. This is far from the truth. If you will take the time and trouble to impartially study the principles of Socialism and the declarations of its authoritative expounders, you will find, as I have, that they have an abhorrence of all violence. You will be surprised to learn (it is surprising that you read the daily papers without learning) that the lawlessness is on the side of Mammon, of private ownership, of arrogant cooperative power. You will find that the principal grievance of the true Socialist is that the law can not, under present conditions, be enforced. You will also find that the enemies of Socialism, the ones who make every effort to misrepresent and malign Socialism, recognize no law save self-interest. You will find that enemies of Socialism are the real anarchists in that they never hesitate to violate the law when their interests are at stake, while they put forth every effort to defeat any popular advancement. For the most part you will find that they succeed because money is power and they have money. It is true that many of the leaders in this new thought are of foreign birth and that, owing to the depraved ideals with which the word religion and Christianity has ever been associated in their native lands, they avow themselves as abhorrent of any form of institutional religion. In their minds all institutional religion must necessarily stand only for tyranny of the worst sort. But if you will look at the principles advocated by these men without prejudice you will soon see that there is no antagonism in principle toward what you and I, under more fortunate surroundings, recognize as Christianity. Even if it were true that up to the present this idea had been principally championed by those who are not of the household of faith, is that a reason why we should refuse to see the truth? Did our forefathers refuse political freedom because some of its stoutest and most effective advocates gloried in being called infidels? Certainly not. Even in our time we have seen no good Republican minister of the gospel refuse to vote his ticket because the redoubtable Bob Ingersol voted the same. It is therefore not a question of what other kind of people vote and work for Socialism or what they expect to gain by its introduction. The fact which we have to consider is that Christian ethics and the present social and industrial economy are antagonistic and at variance. As Christians we must seek to change this. Mammon sits enthroned. As Christians we want to enthrone Jesus. If Socialism will do this every true Christian must become a Socialist. Come see for yourselves. As a brother, I say it will. You need not take my word. Read, work, love. You will surely come. You cannot be neutral. We do not need "Christian Socialism," we need Socialism in order to live as Christians should live. Therefore, I know it will come because I believe in Jesus. Now it is: Jesus or Mammon. Jesus is bound to win. When He wins do you want to come with Jesus into power through Socialism or with Mammon dethroned, in spite of Capitalism? You must decide, my brother. Whatever you decide do it quickly. Time is precious for both sides. Jesus or Mammon?

William Pare, Equitable Villages in America

William Pare, "Equitable Villages in America," Journal of the Statistical Society of London, Vol. 19, No. 2. (Jun., 1856), pp. 127-143.

Equitable Villages in America. By William Pare, Esq.

[Read before the Statistical Section of the British Association at Glasgow, September, 1855.]

There was founded, some four years since, in Long Island, in the State of New York, what is called an "Equitable Village," under the distinctive title of "Modern Times." Its origin is due to Mr. Josiah Warren, formerly of Cincinnati, Ohio, who claims to be the discoverer of a new theory of society, now sought to be reduced to practice at "Modern Times," and other "Equitable Villages" in various parts of the United States of North America.

As this new theory of society is different to any heretofore attempted, and is now being tested by actual experiment, I trust I may be excused for occupying a few minutes of your time in stating what are its main features, and in directing your attention to a few simple works, from which those who desire may obtain further information, and from which I shall freely quote materials for this paper.

Mr. Warren gives to his theory the generic title of "Equitable Commerce," using the word "commerce" not in its restricted and ordinarily understood sense, as pertaining only to trade, and the interchange of commodities, but in the enlarged old English signification of the word " conversation," that is, human intercourse of all sorts, interchange of work, business, ideas, civilities, or amusements; in short, the concrete, or tout ensemble, of human relations.

According to Mr. Warren, the following is the Social Problem, in all its branches, which has to be solved.:—

I. The proper, legitimate, and just reward of labour.

II. Security of person and property.

III. The greatest practicable amount of freedom to each individual.

IV. Economy in the production and uses of wealth.

V. To open the way for each individual to the possession of land, and all other natural wealth.

VI. To make the interests of all to co-operate with and assist each other, instead of clashing with and counteracting each other.

VII. To withdraw the elements of discord, of war, of distrust, and repulsion; and to establish a prevailing spirit of peace, order, and social sympathy.

And, according to him also, the following principles are the means of the solution of this Social Problem:—

1. Individuality.

2. The Sovereignty of every individual.

3. Cost as the limit of price.

4. A circulating medium founded on the cost of labour

5. Adaptation of the supply to the demand.

As observed by Mr. Stephen Pear! Andrews, an acute writer on the subject, "the mere reading of this programme will suggest the immensity of the scope to which the subject extends. A few minds may, from these principles, begin to perceive the rounded outlines of what Mr. Andrews does not hesitate to pronounce the most complete [128] scientific statement of the problem of human society which has ever been presented to the world. Most, however, will hardly begin to understand the universal and all-pervading potency of these few simple principles, until they find them elaborately displayed and elucidated." The briefest possible exposition, however, of each of these principles is all that will be expected of me on this occasion.

And first of " Individuality," out of which springs the doctrine of the " Sovereignty of the Individual."

It is affirmed, that individuality pervades universal nature; that it is positively the most fundamental and universal principle which the finite mind seems capable of discovering, and the best image of the infinite. There are no two objects in the universe which are precisely alike. Each has its own constitution and peculiarities which distinguish it from every other. Infinite diversity is the universal law. In the multitude of human countenances, for example, there are no two alike; and in the multitude of human characters there is the same variety. The principle applies equally to persons, to things, and to events. There have been no two occurrences which were precisely alike, during all the cycling periods of time No action, transaction, or set of circumstances, whatsoever, ever corresponded precisely to any other action, transaction, or set of circumstances. This diversity reigns throughout every kingdom of nature, and, it is contended, "mocks at all human attempts to make laws, or constitutions, or regulations, or governmental institutions of any sort, which shall work justly and harmoniously amidst the unforeseen contingencies of the future."

The individualities of objects are least, or, at all events they are less apparent, when the objects are inorganic, or of a low grade of organization. The individualities of the grains of sand which compose the beach, for example, are less marked than those of vegetables, and those of vegetables are less than those of animals, and, finally, those of animals are less than those of man. In proportion as any object is more complex, it embodies a greater number of elements, and each element has its own individualities or diversities in every new combination into which it enters. Consequently these diversities are multiplied into each other, in the infinite augmentation of geometrical progression. Man, standing, then, at the head of the created universe, is consequently the most complex creature in existence— every individual, man or woman, being a little world in him or herself, an image or reflection of God, an epitome of the Infinite. Hence the individualities of such a being are utterly immeasurable; and every attempt to adjust the capacities, the adaptations, the wants, or the responsibilities of one human being by the capacities, the adaptations, or the wants of another human being, except in the very broadest generalities, is unqualifiedly futile and hopeless. Hence every ecclesiastical, governmental, or social institution which is based on the idea of demanding conformity or likeness in any thing, has ever been, and ever will be, frustrated by the operation of this subtile, all-pervading, principle of individuality. Hence, human society has ever been, and is still, in the turmoil of revolution. The only alternative known has been between revolutions and despotism. Revolutions violently burst the bonds, and explode the foundations [129] of existing institutions. The institution falls before the individual. Despotism only succeeds by denaturalizing mankind. It extinguishes their individualities only by extinguishing them. The individual falls before the Institution.

It is affirmed that this indestructible and all-pervading individuality, furnishes, itself, the law and the only true law of order and harmony throughout the universe. When every individual particle of matter obeys the law of its own attraction, and comes into that precise position, and moves in that precise direction which its own inherent peculiarities demand, the harmony of the spheres is evolved. By that means only, natural classification, natural order, natural organization, natural harmony and agreement, are attained. Every scheme or arrangement which is based upon the principle of thwarting the inherent affinities of the individual monads, which compose any system or organism, is essentially vicious, and the organization is false—a mere bundle of revolutionary and antagonistic atoms. If, then, individuality is a universal law which must be obeyed if we would have order and harmony in any sphere, and, consequently, if we would have a true constitution of human government, then the absolute sovereignty of the individual necessarily results. The monads or atoms of which human society is composed, are the individual men and women in it. They must be so disposed of, as we have seen, in order that society may be harmonic, that the destiny of each shall be controlled by his or her own individualities of taste, conscience, intellect, capacity and will. But man is a being endowed with consciousness. He, and no one else, knows the determining force of his own attractions. No one else can, therefore, decide for him; and hence individuality can only become the law of human action by securing to each individual the sovereign determination of his own judgment, and of his own conduct, in all things, with no right reserved either of punishment, or censure, on the part of anybody else whomsoever; and this is what is meant by the " Sovereignty of the Individual," limited only by the ever-accompanying condition, resulting from the equal sovereignty of all others, that the onerous consequences of his actions be assumed by himself.

It would, perhaps, be injudicious to conclude this almost naked statement of the doctrine of "the Sovereignty of the Individual" without a more formal statement of the scientific limit upon the exercise of that sovereignty which the principle itself supplies. If the principle were predicated of one individual alone, the assertion of his sovereignty, or, in other words, of his absolute right to do as he pleases, or to pursue his own happiness in his own way, would be, confessedly, to invest him with the attributes of despotism over others. But the doctrine which I have endeavoured to set forth is not that. It is the assertion of the concurrent sovereignty of all men, and of all women, and within the limits I am about to state, of all children. This concurrence of sovereignty necessarily and appropriately limits the sovereignty of each. Each is sovereign only within his own dominions, because he can not extend the exercise of his sovereignty beyond these limits without trenching upon, and interfering with, the prerogative of others whose sovereignty the doctrine equally affirms. What, then, constitutes the boundaries of [130] one's own dominions ? This is a pregnant question for the happiness of mankind, and one which, it is said, has never, until now, been specifically and scientifically asked and answered. The answer, if correctly given, will fix the precise point at which sovereignty ceases, and encroachment begins; and it is affirmed that that knowledge, accepted into the public mind, will do more than laws and the sanction of laws, to regulate individual conduct and intercourse. The limitation is this: every individual is the rightful sovereign over his own conduct in all things, whenever, and just so far as, the consequences of his conduct can be assumed by himself; or, rather, inasmuch as no one objects to assuming agreeable consequences, whenever and as far as this is true of the disagreeable consequences. For disagreeable consequences, endurance, or burden of all sorts, the term "cost" is elected as a scientific technicality. Hence the exact formula of the doctrine, with its inherent limitation, may be stated thus:—"The Sovereignty of the Individual, to be exercised at his own cost." It results, that wherever such circumstances exist that a person cannot exercise his own individuality and sovereignty without throwing the "cost," or burden of his actions upon others, the principle has so far to be compromised. Such circumstances arise out of connected or amalgamated interests, and the sole remedy is disconnection. The exercise of sovereignty is the exercise of the deciding power. Whoever has to bear the cost should have the deciding power in every case. If one has to bear the cost of another's conduct, and just so far as he has to do so, he should have the deciding power over the conduct of the other. Hence dependence and close connections of interests demand continual concessions and compromises. Hence, too, close connection and mutual dependence is the legitimate and scientific root of despotism, as disconnection or individualization of interests is the root of freedom and emancipation.

If the close combination which demands the surrender of our will to another, is one instituted by nature, as in the case of the mother and the infant, then the relation is a true one notwithstanding. The surrender is based upon the fact that the child is not yet strictly an individual. The unfolding of its individuality is gradual, and its growing development is precisely marked by the increase of its ability to assume the consequences of its own acts. If the close combination of interests is artificial or forced, then the parties exist toward each other in false relations, and to false relations no true principles can apply. Consequently, in such relations, the sovereignty of the individual must be abandoned. The law of such relations is collision and conflict, to escape which, while remaining in the relations, there is no other means but mutual concessions and surrenders of the selfhood. Hence, inasmuch as the interests of mankind have never yet been scientifically individualized by the operations of an equitable commerce, and the limits of encroachment never scientifically defined, the axioms of morality, and even the provisions of positive legislation, have been doubtless appropriate adaptations in the ages of false social relations to which they have been applied, as the cataplasm or the sinapism may be for disordered conditions of the human system. We must not, however, reason, in [131] either case, from that temporary adaptation in a state of disease to the healthy condition of society or the individual. Much that is relatively good, is only good as a necessity growing out of evil. The greater good is the removal of the evil altogether.

Mr. Warren contends that the doctrine of "Individuality," and "the Sovereignty of the Individual," involves two of the most important scientific consequences, the one serving as a guiding principle to the true solution of existing evils in society, and to the exodus out of the prevailing confusion; and the other as a guiding principle of deportment in existing society while those evils remain. The first is that the sovereignty of the individual, or in other words, absolute personal liberty, can only be enjoyed along with the entire disintegration of combined or amalgamated interests; and here the "cost principle" comes in to point out how that disintegration can and must take place, not as an isolation, but along with, and absolutely productive of the utmost conceivable harmony and co-operation. The second is, that while people are forced, by the existing conditions of society, to remain in the close connections resulting from amalgamated interests, there is no alternative but compromise and mutual concession, or an absolute surrender upon one side or the other. While it is the most ultra-radical doctrine in theory and final purpose ever promulgated in the world, it is at the same time eminently conservative in immediate practice. While it teaches, in principle, the prospective disruption of nearly every existing institution, it teaches concurrently, as matter of expediency, a patient and philosophic endurance of the evils around us, while we labour assiduously for their removal. So far from quarrelling with existing government, where it is put upon the footing of temporary expediency as distinguished from abstract principle, and final purpose, it sanctions and confirms it. It has no sympathies with aimless and fruitless struggles, the recriminations of different classes in society, nor with merely anarchical and destructive onslaughts upon existing institutions. It proposes no abrupt and sudden shock to existing society. It points to a scientific, gradual, and perfectly peaceable substitution of new and harmonious relations for those which are confessedly beset, to use the mildest expression, by the most distressing embarrassments.

Having thus briefly touched upon the two first principles propounded by the author of this new theory for the solution of the Social Problem, viz., "Individuality," and "the Sovereignty of every Individual;" we come now to an exposition of the third principle, which is expressed in the formula "Cost the limit of Price."

Mr. Andrews, the principal writer or commentator on Mr. Warren's theory, whom I have before mentioned and quoted, says of this principle, that "in itself it is one which will not probably strike tho rcader when first stated, as either very profound, very practicable in its application, or very important in its consequences; nor, perhaps, as even equitable in itself. He avers, however, that when subjected to analysis, and traced into its ten thousand different applications, to ownership, to rent, to wages, &c., that it places all human transactions relating to property upon a new basis of exact justice; that is, it has the perfect, simple, but all-prevailing character of a Universal Principle. [132]

"The counter-principle upon which all ownership is now maintained and all commerce transacted in the world is, that 'Value is the limit of price,' or as the principle is generally stated in the cant language of trade, 'a thing is worth what it will bring.'"

Between these two principles, so similar that the difference in the statement would hardly attract a moment's attention unless it were specially insisted upon, lies the essential difference between the present most unsatisfactory condition of society, and the reign of equity, the just remuneration of labour, and the independence and elevation of all mankind.

"There is nothing (continues Mr. Andrews) apparently more innocent, harmless, and equitable in the world than the statement that "a thing should bring what it is worth," and yet even that statement covers the most subtle fallacy which it has ever been given to human genius to detect and expose—a fallacy more fruitful of evil than any other by which the human intellect has ever been clouded."

According to Mr. Warren, value has nothing whatever to do, upon scientific principles, with settling the price at which any article should be sold. Cost is the only equitable limit, and by cost is meant the amount of labour bestowed on its production, that measure being again measured by the painfulness or repugnance of the labour itself.

Value is a consideration for the purchaser alone, and determines him whether he will give the amount of the cost or not.

This statement is calculated to raise a host of objections and inquiries. If one purchaser values an article more highly than another, by what principle will he be prevented from offering a higher price? How is it possible to measure the relative painfulness or repugnance of labour? What allowance is to be made for superior skill or natural capacity? How is that to be settled? How does this principle settle the questions of interest, rent, machinery? &c. What is the nature of the practical experiments which have already been made? &c., &c.

These several questions, and many others, connected with this interesting and important subject, are specifically answered in treatises by Mr. Warren and Mr. Andrews, one of which, by the former of these gentlemen, embodies the "Practical Details" of twenty-four years of continuous experiment upon the workings of the "Cost Principle" and the other principles related to it. These "Practical Details " relate to the operations of several mercantile establishments conducted at different points, upon the "Cost Principle;" to the education of children; to social intercourse; and finally to the complex affairs of several villages which have grown up during the last seven years under the system of ":Equitable Commerce" of which the cost principle is the basis. These practical details, I may venture to affirm, from a personal knowledge of their character, present a body of facts profoundly interesting to the philanthropic and philosophic student of human affairs.

I shall content myself on this occasion with giving a few sentences mainly from a work of Mr. Andrews, intitled "The Science of Society," illustrative, and in defence, of the principle now more immediately under consideration' viz.,—that Cost is the limit (or scientific measure) of Price. [133]

He starts with the proposition—"That the essential element of beneficent commerce is Equity, or that which is just and equal between man and man." He then proceeds:—"The fundamental inquiry, therefore, upon the answer to which alone a science of commerce can be erected, is the true measure of equity, or, what is the same thing, the measure of price in the exchange of labour and commodities.

This question is one of immense importance, and strange to say, it is one which has never received the slightest consideration, which has never, indeed, been raised either by political economists, legislators, or moralists. The only question discussed has been, what it is which now regulates price—never, what should regulate it. It is admitted, nevertheless, that the present system of commerce distributes wealth most unjustly. Why, then, should we not ask the question,—what principle or system of commerce would distribute it justly? Why not apply our philosophy to discovering the true system rather than apply it to the investigation of the law according to which the false system works outs its deleterious results?

Simple equity is this, that so much of your labour as I take and apply to my benefit, so much of my labour ought I to give you to be applied to your benefit; and, consequently, if I take a product of your labour instead of the labour itself, and pay you in a product of my labour, the commodity which I give you ought to be one in which there is just as much labour as there is in the product which I receive.

The same idea may be differently presented in this manner.—It is equity, that every individual should sustain just as just as much of the common burden of life as has to be sustained by anybody on his account. Such would be the result if each produced for himself all that he consumed, as in the first case supposed above; and the fact that it is found convenient to exchange labour and the products of labour, does not vary the definition of equity in the least.

So much for the principle of equity. The next step in the investigation is the method of applying it—the means of arriving at the measure of equity. If I exchange my labour against yours, the first measure that suggests itself for the relative amount of labour performed by each is the length of time that each is employed. If all pursuits were equally laborious, or, in other words, if all labour were equally repugnant or toilsome—if it cost equal amounts of human suffering or endurance for each hour of time employed in every different pursuit, then it would be exact equity to exchange one hour of labour for one other hour of labour, or a product which has in it one hour of labour for another product which has in it one hour of labour the world over. Such, however, is not the case. Some kinds of labour are exceedingly repugnant, while others are less so, and others again are pleasing and attractive. There are differences of this sort which are agreed upon by all the world. For example,—sweeping the filth from the streets, or standing in the cold water and dredging the bottom of a stream, would be, by general consent, regarded as more repugnant, or, in the common language on the subject, harder work, than laying out a garden, or measuring goods.

But besides this general difference in the hardness or repugnance of work, there are individual differences in the feeling towards [134] different kinds of labour which make the repugnance or attraction of one person for a particular kind of labour quite different from that of another. Labour is repugnant or otherwise, therefore, more or less, according to the individualities of persons.

It follows from these facts, that equity in the exchange of labour, or the products of labour, cannot be arrived at by measuring the labour of different persons by time merely. Equity is the equality of burdens according to the requirements of each person, or, in other words, the assumption of as much burden by each person as has to be assumed by somebody, on his account, so that no one shall be living by imposing burdens upon others. Time is one element in the measurement of the burdens of labour, but the different degrees of repugnance in the different kinds of labour prevent it from being the only one. Hence it follows that there must be some means of measuring this repugnance itself—in other words, of determining the relative hardness of different kinds of work, before we can arrive at an equitable system of exchanging labour, and the products of labour. If we could measure the general average of repugnance, that is, if we could determine how people generally regard the different kinds of labour as to their agreeableness or disagreeableness, still that would not insure equity in the exchange between individuals, on account of those individualities of character and taste which have been adverted to. It is an equality of burden between the two individuals who exchange, which must be arrived at, and that must be according to the estimate which each honestly forms of the repugnance to him or her of the particular labour which he or she performs, and which, or the products of which, are to be exchanged.

It is important, for reasons of practical utility, to arrive at a general, or average, estimate of the relative repugnance of different kinds of labour, especially of the most common kinds, and that has been, and is done, under the operations of the cost principle, at the "Equitable Villages," which have been, and are now, in operation in America. But, as we have seen, this even would not be a sufficiently accurate measure of equity to be applied between individuals; while on the other hand, this average itself can only be based upon individual estimates.

It follows, therefore, in order to arrive at a satisfactory measure of equity, and the adoption of a scientific system of commerce:—

1. That some method must be devised for comparing the relative repugnance of different kinds of labour.

2. That in making the comparison, each individual must make his or her own estimate of the repugnance to him or her of the labour which he or she performs, &c.

3. That there should be a sufficient motive in the results, or consequences, to insure an honest exercise of the judgment, and an honest expression of the real feelings of each, in making the comparison.

As to the first condition—the devising some method by which to compare the relative repugnance of different kinds of labour. This is extremely simple. All that is required is to agree upon some particular kind of labour, the average repugnance of which is most easily ascertained, or the most nearly fixed, and use it as a standard of [135] comparison, a sort of yard-stick for measuring the relative repugnance of other kinds of labour. For example, in the western American states it is found that the most appropriate kind of labour to be assumed as a standard with which to compare all other kinds of labour is corn-raising. It is also found, upon extensive investigation, that the average product of that kind of labour, in that region, is twenty pounds of corn to the hour. If, then, blacksmithing is reckoned as one-half harder work than corn-raising, it will be rated (by the blacksmith himself) at thirty pounds of corn to the hour. If shoemaking be reckoned at one-quarter less onerous than corn-raising, it will be rated at fifteen pounds of corn to the hour. In this manner the idea of corn-raising is used to measure the relative repugnance of all kinds of labour.

The second condition—reserving to each individual the right of making his or her estimate of the comparative repugnance to him or to her, of the particular labour which he or she performs, is necessary both for the reasons already stated, and because another equally important principle in the true science of society is the sovereignty of the individual. The individual must be kept absolutely above all institutions. He must be left free even to abandon the principles when he chooses. The only constraint must be in the attractive nature and results of true principles.

The third condition was stated to be—"that there should be a sufficient motive in the results or consequences of compliance with these principles to insure an honest exercise of the judgment, and an honest expression of the real feeling of each in making his estimate of the relative repugnance of his labour." The existence of such a motive can only be shown by a view of the general results of this entire system of principles upon the condition of society, and upon the particular interests of the individual. These results must be gathered from a thorough study of the whole subject, in order to establish this point conclusively to the philosophic mind. The force of a public sentiment, rectified by the knowledge of true principles, will not be lost sight of by such a mind."

I shall not detain you by a statement of the particular remedial results of deviations from the principles of equity upon the interests of individuals, but they are specifically pointed out in the work of Mr. Andrews.

Especial attention is directed to the technical distinction between value and cost—a point of great importance to the whole discussion.

"What a thing is worth," is another expression for the value of a commodity or labour. The value of a commodity, or labour, is the degree of benefit which it confers upon the person who receives it, or to whose use it is applied. The cost of it is, on the other hand, as already explained, the degree of burden which the production of the commodity, or the performance of the labour, imposed upon the person who produced or performed it. They are, therefore, by no means the same. No two things can possibly be more distinct. The burden or cost may be very great, and the benefit or value very little, or vice versâ. In the case of an exchange or transfer of an article from one person to another, the cost relates to the party who makes the transfer, the burden of the production falling on him, and the value to the party [136] to whom the transfer is made, the article going to his benefit. It is the same if the object exchanged is labour directly. It follows, therefore, that to say that "a thing should bring what it is worth," which is the same as to say that "its price should be measured by its value," is quite the opposite of affirming that it should bring as much as it cost the producer to produce it. Hence both rules cannot be true, for they conflict with and destroy each other. It is affirmed, however, that cost is the true und value the false measure of price, and the author seeks to establish this by a most logical disquisition and a comparison of the consequences of the two principles in operation.

It is admitted that although value is not the legitimate limit of price, nor even an element in the price, it is nevertheless an element in the bargain. It is the value of the thing to be acquired which determines the purchaser to purchase. It belongs to the man who labours, or produces an article, estimating for himself, as we have seen, the amount of burden he has assumed, to fix the price measured by that burden or cost. He alone knows it, and he alone, therefore, can determine it. It belongs, on the other hand, to the purchaser to estimate for himself the value of the labour or commodity to him. He alone can do so in fact, for he alone knows the nature of his own wants. By the settlement of the first point—the cost to the producer—the price becomes a fixed sum. If the value then exceeds that sum in the estimation of the other party he will purchase, otherwise not. Hence the value, though not an element in the price, is an element in the bargain. The price is a consideration wholly for the vendor, and the value a consideration wholly for the purchaser. Hence it follows that both value and cost enter into a bargain, even when legitimately made. But value goes solely to determine the demand, and is solely cognizable by the purchaser or consumer—by him who receives; while cost (or burden) goes to determine the price, and is solely cognizable by the seller or producer—by him who renders. By this means the cost of each one's acts is made to fall upon himself, which is the essential condition of the rightful exercise of the sovereignty of the individual. If you over-estimate the value to you of my services, you endure the cost or disagreeable consequences of your mistake or want of judgment. If I, on the other hand, under-estimate the cost or endurance of the performance to me, the cost of that error falls on me, submitting each of us to the government of consequences, the only legitimate corrective. If, again, I over-estimate the cost to me, and ask a price greater than your estimate of the value to you, there is no bargain, and I have lost the opportunity of earning a price measured by the real cost of the performance, so that the cost of my mistake again falls on me; while, the market being open, and a thorough adjust ment of supply to demand being established, others will make a juster estimate, whose services you will procure and you will suffer no inconvenience. Competition will regulate any disposition on my part to overcharge.

All this is reversed in our existing commerce. The vendor adjusts his price to what he supposes to be its value to the purchaser, that is to the degree of want in which the purchaser is found, never to [137] what the commodity cost himself; thus interfering with what cannot concern him, except as a means of taking an undue advantage. The purchaser, on the other hand, offers a price based upon his knowledge or surmise of what the degree of want of the vendor may force him to consent to take.

As respects the propriety of measuring price by value, it is, in the first place, stated to be essentially impossible to measure value exactly, or, in other words, to ascertain the precise worth of labour or commodities; and that, in the next place, if it were possible to measure values precisely, the exchange of commodities according to value would still be a system of mutual conquest and oppression, not a beneficent reciprocation of equivalents. And this is illustrated by the following, among other examples:—

"Suppose I am a wheelwright, in a small village, and the only one of my trade. You are travelling with certain valuables in your carriage, which breaks down opposite my shop. It will take an hour of my time to mend the carriage. You can get no other means of conveyance, and the loss to you, if you fail to arrive at the neighbouring town in season for the sailing of a certain vessel, will be $500, which fact you mention to me, in good faith, in order to quicken my exertions. I give one hour of my work and mend the carriage. What am I, in equity, entitled to charge—what should be the limit of price upon my labour?

Let us apply the different measures and see how they will operate. If value is the limit of price then the price of the hour's labour should be $500. That is the equivalent of the value of the labour to you. If cost is the limit to price, then you should pay me a commodity, or commodities, or a representative in currency which will procure me commodities, having in them one hour's labour, equally as hard as the mending of the carriage, without the slightest reference to the degree of benefit which that labour has bestowed upon you; or, putting the illustration in money thus:—assuming twenty-five cents to be an equivalent for an hour's labour of an artizan in that particular trade, then, according to the cost principle, I should be justified in asking only twenty-five cents, but according to the value principle, I should be justified in asking $500.

The value principle, in some form of expression, is, as I have said, the only recognized principle of trade throughout the world. "A thing is worth what it will bring in the market." Still, if I were to charge you $500, or a fourth part of that sum, and, taking advantage of your necessities, force you to pay it, everybody would denounce me, the poor wheelwright, as an extortioner and a scoundrel. Why? Simply because this is an unusual application of the principle. Wheelwrights seldom have a chance to make such a "speculation," and therefore it is not according to the "established usages of trade." Hence its manifest injustice shocks, in such a case, the common sense of right. Meanwhile you, a wealthy merchant, are daily rolling up an enormous fortune by doing business upon the same principle which you condemn in the wheelwright, and nobody finds fault. At every scarcity in the market you immediately raise the price of every article you hold. It is your business to take advantage of the necessities of those with whom you deal, by selling [138] to them according to the value to them, and not according to the cost to you. You go further. You, by every means in your power, create those necessities, by buying up particular articles and holding them out of the market until the demand becomes pressing, by circulating false reports of short crops, and by other similar tricks known to the trade. This is the same in principle as if the wheelwright had first dug the rut in which your carriage upset, and then charged you the $500.

It is contended that "the value principle" is the commercial embodiment of the essential element of conquest and war,—war transferred from the battle-field to the counter, none the less opposed, however, to the spirit of christian morality, or the sentiment of human brotherhood. In bodily conflict the physically strong conquer and subject the physically weak. In the conflict of trade the intellectually astute and powerful conquer and subject those who are intellectually feeble, or whose intellectual developement is not of the precise kind to fit them for the conflict of wits in the matter of trade. With the progress of civilization and developement we have ceased to think that superior physical strength gives the right of conquest and subjugation. We have graduated, in idea, out of the period of physical dominion. We remain, however, as yet in the period of intellectual conquest or plunder. It has not been questioned hitherto, as a general proposition, that the man who has superior intellectual endowments to others, has a right, resulting therefrom, to profit thereby at the cost of others. In the extreme applications of the admission only is the conclusion ever denied. In the whole field of what are denominated the legitimate operations of trade, there is no other law recognized than the relative " smartness or shrewdness " of the parties, modified at most by a sentimental precept, such as an exhortation to be "fair" in your dealings. The sentiment of honesty exists, but the science of honesty is wanting. The sentiment is first in order. The science must be an outgrowth, a consequential developement of the sentiment. The precepts of christian morality deal properly with that which is the soul of the other, leaving to intellectual investigation the discovery of its scientific complement.

The following, among others, are the objectionable consequences which flow from the principle of making value, instead of cost, the rule of price; and every one of which consequences, it is affirmed, are reversed by the operation of the cost principle:—

1. It renders falsehood and hypocrisy a necessary concomitant of Trade.

2. It makes the rich richer, and the poor poorer.

3. It creates trade for trade's sake, and augments the number of non-producers, whose support is chargeable to labour.

4. It degrades the dignity of labour.

5. It prevents the possibility of a scientific adjustment of supply to demand.

6. It renders competition destructive and desperate.

7. It renders the induction of new machinery a wide-spread calamity, instead of a universal blessing.

The importance and novelty of the three first principles propounded [139] by Mr. Warren, as the solution of the social problem— namely, "Individuality," "the Sovereignty of the Individual," and "Cost the limit of Price," must plead my excuse for having occupied so much of the time accorded me, to their elucidation, and for the necessary brevity with which I shall notice the two remaining principles, and which will explain to you the "Circulating Medium " adopted in these "Equitable Villages," and the means taken to adapt the supply to the demand.

Money has professedly two uses,—one as a standard of value, and another as a circulating medium. Now, in the system of equitable commerce, money, as at present used, is rejected as being too uncertain and fluctuating in its nature to be a standard; and (so far as gold and silver are concerned), as not being convenient as a circulating medium. A critical investigation on these points is gone into in the works of Mr. Warren and Mr. Andrews, the result of which is stated to be, first,—that the product of gold, and for the same reason silver, is quite unfit for our purpose, which is the selection of a staple species of labour with which to compare other labour, while it is shown that corn or wheat does fulfil the required conditions, and, secondly, that paper is just suited as a circulating medium, provided it can be made to rest upon a proper basis, and represent what ought to be represented by a circulating medium.

"Now what is it which ought to be represented by a circulating medium? Clearly, it is price—the price of commodities. The pledge or promise should be exactly equivalent to, as it stands in the place of, the commodity or commodities to be given hereafter. These commodities, which the paper stands in the place of, are the price of what was received. The equitable limit of price it is contended is the cost of the articles received. The promise is, therefore, rightly the equivalent of, or goes to the extent of, the cost of the articles received. But the cost of an article is, we have seen, the labour there is in it, rightly measured. Every issue of the circulating medium should therefore be a representative of, or pledge for, a certain amount of human labour, or for some commodity which has in it an equal amount of human labour; and to avoid all question about what commodity shall be substituted, it is proper that a staple or standard article, the cost of which all agree upon, should be selected."

"The first point," says Mr. Andrews, "is to obtain a standard for a single locality, after which it is quite easy to adjust the standard of other localities to it. Agricultural labour is first selected, because it is the great staple branch of human industry. The most staple article of agricultural product is, then, taken, which for America, and especially for the great valley of the Mississippi, is Indian-corn. In another country it may be wheat, or something else, although Indian corn, wherever it is produced, will be found to have more of the appropriate qualities for a standard than any other article whatsoever, being more invariable in quality, more uniform in the amount produced by the same amount of labour in a given locality, and more uniform in the extent of the demand than any other article. At a given locality, or, as I have stated, at a great variety of localities in the western states, the standard product of Indian-corn is twenty pounds to the hour's labour, the measurement by pounds being also [140] more inflexible or less variant than that by bulk. If, then, in some other locality, as, for example, New England, the product of an hour's labour devoted to raising corn is only ten pounds of corn, the equivalent of the standard hour's labour there will be ten pounds of corn, while in the west it will be twenty pounds. It is the hour's labour, in that species of agriculture, which is therefore the actual unit of comparison, of which the product, whatever it may be, is the local representative. And, in the same manner, in another country wheat may be the standard, as, for example, in England, and may be reckoned at ten pounds to the hour, or whatever is found by trial to be the fact. The reduction of the standard of one locality to that of another, will then be no more difficult than the reduction of different currencies to one value, as now practised."

There is an absolute necessity for some standard of cost, and it is not a question of principle but of expediency what article is adopted. It is the same necessity which is recognized at present for a standard of value, which is sought for, and by some persons erroneously supposed to be found in money.

Now, if an exchange could be always made and completed on the spot, each party giving and receiving an equivalent in labour or the product of labour, the whole problem of exchanges would be solved by this simple method, and there would be no necessity for a circulating medium, or for anything to perform the part which is performed by money in our existing commerce. But such is not the case. Ordinarily the exchange is only partially completed on the spot, the remaining part waiting to be completed at some future time, by the performance of an equivalent amount of labour, or the products or commodities having in them an equivalent amount of labour.

In such a case as that just stated, it is proper that the party who does not make his part of the exchange on the spot, should give an evidence of his obligation to do so at some future time, whenever called upon—and this is the origin of what is called the labour note, which is the form assumed by " Equitable Money," the fourth among the elements of the solution of the problem of society. The party who remains indebted to the other gives his own note, provided the other consents to receive it, for an equivalent amount of his own labour, or else of the standard commodity—say so many pounds of corn, specifying in the note the kind of labour, and the alternative. As it may happen that the party receiving the labour note may not require the labour itself, or that it may be inconvenient for the party promising to perform it when it is wanted, it is provided that the obligation may be discharged, at the option of the party giving the note, in the standard commodity instead. On the other hand, although the party receiving the note may not want the labour himself, yet some person with whom he deals may want it, and hence he can pass the note to a third party who is willing to receive it for an equivalent amount of labour, or products, reccived from him. In this manner the labour note begins to circulate from one to another, and the aggregate of labour notes in circulation in a neighbourhood constitutes the neighbourhood's circulating medium, dispensing, so far as this equitable commerce extends, with money altogether, or, rather, introducing a new species of paper-money, based solely on individual responsibility. [141]

The use of the labour note is not strictly a principle of equity, but partakes more of the nature of a contrivance than any other feature of the system of equitable commerce; but yet it seems to be a necessary instrument to be employed in the practical working of the system. The theory of equity is complete without it, but the necessity for its use arises from the practical fact that exchanges cannot in every case be completed on the spot. Hence a circulating medium of some sort is indispensable; and in order that the system may remain throughout an equitable one, in practice as well as in theory, the circulating medium must be based on equivalents of labour or cost between individuals.

The features of the labour note are peculiar, and the points of difference between it and ordinary money are numerous and far more important than at first sight appears. They are as follows:—

1. Its cheapness and abundance.

2. Being based on individual credit it makes every man his own banker.

3. It combines the properties of a circulating medium, and a means of credit.

4. It represents an ascertained and definite amount of labour or property, which ordinary money does not.

I have no time to amplify on these several heads, but for further information must refer my hearers to the works which hare been published upon the subject.

I come now to the consideration of the fifth and last principle in "Equitable Commerce," which is "the adaptation of the supply to the demand."

Treating of this part of his subject, Mr. Warren says:—"In society where even the first elements of order had made their way to the intellects of men, there would be some point at which all would continually make known their wants, as far as they could anticipate them, and put them in a position to be supplied; and all who wanted employment would know where to look for it, and the supply could be adapted to the demand. We should not then have all the flour carried out of the country where it was raised, so that none could be had (as at this moment while I am writing) and carried a thousand miles in anticipation of higher prices. This rush of flour has "exceeded the demand"—"prices have fallen"—twelve hundred barrels have spoiled in one man's hands, and two thousand barrels are on their way back to the place of production! where, after having been stored, and booked, and drayed, and shipped to New Orleans, and there unshipped, and drayed, and stored, and booked and waiting for a demand, it is again drayed, and shipped, and brought back to be unshipped, drayed, and stored, and booked, and sold, half spoiled, to its original producers, for all its first cost, with all these expenses added, and as much more as the holders "can get." This is the economy of our present profit-making commerce.

"The adaptation of the supply to the demand, although it is continually governing the bodies of men, seems never to have made its way into their intellects, or they would have made it the governing principle of their arrangements. It is this which prompts almost every action of life, not only of men, but other animals—insects—[142] all animated nature. All man's pursuits originate in his efforts to supply some of his wants, either physical mental, or moral; even our intellectual commerce is unconsciously governed by this great principle, whenever it is harmonious and beneficial; and it is discordant and depreciating when it is not so regulated. Any answer to a question is but a supply to a demand. Advice, when wanted, is acceptable, but never otherwise—commands are never in this order, and produce nothing but disorder. The sovereignty of the individual must correct this."

Mr. Andrews contends that " there is no reason in the nature of the case why there should not be as accurate a knowledge in the community of the statistics of supply and demand, as there is of the rise and fall of the tides, nor why that knowledge should not be applied to secure a minute, punctual, and accurate distribution of products over the face of the earth, according to the wants of various countries, neighbourhoods and individuals. The supposed excess of labour is no more an excess than congestion is an excess of blood in the human system. The scarcity of the circulating medium which is now in use, and which is requisite for the interchange of commodities, is regarded by those who have studied this subject profoundly as the principal difficulty in the way of such an adjustment, but that scarcity itself is only a specific form and instance of the general want of adaptation of supply to demand, which extends far beyond all questions of currency—the supply of circulating medium being unequal to the demand for it, owing to the expensiveness of the substances selected for such a medium, and their consequent total unfitness for the purpose.

It follows from what has been said, that appropriate arrangements for the adaptation of supply to demand are a sine quâ non of a true social order. But the existence of such arrangements is an impossibility in the midst of the prevalence of speculation. But speculation has always existed, and is inherent in the present commercial system, and consequently no adequate adjustment of supply to demand has ever been had, or can ever be had, while that system remains in operation. It is the business of speculation, and hence of the whole mercantile profession, to confuse and becloud the knowledge of the community upon this very vital point of their interests, and to derange such natural adjustment as might otherwise grow up, even in the absence of full knowledge on the subject—to create the belief that there is excess or deficiency when there is none, and to cause such excess or deficiency, in fact, when there would otherwise be none, in order to buy cheap and sell dear. Speculation is not only the vital element of the existing system of commerce, but it will always exist upon any basis of exchange short of the cost principle, and this extinguishes speculation.

I have now finished my sketch of the principles of "Equitable Commerce," and I wish to draw attention to the fact as vouched by their discoverer, Mr. Warren, and their expounder, Mr. Andrews, that there is no one of this circle of principles which has not been patiently, repeatedly, and successfully applied in practice, in a variety of modes, during the last eight-and-twenty years, and long before it was announced in theory—a point in which, it is thought, these principles differ materially from all the numerous speculations upon [143] social subjects to which the attention of the public has been heretofore solicited.

An integral view of the connections of the different parts of this system of principles can only be a final result of a thorough familiarity with their detailed applications and practical effects. It is averred, with great emphasis, that there exists so intimate a relation between them, that if any one of them is omitted, it is impossible to work out the proposed results. The others will remain true, but any one of them, or any four of them, are wholly inadequate to the solution.

In conclusion, allow me to say that time has not permitted me to give more than the faintest glimpse of a subject which I deem of the greatest importance to the human family. I have ventured thus much, however, in the hope of exciting sufficient interest to induce some of the acute and inquiring minds among my auditors to procure the very few and uncostly works which have been published on the subject,* and make it, as I am doing, a study. I do not profess to be able to defend all the principles enunciated, although after considerable attention, and with a mind prepossessed against some of them, I confess I should find it difficult to confute any.

In the language of Mr. Andrews,—the very able expositor of the system,—when alluding more especially to "Cost as the limit of Price,"—"A thousand objections will occur which it is impossible to remove at the time of stating the general outline. It will be perceived by the acute intellect that a principle is here broached which is absolutely revolutionary of all existing commerce. Perhaps a few minds may follow it out at once into its consequences far enough to perceive that it promises the most magnificent results in the equal distribution of wealth proportioned to industry—the abolition of pauperism—general security of condition instead of continual bankruptcy or poverty—universal co-operation—the general prevalence of commercial honour and honesty, and in ten thousand harmonizing and beneficent effects, morally and religiously. The larger class of persons, however, will require that each particular detail shall be traced out and defined; and the mass of mankind will only understand the subject upon the basis of practical illustration. Hence the necessity that the practice go along with the theory, a method which has been generally adopted and pursued, and of the results of which the public will be from time to time sufficiently advised."

* 1. "The Science of Society, in two parts. Part I.—The true constitution of Government in the sovereignty of the Individual as the final development of Protestantism, Democracy, and Socialism. Part II.—Cost the limit of Price, a scientific measure of honesty in trade, as one of the fundamental principles in the solution of the social problem By Stephen Pearl Andrews." Published by Fowler and Wells, New York. Price, in cloth, $1.

2. "Equitable Commerce. A new development of principles for the harmonious adjustment and regulation of the pecuniary, intellectual, and moral inter. course of mankind, proposed as elements of new society. By Josiah Warren." Price 25 cents.

3. "Practical Details in Equitable Commerce." An interesting account of the actual working of the principles laid down in the former work. Price 25 cents.

4. "The Periodical Letter, on the Principles and Progress of the Equity Movement." Published monthly, commencing July, 1854. By Josiah Warren. Thompson, P. O., Long Island, New York.

William Bailie, Problems of Anarchism, Intro., Pt. 1

William Bailie, "Problems of Anarchism: Introduction, 1. Social and Individual Liberty," Liberty, 9, 19 (January 7, 1893), 1.

Problems of Anarchism.

INTRODUCTION.

1.—Society and Individual Liberty.

Life throughout all its manifestations has one common need, unimpeded growth, which in man becomes translated into the aspiration for individual freedom. Being a necessary condition to progressive development, it is remarkable that so primary a want arising out of life itself should still be so imperfectly understood and so dimly recognized.

The desire for liberty has accompanied the human race as well as other animal species under nearly all conditions known to us. Sometimes crushed and well nigh stamped out, it has in the long run always reasserted itself, for indeed it is inseparable from conscious existence. The struggle of man against nature early became the struggle of man against man. This form of the battle is not ended yet. And the ever present need of personal freedom has borne and still bears a prominent part in the contest.

In the purely animal horde from which our human ancestors at some time slowly grew into societies having more or less cohesion there was doubtless a larger measure of individual liberty than was afterwards possible. But the term is meaningless except in its relative application to man as a social being living in some kind of definite relation to his fellows. So that, when we speak of personal liberty and the desire for unhindered development, it is always in relation to society, and only in the social state that the individual man is the subject of study and investigation.

Society, however, has never ceased to put a halter on the freedom of its members. Not content with limiting each so as to allow all an equal share of liberty, or rather giving freedom to all bounded only by consideration of others, it has from the first inclined to destroy entirely the liberty of the individual; by custom, by law, by religion, by enforced economic conditions, by the whole routine of life it has checked his progress, stolen away his rights, fettered his natural power of development, and almost annihilated his freedom.

True progress and civilization are nothing but the gradual acquirement of liberty by each. Every progressive change, every reform, every improvement is a revolution in favor of the individual. Let us for a moment take a perspective view of the past. We can then better realize the position attained in the present.

The earliest social condition we yet know of seems to have been largely communistic in form. The tribe or clan is the unit. The man is quite subordinate. No rights, no property, for him exists: these are thought of only as connected with the unit of which he is a part.

Seldom has he a wife of his own; children are not his, they belong either to the tribe or to maternal relatives. Custom rules all his actions. His conduct the crudest savagery: his passions, tempered by the instinct of self-preservation, his only guide. All, however, set in the mold of the social state in which he lives, society claims him and bolds him for its own. Individuality does not thrive here. There is but little aspiration for freedom or a better condition. Progress is painfully slow. The dark night of this age must have been terribly protracted.

The next stage of social growth discloses the family as the unit of society, not of course the family as it now obtains, but each member still dependent on the collectivity; chieftainship or monarchy having developed as the political form. Religion now takes a more permanent hold; whatever the individual may have gained through the evolution of the community, he loses by subordinating himself to the prevailing superstition. All the abuses that enslave man now hold revel, and liberty for him seems farther off than ever.

From this form of society various developments finally break forth. The individual at length emerges as the social unit. His rights, his property, his liberty begin to have theoretical recognition. Thus far reached the society of ancient Rome. But the domination of class, of riches and privilege, the power of political despotism, the sinister influence of religious superstition, combined still closer to enslave the individual. It would be too much to assert that we have left this stage entirely behind us even now. But it is safe to say that the first break was made in that dark epoch when the New World was discovered four centuries ago. Most assuredly this turned out to be the mightiest stroke, of all that followed in periodic succession, for the cause of human freedom, of personal liberty. A general revolt against the time-worn tyranny of a huge superstition, claiming universal authority over all men, soon followed. It was the spontaneous outburst of individuals in divers places awakening at last to the need for free growth for liberty, realizing, and wanting to break, the chains that for so long had bound them in moral and intellectual slavery. The shackles were not thrown off so easily. Again and again have they been forged fresh, but are snapped asunder as the overgrowing desire for freedom impels the individual to leave his ancient beliefs behind. Today we see them eternally shattered. Knowledge, truth, science, slowly but surely undermine all that is left, and leave supernaturalism the naked and unmistakable force of reaction and conservative decay. Like n great mountain seen through a mist from which man is steadily receding as he goes forward in pursuit of his freedom.

Following closely upon the moral and religious revolt came the movement for political reform. Revolutions gave destroyed the prerogatives of kings, taken the power from aristocracy, and we now see democracy wholly or in part wielding the privileges once the exclusive right of a few. Individual liberty has been sought through the form of political equality. Whether achieved or not, it has been the aim of all the great changes in the form and powers of government since the American and French revolutions. With this primary aim the young republic of the western world set out on her career. And ever since have the progressive nations of Europe been following in her footsteps. Liberty for all means freedom for each; unhindered individual development has thus been the motto and the essence of the great progressive movements of modern civilization.

Wm. Bailie.

Benjamin Tucker, An Important Work [Bailie]

T., "An Important Work," Liberty, 9, 19 (January 7, 1893), 2.

An Important Work.

The series of articles from the pen of William Bailie, begun in this number under the general title of "Problems of Anarchism," will probably continue for many months and will deal with most of the sociological questions with which the Anarchistic movement is concerned. I have seen but a small part of the manuscript as yet, but, knowing Comrade Bailie as I do and the excellent articles that he has previously written for Liberty, I feel justified in beginning its publication, regardless of any deviations from Liberty's chosen path that future chapters may show. I do not expect that his views will differ materially from Liberty's, but in any case Comrade Bailie's earnestness and ability furnish a perfect guarantee that the differences which may develop will be worth considering.

Perhaps Liberty's readers would like to know something of this new contributor. He is a young Irish workingman, who for some years past has lived in Manchester, England There he was a Communist of the Kropotkine school, one of the most ardent workers for that cause in England, and a frequent writer for the "Commonweal." Coming to this country a year and a half ago, he made Boston his home and became intimately acquainted with Liberty, of whose teachings he, like most Communists, had a very hazy conception. The closer contact with Anarchistic thought soon inspired him with great interest in it, and he frequently sought interviews with me and with other comrades for the discussion of knotty points. The result is that he has thrown his Communism overboard and is today as good an Anarchist as one would care to see.

Regarding the series of articles now begun, he writes us as follows:

Strictly speaking, anarchism is a political rather than an economic doctrine, but it is found in practice to involve the economic aspect of society even as fundamentally as it does the political. I have long felt that Anarchist literature—at least such of it as I am acquainted with—is lacking in a connected and scientific presentation of its economic conceptions. A correlation of the main results, accepted by competent Anarchists, of what is and is not economic truth, including the special characteristics of Anarchist economics, seems to me to be a work worthy of being accomplished.

That the articles I am engaged upon will perform this function I certainly do not claim. Too well do I know my unfitness und want of preparation for such a task. Moreover, I should not care to assert that there exists the needful harmony among the believers in our doctrine in the field of economics to render such a standard work possible. One thing, however, I make bold to undertake Anarchists of some schools and nearly all other Socialists present the most hopeless confusion in their economic ideas. To dissipate some of these fallacies and endeavor to establish some principles that are sound would prove not without value. This attempt I have the temerity to make. If the effort should succeed even partially, socialist economics will decidedly gain, and the ground would be cleared somewhat for the above-mentioned task.

The preliminary part of the series is a brief and necessarily rough outline of the political attitude of Anarchy. Forming an introduction to the economic inquiry, it is doubtless likely to prove trite enough in subject matter to the renders of Liberty. I could not avoid this risk while making the scope of my subject clear.

I hope that this too modest announcement of Mr. Bailie's purpose will insure attentive consideration of what he has to offer.

T.

William Bailie, The Ancient Working People

William Bailie, "The Ancient Working People," The Arena, XXVII, 6 (June 1902), 630-4.

THE ANCIENT WORKING PEOPLE.

We have hardly yet arrived at the conception of history, as an interpretation of the economic activities and intellectual development of the race, that Buckle, in his monumental effort, attempted nearly half a century ago. Accounts of dynasties, baffles, sieges, and political intrigues still occupy a preponderant place in popular historical writing. To be at once an economist, a sociologist and a political philosopher, attractively combining these qualities to illumine the history of peoples, demands gifts as high as they are rare.

Especially difficult is the task of a writer who sets out to depict a widespread social and industrial movement of ancient times. Not only are authentic records meager and imperfect, but from authors whose opinions on other matters may be considered trustworthy no impartial or accurate statement with respect to the condition and aspirations of the laboring classes can either be expected or obtained. Nor is this due so mach to inability or lack of veracity on the part of ancient writers as to the prevalent class bias incident to a society based upon slavery and in which consequently labor was habitually looked upon as a degradation.

About thirteen years ago there appeared from the pen of C. Osborne Ward, a brother of Lester F. Ward, the eminent American sociologist, a remarkable book containing the fruits of much learning and extensive research in a field seldom trodden by the historian. A second volume of the same work, “The Ancient Lowly,” has been recently published. The first was devoted to the uprisings of slaves in early times, for which the data were found chiefly in the fragmentary remains of ancient writers, some of whom were contemporaries of the events recorded. It also described the organizations of the slaves and other ancient workers. This study is carried down in the second volume to the year 303 of our era. Inscriptions preserved to the present day on stones and monuments that have been discovered in the ancient cities of Italy and Asia Minor form the basis of these investigations. The so-called trades-unions are traced by Mr. Ward to the laws of Salon and the Twelve Tables of Numa.

His enthusiasm for paternal socialism carries the author quite beyond his function as a historian. In the religious rites and ceremonies of the lowly his fervid imagination sees the fraternal labor union. In their sacramental feasts he discovers the common table of the socialist community, uniting in brotherly love thousands of humble toilers. He appears to confuse the plebeians of ancient Rome with the laboring classes who possessed no political status at that period of her history. But the plebs, whose legally recognized leaders were the tribunes, had struggled for centuries to gain political rights and finally succeeded; while the servile working people, who were then the economically productive class, remained to the end outside the pale of citizenship.

When we approach the study of ancient society from the standpoint of sociology, we learn that the family hearth, the domestic altar and worship, formed the strongest bond that held together the men of those times. Religion was the keystone of the social structure. Yet Osborne Ward hesitates not to classify as labor unions, fraternally bound by an economic tie, associations that were primarily religious. He concedes, however, that these tutelary organizations cultivated the belief in the coming of a Savior who would redeem the world, and that they erected temples to their chosen gods. We might add that “Saviors” were not infrequent phenomena in those days—the Great Nazarene being but one among many.

With undisguised admiration, Ward expatiates upon die circumstance that the unions were modeled after the family, having meals in common a paternal head wielding much authority, besides other patriarchal characteristics. But this merely indicates the stage of social development, the family and not the individual forming the unit of society. Not only vas it die social unit, but the family was also the fountain of religious worship. No family, no religion; and without a form of worship man became a social outcast. He could have neither political nor legal status.

Again, in the blending of the family, religion, and society, does Mr. Ward recognize socialism, and he deduces s communistic basis for his ancient labor unions. In later times, however, as Mommsen has shown, the original religious character of the unions becomes merely a cloak for other objects.

It is in his explanation of Christianity that this investigator best displays his peculiar genius. If not novel, his views have at least the merit of sincerity. Jesus is no longer a great spiritual teacher, not to say divine, nor merely a moral lawgiver. Rather is he a walking delegate, a peripatetic labor agitator, an itinerant social reformer. The apostles are all connected with their respective trades-unions. Luke, who was their historian, was in fact president of a union of journeymen doctors. Paul likewise was a walking delegate and a powerful agitator. Christianity, in short, from the beginning was an industrial movement, spreading among the working class, who saw in this new religion a promise of economic emancipation.

Let us candidly admit that this picture of the early Church is not wholly destitute of truth. Yet the evidence as here presented is by no means conclusive. Nor need we deny that, on a thread of conjecture supported by hypothesis, he has woven a texture displaying some interesting and instructive historic truth.

Throughout this pretentious work the partizan palpably usurps the place of the historian. Except perhaps in pointing to sources of original information, serviceable to the special student, Osborne Wards book conspicuously fails as a lasting or important contribution to sociology. Its style is diffuse, florid, and bristling with needless repetition. Few readers would have the patience to go through the twelve or thirteen hundred close-packed pages; and it is doubtful if they would find enough reward for their pains. The author indulges in a display of languages both living and dead, which, while evidence of his linguistic accomplishments, is more likely to repel than attract the class of readers who desire to learn about the struggles and organization of the ancient workingmen.

If the conclusions set forth in this work are sound, trades-unionism in ancient times was ramified over the then civilized world, embracing millions of laboring men and women within its beneficent folds. Its members were the first to accept the Christian gospel, with its ideas of universal brotherhood and equality, which thence spread from the bottom upward through all ranks of society. The unions were friendly societies, supporting, without the taint of charity, disabled and out-of-work members. It would appear indeed from numerous extant inscriptions that these associations of laborers were ostensibly burial clubs. Among other activities they conducted free schools for the children of the workers. From the Roman government they took contracts for many kinds of industrial undertakings, erected public buildings, constructed roads and bridges, and supplied munitions of war to the imperial armies. They threw their influence in favor of candidates for public office who promised to turn over such contracts to organized labor. In a word, they aimed to become privileged monopolists, seeking their own immediate ends like their successors, the guilds of later times, or the great corporations of to-day, that exploit the general welfare for their own emolument.

To Osborne Ward, however, those ancient working-class politicians are worthy [of] the emulation and imitation of their modem descendants. Let us go back, he cries, “to that pure, sweet, lovely, self-supporting socialism outlined by the great law of Solon!”

Though they flourished, we are told, for about nine centuries, an appalling tragedy seems to have at last terminated the commendable efforts and growing power of these vast economic associations. About the year 303 A. D., the emperor Diocletian allowed himself to be persuaded to countenance a wholesale massacre of organized toilers. They were charged with harboring Christians, whom persecution sought to devour. Notwithstanding our author’s habit of jumbling indiscriminately together all matters pertaining to the unions and Christianity, it is evident that the ghastly scheme of extermination perpetrated in numerous cities of the empire was after all only one of the many attempts officially to stamp out the robust and rapidly spreading religion of Jesus Christ. Mr. Ward closes with a lament that after the date of this massacre all records of the labor unions disappear. But he passes over a more potent cause of the decay and ultimate obliteration of the ancient workingmen’s movement. This was the gradual rise of feudalism as a new economic basis of society, which began with the overthrow of the empire by the barbarians.

William Bailie.

Boston, Mass.

William Bailie, The Martyrdom of the Soul

William Bailie, "The Martyrdom of the Soul," Liberty, 8, 35 (February 6, 1892), 2-3.

The Martyrdom of the Soul.

In my experience of work-a-day life and every-day people there is one thing above all others that I account the most notable, and that by reason of its rarity. Not that I claim a longer or wider experience than the next man, for mine indeed is but short, yet varied enough to give point to the observation. It is true the rare quality I speak of has appeared to me in several individuals who stood out like oases in the desert, or as beacons on the waters, their light glittering with a brightness which served only to show the profundity of the darkness around.

I must crave the exercise of a little patience with my mode of explanation, for instead of defining this notable rarity I shall begin by pointing out its absence in the examples I am about to introduce. With them I shall be lenient, and sympathetic withal, because in their ranks I often, if not always, march myself. We live not in an age of martyrs. People nowadays seldom feel the necessity to enter the state of martyrdom, and least of all the people whom I am about to accuse. Yet consciously in a few cases and in the vast number unconsciously they do exist upon the earth in a state of living, helpless, crucified martyrdom.

We shall examine them as they come, indiscriminately. Take your good citizen, your thriving man of business, conscious of his well-merited success and his neighbors’ respect. Has he ever for one whole moment in his life knowingly cultivated himself,—that is, the part of him which in a careful analysis might be distinguished as essentially him, an entity, an individuality, a something which differentiated him from all others; a feature held not in common with the rest, but in distinction to and separate from all those common attributes?

Like other boys, he received in due course an education; they all received the same. The main object was to prepare him—that is, the parts of him, the powers, passions, capacities, which he held in common with the others—for the busy struggling un-individual life which he now so complacently follows. That exercise did nothing to foster or enlarge the distinctive entity; it helped in its infancy to crush and smother it. Possibly when he left school he did feel some latent yet distinctive desires and predilections. He dreamt of going to sea, or to California, or living in the country, or becoming a philosopher, or a stone-mason, or of reaching the dignity and distinction of a policeman or a President or what not. Whatever may have been his private feelings, his individual leanings, in the matter, nobody consulted, and he soon forgot that such heresies had ever found lodgment in his mind, for like his peers he had early been impressed with the essential object of his bringing up, viz., to make a man of himself by getting more, realizing a position, a standing in the world, from a material point of view, always making the most of his opportunities. In a word, not to be a man, a separate individual, but to tread the same paths the rest were on, do the same things, reach the same goal, feel the same contentment and satisfaction at his success in the beaten path.

Not without sundry rebellions, however, is all this programme accomplished.

His parents put him into a situation which at the time offers the best opportunities. After awhile mayhap its dullness, insipidity, and want of agreement with his natural tastes and ambitions bring a discontent. Another place which has also been selected because of its fulfillment of the general stipulations, is procured, and for awhile the young man is satisfied. Finally he learns to heed no more those inner promptings, but settles down to the life that is laid upon in performing his round of duty, his commercial labors and social engagements, with a sense of their sacredness which completely annihilates the natural proferences and crude yearnings of the individual man. In business hours he associates with many people. To each he is civil, polite, and always tries to converse as if interested in the phase of the weather or other circumstance that each desires to unburden himself of.

He finds himself married. Then arises a variety of duties, impositions, which, whether they correspond with his inclinations or net (they seldom do), he feels obliged to lend himself to, and perform to the satisfaction of another party. Visits, entertainments shopping, and other indifferent locomotory functions which are always dull and often positively abhorrent. The exactions upon his stifled entity belonging to his bi-condition grow with years, and at last he almost ceases to remember that be ever was an individual, n free being.

He has a family. As they grow in years and numbers, his whole thoughts and most of his time are devoted to placing, settling, and worrying about them. If he is considerate and good, fired with the regulation pride of family, he takes to these trying duties kindly, acting as their general omnipotence,

When this period is well through, his head in bald; he probably attends church with more devotion and regularity, for he had not till now much time to spare for ultra-earthly duties or spiritual thoughts.

Now, when he is about worked up, he is free at last to turn his attention to his own cultivation. Whatever of the distinctive personality had once flourished within is long since smothered and dead, so instead of this he thinks of the life to come and spends the remainder of his days in pious contemplation of the projected but uncertain bliss beyond. Thus vegetating has he gone through life. Never did be perpetrate an original deed, or utter a new thought, or feel the influence of an uncommon emotion. No worse can be said of him than this: he has travelled life’s journey as millions more, past, present, and to come, feeling no aspiration, performing no action by which from any of those he might have been distinguished. Wedged in by circumstances, surrounded by conditions, he made not the effort to break the chain they forged that bound him to the beaten path. As he passes from the stage of life, another stops into his place, filling it with equal competency; and, missing him not, the world goes on its way.

Let us shift our ground. Here is another type. A man pitchforked into the rut of life he exists in. One who "earns his broad by the sweat of his brow," the ancient curse still pressing upon him heavily; cast as it were upon a raft, around and upon which cling a multitude scrambling for a hold and a footing secure. About his vocation there is no choice, not even a predilection. Little stimulus here to build a berth, to make a position giving a safe and comfortable competence as did the other. From the outset his life's work seems to be a struggle to subsist, to find a spar, a piece of débris, anything to cling to about the precarious raft of existence. Not seldom in this does he fail completely, dropping unnoticed to the bottom.

Passing over the preparation for life’s battle which the meager education allotted him affords, he begins his career as 'prentice errand-boy, drudge, or general knockabout. Truly he gains an advantage over our first type in that some opportunity may arise in the grim variety and precariousness of this experience to find out and cherish, yet rarely to develop, his personality. When he is settled in life (this you will perceive is a paradox, for he never is settled in life, but always borne hither and thither—insecure), or what is his nearest approach to that condition, the head of a family of which he is the only support, the life he leads is after this fashion. A day of toil extending through twelve or fourteen hours, including meals and going to and fro, which leaves him physically exhausted and mentally inert. Inexorable destiny decrees that to cultivate the vital entity whose latent existence he may perchance dimly feel shall not be the privilege of his condition. The world permits him to live; the repayment of this debt with usurious interest leaves him but little leisure and less opportunity to consciously discover that which is within. The semblance of amusement—the most trivial excitement, the least exalting pleasures absorb the scanty time of rest; and for anything beyond, his weariness proves an effectual barrier.

Imagine for yourself the conditions and surroundings, or perhaps you know already from ripe experience. Whether it be on a street-car, a monotonous but ever vigilant strain; or at the furnace plutonic, or the whirring machine subduing and fashioning the useful metal; or it may be behind the counter of a busy store sustaining the maximum of pressure to the square inch, a dreary and exhausting round of trivialities; else in the din of the flying factory ‘mid the buzzing of a myriad wheels; or in the quieter workshop still feeling the squeeze in the race for life; whether handling the shovel and pick, or following the plough, so needful forms of toil yet se unprofitable; or mayhap treading the ladder with the “hod” while the man at the top does all the work—in every case the result is alike. On duty, a ceaseless effort; off, lassitude needing all the little opportunity for recuperation so again to be capable of the same endurance.

Thus is strangled and annihilated the soul of man.

Here is a veritable martyrdom. True, we may find exceptions, and I am pleased to think, a growing number who escape; but it is only partial, and they are still rare. The conditions are iron-bound, the circumstances imperative, and they effect their stifling and destructive work as surely and as completely as a political party chokes and stamps out an independent opinion.

Upon the home life we need not dwell. Domestic comforts represented too often merely by a sleeping place, where the partner lives who prepares the food and supplies maternity to the children. Comfort, happiness, peace—to cultivate these there is no time.

Family life is a pretence, a shadow, hardly ever a pleasant reality.

Small wonder that the mass of humanity, a few of whose ordinary surroundings and conditions of life in a free (!) country have been imperfectly sketched, moves forward with so little haste. It is made up of an agglomeration of distinct individuals, everyone wedged in by all the others, obliged to fashion and accommodate himself to his environment.

Let us here affirm that each intelligent unit has a distinctive entity, a personality capable of cultivation, which would render it more complete and thoroughly differentiate it from all others. Denied the opportunity to perfect this cultivation, knowledge is lacking, expansion and elevation of the soul impossible, and liberty, dearest of all, not to be attained.

The whole is no greater than all of its parts, and can contain nothing which does not in some of them reside, consequently it partakes of all these negatives, and by its ponderance crushes whatever small stock of asserted self-consciousness a few, by overcoming the pressure of prejudice and circumstance, have audaciously evolved.

The mass can move onward only when the component parts are in the way of progress. No advance were possible, did not some, a minute fraction to be sure, discern that innate personality and give rein to the soul. When each and everyone can do this, freely, spontaneously, the whole mass will have ascended to a higher plane to breathe a purer air, but not till then.

Although the types we have taken to exemplify our theme are of the gender masculine, yet what has been said is none the less true of their coördinates, women. Indeed the sacrifice of the woman’s personality is so absolute and so universal that to handle it here is quite impossible. Tomes might be filled about it; to indite a library would not exhaust it. Therefore with an observation I pass on. It is this. Women are to a greater degree than men the slaves of routine, custom, and conventionality. Their lives under the imperfect civilization of today partake more of the flat, monotonous sameness of the prairie, especially in Old World countries. Hence, while the vacuity of their existence is more perfect and the soul’s suppression less relieved by stray gleams of personal development, the sacrifice is not so galling, the desire of wider individuality hardly so keen, and the unconscious martyrdom enwraps in tighter folds the whole character of woman.

The sensitive mind feels the curb at every turn. Dame Grundy and her progeny, public opinion, custom, respectability, and the rest, are potent factors in preserving mediocrity and rolling out all her subjects—victims, I should say—to one level, insipid and barren. The unlucky wight who drops out of the ranks, steps aside, or strides beyond, how he suffers! Courage and endurance he must possess in good store if he maintain his chosen ground. The soul should be well watered, its roots deep set in a fruitful soil, to endure the assault.

What is more painful, while bordering on the ridiculous, than to see the people whose souls are dormant shocked and scared, ever ready to attack, as the silly turkey a red rag, the slightest manifestation of cultivated individuality. Anything novel in externals, as the fleeting fashions, is received with open arms. But a new idea, the unusual and ill-understood thought or action of a person with a soul, shall be anathema. To be so is to be a crank, an eccentric creature; at best, a fool; at worst, an enemy of society,—an Anarchist.

Do you belong to this category? A modern member of the tribe of Ishmael. How often in company, in the office the work-shop, the club, amongst the companions, not of your own choice exactly, but whom you are, as it were, thrust upon, have you felt it necessary to smother the sentiment or opinion which would only excite their derision and contempt? Why? Simply because it was unusual; they would not understand. The horse or yacht race, the latest murder, the forthcoming election, all the commonplace topics of every-day recurrence you may have your say about, but see to’t that it is what everybody says, else keep it to yourself. And when you think on other matters, pursuing the course toward which a free and distinctive entity urges you, O! tell it not in Gath, publish it not in Eskalon,, that you may escape martyrdom at the hands of the Philistines.

Take this advice with thee. Never despise the inner promptings. Know that thou dost possess something worth cultivating; seek for it, and thon shalt in some direction find it Fear net to think and to express thy thought. Act upon thine own judgment when thou canst brave the calumny and ostracism of the multitude. If thon wouldst possess a soul of thine own, make not gain thy chief business, but be ever ready to sacrifice something for thy soul’s sake.

William Bailie.

J. K. Ingalls, Henry George Examined

Joshua King Ingalls, "Henry George Examined," Liberty, 2, 1 (October 14, 1882), 5-6.

HENRY GEORGE EXAMINED.*

Should Land be Nationalized or Individualized?

BY J. K. INGALLS

Editor Irish World:—However interesting for the moment may be the questions as to whether Messrs. Parnell and Davitt are acting in unity, and as to whether Mr. George has captured the latter gentleman, a still graver question must ultimately present itself in connection with the disposition and final control of the land. Among the advocates of the “new departure” I have observed but one who has seemed to apprehend the exact issue,—viz., your correspondent, “W. M. C.” “Phillip,” indeed, apprehends that the solution must have a more individualistic application than is necessarily embraced in the term “nationalization of the land,” but, until he fully develops his ideas, I will suspend judgment on them.

Now, potentially, there can be no difference between monopoly under lease and monopoly under freehold, as we shall see on careful investigation. But let us, first ascertain what this phrase really means. Does it mean land for the whole people? Then who would want to rent or let? Does it mean ownership by the government or State? If so, it is not the solution, but only the stating, of the land problem. At the outset this is the theory of all governments.

When William of Normandy defeated Harold, he, as head of the State, assumed control of the lend, and parcelled it out to his bandit lieutenants and favorites. The English monarchs did the same in Ireland.

In ancient Rome the nation claimed the domain; but after a few hundred years it was all in the hands of a few patricians and military chieftains. The land in these United States, at adoption of the Constitution, was mainly national domain. Less then a hundred years sufficed to place it the hands of speculators, favored corporations, and domestic and foreign landlords. Less than one-quarter is now held by the government, and but a small proportion by actual cultivators, and even one-half of that is mortgaged to money-lenders beyond all hope of redemption.

I shall be told that it is not intended to allow private property in land at all, and that hence no monopolistic accumulation could arise. Well, then, there can be no public property in land; or, if so called or held, it must be with this sweeping limitation,—that the public, State, or government can never transfer it to private control. What I wish to indicate here is that no step whatsoever towards securing the individual people in their “rights of soil” can be taken without “limitation of the principle of property” in its application to the land.

But I shall be told also that for the individual to lease his land from the State or government will obviate all danger that any person will he excluded from cultivating the soil who honestly seeks to do so. This would be satisfactory if it were proposed, as "W. M. C.” proposes, to limit lease-holds so that all could have opportunity.

Without such limitation lettings would have to be made at auction; and it would be no more difficult for the millionaire to bill off all the leases of a section, township, or county than to buy up all the fees simple. Indeed, It would be far easier, for it would require him to invest none of his capital in land, as now. To nationalize the laud in any catch sense as that would help no poor man to a piece of land, but would only subject labor to dependence on a speculating and adventurer class instead of an hereditary landlord, and upon the favors of a partisan bossism, instead of a foreign government.

We should have our "seventy-thousand-acre farms” run by "produce kings,” aided by machinery and “transient help” in seed time and harvest, resulting in the ultimate exhaustion of the soil and time reduction of labor to the tramp state. Our stock-jobbing system would be mercilessly applied here, and the condition or the poor, by lack of opportunity for self-employment, would be rendered constantly worse and worse instead of being improved.

I do not mean in any degree to intimate that Mr. Davitt or Mr. George contemplates any such results, but this is the logical outcome to any plan of occupancy which does not positively assure the individual right to enter upon and cultivate the land necessary to his sustenance, and that without accounting to landlord or government official. I am gratified that the “Irish World" has not committed itself to any plan which does not effectually realize this aim.

"Rent," according to Mr. Davitt,” is an immoral tax,” and, according to Mr. George, is “the price of monopoly,” and, whether paid to a single or to a collective landlord, is unchanged in its nature.

In view of the brave and noble work which Mr. George has done and is still doing for the cause of land reform, it pains me to say that he does not seem to have appreciated his own words, much less comprehended the clear-cut definition of Mr. Davitt, and, as to the twin blasphemy of usury, not to have apprehended it at all. Even as late as March 10, 1882, he speaks of the increase of rent with the growth of society as “a most beautiful evidence of creative design.”

In so late a number of the “Irish World” as July 8th, in the report of his Dublin lecture, after reiterating that the present agitation “means land for the whole people—every men, women, and child, rich and poor,” a” solution which gives to every man that which he fairly earns,” be gives utterance to such inconsistent economic twaddle as this, saying it is “Michael Davitt’s plan:” “To solve the land question and the labor question it is merely necessary [not to nationalize the land) to take for the benefit of the whole people those fruits coming from the land which are not due to the exertions of labor or use of capital of those who are engaged in using it.” Doubtless, Mr. George would be unable to find even in Ireland an instance where, the landlord being a judge, anything more then these fruits were taken as rent. The only difference between this plan, which Mr. George was careful to state was not “Mr. Devitt’s particularly” (I should hope not), and current landlordism is that in one instance those fruits go to a class, and in the other to the whole people; in other words, to the ruling political party or administration. He does not stop to consider that this circumstance would in no sense change the immoral nature of the tax, however it might mitigate its public impolicy. As to the portion of fruits which are to go to the use of capital employed in cultivating the land, it would be hopeless to find any farmer or operator in any field of industry to admit that more was now received than was their due. Political economists do not admit any such thing, and we look through “Progress and Poverty” in vain to find any such intimation from Mr. George.

That he aims at the same general result as other land reformers, I have no shadow of doubt; but his premises as to the use of capital end its reproductive power, together with his theory of rent—that it is the result of something produced by the land without labor,—is wholly unsupported by any known facts; and his plan of taxing back what is wrongfully wrung from labor under this false pretence can but prove delusive. If successful as a tax, it would to that extent prove useless as a measure of equity. If successful, as he conceives, in giving every one a foothold on God’s footstool, it would cease to yield any revenue whatever, and thus prove self-destructive, for no one not deprived of land by law or force would pay rent to government or landlord.

The farther discussion of the question I have put in the form of

DIALOGUE.

Jonathan—Good morning, George. I am glad you have called. I am becoming deeply interested in the land question. To me it seems of importance to other countries as well as to Ireland, and that we cannot fully sympathize with the movement there until we understand it as a problem of world-wide application.

George—You cannot be interested in a question of deeper importance, and you are right in thinking it a subject of universal concern. The monopoly of the land in every country lies at the foundation of class domination and of the poverty and industrial subjection which prevail widely even in this land of civil and political freedom. Private property in land, whether under inheritance or commercial traffic, necessarily ends, sooner or later, in its absorption into the hands of a small and privileged class, while the majority of the cultivators, and, indeed, all workers, will be reduced to the condition of tenants, wage-workers, and tramps.

J.—That is also my thought, although as to private property in land I am not certain it could not be so defined and guarded as to make it operate in favor of equal opportunity and equal security. For instance, here I own forty acres. This would interfere with no one's opportunity if some were not allowed to buy up hundreds and thousands of acres, not for the purpose of cultivating or occupying, but to hold them against the poor and homeless, in order that they may tax the toil applied in their cultivation and prevent those who need from going upon them and making homes.

G.—I see you have not studied this land question in all its phases. Private property means property, and, if you attempt to guard or control it, it ceases to be such. I think nationalization of the land the only practical solution of the question, and that can be most readily effected by taxing back the value of the land—i. e., the rent which it will bring—for the benefit of the whole people.

J.—The nationalization of the land in a comprehensive sense is a thing generally admitted, I think. No one disputes that the land of any country belongs to the whole people of that country. The only question is, how can the principle be applied to protect the individual in his natural right of access to his normal environment so as not to invalidate the right of "eminent domain," which is exercised more or less widely and wisely by the governments of all countries, and which by the genius of our laws is supposed to reside in the whole people? The whole people cannot be evicted. It is only by allowing the individual to be evicted and debarred from his natural inheritance that society can be endangered by land monopoly. Society has, therefore, an undoubted right to prohibit the occupancy by any person of such extent of the common inheritance as would crowd or exclude the weakest member from his foothold on the soil.

Whether the occupant holds his house as property, contributing his share of the public burden in the form of a tax, or as a tenant and contributing under the form of rent, would seem to matter little so long as the large occupancy of the richer and stronger did not imperil the opportunity of the poor and weak. By the late mention of a book I have not yet read, I judge that Mr. Wallace alone among English land reformers recognizes the necessity of limitation of occupancy under leasehold, and advocates features of fixity which will secure permanent holding and the inviolability of home to the family. As to letting rent go on, as under the land system, and then taxing it all back from the benefit of the whole people, I am unable to see how that place can be made to harmonize with any democratic idea or fail to become a most dangerous experiment for any government to attempt. Industry at most should be taxed only for the reasonable necessities of government, and only after such necessity has risen and honest estimate made. To levy taxes for the accumulation of an indefinite sum, for which expenditures have to he found, is to create a fund inviting corruption and [s]peculation and the betrayal of public trusts. No experience which any people in any time have had would justify it, and it could not logically be sanctioned by anyone but the advocates of the nationalizing of industry as well as of the land, and of wholesale governmental co-operation, which would make the government the employer of all labor and the determiner of all wages. I do not understand you to advocate this.

G.—Oh, no. However I may agree in the abstract with what you say, I cannot avoid seeing that it is private property in land which is the foundation of the evil. Abolish this by making the nation the owner, and, of course, no such thing as monopoly could exist. You must admit that to equally distribute the land among the people would be impossible, even if desirable, which it is not. Many want no land, but all are entitled to their share of what it produces, minus the amount justly due the cultivator, and minus the part rightfully due the capitalist, who has furnished or advanced means to furnish the stock and general plant employed in cultivating the land.

J.—And the cost of collecting and disbursing the same among the whole body of claimants?

G.—Yes; but that is unavoidable, and must be considered as compensated by relief from all other forms of taxation. I was going to add that rent is an economical fruit not the result of labor, but in addition to it, which the holder of land who cultivates it himself receives over and above the compensation of his labor as truly as the idle landlord.

J.—Is rent at the same time, then, "an immoral tax," as Mr. Davitt asserts?

G.—Yes, when paid to landlords, but if paid to the government, and by that applied to the public welfare, each member of the community gets his just share of the natural produce of the land. Rent, economical rent at least, arises wholly from the different fertility of special soils, as explained by Ricardo and other political economists.

J.—I am not unaware of that, or of the use Malthus and other writers have made of this theory to satisfy the laborer that eviction and starvation are in the order of Providence and not the results of unjust and barbarous laws of tenure. That under any system of freedom of the land there would be a choice of locations and of qualities of the soil there can be no doubt; that parties would be willing to pay something for such choice there can be as little; but that such transactions would degenerate into fixed rents, without landlords, is hardly conceivable,—not certainly while as at present there is abundance of land of good quality to produce all that is necessary for the public consumption. The inhuman mockery of this plausible theory is all too apparent when we reflect that much of the best land even in Ireland is now untilled, while tenants are being evicted from the poorest because they will not pay a rent at a rate almost, if not quite, as high as the best land would command. Take away the write of ejectment from the landlord, with which he now clothed, and the constabulary and military which enable him to enforce it, and all the rent he would be able to collect from choice of place or preference of soils would not distress or seriously wrong any. Ownership under such limitation as would always leave land open to occupation, even of a poor quality, would remove distressful poverty far from the door of the industrious and frugal. The few who are lazy and improvident also would improve their condition as opportunities increased and as chances of doing better by idle scheming than by honest work decreased.

G.—It seems to me you treat the rent theory with too little consideration. It is very clear to me that rent only represents the difference between the productiveness of the best lands and that which is not sufficiently productive to yield rent. If the cultivator owns the land himself, this production in excess of that of poorer land which is cultivated is a gratuity to him which comes from Nature, and not from his toil, since he has toiled no harder than the man who has produced the smaller yield; and the only way to equalize the award of industry is to tax away this excess and give it to the public. The theory is in itself so plain and generally accepted that I wonder you have the courage to dispute it. Mr. Mill denominates it the "pons asinorum."

J.—I know it, but was always in a doubt as to his application of the term. It might be that he meant such a bridge that all asses coming near would be sure to go over. It is not so much the theory as the use which is made of it that I deprecate. That there is difference in soils and in the desirableness of situations is true enough, but that such difference constitutes the entire rental is too absurd for serious discussion. For, then, if all soils were equally fertile, and all situations equally desirable, no rent could be obtained, however the land might be monopolized. This reminds me of the thesis of the metaphysician, that, if an ass was placed equi-distant between two equally-attractive bundles of hay, he would die of starvation without being able to decide between the two. And, theoretically, this is all sound; practically, it is nonsense. In truth, rent arises from exactly the opposite direction to that here assumed. The amount any land will yield above the bare necessities of the cultivator becomes the measure of rent under land monopoly. And to apply the scheme of taxing back land values or rent for the public good means, if it means anything, the taxing of productive labor, all above a bare subsistence, and dividing it among all, whether workers or otherwise. The inequality which would arise from the working of lands of unequal fertility is greatly over-estimated, and it seems to me could be remedied by much easier and more natural methods. With a rational system of limited occupancy the restriction would embrace the consideration of superior fertility, and with more land of an inferior quality, with more varied crops and careful tillage, all serious inequalities would be overcome. There are also many compensations not discernible on the bare statement. The man with easier tillage and more productive soil will be able, doubtless, to obtain the same price for his grain or fruits as the man with poorer soil and shorter crops. He will leave somewhat more to exchange, and will with the excess purchase luxuries. This, while it may stimulate other industries, will not increase the cost of any necessaries to the neighbor. Another principle will also come in to render thee inequalities less serious, if they could be regarded as serious at all. The principle of serving first the first comer would render all such inequality of little account. Only as population increased and progress in production advanced would the less desirable places come into requisition. The older and feeble would be in possession of the more productive, while the young and strong would attack the more unfriendly situation. The rent theory goes always upon the notion that the best land will keep producing bountifully year after year and generation after generation. This is folly. Land, however fertile when first taken up or when it first comes into the possession of the cultivator, will soon work down to a condition where it will do no more than is done for it. Its productiveness will then depend on what is done in the way of returning the elements of fertility and proper culture. The original difference of most cultivable land will soon disappear under an equitable system of apportionment and intelligent use.

G.—Well, I came to read you a lecture on this subject, but you have read me one. I have never heard the "rent theory" attacked in this way before. If rent means only the different degrees of productiveness of different soils, there seems force in your suggestion that then no rent could be collected if all lands were equally desirable. But it is quite apparent that landlordism could not stand on any such position as that. I shall have to modify the statement by saying that under private ownership of the soil monopoly is enabled to exact the difference between the production of the best land and of such land as would be worked for its entire product without rent.

J.—Well, do you not see that you proceed in the wrong direction in drawing your conclusions? It comes really to an issue upon the question as to the "natural rate of wages." Adam Smith asserts that to be the entire labor product. Ricardo, the author of the "Theory of Rent," consistent with his theory, makes bare subsistence the natural rate. If this is true, as it must be, or the theory of economic rent be abandoned, then rent begins at this end and not at the excess end of the industrial problem, and does not absolutely require that any but the poorest lands be cultivated to produce a rent, if such lands will yield anything besides a bare subsistence to the cultivator.

Whether this theory would work if left to the operation of natural laws is another question, which it will be time enough to examine when our laws are repealed and equal opportunities are enjoyed.

It would be very easy to show that commodities have a price only because there is a difference in their quality, etc. For instance, the price of potatoes is only the difference between the size and quality of those most desired and those which are so small and of so poor a quality that they can be had for nothing. But an economist who should attempt to incorporate such a circumstance into a basic economic principle, and seek to tax back the whole value thus found for the public use, would simply stultify himself.

Your mistake arises in supposing that there is such a thing as wealth produced without labor. With equal access to the earth and its natural and spontaneous productions, the labor of gathering is all there is of production, and all that one man can justly exchange with another is the service he has rendered in such gathering. And that, in the absence of monopoly, is all that can have price. How one who stands aloof and does nothing towards this gathering can claim a portion of the wages of the gatherer is not consistent with any conceivable system of equity. Only upon repaying the service rendered is he entitled to any interest in the thing harvested, and then he receives under an equitable exchange the same proportion according to his service as the man who gathered.

In this way the right of soil is essentially vindicated. The artisan, artist, teacher, littérateur, and follower of any trade or profession is protected, for each requires and usually consumes quite as much of the earth's products as the cultivator, and that, too, without rendering disproportionate service. Why, then, should the cultivator be taxed to benefit the others? Under free land or effective limitation of its ownership it would be optional with anyone of another calling who felt he was unfairly treated to plant and gather the fruits of the earth himself. All this would require no complicated scheme of taxation, no cumbersome official machinery, but simply a repeal of the class laws of tenure and the extension of the principle of limitation found so salutary in all other matters of civil rule.

G.—In view of all you have said, I still think that rent arises, to an extent, at least, from a "gratuity of Nature," and does belong properly to the whole people, and I see no better method than to tax away this gratuity from the landlord for the benefit of all.

J—Without arguing that point farther, it really appears to me that to estimate that as a gratuity which is acknowledged to be "the price of monopoly," is illogical in the last degree. If nature has gratuities, it is for those who gather them. With equal opportunity, if any refuse or neglect to gather them (not infants or disabled), they have no equitable or moral claim upon that which others have gathered; for, by rendering a reciprocal service in that which they prefer to do, they can secure what they need. Whether any such thing as economic rent exists at all can only be determined in the absence of monopoly. That rents are greatly above any possible bid for choice, and wholly separate therefrom, is seen by the fact that, where highest, premiums are often paid on leaseholds. Taxation on a basis so indefinite, so wholly dependent on monopoly and the limit of endurance which the poor will sustain, is as devoid of economic judgment as of democratic simplicity.

G.—But an end must be put to the oppression of landlordism, and, as the land cannot he divided in such a way that all shall share its benefits, I know of no other way to make the thing equitable. The tendency of productive industry to consolidate itself in the hands of large corporations must necessarily extend to the cultivation of the land, where it is seen that a few large enterprises can be carried on much more successfully than many small ones. To divide up the land into small holdings would be detrimental to production, as is held by many writers.

J.—But many writers of eminence take an opposite view, citing France, Belgium, Switzerland, &c. But, though the issue is at least evenly contested, I do not propose to make a point of that. Even if wholly as you say, in its mere relation to production, it would not be conclusive. There are other and broader questions than that of large production. The maintenance of the fertility of the soil and the development and improvement of the individuals of the race are aims to which minor economies should be sacrificed, if need be.

G.—You will admit that the "division of labor" has exerted a powerful influence in that direction!

J.—Certainly; but you must also admit that, carried to the extremes which are exhibited in our large manufacturing establishments, it tends to reduce the worker to a mere appendage of a machine, and can have only one effect,—the deterioration of all manliness and the destruction of all self-respect. The pointing of a pin, as a continual employment for twelve or fourteen hours a day, can end only by reducing the man to an automaton. Large production of pins can well be sacrificed to a greater diversity of employment for the individual, and the development of a higher manhood; if not in the interest of simple political economy, at least in the higher interest of social economy.

G.—My plan embraces the idea of "giving to every man that which he fairly earns," and to capital what is "due for its use;" but that which goes as rent to the land I would have divided equally among all, since it belongs to all. Interest on money and profits derived from commodities in process of exchange and distribution are different in their nature from rent, and are realized "after labor has been duly rewarded."

J.—I am aware that economists seek to draw this distinction; but it is wholly technical. The union of capital with labor is no more complete than that of the land with labor. No essential difference can be shown between rent, interest, and profits.

Rent is the interest upon the money for which the hired land would exchange. Interest is the rent of the land which the money would purchase. It can make no possible difference to the farmer whether the sum he pays is paid as rent or as interest on the purchase money of his farm. Both the rent and interest may be loaded with expenses, taxes, repairs, &c., but stripped of all these, they are identical in this: they are a tax upon the production of those who work for the benefit of those who do no work. Profits are also loaded with costs of superintendence, expenses, &c. Stripped of "dues for service," however, they are identical with rent and interest,—an "immoral tax" on the productions of industry.

G.—But you forget that I assume that rent arises not from the labor, but independent of it, as taught by all political economists. And it is to tax that back for the benefit of all that I am contending. The question of interest and profits is held to be different from rent; but your way of putting it is novel. Yet it seems to me these are both right, and would work no great evil but for a monopoly of the land.

J.—But these, in common with rent, take so much from the annual production of labor, without any return whatsoever, when stripped of the extraneous portions with which they are usually connected. I think I have satisfactorily shown that rent arises in no such way as claimed, but wholly as "a monopoly price;" that wealth has no such power of increase as is claimed in justification of interest or usury; that trade has no power to multiply wealth, and that commerce can only add to the wealth of society by performing specific service in its production where and when needed for consumption, and that, when such service is fairly rewarded, nothing remains for profits but an immoral tax.

G.—But surely you do not propose to control interest and profits as well as rent? That would involve a degree of governmental supervision which I am sure would be repugnant to the spirit of any free people.

J.—Doubtless; but the dilemma is yours, not mine. I was just going to say that, waving my objections to the "rent theory," admitting the power of wealth to increase of itself without labor, and of commodities in process of exchange to multiply on the hands of the holders,—though each proposition is vastly absurd,—the conclusion is unavoidable that interest on money and profits on trade are equally gratuities arising in Nature, to which all are equally entitled as well as to the economic rent arising from the land. How you can logically refuse to tax back the money and trade values, if any such naturally exist, as well as the land values is a matter of great wonder to me.

G.—But I see no other method of redressing the great wrong of land monopoly, and, that evil obviated, it seems to me that the other evils would remedy themselves, if they are evils.

J.—That is also my belief. In your plan, however, I see no certainty of remedying the basic evil. To do away with land monopoly only one course is open,—abolish it, as chattel slavery was abolished. Repeal all laws giving titles to land and make occupation the only valid tenure. This would do away with all discussion as to the nature of property in it. Production is the only thing which can be taxed. Improvements should be exempt, while coercive taxation remains. The "No-Rent" manifesto is the true gospel of Land Reform, and becomes realized as soon as the legal process for collection and for ejectment is taken away, and the constable and soldier are withdrawn from enforcing such laws. Only courage and moral purpose in the people are necessary to abolish this great evil; schemes and plans to circumvent it, by indirect means, will prove vain.

G.—But the difficulty still remains. Equal distribution is impossible. Besides, some want much land, others little, and still others none at all. "Nationalization might be changed to Townshipization,"† and so the local government, whatever its form, have control. The large holders would then share, under the system of taxation, with those who held little or none. Each would rent of all, and so the values be equally distributed.

J.—I am very glad to hear you say this. It is one step more in the right direction. This would approach nearly to the ownership in the township or village community, once the general system of land tenure in Europe. A step or two more will place you on solid ground. The familization and individualization of the land follows as a logical sequence from your admission.

G.—But you do not notice my point that many individuals do not want land at all.

J.—I was about to say that it is untrue. Every individual needs a place to live and work in. Thus far the wants of all are nearly equal. We are "tenants in common," upon the bosom of mother Earth, and no one has any just claim against another for obtaining that which with equal opportunity he declines to appropriate. His refusal to occupy proves that he estimates his advantage greater not to occupy, and that all assumed advantage to the occupier is quite if not more than compensated through reciprocal exchange.

There exists no reason why any one should hire a home which does not apply with greater force to the reasons why he should own it. Even a single room can be owned, since it can be hired. Requiring to change his residence, one would experience no more difficulty in finding a purchaser than would the landlord (nation or township) in finding a tenant for it. Any disposition of the land which does not embrace the private ownership of home and the normal environment of the individual will not be the final one. Under that, even the changeful and migratory would find no serious inconvenience, while the many would enjoy, in its security and stability, a permanent reliance, and, in its healthful stimulus, the noblest incentives to beautify and adorn the limited portion falling to their control.

---

* The introductory portion of this article, preceding the dialogue, appeared originally in the “Irish World." The remainder was offered to the editor of that paper, but rejected by him.—Editor Liberty.

† See Henry George in "Irish World" for August 26.

Peter Kropotkin, "The Coming Anarchy

Peter Kropotkin, "The Coming Anarchy," The Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature, 46, 4 (October, 1887), 433-443. [Reprinted from The Nineteenth Century.]

THE COMING ANARCHY.

BY PRINCE PETER KROPOTKIN.

The views taken in the preceding article* as to the combination of efforts being the chief source of our wealth explain why most anarchists see in communism the only equitable solution as to the adequate remuneration of individual efforts. There was a time when a family engaged in agriculture, and supported by a few domestic trades, could consider the corn they raised and the plain woollen cloth they wove as productions of their own and nobody else's labor. Even then such a view was not quite correct there were forests cleared and roads built by common efforts; and even then the family had continually to apply for communal help, as is still the case in so many village communities. But now, under the extremely interwoven state of industry, of which each branch supports all others, such an individualistic view can be held no more. If the iron trade and the cotton industry of this country have reached so high a degree of development, they have done so owing to the parallel growth of thousands of other industries, great and small; to the extension of the railway system; to an increase of knowledge among both the skilled engineers and the mass of the workmen to a certain training in organization slowly developed among British producers; and, above all, to the world- trade which has itself grown up, thanks to works executed thousands of miles away. The Italians who died from cholera in digging the Suez Canal, or from "tunnel-disease" in the St. Gothard Tunnel, have contributed as much toward the enrichment of this country as the British girl who is prematurely growing old in serving a machine at Manchester; and this girl as much as the engineer who made a labor-saving improvement in our machinery, flow can we pretend to estimate Lhe exact part of each of them in the riches accuniulated around us?

We may admire the inventive genius or the organizing capacities of an iron lord but we must recognize that all his genius and energy would not realize one-tenth of what they realize here if they were spent in dealing with Mongolian shepherds or Siberian peasants instead of Jijitish workmen, British engineers, and trustworthy managers. An English millionaire who succeeded in giving a powetful impulse to a branch of home industry was asked the other day what were, in his opinion, the reaL causes of his success? His answer was

—' I always sought out the right man for a given branch of the concern, and I left him full independence—maintaining, of course, for myself the general supervision."" Did you never fail to find such men was the next question. " Never.""' But in the new branches which you introduced you wanted a number of flew inventions."" No doubt; we spent thousands in buying patents." This little colloquy sums up, in my opinion, the real case .of those industrial undertakings which are quoted by the advocates of "an .adequa(e remuneration of Individual efforts" in the shape of millions bestowed on the managers of prosperous indusiries. it shows in how far the efforts are really " individual." Leav'ing aside the thousand conditions which sometimes permit a man to show, and sometimes prevent him from showing, his capacities to their full extent, it might be asked in how far the same capacities could bring out the same results, if the very same employer could find no trustworthy managers and no skilled workmen, and if hundreds of inventions were not stimulated by the mechanical turn of mind of so many in• habitants of this country. British industry is the work of the British nation—nay, of Europe and India taken together—not of separate individuals.

While holding this synthetic view on production, the anarchists cannot consider, like the collectivists, that a remuneration which would be proportion- ate to the hours of labor spent by each person in the production of riches may be an ideal, or even an approach to an ideal, society. Without entering here into a discussion as to how far the exchange value of each merchandise is really measured now by the amount of labor necessary For its production—a separate study must be devoted to the subject—we might say that the collectivist ideal seems to us merely unrealizable in a society which would be brought to consider the necessaries for production as a common property. Such a society would be compelled to abandon the wage-system altogether. It appears impossible that the mitigated individualism of the collectivist school could co-exist with the partial communism implied by holding land and machinery in common—unless imposed by a powerful government, much more powerful than all those of our own times. The present wage-system has grown up from the appropriation of the necessaries for production by the few; it was a necessary condition for the growth of the present capitalist production ; and it cannot outlive it, even if an attempt be made to pay to the worker the full value of his producer and money be substituted by hours of labor checks. Common possession of the necessities for production implies the common enjoyment of the fruits of the common production; and we consider that an equitable organization of society can only arise when every wage-system is abandoned, and when everybody, contributing for the common well-being to the full extent of his capacities, shall enjoy also from the common stock of society to the fullest possible extent of his needs.

We maintain, moreover, not only that communism is a desirable state of society, but that the growing tendency of modern society is precisely toward communism—free communism— notwithstanding the seemingly contradictory growth of individualism. In the growth of individualism (especially during the last three centuries) we merely see the endeavors of the individual toward emancipating himself from the steadily growing powers of Capital and the State. But side by side with this growth we see also, throughout history up to our own times, the latent struggle of the producers of wealth for maintaining the partial communism of old, as well as for reintroducing communist principles in a new shape, as soon as favorable conditions permit it. As soon as the communes of the tenth, eleventh, and twelfth centuries were enabled to start their own independent life, they gave a wide extension to work in common, to trade in common, and to a partial consumption in common. All this has disappeared; but the rural commune fights a hard struggle to maintain its old features, and it succeeds in maintaining them in many places of Eastern Europe, Switzerland, and even France and Germany; while new organizations, based on the same principles, never fail to grow tip as soon as it is possible. Notwithstanding the egotistic turn given to the public mind by the merchant-production of our century, the communist tendency is continually reasserting itself and trying to make its way into public life. The penny bridge disappears before the public bridge so also the road which formerly had to be paid for its use. The same spirit pervades thousands of other institutions. Museums, free libraries, and free public schools; parks and pleasure grounds paved and lighted streets, free for everybody's use; water supplied to private dwellings, with a growing tendency toward disregarding the exact amount of it used by the individual; tramways and railways which have already begun to introduce the season ticket or the uniform tax, and will surely go much further on this line when they ate no longer private property all these are tokens showing in which direction further progress is to be expected.

It is in putting the wants of the individual above the valuation of the services lie has rendered, or might render, to society; it is in considering society as a whole, so intimately connected together that a service rendered to any individual is a service rendered In the whole society. The librarian of the British Museum does not ask the reader what have been his previous services to society, he simply gives him the books he requires; and for a uniform fee, a scientific society leaves its gardens and museums at the free disposal of each member. The crew of a lifeboat do not ask whether the men of a distressed ship are entitled to be rescued at a risk of life; and the Prisoners' Aid Society do not inquire what the released prisoner is worth. Here are men in need of a service; they are fellow men, and no further rights are required. And if this very city, so egotistic to-day, be visited by a public calamity—let it be besieged, for example, like Paris in 1871, and experience during the siege a want of food—this very same city would be unanimous in proclaiming that the first needs to be satisfied are those of the children and old, no matter what services they may render or have rendered to society. And it would take care of the active defenders of the city whatever the degrees of gallantry displayed by each of them. But, this tendency already existing, nobody will deny, I suppose, that, in proportion as humanity is relieved from its hard struggle for life, the same tendency will grow stronger. If our productive powers be fully applied for increasing the stock of the stable necessities for life ; if a modification of the present conditions of property increased the number of producers by all those who are not producers of wealth now ; and if manual labor reconquered its place of honor in society—all this decuplating our production and Tendering labor easier and more attractive—the communist tendencies already existing would immediately enlarge their sphere of application.

Taking all that into account, and still more the practical aspects of the question as to how private property might become common property, most of the anarchists maintain that the very next step to be made by society, as soon as the present régime of property undergoes a modification, will be in a communist sense. We are communists. But our communism is not that of either the Phalanstère or the authoritarian school it is anarchist communism, communism without government, free communism. It is a synthesis of the two chief aims prosecuted by humanity since the dawn of its history—economical freedom and political freedom.

I have already said that anarchy means no-government. We know well that the word "anarchy" is also used in the current language as synonymous with disorder. But that meaning of "anarchy," being a derived one, implies at least two suppositions. It implies, first, that wherever there is no government there is disorder and it implies, moreover, that order, due to a strong government and a strong police, is always beneficial, Both implications, however, are anything but proved. There is plenty of order—we should say, of harmony—in many branches of human activity where the government, happily, does not interfere. As to the beneficial effects of order, the kind of order that reigned at Naples under the Bourbons surely was not preferable to some disorder started by Garibaldi; while the Protestants of this country will probably say that the good deal of disorder made by Luther was preferable, at any rate, to the order which reigned under the Pope. As to the proverbial "order" which was once "restored at Warsaw,'' there are, I suppose, no two opinions about it. While all agree that harmony is always desirable, there is no such unanimity about order, and still less about the "order" which is supposed to reign in our modern societies; so that we have no objection whatever to the use of the word "anarchy" as a negation of what has been often described as order.

By taking for our watchword anarchy, in its sense of no-government, we intend to express a pronounced tendency of human society. In history we see that precisely those epochs when small parts or humanity broke down the power of their rulers and reassumed their freedom were epochs of the greatest progress, economical and intellectual. Be it the growth of the free cities, whose unrivalled monuments—free work of free associations of workers—still testify of the revival of mind and of the wellbeing of the citizen; be it the great movement which gave birth to the Reformation—those epochs witnessed the greatest progress when the individual recovered some part of his freedom.

And if we carefully watch the present development of civilized nations, we cannot fail to discover in it a marked and ever-growing movement toward limiting more and more the sphere of faction of government, so as to leave more and more liberty to the initiative of the individual. After having tried all kinds of government, and endeavored to solve the insoluble problem of having a government "which might compel the individual to obedience, without escaping itself from obedience to collectivity," humanity is trying now to free itself from the bonds of any government whatever, and to respond to its needs of organization by the free understanding between individuals prosecuting the same common aims. Home Rule, even for the smallest territorial unit or group, becomes a growing need; free agreement is becoming a substitute for law; and free co-operation a substitute for governmental guardianship. One after the other those functions which were considered as the functions of government during the last two centuries are disputed; society moves better the less it is governed. And the more we study the advance made in this direction, as well as the inadequacy of governments to fulfil the expectations laid in them, the more we are bound to conclude that Humanity, by steadily limiting the functions of government, is marching toward reducing them finally to nil; and we already foresee a state of society where the liberty of the individual will be limited by no laws, no bonds—by nothing else but his own social habits and the necessity, which every one feels, of finding co-operation, support, and sympathy among his neighbors.

Of course, the no-government ethics will meet with at least as many objections as the no-capital economics. Our minds have been so nurtured in prejudices as to the providential functions of government that anarchist ideas must be received with distrust. Our whole education, since childhood up to the grave, nurtures the belief in the necessity of a government and its beneficial effects. Systems of philosophy have been elaborated to support this view; history has been written from this standpoint; theories of law have been circulated and taught for the same purpose. All politics are based on the same principle, each politician saying to people he wants to support him: "Give me the governmental power; I will, I can, relieve you from the hardships of your present life." All our education is permeated with the same teachings. We may open any book of sociology, history, law, or ethics everywhere we find government, its organization, its deeds, playing so prominent a part that we grow accustomed to suppose that the State and the political men are everything; that there is nothing behind the big statesmen. The same teachings are daily repeated in the Press. Whole columns are filled up with minutest records of parliamentary debates, of movements of political persons; and, white reading these columns, we too often forget that there is an immense body of men—mankind, in fact—growing and dying, living in happiness or sorrow, laboring and consuming, thinking and creating, besides those few men whose importance has been so swollen up as to overshadow humanity.

And yet, if we revert from the printed matter to our real life, and cast a broad glance on society as it is, we are struck with the infinitesimal part played by government in our life. Millions of human beings live and die without having had anything to do with government. Every day millions of transactions are made without the slightest interference of government; and those who enter into agreements have not the slightest intention of breaking bargains. Nay, those agreements which are not protected by government (those of the Exchange, or card debts) are perhaps better kept than any others. The simple habit of keeping his word, the desire of not losing confidence, are quite sufficient in the immense overwhelming majority of eases to enforce the keeping of agreements. Of course, it may be said that there is still the government which might enforce them if necessary. But not to speak of the numberless cases which even could not be brought before a court, everybody who has the slightest acquaintance with trade will undoubtedly confirm the assertion that, if there were not so strong a feeling of honor to keep agreements, trade itself would become utterly impossible. Even those merchants and manufacturers who feel not the slightest remorse when poisoning their customers with all kinds of abominable drugs, duly labelled, even they also keep their commercial agreements. But, if such a relative morality as commercial honesty exists now, under the present conditions, when enrichment is the chief motive, the same feeling will further develop very fast as soon as robbing somebody of the fruits of his labor is no longer the economical basis of our life.

Another striking feature of our century tells in favor of the same no-government tendency. It is the steady enlargement of the field covered by private initiative, and the recent growth of large organizations resulting merely and simply from free agreement. The railway net of Europe—a confederation of so many scores of separate societies— and the direct transport of passengers and merchandise over so many lines which were built independently and federated together, without even so much as a Central Board of European Railways, are a most striking instance of what is already done by mere agreement if fifty years ago somebody had predicted that railways built by so many separate companies finally would constitute so perfect a net as they do today, he surely would have been treated as a fool. It would have been urged that so many companies, prosecuting their own interests, would never agree without an International Board of Railways, supported by an International Convention of the European States, and endowed with governmental powers. But no such board was resorted to, and the agreement came nevertheless. The Dutch Beurden extending now their organizations over the rivers of Germany, and even to the shipping trade of the Baltic; the numberless amalgamated manufacturers' associations, and the syndicats of France, are so many instances in point. If it be argued that many of these organizations are organizations for exploitation, it would prove nothing, because, if men prosecuting their own egotistic, often very narrow, interests can agree together, better inspired men, compelled to be more closely connected with other groups, will necessarily agree still easier and still better.

But there also is no lack of free organizations for nobler pursuits. One of the noblest achievements of our century is undoubtedly the Lifeboat Association. Since its first humble start which we all remember, it has saved no less than 32,000 human lives. It makes appeal to the noblest instincts of man its activity is entirely dependent upon devotion to the common cause; while its internal organization is entirely based in the independence of the local committees. The Hospitals Association and hundreds of like organizations, operating on a large scale and covering each a wide field, may also be mentioned under this head. But, while we know everything about governments and their deeds, what do we know about the results achieved by free co-operation? Thousands of volumes have been written to record the acts of governments; the most trifling amelioration due to law has been recorded; its good effects have been exaggerated, its bad effects passed by in silence. But where is the book recording what has been achieved by free co-operation of well-inspired men?—At the same time, hundreds of societies are constituted every day for the satisfaction of some of the infinitely varied needs of civilized man. We have societies for all possible kinds of studies—some of them embracing the whole field of natural science, others limited to a small special branch; societies for gymnastics, for shorthand-writing, for the study of a separate author, for games and all kinds of sports, for forwarding the science of maintaining life, and for favoring the knowledge of how to destroy it; philosophical and industrial, artistic and anti-artistic for serious work and for mere amusement—in short, there is not a single direction in which men would exercise their faculties without combining together for the prosecution of some common aim. Every day new societies are formed, while every year the old ones aggregate together into larger units, federate across the national frontiers, and cooperate in some common work.

The most striking feature of these numberless free growths is that they continually encroach on what was formerly the domain of the State or the Municipality. A householder in a Swiss village on the banks of Lake Leman belongs now to, at least, a dozen different societies which supply him with what is considered elsewhere as a function of the municipal government. Free federation of independent communes for temporary or permanent purposes lies at the very bottom of Swiss life, and to these federations many a part of Switzerland is indebted for its roads and fountains, its rich vineyards, well-kept forests, and meadows which the foreigner admires. And besides these small societies, substituting themselves for the State within some limited sphere, do we not see other societies doing the same on a much wider scale? Each German Bürger is proud of the German army, but few of them know how much it borrows of its force from the numberless private societies for military studies, exercise, and games; and how few are those who understand that their army would become an incoherent mass of men the day that each soldier was no longer inspired by the feelings which inspire him now? In this country, even the task of defending the territory—that is, the chief, the great function of the State—has been undertaken by an army of Volunteers, and this army surely might stand against any army of slaves obeying a military despot. More than that: a private society for the defence of the coasts of England has been seriously spoken of. Let it only come into life, and surely it will be a more effective weapon for self-defence than the ironclads of the navy. One of the most remarkable societies, however, which has recently arisen is undoubtedly the Red Cross Society. To slaughter men on the battlefields, that remains the duty of the State; but these very States recognize themselves unable to take care of their own wounded they abandon the task, to a great extent, to private initiative. What a deluge of mockeries would not have been cast over the poor " Utopist" who should have dared to say twenty-five years ago that the care of the wounded might be left to private societies! "Nobody would go in the dangerous places! all hospitals would gather where there was no need of them! national rivalries would result in the poor soldiers dying without any help, and so on,"—such would have been the outcry. The war of 1871 has shown how perspicacious those prophets are who never believe in human intelligence, devotion, and good sense.

These facts—so numerous and so customary that we pass by without even noticing them—are in our opinion one of the most prominent features of the second half of our century. The just-mentioned organisms grew up so naturally; they so rapidly extended and so easily aggregated together; they are such unavoidable outgrowths of the multiplication of needs of the civilized man, and they so well replace State-interference, that we must recognize in them a growing factor of our life. Modern progress is really toward the free aggregation of free individuals so as to supplant government in all those functions which formerly were intrusted to it, and which it mostly performed so badly.

As to parliamentary rule, and representative government altogether, they are rapidly falling into decay. The few philosophers who already have shown their defects have only timidly summed up the growing public discontent. It is becoming evident that it is merely stupid to elect a few men, and to intrust them with the task of making laws on all possible subjects, of which subjects most of them are utterly ignorant. It is becoming understood that Majority rule is as defective as any other kind of rule; and Humanity searches, and finds, new channels for resolving the pending questions. The Postal Union did not elect an international postal parliament in order to make laws for all postal organizations adherent to the Union. The railways of Europe did not elect an international railway parliament in order to regulate the march of the trains and the repartition of the income of international traffic; and the Meteorological and Geological Societies of Europe did not elect either meteorological or geological parliaments for scheming polar stations, or for establishing a uniform subdivision of geological formations and a uniform coloration of geological maps. They proceeded by means of agreements. To agree together they resorted to congresses; but, while sending delegates to their congresses, they did not elect M.P.'s bons à tout faire; they did not say to them, "Vote about everything you like—we shall obey." They put questions and discussed them first themselves; then they sent delegates acquainted with the special question to be discussed at the congress, and they sent delegates—not rulers. Their delegates returned from the congress with no laws in their pockets, but with proposals of agreements. Such is the way assumed now (the very old way, too) for dealing with questions of public interest—not the way of lawmaking by means of a representative government. Representative government has accomplished its historical mission; it has given a mortal blow to Court-rule; and by its debates it has awakened public interest in public questions. But, to see in it the government of the future Socialist society, is to commit a gross error. Each economical phase of life implies its own political phase; and it is impossible to touch the very bases of the present economical life—private property—without a corresponding change in the very bases of the political organization. Life already shows in which direction the change will be made. Not in increasing the powers of the State, but in resorting to free organization and free federation in all those branches which are now considered as attributions of the State.

The objections to the above may be easily foreseen. It will be said of course:—"But what is to be done with those who do not keep their agreements? What with those who are not inclined to work? What with those who would prefer breaking the written laws of society, or—in the anarchist hypothesis—its unwritten customs? Anarchy may be good for a higher humanity,—not for the men of our own times.''

First of all, there are two kinds of agreements there is the free one which is entered upon by free consent, as a free choice between different courses equally open before each of the agreeing parties; and there is the enforced agreement, imposed by one party upon the other, and accepted by the latter from sheer necessity; in fact, it is no agreement at all; it is a mere submission to necessity. Unhappily, the great bulk of what are now described as agreements belong to the latter category. When a workman sells his labor to an employer, and knows perfectly well that sonic part of the value of his produce will be unjustly taken by the employer; when he sells it without even the slightest guarantee of being employed so much as six consecutive months—and he is compelled to do so because he and his family would otherwise starve next week—it is a sad mockery to call that a free contract. Modern economists may call it free, but the father of political economy — Adam Smith — was never guilty of such a misrepresentation. As long as three-quarters of humanity are compelled to enter into agreements of that description, force is, of course, necessary, both to enforce the supposed agreements and to maintain such a state of things. Force—and a good deal of force—is necessary for preventing the laborers from taking possession of what they consider unjustly appropriated by the few ; and force is necessary for always bringing new " uncivilized nations" under the same conditions. The Spencerian no-force party perfectly well understand that and while they advocate no force for changing the existing conditions, they advocate still more force than is now used for maintaining them. As to anarchy, it is obviously as incompatible with plutocracy as with any other kind of cracy.

But we do not see the necessity of force for enforcing agreements freely entered upon. We never heard of a penalty imposed on a man who belonged to the crew of a lifeboat and at a given moment preferred to abandon the association. All that his comrades would do with him, if he were guilty of a gross neglect, would be probably to refuse further to do anything with him. Nor did we hear of fines imposed on a contributor of Mr. Murray's Dictionary for a delay in his work, or of gendarmes driving the volunteers of Garibaldi to the battle-fields. Free agreements need not be enforced.

As to the so-often repeated objection that nobody would labor if lie were not compelled to do so by sheer necessity, we heard enough of it before the emancipation of slaves in America, as well as before the emancipation of serfs in Russia; and we have had the opportunity of appreciating it at its just value. So we shall not try to convince those who can be convinced only by accomplished facts. As to those who reason, they ought to know that, if it really was so with some parts of humanity at its lowest, stages—and yet, what do we know about it?—or if it is so with some small communities, or separate individuals, brought to sheer despair by unsuccesses in their struggle against unfavorable conditions, it is not so with the bulk of the civilized nations. With us, work is a habit, and idleness an artificial growth. Of course, when to be a manual worker means to be compelled to work all the life long for ten hours a day, and often more, at producing some part of something—a pin's head, for instance; when it means to be paid wages on which a family can live only on the condition of the strictest limitation of all its needs; when it means to be always under the menace of being thrown to-morrow out of employment—and we know how frequent are the industrial crises, and what a misery they imply when it means, in a very great number of cases, premature death in a paupers' hospital, if not in the workhouse when to be manual worker signifies to wear all life long a stamp of inferiority in the eyes of those very people who live on the work of their "bands;'' when it always means the renouncement of all those higher enjoyments that science and art give to man—oh, then there is no wonder that everybody—the manual worker as well—has but one dream that of rising to a condition where others would work for him. When I see writers who boast that they are the workers, and write that the manual workers are an inferior race of lazy and improvident fellows, I am inclined to ask them, Who, then, has made all you see round about you the houses you live in, the chairs, the carpets, the streets you enjoy, the clothes you wear? Who built the universities where you were taught, and who provided you with food during your school years? And what would become of your readiness to "work," if you were compelled to work in the above conditions all your life on a pin's head? No doubt, anyhow you would be reported as a lazy fellow! And I affirm that no intelligent man can be closely acquainted with the life of the European working classes without wondering, on the contrary, at their readiness to work, even under such abominable conditions.

Overwork is reluctant to human nature—not work. Overwork for supplying the few with luxury—not work for the well-being of all. Work, labor, is a physiological necessity, a necessity of spending accumulated bodily energy, a necessity which is health and life itself. If so many branches of useful waft are so reluctantly done now, it is merely because they mean overwork, or they are improperly organized. But we know—old Franklin knew it—that four hours of useful work every day would be more than sufficient for supplying everybody with the comfort of a moderately well-to-do middle-class house, if we all gave ourselves to productive work, and if we did not waste our productive powers as we do waste them now. As to the childish question, repeated for fifty years (who would do disagreeable work?), frankly I regret that none of our savants has ever been brought to do it, he it for only one day in his life. If there is still work which is really disagreeable in itself, it is only because our scientific men have never cared to consider the means for rendering it less so they always knew that there were plenty of starving men who would do it for a few pence a day.

As to the third—the chief —objection, which maintains the necessity of a government for punishing those who break the law of society, there is so much to say about it that it hardly can be touched incidentally. The more we study the question, the more we are brought to the conclusion that society itself is responsible for the anti-social deeds perpetrated in its midst; and that no punishments, no prisons, and no hangmen can diminish the numbers of like deeds; nothing short of a re-organization of "society itself. Three-quarters of all the acts which are brought every year before our courts have their origin, either directly or indirectly, in the present disorganized state of society with regard to the production and distribution of wealth—not in the perversity of human nature. As to the relatively few anti-social deeds which result from antisocial inclinations of separate individuals, it is not by prisons, nor even by resorting to the hangman, that we can diminish their numbers. By our prisons, we merely multiply them and render them worse. By our detectives, our "price of blood," our executions, and our jails, we spread in society such a terrible flow of basest passions and habits, that he who would realize the effects of these institutions to their full extent, would be frightened by what society is doing under the pretext of maintaining morality. We must search for other remedies, and the remedies have been indicated long since.

Of course now, when a mother in search of food and shelter for her children must pass by shops filled up with the most refined delicacies of refined gluttony ; when gorgeous and insolent luxury is displayed side by side with the most execrable misery ; when the dog and the horse of a rich man are far better cared for than millions of children whose mothers earn a pitiful salary in the pit or the manufactory ; when each "modest" evening dress of a lady represents eight months, or one year, of human labor; when enrichment on somebody's account is the avowed aim of the upper classes," and no distinct boundary can be traced between honest and dishonest means of making money—then force is the only means for maintaining such a slate of things; then an army of policemen, judges, and hangmen becomes a necessary institution.

But if all our children—all children are our children—received a sound instruction and education—and we have the means of doing so; if every family lived in a decent home—and they could under the present high pitch of our production; if every boy and girl were taught a handicraft at the same time as lie or she receives a scientific instruction, and not to be a manual producer of wealth were considered as a token of inferiority; if men lived in closer contact with one another, and had continually to come into contact on those public affairs which now are invested in the few; and if, in consequence of a closer contact, we were brought to take as lively an interest in our neighbors' difficulties and pains as we formerly took in those of our kinsfolk—then we should not resort to policemen and judges, to prisons and executions. The anti-social deeds would be prevented in bud, not punished; the few contests which would arise would be easily settled by arbitrators and no more force would be necessary to impose their decisions than is required now for enforcing the decisions of the family tribunals of China, or of the Valencia water-courts.

And here we are brought to consider a great question: What would become of morality in a society which would recognize no laws and proclaim the full freedom of the individual? Our answer is plain. Public morality is independent from, and anterior to, law and religion. Until now, the teachings of morality have been associated with religions teachings. But the influence which religious teachings formerly exercised on the mind has faded of late, and the sanction which morality derived from religion has no more the power it formerly had. Millions and millions grow in our cities who have lost the old faith. Is it a reason for throwing morality overboard, and for treating it with the same sarcasm as primitive cosmogony?

Obviously not. No society is possible without certain principles of morality generally recognized. If everybody grew accustomed to deceive his fellow- men if we never could rely on each other's promise and words ; if everybody treated his like as an enemy, against whom every means of warfare is justifiable—no society could exist. And we see, in fact, that notwithstanding the decay of religious beliefs, the principles of morality remain unshaken. We even see irreligious people trying to raise the current standard of morality. The fact is that moral principles are independent of religious beliefs they are anterior to them. The primitive Tchuktchis have no religion they have only superstitions and fear of the hostile forces of nature; and nevertheless we find with them the very same principles of morality which are taught by Christians and Buddhists, Mussulmans and Hebrews. Nay, some of their practices imply a much higher standard of tribal morality than that which appears in our civilized society. In fact, each new religion takes its moral principles from the only real stock of morality—the moral habits which grow with men as soon as they unite to live together in tribes, cities, or nations. No animal society is possible without resulting in a growth of certain moral habits of mutual support and even self-sacrifice for the common well-being. These habits are a necessary condition for the welfare of the species in its struggle for life—cooperation of individuals being a much more important factor in the struggle for the preservation of the species than the so-much-spoken-of physical struggle between individuals for the means of existence. The "fittest" in the organic world are those who grow accustomed to life in society; and life in society necessarily implies moral habits. As to mankind, it has, during its long existence, developed in its midst a nucleus of social habits, of moral habits, which cannot disappear as long as human societies exist. And therefore, notwithstanding the influences to the contrary which are now at work in consequence of our present economical relations, the nucleus of our moral habits continues to exist. Law and religion only formulate them and endeavor to enforce them by their sanction.

Whatever the variety of theories of morality, all can be brought under three chief categories the morality of religion; the utilitarian morality; and the theory of moral habits resulting from the very needs of life in society. Each religious morality sanctifies its prescriptions by making them originate from revelation; and it tries to impress its teachings on the mind by a promise of reward, or punishment, either in this or in future life. The utilitarian morality maintains the idea of reward, but it finds it in man himself. It invites men to analyze their pleasures, to classify them, and to give preference to those which are most intense and most durable. We must recognize, however, that, although having exercised some influence, this system has been judged too artificial by the great mass of human beings. And finally—whatever its varieties—there is the third system of morality which sees in moral actions—in those actions which are most powerful in rendering men best fitted to life in society—a mere necessity of enjoying the joys of his brethren, of suffering when some of his brethren are suffering; a habit and a second nature, slowly elaborated and perfected by life in society. That is the morality of mankind; and that is also the morality of anarchy.

I could not better illustrate the difference between the three systems of morality than by repeating the following example. Suppose a child is drowning in a river, and three men stand on the bank of the river: the religious moralist, the utilitarian, and the plain man of the people. The religious man is supposed, first, to say to himself that to save the child would bring him happiness in this or another life, and then save the child; but if he does so, he is merely a good reckoner, no more. Then comes the utilitarian, who is supposed to reason thus "The enjoyments of life may be of the higher and of the lower description. To save the child would assure me the higher enjoyment. Therefore let me jump in the river." But, admitting that there ever was a man who reasoned in this way, again, he would be a mere reckoner, and society would do better not to rely very much upon him: who knows what sophism might pass one day through his head! And here is the third man. He does not much calculate. But he has grown in the habit of always feeling the joys of those who surround him, and to feel happy when others are happy; of suffering, deeply suffering when others suffer. To act accordingly is his second nature. He hears the cry of the mother, he sees the child struggling for life, and he jumps in the river like a good dog, and saves the child, thanks to the energy of his feelings. And when the mother thanks him, he answers: "Why! I could not do otherwise than I did." That is the real morality. That is the morality of the masses of the people; the morality grown to a habit, which will exist, whatever the ethical theories made by philosophers, and will steadily improve in proportion as the conditions of our social life are improved. Such a morality needs no laws for its maintenance. It is a natural growth favored by the general sympathy which every advance toward a wider and higher morality finds in all fellow-men.

Such are, in a very brief summary, the leading principles of anarchy. Each of them hurts many a prejudice, and yet each of them results from an analysis of the very tendencies displayed by human society. Each of them is rich in consequences and implies a thorough revision of many a current opinion. And it is not a mere insight into a remote future. Already now, whatever the sphere of action of the individual, he can act, either in accordance with anarchist principles or on an opposite line. And all that may be done in that direction will be done in the direction whereto further development goes. All that may be done in the opposite way will he an attempt to force humanity to go where it will not go. —Nineteenth Century.

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* Nineteenth Century, February, 1867. The present article has been delayed in consequence of the illness of the author.

Peter Kropotkin, The Scientific Bases of Anarchy

Peter Kropotkin, "The Scientific Bases of Anarchy," The Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature," 45, 4 (April 1887), 433-443. [Reprinted from The Nineteenth Century.]

THE SCIENTIFIC BASES OF ANARCHY.

BY PRINCE PETER KROPOTKIN.

Anarchy (αν-αρχη), the No-Government system of Socialism, has a double origin. It is an outgrowth of the two great movements of thought in the economical and the political fields which characterize our century, and especially its second part. In common with all Socialists, the anarchists hold that the private ownership of land, capital, and machinery has had its time that it is condemned to disappear; and that all requisites for production must, and will, become the common property of society, and be managed in common by the producers of wealth. And, in common with the most advanced representatives of political Radicalism, they maintain that the ideal of the political organization of society is a condition of things where the functions of government are reduced to a minimum, and the individual recovers his full liberty of initiative and action for satisfying, by means of free groups and federations— freely constituted—all the infinitely varied needs of the human being. As regards Socialism, most of the anarchists arrive at its ultimate conclusion, that is, at a complete negation of the wage- system and at communism. And with reference to political organization, by giving a further development to the above-mentioned part of the Radical programme, they arrive at the conclusion that the ultimate aim of society is the reduction of the functions of government to nil—that is, to a society without government, to Anarchy. The anarchists maintain, moreover, that such being the ideal of social and political organization, they must not remit it to future centuries, hut that only those changes in our social organization which are in accordance with the above double ideal, and constitute an approach to it, will have a chance of life and be beneficial for the commonwealth.

As to the method followed by the anarchist thinker, it differs to a great extent from that followed by tile Utopists. The anarchist thinker does not resort to metaphysical conceptions (like the "natural rights,” the “duties of the State,” and so on) for establishing what are, in his opinion, the best conditions for realizing the greatest happiness of humanity. He follows, on the contrary, the course traced by the modern philosophy of evolution—without entering, however, the slippery route of mere analogies so often resorted to by Herbert Spencer. He studies human society as it is now and was in the past; and, without either endowing men altogether, or separate individuals, with superior qualities which they do not possess, he merely considers society as an aggregation of organisms trying to find out the best ways of combining the wants of the individual with those of co-operation for the welfare of the species. He studies society and tries to discover its tendencies, past and present, its growing needs, intellectual and economical ; and in his ideal he merely points out in which direction evolution goes. He distinguishes between the real wants and tendencies of human aggregations and the accidents (want of knowledge, migrations, wars, conquests) which prevented these tendencies from being satisfied, or temporarily paralyze them. And he concludes that the two most prominent, although often unconscious, tendencies throughout our history were: a tendency toward integrating our labor for the production of all riches in common, so as finally to render it impossible to discriminate the part of the common production due to the separate individual; and a tendency toward the fullest freedom of the individual for the prosecution of all aims, beneficial both for himself and for society at large. The ideal of the anarchist is thus a mere summing-up of what he considers to be the next phase of evolution. It is no longer a matter of faith; it is a matter for scientific discussion.

In fact, one of the leading features of our century is the growth of Socialism and the rapid spreading of Socialist views among the working classes. How could it be otherwise? We have witnessed during the last seventy years an unparalleled sudden increase of our powers of production, resulting in an accumulation of wealth which has outstripped the most sanguine expectations. But, owing to our wage system, this hi- crease of wealth—due to the combined efforts of men of science, of managers, and workmen as well—has resulted only in an unprevented accumulation of wealth in the hands of the owners of capital; while an increase of misery for the great numbers, and an insecurity of life for all, have been the lot of the workmen. The unskilled laborers, in continuous search for labor, are failing into an unheard-of destitution; and even the best-paid artisans and skilled workmen, who undoubtedly are living now a more comfortable life than before, labor under the permanent menace of being thrown, in their turn, into the same conditions as the unskilled paupers, in consequence of some of the continuous and unavoidable fluctuations of industry and caprices of capital. The chasm between the modern millionaire who squanders the produce of human labor in a gorgeous and vain luxury, and the pauper reduced to a miserable and insecure existence, is thus growing more and more, so as to break the very unity of society—the harmony of its life—and to endanger the progress of its further development. At the same time, the working classes are the less inclined patiently to endure this division of society into two classes, as they themselves become more and more conscious of the wealth-producing power of modern industry, of the part played by labor in the production of wealth, and of their own capacities of organization. In proportion as all classes of the community take a more lively part in public affairs, and knowledge spreads among the masses, their longing for equality becomes stronger, and their demands of social reorganization become louder and louder: they can be ignored no more. The worker claims his share in the riches he produces he claims his share in the management of production; and he claims not only some additional wellbeing, but also his full rights in the higher enjoyments or science and art. These claims, which formerly were uttered only by the social reformer, begin now to be made by a daily growing minority of those who work in the factory or till the acre; and they so conform with our feelings of j ustice, that they find support in a daily growing minority amid the privileged classes themselves. Socialism becomes thus the idea of the nineteenth century; and neither coercion nor pseudo-reforms can stop its further growth.

Much hope of improvement was laid, of course, in the extension of political rights to the working classes. But these concessions, unsupported as they were by corresponding changes in the economical relations, proved delusory. They did not materially improve the conditions of the great bulk of the workmen. Therefore, the watchword of Socialism is “Economical freedom, as the only secure basis for political freedom.” And as long as the present wage system, with all its bad consequences, remains unaltered, the Socialist watchword will continue to inspire the workmen. Socialism will continue to grow until it has realized its programme.

Side by side with this great movement of thought in economical matters, a like movement was going on with regard to political rights, political organization, and the functions of government. Government was submitted to the same criticism as Capital. While most of the Radicals saw in universal suffrage and republican institutions the last word of political wisdom, a further step was made by the few. The very functions of government and the State, as also their relations to the individual, were submitted to a sharper and deeper criticism. Representative government having been experimented on a wider field than before, its effects became more and more prominent. It became obvious that these defects are not merely accidental, but inherent to the system itself. Parliament and its executive proved to be unable to attend to all the numberless affairs of the community and to conciliate the varied and often opposite interests of the separate parts of a State. Election proved unable to find out the men who might represent a nation, and manage, otherwise than in a party spirit, the affairs they are compelled to legislate upon. These defects became so striking that the very principles of the representative system were criticised and their justness doubted. Again, the dangers of a centralized government became still more conspicuous when the Socialists came to the front and asked for a further increase of the powers of government by intrusting it with the management of the immense field covered now by the economical relations between individuals. The question was asked, whether a government intrusted with the management of industry and trade, would not become a permanent danger for liberty and peace, and whether it even would be able to be a good manager?

The Socialists of the earlier part of this century did not fully realize the immense difficulties of the problem. Convinced as they were of the necessity of economical reforms, most of them took no notice of the need of freedom for the individual ; and we have had social reformers ready to submit society to any kind of theocracy, dictatorship, or even Cæsarism, in order to obtain reforms in a Socialist sense. Therefore we saw, in this country and also on the Continent, the division of men of advanced opinions into political Radicals and Socialists—the former looking with distrust on the latter, as they saw in them a danger for the political liberties which have been won by the civilized nations after a long series of struggles. And even now, when the Socialists all over Europe are becoming political parties, and profess the democratic faith, there remains among most impartial men a well-founded fear of the Volksstaat or “popular State” being as great a danger for liberty as any form of autocracy, if its government be intrusted with the management of all the social organization, including the production and distribution of wealth.

The evolution of the last forty years prepared, however, the way for showing the necessity and possibility of a higher form of social organization which might guarantee economical freedom without reducing the individual to the role of a slave to the State. The origins of government were carefully studied, and all metaphysical conceptions as to its divine or “social contract” derivation having been laid aside, it appeared that it is among us of a relatively modern origin) and that its powers grew precisely in proportion as the division of society into the privileged and unprivileged classes was growing in the course of ages. Representative government was also reduced to its real value—that of an instrument which has rendered services in the struggle against autocracy, but not an ideal of free political organization. As to the system of philosophy which saw in the State (the Kultur-Staat) a leader to progress, it was more and more shaken as it became evident that progress is the more effective when it is not checked by State interference. It thus became obvious that a further advance in social life does not lie in the direction of a further concentration of power and regulative functions in the hands of a governing body, but in the direction of decentralization, both territorial and functional—in a subdivision of public functions with respect both to their sphere of action and to the character of the functions it is in the abandonment to the initiative of freely constituted groups of all those functions which are now considered as the functions of govern- went.

This current of thought found its expression not merely in literature, but also, to a limited extent, in life. The uprise of the Paris Commune, followed by that of the Commune of Cartagena— a movement of which the historical bearing seems to have been quite overlooked in this country—opened a new page of history. If we analyze not only this movement in itself, but also the impression it left in the minds and the tendencies which were manifested during the communal revolution, we must recognize in it an indication showing that in the future human agglomerations which are more advanced in their social development will try to start an independent life ; and that they will endeavor to convert the more backward parts of a nation by example, instead of imposing their opinions by law and force, or submitting themselves to the majority-rule, which always is a mediocrity-rule. At the same time the failure of representative government within the Commune itself proved that self-government and self-administration must be carried on further than in a mere territorial sense to be effective they must be carried on also with regard to the various functions of life within the free community; a merely territorial limitation of the sphere of action of government will not do—representative government being as deficient in a city as it is in a nation. Life gave thus a further point in favor of the no-government theory) and a new impulse to anarchist thought.

Anarchists recognize the justice of both the just-mentioned tendencies toward economical and political freedom, and see in them two different manifestations of the very same need of equality which constitutes the very essence of all struggles mentioned by history. Therefore, in common with all Socialists, the anarchist says to the political reformer

No substantial reform in the sense of political equality, and no limitation of the powers of government, can be made as long as society is divided into two hostile camps, and the laborer remains, economically speaking, a serf to his employer.” But to the Popular State Socialist we say also “You cannot modify the existing conditions of property without deeply modifying at the same time the political organization. You must limit the powers of government and renounce Parliamentary rule. To each new economical phasis of life corresponds a new political phasis. Absolute monarchy—that is, Court-rule—corresponded to the system of serfdom. Representative government corresponds to Capital-rule. Both, however, are class-rule. But in a society where the distinction between capitalist and laborer has disappeared, there is no need of such a government it would be an anachronism, a nuisance. Free workers would require a free organization, and this cannot have another basis than free agreement and free co-operation, without sacrificing the autonomy of the individual to the all-pervading interference of the State. The no-capitalist system implies the no-government system.’’

Meaning thus the emancipation of man from the oppressive powers of capitalist and government as well, the system of anarchy becomes a synthesis of the two powerful currents of thought which characterize our century.

In arriving at these conclusions anarchy proves to be in accordance with the conclusions arrived at by the philosophy of evolution. By bringing to light the’ plasticity of organization, the philosophy of evolution has shown the admirable adaptivity of organisms to their conditions of life, and the ensuing development of such faculties as render more complete both the adaptations of the aggregates to their surroundings and those of each of the constituent parts of the aggregate to the needs of free cooperation. ft familiarized us with the circumstance that throughout organic nature the capacities for life in common are growing in proportion as the integration of organisms into compound aggregates becomes more and more complete ; and it enforced thus the opinion already expressed by social moralists as to the perfectibility of human nature. It has shown us that, in the long run of the struggle for existence,’’ the fittest’’ will prove to lie those who combine intellectual knowledge with the knowledge necessary for the production of wealth, and not those who are now the richest because they, or their ancestors, have been momentarily the strongest. By showing that the “struggle for existence” must be conceived, not merely in its restricted sense of a struggle between individuals for the means of subsistence, but in its wider sense of adaptation of all individuals of the species to the best conditions for the survival of the species, as well as for the greatest possible sum of life and happiness for each and all, it permitted us to deduce the laws of moral science from the social needs and habits of mankind. It showed us the infinitesimal part played by positive law in moral evolution, and the immense part played by the natural growth of altruistic feelings, which develop as soon as the conditions of life favor their growth. It thus enforced the opinion of social reformers as to the necessity of modifying the conditions of life for improving man, instead of trying to improve human nature by moral teachings while life works in an opposite direction, Finally, by studying human society from the biological point of view, it came to the conclusions arrived at by anarchists from the study of history and present tendencies, as to further progress being in the line of socialization of wealth and integrated labor, combined with the fullest possible freedom of the individual.

It is not a mere coincidence that Herbert Spencer, whom we may consider as a pretty fair expounder of the philosophy of evolution, has been brought to conclude, with regard to political organization, that ‘‘that form of society toward which we are progressing’’ is “one in which government will be reduced to the smallest amount possible, and freedom increased to the greatest amount possible." [1] When he opposes in these words the conclusions of his synthetic philosophy to those of Auguste Comte, he arrives at very nearly the same conclusion as Proudhon [2] and Bakunin. [3] More than that, the very methods of argumentation and the illustrations resorted to by Herbert Spencer (daily supply of fond, post-office, and so on) are the same which we find in the writings of the anarchists. The channels of thought were the same, although both were unaware of each other’s endeavors.

Again, when Mr. Spencer so powerfully, and even not without a touch of passion, argues (in his Appendix to the third edition of the Data of Ethics) that human societies are marching toward a state when a further identification of altruism with egoism will be made "in the sense that personal gratification will come from the gratification of others;" when he says that “we are shown, undeniably, that it is a perfectly possible thing for organisms to become so adjusted to the requirements of their lives, that energy expended for the general welfare may not only be adequate to check energy expended for the individual welfare, but may come to subordinate it, so far as to leave individual welfare no greater part than is necessary for maintenance of individual life"—provided the conditions for such relations between the individual and the community be maintained [4]—he derives from the study of nature the very same conclusions which the forerunners of anarchy, Fourier and Robert Owen, derived from a study of human character. When we see further Mr. Bain so forcibly elaborating the theory of moral habits, and the French philosopher, M. Guyau, publishing his remarkable work on Morality without Obligation or Sanction; when J. S. Mill so sharply criticises representative government, and when he discusses the problem of liberty, although failing to establish its necessary conditions; when Sir John Lubbock prosecutes his admirable studies on animal societies, and Mr. Morgan applies scientific methods of investigation to the philosophy of history—when, in short, every year, by bringing some new arguments to the philosophy of evolution, adds at the same time some new arguments to the theory of anarchy—we must recognize that this last, although differing as to its starting-points, follows the same sound methods of scientific investigation. Our confidence in its conclusions is still more increased. The difference between anarchists and the just-named philosophers may be immense as to the presumed speed of evolution, and as to the conduct which one ought to assume as soon as he has had an insight into the aims toward which society is marching. No attempt, however, has been made scientifically to determine the ratio of evolution, nor have the chief elements of the problem (the state of mind of the masses) been taken into account by the evolutionist philosophers. As to bringing one’s action into accordance with his philosophical conceptions, we know that, unhappily, intellect and will are too often separated by a chasm not to be filled by mere philosophical speculations, however deep and elaborate.

There is, however, between the just-named philosophers and the anarchists a wide difference on one point of primordial importance. This difference is the stranger as it arises on a point which might be discussed figures in hand, and which constitutes the very basis of all further deductions, as it belongs to what biological sociology would describe as the physiology of nutrition.

There is, in fact, a widely spread fallacy, maintained by Mr. Spencer and many others, as to the causes of the misery which we see round about its. It was affirmed forty years ago, and it is affirmed now by Mr. Spencer and his followers, that misery in civilized society is due to our insufficient production, or rather to the circumstance that "population presses upon the means of subsistence." It would be of no use to inquire into the origin of such a misrepresentation of facts, which might be easily verified. It may have its origin in inherited misconceptions which have nothing to do with the philosophy of evolution. But to be maintained and advocated by philosophers, there must be, in the conceptions of these philosophers, some confusion as to the different aspects of the struggle for existence. Sufficient importance is not given to the difference between the struggle which goes on among organisms which do not co-operate for providing the means of subsistence, and those which do so. In this last case again there must be some confusion between those aggregates whose members find their means of subsistence in the ready produce of the vegetable and animal kingdom, and those whose members artificially grow their means of subsistence and are enabled to increase (to a yet unknown amount) the productivity of each spot of the surface of the globe. Hunters who hunt, each of them for his own sake, and hunters who unite into societies for hunting, stand quite differently with regard to the means of subsistence. But the difference is still greater between the hunters who take their means of subsistence as they are in nature, and civilized men who grow their food and produce all requisites for a comfortable life by machinery. in this last case—the stock of potential energy in nature being little short of infinite in comparison with the present population of the globe—the means of availing ourselves of the stock of energy are increased and perfected precisely in proportion to the density of population and to the previously accumulated stock of technical knowledge so that for human beings who are in possession of scientific knowledge, and cooperate for the artificial production of the means of subsistence and comfort, the law is quite the reverse to that of Malthus. The accumulation of means of subsistence and comfort is going on at a much speedier rate than the increase of population. The only conclusion which we can deduce from the laws of evolution and of multiplication of effects is that the available amount of means of subsistence increases at a rate which increases itself in proportion as population becomes denser—unless it be artificially (and temporarily) checked by some defects of social organization. As to our powers of production (our potential production), they increase at a still speedier rate ; in proportion as scientific knowledge grows, the means for spreading it are rendered easier, and inventive genius is stimulated by all previous inventions.

If the fallacy as to the pressure of population on the means of subsistence could be maintained a hundred years ago, it can be maintained no more, since we have witnessed the effects of science on industry, and the enormous increase of our productive powers during the last hundred years. We know, in fact, that while the growth of population of England has been from 16½ millions in 1844 to 26¾ millions in 1883, showing thus an increase of 62 per cent., the growth of national wealth (as testified by schedule A of the income Tax Act) has increased at a twice speedier rate; it has grown from 221 to 507½ millions—that is, by 130 per cent. [5] And we know that the me increase of wealth has taken place in France, where population remains almost stationary, and that it has gone on at a stilt speedier rate in the United States, where population is increasing every year by immigration.

But the figures just mentioned, while showing the real increase of production, give only a faint idea of what our production might be tinder a more reasonable economical organization. We know well that the owners of capital, while trying to produce wares with fewer hands,” are also continually endeavoring to limit the production, in order to sell at higher prices. When the benefits of a concern are going down, the owner of the capital limits the production, or totally suspends it, and prefers to engage his capital in foreign loans or shares of Patagonian gold-mines. Just now there are plenty of pitmen in England who ask for nothing better than to he permitted to extract coal and supply with cheap fuel the households where children are shivering before empty chimneys. There are thousands of weavers who ask for nothing better than to weave stuffs in order to replace the Whitechapel rugs with linen. And so in all branches of industry. How can we talk about a want of means of subsistence when 246 blasting furnaces and thousands of factories lie idle in Great Britain alone ; and when there are, just now, thousands and thousands of unemployed in London alone thousands of men who would consider themselves happy if they were permitted to transform (under the guidance of experienced men) the heavy clay of Middlesex into a rich soil, and to cover with rich cornfields and orchards the acres of meadowland which now yield only a few pounds' worth of hay ? But they are prevented from doing so by the owners of the land, of the weaving factory, and of the coal- mine, because capital finds it more advantageous to supply the Khedive with harems and the Russian Government with “ strategic railways’’ and Krupp guns. Of course the maintenance of harems pays it gives ten or fifteen per cent, on the capital, while the extraction of coal does not pay—that is, it brings three or five per cent.,—and that is a sufficient reason for limiting the production and permitting would-be economists to indulge in reproaches to the working classes as to their too rapid multiplication!

Here we have instances of a direct and conscious limitation of production, due to the circumstance that the requisites for production belong to the few, and that these few have the right of disposing of them at their will, without caring about the interests of the community. But there is also the indirect and unconscious limitation of production—that which results from squandering the produce of human labor in luxury, instead of applying it to a further increase of production.

This last even cannot be estimated in figures, but a walk through the rich shops of any city and a glance at the manner in which money is squandered now, can give an approximate idea of this indirect limitation. When a rich man spends a thousand pounds for his stables, he squanders five to six thousand days of human labor, which might be used, under a better social organization, for supplying with comfortable homes those who are compelled to live now in dens. And when a lady spends a hundred pounds for her dress, we cannot but say that she squanders, at least, two years of human labor, which, again under a better organization, might have supplied a hundred women with decent dresses, and much more if applied to a further improvement of the instruments of production. Preachers thunder against luxury, because it is shameful to squander money for feeding and sheltering hounds and horses, when thousands live in the East End on sixpence a day, and other thousands have not even their miserable sixpence every day. But the economist sees more than that in our modern luxury when millions of days of labor are spent every year for the satisfaction of the stupid vanity of the rich, be says that so many millions of workers have been diverted from the manufacture of those useful instruments which would permit us to decuple and centuple our present production of means of subsistence and of requisites for comfort.

In short, if we take into account both the real and the potential increase of our wealth, and consider both the direct and indirect limitation of production, which are unavoidable under our present economical system, we must recognize that the supposed “pressure of population on tile means of subsistence” is a mere fallacy, repeated, like many other fallacies, without even taking the trouble of submitting it to a moment’s criticism. The causes of the present social disease must be sought elsewhere.

Let us take a civilized country. The forests have been cleared, the swamps drained. Thousands of roads and railways intersect it in all directions; the rivers have been rendered navigable, and the seaports are of easy access. Canals connect the seas. The rocks have been pierced by deep shafts; thousands of manufactures cover the land. Science has taught men how to use the energy of nature for the satisfaction of his needs. Cities have slowly grown in the long run of ages, and treasures of science and art are accumulated in these centres of civilization. But—who has made all these marvels?

The combined efforts of scores of generations have contributed toward the achievement of these results, The forests have been cleared centuries ago; millions of men have spent years and years of labor in draining the swamps, in tracing the roads, in building the railways Other millions have built the cities and created the civilization we boast of. Thousands of inventors, mostly unknown, mostly dying in poverty and neglect, have elaborated the machinery in which Man admires his genius Thousands of writers, philosophers and men of science, supported by many thousands of compositors, printers, and other laborers whose name is legion, have contributed in elaborating and spreading knowledge, in dissipating errors, in creating the atmosphere of scientific thought, without which the marvels of our century never would have been brought to life. The genius of a Mayer and a Grove, the patient work of a Joule, surely have done more far giving a new start to modern industry than all the capitalists of the world; but these men of genius themselves are, in their turn, the children of industry thousands of engines had to transform heat into mechanical force, and mechanical force into sound, light, and electricity—and they had to do so years long, every day, under the eyes of humanity—before some of our contemporaries proclaimed the mechanical origin of heat and the correlation of physical forces, and before we ourselves became prepared to listen to them and understand their teachings. Who knows for how ninny decades we should continue to be ignorant of this theory which now revolutionizes industry, were it not for the inventive powers and skill of those unknown workers who have improved the steam-engine, who brought all its parts to perfection, so as to make steam more manageable than a horse, and to render the use of the engine nearly universal? But the same is true with regard to each smallest part of our machinery. In each machine, however simple, we may read a whole history—a long history of sleepless nights, of delusions and joys, of partial inventions and partial improvements which brought it to its present state. Nay, nearly each new machine is a synthesis, a result of thousands of partial inventions made, not only in one special department of machinery, but in all departments of the wide field of mechanics.

Our cities, connected by roads and brought into easy communication with all peopled parts of the globe, are the growth of centuries; and each house in these cities, each factory, each shop, derives its value, its very raison d'être, from the fact that it is situated on a spot of the globe where thousands or millions have gathered together. Every smallest part of the immense whole which we call the wealth of civilized nations derives its value precisely from being a part of this whole. What would be the value of an immense London shop or storehouse were it not situated precisely in London, which has become the gathering-spot for five millions of human beings? And what the value of our coal-pits, our manufactures, our shipbuilding yards, were it not for the immense traffic which goes on across the seas, for the railways which transport mountains of merchandise, for the cities which number their inhabitants by millions? Who is, then, the individual who has the right to step forward and, laying his hands on the smallest part of this immense whole, to say, "I have produced this it belongs to me?” And how can we discriminate, in this immense interwoven whole, the part which the isolated individual may appropriate to himself with the slightest approach to justice? Houses and streets, canals and railways, machines and works of art, all these have been created by the combined efforts of generations past and present, of men living on these islands and men living thousands of miles away.

But it has happened in the long run of ages that everything which permits men further to increase their production, or even to continue it, has been appropriated by the few. The land, which derives its value precisely from its being necessary for an ever-increasing population, belongs to the few, who may prevent the community from cultivating it. The coal-pits, which represent the labor of generations, and which also derive their value from the wants of the manufactures and railroads, from the immense trade carried on and the density of population (what is the value of coal-layers in Transbaikalia?), belong again to the few, who have even the right of stopping the extraction of coal if they choose to give another use to their capital. The lace-weaving machine, which represents, in its present state of perfection, the work of three generations of Lancashire weavers, belongs again to the few ; and if the grandsons of the very same weaver who invented the first lace-weaving machine claim their tights of bringing one of these machines into motion, they will be told "Hands off! this machine does not belong to you!" The railroads, which mostly would be useless heaps of iron if Great Britain had not its present dense population, its industry, trade, and traffic, belong again to the few—to a few shareholders, who may even not know where the railway is situated which brings them a yearly income larger than that of a medieval king and if the children of those people who died by thousands in digging the tunnels would gather and go—a ragged and starving crowd—to ask bread or work from the shareholders, they would be met with bayonets and bullets.

Who is the sophist who will dare to say that such an organization is just? But what is unjust cannot be beneficial for mankind; and it is not. In consequence of this monstrous organization, the son of a workman, when he is able to work, finds no acre to till, no machine to set in motion, unless he agrees to sell his labor for a sum inferior to its real value. His lather and grandfather have contributed in draining the field, or erecting the factory, to the full extent of their capacities—and nobody can do more than that—but he comes into the world more destitute than a savage. If he resorts to agriculture, he will be permitted to cultivate a plot of land, but on the condition that he gives up one quarter of his crop to the landlord. If he resorts to industry, he will be permitted to work, but on the condition that out of the thirty shillings lie has produced, ten shillings or more will be pocketed by the owner of the machine. We cry against the feudal baron who did not permit any one to settle on his land otherwise than on payment of one quarter of the crops to the lord of the manor; but we continue to do as they did—we extend their system. The forms have changed, but the essence has remained the same. And the workman is compelled to accept the feudal conditions which we call "free contract,” because nowhere will he find better conditions. Everything has been appropriated by somebody; he must accept the bargain, or starve.

Owing to this circumstance our production takes a wrong turn. It takes no care of the needs of the community; its only aim is to increase the benefits of the capitalist. Therefore—the continuous fluctuations of industry, the crises periodically coming nearly every ten years, and throwing out of employment several hundred thousand men who are brought to complete misery, whose children grow up in the gutter, ready to become inmates of the prison and workhouse. The workmen being unable to purchase with their wages the riches they are producing, industry must search for markets elsewhere, amid the middle classes of other nations. It must find markets, in the East, in Africa, anywhere; it must increase, by trade, the number of its serfs in Egypt, in India, in the Congo. But everywhere it finds competitors in other nations which rapidly enter into the same fine of industrial development. And wars, continuous wars, must be fought for the supremacy on the world-market—wars for the possession of the East, wars for getting possession of the seas, wars for having the right of imposing heavy duties on foreign merchandise. The thunder of guns never ceases in Europe; whole generations are slaughtered and we spend in armaments the third of the revenue of our States—a revenue raised, the poor know with what difficulties.

Education is the privilege of the few. Not because we can find no teachers, not because the workman’s son and daughter are less able to receive instruction, but because one can receive no reasonable instruction when at the age of fifteen be descends into the mine, or goes selling newspapers in the streets. Society becomes divided into two hostile camps; and no freedom is possible under such conditions. While the Radical asks for a further extension of liberty, the statesman answers him that a further increase of liberty would bring about an uprising of the paupers ; and those political liberties which have cost so dear are replaced by coercion, by exceptional laws, by military rule.

And finally, the injustice of our repartition of wealth exercises the most deplorable effect on our morality. Our principles of morality say "Love your neighbor as yourself;" but let a child follow this principle and take oil his coat to give it to the shivering pauper, and his mother will tell him that he must never understand the moral principles in their right sense. If he lives according to them, he will go barefoot, without alleviating the misery round about him! Morality is good on the lips, not in deeds. Our preachers say, “Who works, prays," and everybody endeavors to make others work for himself. They say, “Never lie!" and politics is a big lie. And we accustom ourselves and our children to live under this double-faced morality, which is hypocrisy, and to conciliate our double-faced- ness by sophistry. Hypocrisy and sophistry become the very basis of our life. But society cannot live under such a morality. It cannot last so it must, it will, be changed.

The question is thus no more a mere question of bread, it covers the whole field of human activity. But it has at its bottom a question of social economy, and we conclude: The means of production and of satisfaction of all needs of society, having been created by the common efforts of all must be at the disposal of all. The private appropriation of requisites for production is neither just nor beneficial. All must be placed on the same footing as producers and consumers of wealth. That would be the only way for society to step out of the bad conditions which have been created by centuries of wars and oppression. That would be the only guarantee for further progress in a direction of equality and freedom, which always were the real, although unspoken goal of humanity.—Nineteenth Century.

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1 Essays, vol. iii. I am fully aware that in the very same Essays, a few pages further, Herbert Spencer destroys the force of the fore going statement by the following words: “Not only do I contend.” he says, “that the restraining power of the State over individuals and bodies, or classes of individuals, is requisite, but I have contended that it should be exercised much more effectually and carried much further than at present” (p. 145). And although he tries to establish a distinction between the (desirable) negatively regulative and the (undesirable) positively regulative functions of government, we know that no such distinction can be established in political life, end that the former necessarily lead to, and even imply, the latter. But we must distinguish between the system of philosophy and its interpreter. All we can say is that Herbert Spencer does not fully indorse all the conclusions which ought to be drawn from his system of philosophy.

2 Idée générale sur la Révolution au XIX^e siècle; and Confessions d’un révolutionnaire.

3 Lettres à un Français sur la crise actuelle; L'Empire knouto-germanique; The State’s Idea and Anarchy (Russian).

4 Pages 300 to 302. In fact, the whole of his chapter ought to be quoted.

5 A. R. Wallace’s Bad Times.

Peter Kropotkin, The Morality of Nature

Peter Kropotkin, "The Morality of Nature," The Living Age, 245 (Seventh Series, Vol. XXVII), No. 3172 (April 22, 1905), 193-209. [Reprinted from The Nineteenth Century and After.]

THE MORALITY OF NATURE.

The work of Darwin was not limited to biology only. Already in 1837, when he had just written a rough outline of his theory of the origin of species, he entered in his note-book this significant remark: “My theory will lead to a new philosophy.” And so it did in reality. The application which he made of the idea of evolution to the whole of organic life marked a new era in philosophy;[1] and it led him later on to write a sketch of the development of the moral sense, which opened a new page in ethics. In this sketch so much was done to throw a new light upon the true and efficient cause of the moral feelings, and place the whole of ethics on a scientific basis, that although Darwin’s leading ideas may be considered as a further development of those of Shaftesbury and Hutcheson, his work represents, nevertheless, a new departure, on the lines faintly indicated by Bacon. It secured, therefore, for its author a place by the side of the other founders of ethical schools, such as Hume, Hobbes, or Kant.

The leading ideas of Darwin’s ethics may easily be summed up. In the very first sentences of his essay he states his object in quite definite terms. He begins with a praise of the sense of duty, which he characterizes in the well- known poetical words of Kant: “Duty! Wondrous thought that workest neither by fond insinuation, flattery, nor by any threat . . .“ &c. And he undertakes to explain this sense of duty, or moral conscience, “exclusively from the side of natural history”—an explanation, he adds, which no English writer had hitherto attempted to give.[2] That the moral sense should be acquired by each individual separately, during its lifetime, he naturally considers “at least extremely improbable on the general theory of evolution”; and he derives this sense from the social feelings which are Instinctive or Innate in the lower animals, and probably In man as well (pp. 150-151). The origin and the very foundation of all moral feelings Darwin sees “in the social instincts which lead the animal to take pleasure in the society of its fellows, to feel a certain amount of sympathy with them, and to perform various services for them”; sympathy being tinderstood here in its proper sense—not as a feeling of commiseration or love, but as a “fellow-feelbig” or “mutual sensibility”; the fact of being induenced by another’s feelings.

This being Darwin’s first proposition, his second is that as soon as the mental faculties of a species become highly developed, as they are in man, the social instinct wilt necessarily lead, as every other unsatisfied instinct does, to a sense of dissatisfaction, or even misery, as often as the individual, reasoning about its past actions, sees that in sonic of them “the enduring and always present social instinct had yielded to some other Instinct, at the time stronger, but neither enduring nor leaving behind it a very vivid impression.” For Darwin the moral sense Is thus not the mysterious gift of unknown origin which it was for Kant “Any animal whatever,” he says, “endowed with well-marked social instincts, the parental and filial affections being here included, would inevitably acquire a moral sense, or conscience [Kant’s ‘knowledge of duty’], as soon as its intellectual powers had become as well, or nearly as well, developed as in man” (ch. iv. pp. 149-150).

To these two fundamental propositions Darwin adds two secondary ones. After the power of language had been acquired, and the wishes of the community could be expressed, “the common opinion how each member ought to act for the public good would naturally become, in a paramount degree, the guide of action.” However, the effect of public approbation and disapprobation depends entirely upon the development of mutual sympathy. It is because we feel in sympathy with others that we appreciate their opinions; and public opinion acts in a moral direction only where the social Instinct is sufficiently strongly developed. This is evidently an important remark, because It refutes those theories of Mandeville and his more or less outspoken eighteenth-century followers, which represented morality as nothing but a set of conventional manners. Finally, Darwin mentions habit as a potent factor for framing our conduct it strengthens the social Instinct and mutual sympathy, as also obedience to the judgment of the community.

Having thus stated the substance of his views in four definite propositions, Darwin gives them some further developments. He examines, first, sociability in animals, their love of society, and the misery which every one of them feels if it is left alone; their continual intercourse; their mutual warnings, and the services they render each other in hunting and for self-defence. “It is certain,” he says, “that associated animals have a feeling of love for each other which is not felt by non-social adult animals.” They may not much sympathize with each other’s pleasures, but cases of sympathy with each other’s distress or danger are quite common, and Darwin quotes a few of the most striking instances. Some of them, such as Saintsbury’s blind pelican or the blind rat, both of which were fed by their congeners, have become classical by this time, while several similar illustrations have been added since. “Moreover, beside love and sympathy,” Darwin continues, “animals exhibit other qualities connected with social instincts which in us would be called moral,” and he gives a few examples of moral self-restraint in dogs and elephants. Altogether it is evident that every action in common—and with certain animals it is quite habitual—requires some restraint of the same sort. However, it must be said that Darwin did not treat the subject of sociability in animals and their incipient moral feelings with all the developments which it deserved, In view of the central position which it occupies in his theory of morality.

Considering nest human morality, Darwin remarks that although man, such as he now exists, has but few special instincts, he nevertheless is a sociable being who must have retained from an extremely remote period some degree of instinctive love and sympathy for his fellows. These feelings act as an impulsive instinct, which is assisted by reason, experience, and the desire of approbation. Thus the social instincts, which must have been acquired by man in a very rude state, and probably even by his ape-like progenitors, still give the impulse for some of his best actions.” The remainder is the result of a steadily growing intelligence and collective education.

It is evident that these views are correct only if we are ready to recognize that the intellectual faculties of animals differ from those of man in degree, but not in their essence. But this is admitted now by most students of comparative psychology; and the attempts which have been made lately to establish “a gulf” between the instincts and the Intellectual faculties of man and those of animals have not attained their end.[3] However, It does not follow from this resemblance that the moral instincts developed in different species, and the less so in species belonging to two different classes of animals, should be Identical. If we compare insects with mammals, we must never forget that the lines of their development have diverged at it very early period of animal evolution. The consequence was that a deep physiological differentiation between separate portions of the same species took place with the ants, the bees, the wasps, &c., corresponding to a permanent physiological division of labor between their females, their males, and their workers—a division of which there is no trace among mammals. Therefore it seems almost impossible to ask men to judge of the morality of the worker-bees when they kill the males in their hive; and this is why the illustration of Darwin to this effect met with so much hostile criticism. And yet the moral conceptions of man and the actions of insects have so much in common that the greatest ethical teachers of mankind did not hesitate to recommend certain features of the ants and the bees for imitation by man. Their devotion to the group is certainly not surpassed by ours; and, on the other hand—to say nothing of our race wars, or of the occasional exterminations of religious dissidents and political adversaries—the human code of morality has undergone such variations in the course of time as to pass from the exposure of children by savages in years of scarcity, and the "wound-for-wound and life-for-life” principle of the Decalogue, to the profound respect of everything that lives preached by Bodisatta and the pardon of offences practised by the early Christians. we are thus bound to conclude that while the differences between the morality of the bee and that of man are due to a deep physiological divergence, the striking similarities between the two point, nevertheless, to a community of origin.

The social instinct is thus, in Darwin’s opinion, the common stock, out of which all morality originates; and he further analyzes this instinct. Unfortunately, scientific animal psychology is still in its infancy, and therefore it Is extremely difficult to disentangle the complex relations which exist between the social Instinct, properly so called, and the parental and filial instincts, as well as several other instincts and faculties, such as sympathy, reason, experience, and a tendency to Imitation (p. 163). Darwin felt this difficulty very much, and therefore he expressed himself extremely cautiously. The parental and filial instincts, he suggested, “apparently lie at the base of the social instincts”; and in another place be wrote: “The feeling of pleasure from society is probably an extension of the parental or filial affections, since the social instinct seems to be developed by the young remaining for a long time with their parents” (p. 161).

This caution was fully justified, because in other places he pointed out that the social instinct must be a separate instinct in itself, different from the others—an instinct which has been developed by natural selection for its own sake, as it was useful for the well-being and the preservation of the species. It is so fundamental that when it runs against another instinct, even one so strong as the attachment of the parents to their offspring, it often takes the upper hand. Birds, when the time has come for their autumn migration, will leave behind their tender young, not yet old enough for a prolonged flight, and follow their comrades (pp. 164-165).

To this striking illustration I may also add that the social Instinct Is strongly developed with many tower animals, such as the land-crabs, or the Molucca crab[4]; as also with certain fishes, with whom it hardly could be considered as an extension of the filial or parental feelings. In these cases it appears rather as an extension of the brotherly or sisterly relations, or feelings of comradeship, which probably develop each time that a considerable number of young animals, having been hatched at a given place and at a given moment, continue to live together—whether they are with their parents or not. It would seem, therefore, more correct to consider the social and the parental instincts as two closely connected instincts, of which the former is perhaps the earlier, and therefore the stronger, and which both go hand in hand in the evolution of the animal world. Both are favored by natural selection, which, as soon as they come into conflict, keeps the balance between the two, for the ultimate good of the species.[5]

The most important point in the ethical theory of Darwin is, of course, his explanation of the moral conscience of man and his sense of remorse anti duty. This point has always been the stumbling-block of all ethical theories. Kant, as is known, utterly failed, in his otherwise so beautifully written work on morality, to establish why his “categorical imperative” should be obeyed at all, unless such be the will of a supreme power. We may admit that Kant’s “moral law,” if we slightly alter its formula, while we maintain its spirit, is a necessary conclusion of the human reason. We certainly object to the metaphysical form which Kant gate it; but, after all, it substance is equity, justice. And, if we translate the metaphysical language of Kant into the concrete language of inductive science, we may find points of contact between his conception of the origin of the moral law and the naturalist's view concerning the development of the moral sense. But this is only one-half of the problem. Supposing, for the sake of argument, that, “pure reason,” free from all observation, all feeling, and all instinct, in virtue of its inherent properties, should necessarily come to formulate a law of justice similar to Kant’s Imperative, and granting that no reasoning being could ever come to any other conclusion, because such are the Inherent properties of reason—granting all this, and fully recognizing at the same time the elevating character of Kant’s moral philosophy, the great question of all ethics remains, nevertheless, in full: “Why should man obey the moral law, or principle, formulated by his reason?” Or, at least, “Whence that feeling of obligation which men are experiencing?"

Several critics of Kant’s ethical philosophy have already pointed out that it left this great fundamental question unsolved. But they might have added also that Kant himself bad recognized his incapacity of solving it. After having thought intensely upon the subject, and written about it for four years, he acknowledged in his Philosophical Theory of Religion (Part I., “Of the Radical Evil of Human Nature,” published in 1792) that he was unable to find tile origin of the moral law. In fact, he gave up the whole problem by recognizing “the incomprehensibility of this capacity, a capacity which proclaims a divine origin”—this very incomprehensibility having to rouse man’s spirit to enthusiasm and to strengthen it for any sacrifices which respect to his duty may impose upon him.[6]

Intuitive philosophy having thus acknowledged its incapacity to solve the problem, let us see how Darwin solved it from the point of view of the naturalist. Here is, he said, a man who has yielded to a strong sense of self-preservation, and has not risked his life to save that of a fellow-creature; or, he has stolen food from hunger. In both cases he has obeyed a quite natural instinct, and the question is—Why should he feel miserable at all? Why should he think that he ought to have obeyed some other Instinct, and acted differently? Because, Darwin replies, in human nature “the more enduring social Instincts conquer the less persistent Instincts.” Moral conscience has always a retrospective character; it speaks in us when we think of our past actions; and it is the result of struggle, during which the less persistent, the less permanent individual instinct yields before the more permanently present and the more enduring social instinct. With those animals which always live in society “the social Instincts are ever present and persistent” (p. 171). Such animals are always ready to join in the defence of the group and to aid each other in different ways. They feel miserable if they are separated from the others. And it is the same with man. “A man who possessed no trace of such Instincts would be a monster” (p. 162). On the other hand, the desire which leads a man to satisfy his hunger or his auger, or to escape danger, or to appropriate somebody’s possessions, is in its nature temporary. Its satisfaction is always weaker than the desire itself. And when we think of it in the past, we cannot recall it as vividly as it was before its satisfaction. Consequently, if a man, with a view of satisfying such a desire, has acted so as to traverse his social Instinct, and afterwards reflects upon his action—which we continually do—he will be driven “to make a comparison between the impressions of past hunger, vengeance satisfied, or danger shunned at other men’s cost with the almost ever-present instinct of sympathy, and with his early knowledge of what others consider as praiseworthy or blamable.” And once he has made this comparison he will feel “as if he had been balked in following a present instinct or habit, and this with all animals causes dissatisfaction, or even misery.” (P. 173).

And then Darwin shows how the primary promptings of such a conscience, which always “looks backwards, and serves as a guide for the future,” may take the aspect of shame, regret, repentance, or even violent remorse, if the feeling be supported by reflection about the judgment of those with whom man feels in sympathy. Later on, habit will necessarily increase the power of this conscience over man’s actions, while at the same time it will tend to harmonize more and more the desires and passions of the individual with his social sympathies and instincts (p. 177).[7] Altogether the great difficulty for ethical philosophy is to explain the first germs of the “ought”—the appearance of the first whisper of the voice which pronounces that word, If that much has been explained, the accumulated experienee of the community and Its collective teachings will explain the rest

We have thus, for the first time, an explanation of the sense of duty on a natural basis. True, that it runs counter to the Ideas that are current now about animal and human nature; but it is correct. Nearly all ethical writers have hitherto started with the unproved postulate that the strongest of all the Instincts of man, and the more so of animals, is the self-preservation instinct, which, owing to a certain looseness of their terminology, they have identified, in man, with self-assertion, or egoism properly speaking. This instinct, which they conceived as including, on the one side, such primary impulses as self-defence, self-preservation, and the very act of satisfying hunger, and, on the other side, such derivative feelings as the longing for domination, greed, hatred, the desire of revenge, and so on—this compound and heterogeneous aggregate of instincts and feelings they represented as an all-pervading and all-powerful force, which finds no contradiction in animal and human nature, excepting in a certain feeling of benevolence or mercy. The consequence of such a view was that, once human nature was recognized as such, there obviously remained nothing but to lay a special stress upon the softening influence of those moral teachers who appealed to mercy, borrowing the spirit of their teachings and the impressiveness of their words from a world that lies outside nature—outside and above the world which is accessible to our senses. And if one refused to accept this view, the only alternate issue was to attribute, as Hobbes and his followers did, a special importance to the coercive action of the state, inspired by genial lawgivers—which meant, of course, merely to shift the extra-natural inspiration from the religious preacher to the law-maker.

Beginning with the Middle Ages, the founders of ethical schools, for the most part ignorant of nature, to the study of which they preferred metaphysics, had represented the self-assertive instincts of the individual as the very condition of its physical existence. To obey their promptings was considered as the law of nature, the neglect of which would lead to a sure defeat and to the ultimate disappearance of the species. Therefore, to combat these egotistic promptings was possible only if man called to his aid the supernatural forces. The triumph of moral principles was thus represented as a triumph of man over nature, which he may hope to achieve only with an aid from without, coming as a reward for his humility. They told us, for instance, that there is no greater virtue, no greater triumph of the spiritual over the natural, than self- sacrifice for the welfare of our fellow- men. But the fact is that self-sacrifice In the interest of an ants’ nest, for the safety of a group of birds, or the security of a drove of cattle, a herd of antelopes, or a band of monkeys, is a zoological fact of everyday occurrence is Nature—a fact for which hundreds upon hundreds of animal species require nothing else but natural sympathy with their fellow-creatures, the sensation of full vital energy, and a constant habit of mutual aid. Darwin, who knew nature, had the courage boldly to assert that of the two instincts—the social and the individual—it is the former which is the stronger, the more persistent, and the more permanently present. And he was right. The instinct of mutual aid pervades the animal world, because natural selection works for maintaining and further developing it, and pitilessly destroys those species which lose it in the great struggle for life which every animal species carries on against the hostile agencies of climate, surroundings, and natural enemies, big and small, those species which most consistently carry out the principle of mutual support have the best chance to survive, while the others die out. And the same great principle is confirmed by the history of mankind.

It is most remarkable that in representing the social instinct under this aspect we return, in fact, to what Bacon, the great founder of inductive science, had perceived. In his programme of the work to be done by the next generations with the aid of the inductive method, in The Great Instauration, he wrote:

All things are endued with an appetite for two kinds of good—the one as a thing is a whole in itself, the other as it is a part of some greater whole; and this latter is more worthy and more powerful than the other, as it tends to the conservation of a more ample form. The first may be called individual, or self-good, and the latter, good of communion. . . . And thus it generally happens that the conservation of the more general form regulates the appetites.[8]

It may be asked, of course, whether such a conception agrees with the theory of natural selection, according to which struggle for life, within the species, was considered a necessary condition for the appearance of new species, and for evolution altogether Having already touched elsewhere upon this question, I will not enter here into its discussion, and will only add the following remark. Immediately after the appearance of Darwin’s work on the origin of species we were all inclined to believe that an acute struggle for the means of existence between the members of the same species was necessary for accentuating the variations, and for the development of new species. But the deeper we go into the study of the facts of nature, and realize the direct influence of the surroundings for producing variation in a definite direction, as also the influence of isolation upon portions of the species separated from the main body in consequence of their migrations, we are prepared to understand “struggle for life” in a much wider and deeper sense. We see more and more the group of animals, acting as a whole, carrying on the struggle against adverse conditions, or against some such an enemy as a kindred species, by means of mutual support within the group, and thus acquiring habits which reduce the struggle, while they lead at the same time to a higher development of intelligence amongst those who took to mutual support. The above objection falls through in proportion as we advance in our knowledge of the struggle for life.

Nature has thus to be recognized as the first ethical teacher of man. The social instinct, innate in men as well as it is in all the sociable animals, is the origin of all ethical conceptions and all the subsequent ethical development.

II.

The starting-point for a work on ethics, from the evolution point of view, was thus given by Darwin. Taking the social instinct as a basis for the further development of moral feelings, we had, first, to consolidate that basis, and then to build upon it the whole structure of ethics. Such a work, however, has not yet been carried out; those evolutionists who dealt with the question of morality having mostly followed, for one reason or another, the lines of pre-Darwinian ethical thought, but not those which were indicated—perhaps too briefly—in The Descent of Man.

This applies, as is known, to Herbert Spencer. It would certainly be out of place here to discuss his ethics as a whole, the more so as it contains portions of great value, which could not be dealt with incidentally. But it is only the more necessary to mention that the ethical philosophy of Spencer was constructed on a different plan. The ethical and sociological portions of his Synthetic Philosophy were worked out, in the main, long before the appearance of Darwin’s essay on the moral sense, under the influence, partly of Auguste Comte, and partly of Bentham’s utilitarianism and the eighteenth-century sensualists.[9] It is only in the first chapters of Justice (published in this Review in March and April 1890) that we find in Spencer’s work a reference to “animal ethics” and "sub-human justice,” to which Darwin had attributed such an importance for the development of the moral sense in man. However, this reference stands in no organic connection with the rest of Spencer's ethics, because he does not consider primitive men as sociable beings whose societies would have been a continuation of the animal clans and tribes. Remaining true to Hobbes, he considers them as loose aggregations of individuals, continually fighting each other, and emerging from this chaotic state only after some superior men had imposed social bonds upon them. The chapters on animal ethics are thus a superstructure in Spencer's ethical system. The moral sense of man is not a further development of the social feelings which existed amongst his remotest prehuman ancestors. It made its appearance at a much later epoch, originating from those restraints which were imposed upon men by their political, social, and religious authorities (Data, § 45). The sense of duty, as Bain had suggested after Hobbes, is a product, or rather “a reminiscence,” of the coercion which was exercised at the early stages of mankind by its temporary leaders.

This admission—which, by the way, it would be difficult to support by modern investigation—puts its stamp upon all the further developments of Spencer's ethics. The history of mankind is divided into two stages: the “militant,” which has prevailed till now, and the “industrial,” which is slowly coming in at the present time, and both of which require their own special morality. Under the militant stage coercion was more than necessary: it was the very condition of progress. It was also necessary during that stage that the individual should be sacrificed to the community, and that a corresponding moral code should be elaborated. And this double necessity of coercion and sacrifice of the individual must continue to exist so long as the industrial state has not entirely taken the place of the militant state. Two different kinds of ethics, appropriated to these two different states, are thus admitted (Data, § 48-50), and such an admission leads to many conclusions which stand or fall with It. Moral science appears, therefore, as the search for a compromise between a code of enmity and a code of amity—between equality and inequality (25). And as there is no issue out of that conflict—because the coming of the industrial state will only be possible after the cessation of the conflict—there remains nothing to be done but to add a certain benevolence (some, but not too much) to the strictly individualistic principles which Spencer considers the embodiment of retributive Justice. Therefore all his attempts to establish a standard of morality necessarily fall, and he finally comes to the unexpected conclusion that all the moral systems, philosophical and religious, complete each other; while Darwin’s idea was, on the contrary, that sociability and the power of the social instinct are the common stock, out of which all systems and teachings of morality, including the ethical portions of the different religions, have originated.

It may be added, in conclusion, that although Spencer’s conception of the struggle between egoism and altruism bears a great resemblance to Comte’s treatment of this subject, the views of the Postivist philosopher concerning the social instinct—notwithstanding all his opposition to the transmutation of species—were nearer to the above-mentioned views of Darwin than to those of Spencer. Discussing the relative value of the two sets of instincts, social and individual, Comte did not hesitate to recognize the preponderance of the former. He even saw in the recognition of this preponderance of the social instinct the distinctive feature of a moral philosophy which had broken with theology and metaphysics.[10]

As already said, none of the immediate followers of Darwin ventured to further develop his ethical philosophy. George Romanes probably would have made an exception, because he proposed, after he had studied animal Intelligence, to discuss animal ethics and the probable genesis of the moral sense; for which purpose he was already collecting the materials.[11] Unfortunately, we lost him before be had sufficiently advanced in his work. As to the other evolutionists, they either adopted views in ethics very different from those of Darwin—such was the case of Huxley in his lecture, “Evolution and Ethics”—or they worked on quite independent lines, after having taken the central idea of evolution as a basis. Such is the moral Philosophy of Marc Guyau,[12] which deals mainly with the higher aspects of morality without discussing the ethics of animals.[13] This is why I thought necessary to discuss the subject anew in a work, Mutual Aid: a Factor of Evolution, in which the effect of the mutual aid instincts and habits was analyzed as a factor of progressive evolution, both in the animal world and in human history. The same social habits of animals have to be analyzed now from the double point of view of the ethical inclinations which our primitive ancestors have inherited from the prehuman stage, and the ethical lessons which they gained later on from the observation of nature; and I must, therefore, ask the reader's indulgence if I briefly allude here to facts already mentioned in my mutual aid studies. Sociability in animals has a double significance, and therefore has to be considered under a double aspect. It is the weapon to which the group resorts in its struggle for existence, and as such it interests the naturalist. And it is the stock from which the ethical feelings of man have sprung, and us such it offers the deepest interest for the ethical philosopher. From this last point of view we have to analyze it now.

III.

Primitive man lived in close intimacy with animals. With some of them he probably shared the shelters under the rocks, occasionally the caverns, and very often food. Not more than a hundred years ago the natives of Siberia and America astonished our naturalists by their thorough knowledge of the habits of the most retiring beasts and birds; but primitive man stood in still closer relations to the animals, and knew them still better. The wholesale extermination of life by means of forest and prairie fires, poisoned arrows, and the like, had not yet begun; and from the bewildering abundance of animal life which was found by the white settlers when they first took possession of the American continent we may judge of the density of the animal population during the early Post-glacial period. Paleolithic and neolithic man lived closely surrounded by his dumb brothers—just as the shipwrecked crew of Behring lived amidst the multitudes of polar foxes, which were prowling in the midst of their encampments and gnawing at night at the very furs upon which the men were sleeping. Our primitive ancestors lived with the animals, in the midst of them. And as soon as they began to bring some order into their observations of nature, and to transmit them to posterity, the animals and their life supplied them with the chief materials for their unwritten encyclopædia of knowledge, as well as for their wisdom, which they expressed in proverbs and sayings. Animal psychology was the first psychology which man was aware of— it is still a favorite subject of talk at the camp fires; and animal life, closely interwoven with that of man, was the subject of the very first rudiments of art, inspiring the first engravers and sculptors, and entering into the composition of the most ancient epical traditions and cosmogonic myths.

The first thing which our children learn in natural history is something about the beasts of prey—the lions and the tigers. But the first thing which primitive savages must have learned about nature was that it represents a vast agglomeration of animal clans and tribes: the ape tribe, so nearly related to man, the ever-prowling wolf tribe, the knowing, chattering bird tribe, the ever-busy insect tribe, and so on. For them the animals were an extension of their own kin—only so much wiser than themselves. And the first vague generalization which men must have made about nature—so vague as to hardly differ from a mere impression—was that the living being and his clan or tribe are inseparable. We can separate them—they could not: unit it seems even doubtful whether they could think of life otherwise than within a clan or a tribe.

Such an impression of nature was unavoidable. Among his nearest congeners—the monkeys and the apes—man saw hundreds of species living in large societies, united together within each group by the closest bonds. He saw how they supported each other during their foraging expeditions. how they combined against their common enemies, and rendered each other all sorts of small services, such as the picking of thorns from each other’s fur, the nestling together in cold weather, and so on. Of course they often quarrelled; but there was more noise in these quarrels than serious harm, and at times, in case of danger, they displayed the most striking mutual attachment; to say nothing of the strong devotion of the mothers to their young ones, which they have in common with all the animals. Sociability was thus the rule with the monkey tribe; and if there are now two species of big apes, the gorilla and the orang-utang. which are not sociable, and keep in smell families only, the very limited sizes of the areas they inhabit are a proof of their being now decaying species—decaying perhaps, on account of the merciless war which men have waged against them in consequence of the very resemblance between the two species.[14]

Primitive man saw, next, that even among the carnivorous beasts, which live by killing other animals, there is one general and invariable rule: They never kill each other. Some of them are very sociable—such are all the dog tribe: the jackals, the dholes or kholzun dogs, the hyænas. Some others prefer to live in small families; but even among these last the more intelligent ones—the lions and the leopards—occasionally join together for hunting, like the dog tribe. And as to those few which lead—nowadays, at least—a quite solitary life in small families, so that even the females with their cubs will often keep separate from the males, the same general rule of nature prevails among them: they do not kill each other. Even now, when the myriads of ruminants which formerly peopled the prairies have been exterminated, and the tigers live mainly on man's herds, and are compelled, therefore, to keep close to the villages, every one to its own domain—even now the natives of India will tell us that somehow the tigers manage to keep to their separate domains without fighting bloody internecine wars for securing them, Besides, it appears extremely probable that even those few animals which now lead a solitary existence—such as the tigers, the smaller species of the cat tribe (nearly all nocturnal), the hears, the genets, most weasels, the marten tribe, the hedgehog, and a few others—were not always solitary creatures. For some of them we have positive evidence that they remained sociable so long as they escaped extermination by man, and we have reason to believe that nearly all of them were in the same conditions in times past.[15] But even if there always existed a few unsociable species, the fact is that man has always considered them an exception.

The lesson of nature was, thus, that even the strongest beasts are bound to combine. And that man who had witnessed once in his life an attack of wild dogs, or dholes, upon the biggest beasts of prey, certainly realized, once and for ever, the irresistible force of the tribal unions, and the confidence and courage with which they inspire every individual. Man made divinities of these dogs, and worshipped them, trying by all sorts of magic to acquire their courage.

In the prairies and the woods our earliest ancestors saw myriads of animals, all living in clans and tribes. Countless herds of red-deer, fallow deer, reindeer, gazelles and antelopes, thousands of droves of buffaloes and legions of wild horses, wild donkeys, quaggas, zebras, and so on, were moving over the boundless plains, peacefully grazing side by side. Even the dreary plateaus had their herds of llamas and wild camels. And when man approached these animals, he soon realized how closely connected all these beings were in their respective droves or herds. Even when they seemed fully absorbed in grazing, and apparently took no notice of the others, they closely watched each other’s movements, always ready to join in some common action. Man saw that all the deer tribe, whether they graze or merely gambol, always keep sentries, which never release their watchfulness and never are late to signal the approach of a beast of prey; he knew how, in case of a sudden attack, the males and the females would encircle their young ones and face the enemy, exposing their lives for the safety of the feeble ones; and how, even with such timid creatures as the antelopes, or the fallow deer, the old males would often sacrifice themselves in order to cover the retreat of the herd. Man knew all that which we ignore or easily forget, and he repeated it in his tales, embellishing the acts of courage and self-sacrifice with his primitive poetry, or mimicking them in his religious tribal dances. Still less could he ignore the great migrations of animals because be followed them—Just as the Chukchi follows still the herds of the wild reindeer, when the clouds of mosquitoes drive them from one place of the Chukchi peninsula to another, or as the Lapp follows the herds of his halt-domesticated reindeer In their wanderings, over which he has no control. And If we, with all our book-learning, feel unable to understand how animals scattered over a wide territory can warn each other so us to bring their thousands to a given spot before they begin their march north, south, or west, our ancestors, who considered the animals as beings so much wiser than themselves, saw no difficulty in explaining that intercourse. For them all animals—beasts, birds, and fishes alike—were in continual communication, warning each other by means of hardly perceptible signs or sounds, informing one another about all sorts of events, and thus constituting one vast community, which bad Its own habits and rules of propriety and good behavior. Even to-day deep traces of that conception of nature survive in the folklore of all nations.

From the populous, animated, and gay villages of the marmots, the prairie dogs, the jerboas, the hamsters, and so on, and from the colonies of that silent sage, the beaver, with which the Postglacial rivers were thickly studded, primitive man, who himself had begun as a nomad forest-dweller, could learn the advantages of settled life, permanent dwellings, and labor in common. Even now we can see how the nomad cattle-breeders of Mongolia, whose improvidence is phenomenal, learn from the striped marmot (Tamias striatus) the advantages of agriculture and foresight when they plunder quite regularly every autumn the underground galleries of this rodent and seize its provisions of eatable bulbs. The granaries of many smaller rodents, full of all sorts of eatable seeds, must have given man the first suggestion as to the culture of cereals. In fact the sacred books of the East contain many an allusion to the foresight and laboriousness of the animals, which are set up as an example to man.

The birds, in their turn—almost every one of their species—gave our ancestors a lesson of the most intimate sociability, of the joys of social life, and its enormous advantages. It certainly did not escape the attention of that, even among the birds of prey, many species of falcons are extremely sociable, and that even some eagles combine for hunting; while the docks of kites will sometimes chase the strongest eagle and get bold of its spoil. And they saw, of course, many a time, how the smallest birds, if they are numerous enough, overcome their first terror at the sight of a hawk, and chase it, immensely enjoying this kind of sport

The nesting associations of aquatic birds, and their unanimity in defending their young broods and eggs, were well known to man. He knew that as soon as he approached the shore of a lake where thousands of birds belonging to different species were nesting, his appearance would be signalled at once; how, the moment he would set his foot upon their grounds, hundreds of birds would circle and fly round him, skim over his face, bewilder him by the flapping of their wings, deafen him by their cries, and often compel him to retreat. Man knew this only too well, for his very existence in the early summer depended upon his capacity to resist such a combined attack of the winged tribe. And then the joy of life in the autumn societies of the bird-youngsters was certainly familiar to people who themselves lived in the woods and by the side of the forest brooks. Who knows if the very idea of wide tribal unions, or, at least, of those great tribal hunts (abà with the Mongols, kadà with the Tunguses), which are rent fêtes, lasting a couple of months every autumn, was not suggested by such autumn gatherings of the birds, in which so many widely different species join together, spending a few hours every day in providing their food, and their chattering and fluttering about the remainder of the time?

Man knew also, of course, the gay play of animals, the sports in which several species delight, the concerts and dances of some others; the flights which certain species perform in the evenings, sometimes with a wonderful art and elaboration; the noisy meetings which are held by the swallows mid other migrating birds, for years in succession, on the same spot, before they start on their long journeys south. And how often man must have stood in bewilderment as he saw the immense migrating columns of birds passing over his head for many hours in succession. The “brute savage” knew and meditated on all these beauties of nature, which we have forgotten in our towns, and which we do not even find in our “natural history” books, compiled for teaching anything but life; while the narratives of the great explorers—the Humboldts, the Audubons, the Azaras, the Brehms, of which every page was a picture of the real life of nature, are mouldering in our libraries.

In those times the wide world of the running waters and lakes was not a sealed book for man. He was familiar with its inhabitants as well. Even now many semi-savage natives of Africa and Polynesia profess a deep reverence for the crocodile. They consider him a near relative to man—a sort of ancestor. They even avoid naming him in their conversations, and if they must mention him they will say “the old grandfather,” or use some other word expressing kinship and veneration. The crocodile, they maintain, acts exactly as they themselves do. He will never finally swallow his prey without having invited his relatives and friends to share the food; and if one of his tribe has been killed by man, otherwise than in due and just blood revenge, he will take vengeance upon any one of the murderer’s kin. Therefore, if a negro has been eaten by a crocodile, his tribe will take the greatest care to discover the real culprit, and when lie has been discovered and killed, they will carefully examine his intestines, in order to make sure that there has been no mistake; but if no proof of the beast’s guilt is forthcoming, they will make all sorts of expiatory amends to the crocodile tribe, in order to appease the relatives of the innocently slaughtered individual, and continue to search for the real culprit. Otherwise the kinsfolk of the former would take revenge. The same belief exists among the Red Indians concerning the rattlesnake and the wolf, and its bearing upon the subsequent development of the idea of justice is self-evident.

The fishes, their shoals, and the ways they play in the transparent waters, exploring them by their scouts before they move in a given direction, must have deeply impressed man from a remote antiquity. Traces of this impression are found in folklore in many parts of the globe. Thus, for instance, Dekanawideh, the legendary lawgiver of the Five Nations of the Red Indians, who is supposed to have given them the class organization, is represented as having retired first to meditate in contact with nature. He “reached the side of a smooth, clear, running stream, transparent and full of fishes. He sat down, reclining on the sloping bank, gazing intent into the waters, watching the ashes playing about in complete harmony. . . .“ Thereupon he conceived the scheme of dividing his people into gentes and classes, or totems.[16]

Altogether, for the primitive savage, animals are mysterious, problematic beings, possessed of a wide knowledge of the things of nature. They know much more than they are ready to tell us. In some way or another, by the aid of senses much more refined than ours, and by telling to each other all that they notice in their rambles and flights, they know everything, for miles round. And if man has been “just” towards them, they will warn him of a coming danger, as they warn each other; but they will take no heed of him if he has not been straightforward in his actions. Snakes and birds (the owl is a leader of the snakes), mammals and insects, lizards and fishes—all understand each other, and continually communicate their observations to one another. They all belong to one brotherhood, into which they may, in some cases, admit man.

Inside this vast brotherhood there are, of course, the still closer brother-hoods of beings “of one blood.” The monkeys, the bears, the wolves, the elephants and the rhinoceroses, most ruminants, the hares and most of the rodents, the crocodiles, and so on, perfectly know their own kin, and they will not tolerate any one of their relatives to be slaughtered by man without taking, in one way or another, honest revenge. This conception must have had an extremely remote origin, it must have grown at a time when man had not yet become omnivorous (which, I am inclined to think, must have happened during the Glacial period), and had not yet begun to hunt animals for food. However, the same conception has been retained clown to the present time. Even now, when a savage is hunting, he is bound to respect certain rules of propriety towards the animals, and he must perform certain expiatory ceremonies after his hunt. Most of these ceremonies are rigorously enacted, even nowadays in the savage clans, especially as regards those species which are considered the allies of man.

It is well known that two men belonging to two different clans or tribes can become brothers by mixing the blood of the two, obtained from small incisions made for that purpose. To enter into such a union was quite habitual in olden times, and we learn from the folklore of all nations, and especially the sagas, how religiously such a brotherhood was observed. But it was also quite habitual for man to enter into brotherhood with some animal. The tales continually mention it. An animal asks a hunter to spare it and if the hunter accedes to the demand the two become brothers. And then the monkey, the bear, the doe, the bird, the crocodile, or the bee—any one of the sociable animals—will take all possible care of the man-brother in the critical circumstances of his life, sending his or her animal brothers of different tribes to warn him or help him out of a difficulty. And if the warning comes too late, or is misunderstood, and he loses his life, they all will try to bring him back to life, and if they fall they will take the due revenge, just as if the man had been one of their own kin.

When I journeyed in Siberia I was often struck, without understanding it, with the care which my Tungus or Mongol guide would take not to uselessly kill any animal. The fact is that every life is respected by a savage, or rather it was before he came in contact with Europeans, if he kills an animal, it is for food or for clothing; but he does not destroy life, as the whites do, for the mere excitement of the slaughter. True, the Red Indians have done that with the buffaloes; but it was only after they had been for a long time in contact with the white and had got from them the rifle and the quick-firing revolver. Of course, there are rascals among the animals—the hymns, for instance, or the shrew-mouse, or the man-eating tiger; but these do not count: they are outlaws. As to the great animal world as a whole, savage children are taught to respect it and to see in it an extension of their own kin.

The idea of “Justice,” conceived at its origin as revenge, is thus connected with observations made on animals. But it appears extremely probable that the idea of reward for “just” and “unjust” treatment must also have originated, with primitive mankind, from the idea that animals take revenge if they have not been properly treated by man, and repay kindness by kindness. This idea is so deeply rooted in the minds of the savages all over the world that it may be considered as one of the most primitive conceptions of mankind. Extended from a few animals to all of them, it soon embodied the whole of nature—the trees and the forests, the rivers and the seas, time Locks and the mountains, which are all living. Gradually it grew to be a conception of the great whole, bound together by certain links of mutual support, which watches all the actions of the living beings, and, owing to that solidarity in the universe, undertakes the revenge of wrong deeds. It became the conception of time Eumenides and the Moirai of the Greeks, the Parcae of the Romans, and especially the Karma of the Hindoos. The Greek legend of the cranes of Ibikus, which links together man and birds, and countless Eastern legends are poetical embodiments of the same conception,

This is what primitive man saw in nature and learned from it. With our scholastic education, which has systematically ignored nature and has tried to explain its most common facts by metaphysical subtleties, we began to forget that lesson. But for our Stone Age ancestors sociability and mutual aid within the tribe must have been a fact so general in nature, so habitual, and so common, that they certainly could not imagine life under another aspect. The conception of an isolated being is a later product of civilization—an abstraction, which it took ages to develop in the human race. To a primitive man isolated life seems so strange, so much out of the usual course of nature, that when he sees a tiger, a badger, a shrew-mouse, or a kingfisher leading a solitary existence, or when he notices a tree that stands alone, far from the forest, he creates a legend to explain this strange occurrence. He makes no legends to explain life in societies, but he has one for every case of solitude. The hermit, if he is not a sage or a wizard, is in most cases an outcast of animal society. He has done something so contrary to the ordinary run of life that they have thrown him out. Very often he is a sorcerer, who has the command of all sorts of dangerous powers, and has something to do with the pestilential corpses which sow disease in the world. This is why he prowls at night. prosecuting his wicked designs under the cover of darkness. All other beings in nature are sociable, and human thought runs in this channel. Sociable life—that is, we, not I—is, in the eyes of primitive man, the normal form of life. It is life itself. Therefore “We” must have been the normal form of thinking for primitive man: a “category” of his understanding, as Kant might have said. And not even “We,” which is still too personal, because it represents a multiplication of the “I's,” but rather such expressions as “the men of the beaver tribe,” “the kangaroo men,” or “the turtles.” This was the primitive form of thinking, which nature impressed upon the mind of man.

Here, in that identification, or, we might even say, in this absorption of the “I” by the tribe, lies the root of all ethical thought. The self-asserting “Individual” came much later on. Even now, with the lower savages, the “individual” hardly exists at all. It is the tribe, with its hard-and-fast rules, superstitions, taboos, habits, and interests, which is always present in the mind of the child of nature. And in that constant, ever-present identification of the unit with the whole, lies the substratum of all ethics, the germ out of which all the subsequent conceptions of justice, and the still higher conceptions of morality, grew up in the course of evolution.

But these further steps, as well as the various aspects of sociability itself, and their teachings, will have to be discussed separately on some other occasion.

P. Kropotkin.

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[1] In his “History of Modern Philosophy” the Danish professor, Herald Hoffding, give, an admirable sketch of the philosophical importance of Darwin’s work. "Geschichte der neueren Philosophie,” German translation by F. Bendixen (Leipzig, 1896), vol. II. pp. 487 sq.

[2] “The Descent of Man,” chap. iv. pp. 148 sq. All quotations after the last (cheap) edition of Mr. Murray, 1901.

[3] The incapacity of an ant, a dog, or a cat to make a discovery, or to hit upon the correct solution of a difficulty, are not proofs of an essential difference between the intelligence of men and that of these animals, because the same want of inventiveness is continually met with in men as well. Like the ant in one of Lubbock’s experiments, thousands of men who had not been already familiar with bridges would spend their forces in the effort of crossing a brook, or a ravine before they would try to bridge it. And, on the other band, the collective intelligence of an ant’s nest or a beehive—one individual to the thousand hitting upon the correct solution, and the others imitating it—solves difficulties much greater than these upon which the individual ant, or bee, or cat has so ludicrously failed, The bees at the Paris Exhibition, and their devices to prevent being disturbed in their work, or any one of the well-known facts of inventiveness among the bees, the ants, the wolves hunting together, are instances in point.

[4] ‘‘Mutual Aid,” 1903, pp. 11 and 12.

[5] ‘In an excellent analysis of the social feeling (“Animal Behavior,” 3000, pp. 281.232) Professor Lloyd Morgan says: “And this question Prince Kropotkin, in common with Darwin and Espinas, would probably answer without hesitation that the primeval germ of the social community lay In the prolonged coherence of the group of parents and offspring.” I should only add the words: “or of the offspring without the parents” because this addition would better agree with the above facts, while it also more correctly renders the idea of Darwin.

[6] Hartleben's edition of Kant's works, vol. vi. pp. 143.144. English translation by Th. K. Abbott: "Kant's Critique of Practical Reason, and other Works." London, 1879, pp. 425-427.

[7] In a footnote Darwin with his usual deep insight, makes, however, one exception. “Enmity or hatred," he remarks, “seems also to be a highly persistent feeling, perhaps more so than any other this can be named. . . . This feeling would thus seem to be innate, and is certainly a most persistent one. It seems to be the complement and converse of the true social instinct” (Footnote 27). This feeling, so deeply seated to animal nature, evidently explains the bitter wars that are fought between different tribes, or groups in several animal species and among men. It explains also the existence of two different codes of morality retained till now among civilized nations. But this important and yet neglected subject can better be treated in connection with the development of the idea of justice.

[8] “On the Dignity and Advancement of Learning,” Book VII, chap. I. (p. 270 of J. Devey’s edition in Bohn's Library), we certainly find Bacon’s arguments in favor of this idea insufficient; but he was only establishing the outlines or a science, which had to be worked out by his followers. In another place he returns to the same idea. He speaks of “two appetites [instincts] of the creatures. (1) that of self-preservation and defence, and (2) that of multiplying and propagating,” and he adds: “the latter, which is active, seems stronger and more worthy than the former, which is passive.”

[9] Spencer’s “Data of Ethics” appeared in 1879, and his ‘Justice” in 1891; that is, long after Darwin's "Descent of Man.” which wad published in 1871. Bus his “Social Statics” had already appeared in 1850. Spencer was, of course, quite right to insist upon the differences between his philosophical conceptions and those of Auguste Comte; but the influence upon him of the founder of Positivism is undeniable, notwithstanding the deep contrast between the minds of the two philosophers. To realize the influence of Comte it would be sufficient to compare Spencer's views on biology with those of the French philosopher, especially as they are expressed in chap. iii. of “Discours préliminaire,” in vol. i. of “Politique positive." In ethics, the influence of Comte especially apparent in the importance attributed by Spencer to the distinction between the “militant” and the “industrial” stages of mankind, and the opposition between "egoism” and “altruism.” This last word is used in the too wide, and therefore indefinite, sense in which it was used by Comte when he had first coined it.

[10] "Positive morality thus differs, not only from metaphysical, but also from theological morality, in taking for a universal principle the direct preponderance of the social feelings” (“Politique positive, Discours préliminaire,” (2nd part. p. 93, and in several other places). Unfortunately, the flashes of genius which one finds scattered throughout the "Discours préliminaire” are often obscured by Comte's ideas of his later period, which hardly could be described as a development of the positive method,

[11] He mentions it in his "Mental Evolution in Animals" (London, 1883, p. 352).

[12] ‘A. Sketch of Morality;” English translation by Mrs. G. Kapteyn, London, 1898 (Watts).

[13] The work of Professor Lloyd Morgan, who has lately rewritten his earlier book on animal intelligence under the new title of “Animal Behavior” (London, 1900), is not yet terminated, and can only be mentioned as promising to give a new and full treatment of the subject, especially from the point of view of comparative psychology. Other works dealing with the same subject, or having a bearing upon it, and of which "Les Sociétés animales,” by Espinas, deserve special mention, are enumerated in the preface of my work on mutual aid.

[14] Several African travellers speak of that enmity and signal its causes.

[15] See "Mutual Aid.” chaps. i. and ii., and Appendix.

[16] J. Brant-Sero, “Dekanawideh,” in “Man,” 1901, p. 166. In other legends the wise man of the tribe learns wisdom from the beaver, or the squirrel or some bird.

J. K. Ingalls, Land Reform in 1848 and 1888

Joshua King Ingalls, "Land Reform in 1848 and 1888," Liberty, 5, 22 (Jun 9, 1888), 5.

Land Reform in 1848 and 1888.

The veteran land reformer, J. K. Ingalls, in a fine article running through two numbers of the “Truth Seeker” under the above title, contrasts the schemes of George Henry Evans and Henry George. The whole is well worth rending, hut room can be made here only for the following extracts:

I do not propose to discuss the respective claims of George and Evans as authorities on the land question, nor, at any length, the nature of their peculiar plans or schemes; but will state the “measure” of the one, and the “remedy” of the other, briefly, leaving you to judge between them as reason or prejudice may determine. So far as a statement of the pernicious influence or land monopoly is concerned, Mr. George has simply reiterated the arguments and statements of the early reformers, and, if in more attractive phrase, it does not necessarily follow that the influence of his utterances will be more enduring. So far the two men and their eras present no important differences. Only in respect to: “What is to be done?” do they differ. They represent in this not only different eras, but quite different systems of philosophy, social and political. It is true they agree that reform must come through the ballot and through legislation. But Mr. Evans belonged to the school that believes government to be a necessary evil, and that we are to have as little to do with it as possible. That nature is to be relied on mainly, and that to correct the evils of already existing legislation is the great aim to be sought by the reformer. Thus far he is an optimist. The line of Mr. George’s thought is decidedly pessimistic. He accepts the theories of Malthus and Ricardo that rent, that synonym of all subjection and the men suffer from it, is a result of natural law, which can only be eliminated through Statecraft and the rate of force, and that the onward march of progress, with its natural adjunct, poverty, can only thus be stayed. He has some way, however, of applying the optimistic rule to interest and profits; at any rate, has never proposed that these should be taxed back for the benefit of the State, although admitting they are equally uncompensated by service, and are as truly “a gratuity of nature” as is the use of land.

The plan of Mr. Evans was this: By political agitation and control of the legislature to place a limit to the ownership of land. This principle had already been applied to religious and other corporate institutions, and to the patenting of the lands “only to actual settlers in limited quantities.” The maximum had been fixed at one hundred and sixty acres. Mr. Evans suggested this as a limit to private ownership, not as a fixed quantity, but to obtain a recognition of the right of government to so limit it, to be modified as wisdom should direct in the future. He contemplated a peaceful attainment of this object, by wise gradations, invading no “vested rights,” yet effectually preventing any further accumulation of landed estates beyond the legal limit, whether by purchase, gift, or inheritance. All of these matters nre held to be subjects properly regulative by statute law. The advocates of land nationalization propose to have the State resume the title to the land it has once already sold to private parties; to be rented back to those who want and are able to hire. Mr. George simplifies this process by treating land values as simply the amount of rent the land will yield, and taxing it back entire without any disturbance to owners or to occupiers. This maybe termed “a short method” of “land nationalization.” It means “confiscation of rent.” You have here substantially the means proposed by the two men, representing different schools and distinct periods, for the reform of a universally admitted evil, the monopolized control of the only passive factor in production,—the home and standing-place and work-room of the whole human family. They are in accord fully as to the nature of the evil to be remedied, and, indeed, as to the necessity of securing political supremacy to accomplish the reform. The great object, as both agree, is justice to labor, the abolition of poverty, and the promotion of the public good. But the measures for which such political power is to he wielded in order to accomplish those ends are wholly incompatible with each other. The one sought equality through limitation of power and restriction of privilege, mutually operative as to all citizens of a State. The other seeks the annihilation of a class, allodial owners, embracing those whose ownership promotes social prosperity as well as those which endanger It, and the making of every occupant of the hued a tenant of the Stats, hut offers no-guarantee whatever against the unlimited control of the land through lease-hold, or the extension of legal privilege to the lordly rule of capital, such leases would give.

Now, limitation of powers is involved in, and is, indeed, the professed burden of, all forms of legislation whatever. Limitation to private ownership of an essential, natural element, indispensable to the life and to the well-being of the individual, is a logical and constitutional means of redress, under any view of law which ever prevailed. It accords with our system of tenure, which assumes that the right of occupancy is in every one of the whole people. “Confiscation of rent,” on the other hand, would require an entire subversion of our system of occupancy and of well-established principles of property; is inconsistent with our Constitution, if we have one; and, being revolutionary in Its character, should only he resorted to in the last extremity, even were It In itself wise and feasible. This remedy is, doubtless, compatible with the fictions of English law and of monarchy by “divine right”; but not by any theory of democracy or principles of equity with which I am acquainted. But I think the time for promoting any positive reform of the land system through political ascendancy, and by legislative preponderance of an honest purpose to effect is public good, has long since passed away, through either Mr. George’s or Mr. Evans’s schemes. For it is quite apparent now to clear-headed people that the land question, and all other questions of human interest, will take care of themselves, if governments will let them alone, withdraw their bailiffs, tax-gatherers, detective police, and bandit, mercenary soldiery.

Social industry from its primitive communal organization has passed through three phases of development. In the patriarchal state labor had some degrees of organization, in which the more spontaneous coöperation of the tribe or community became subjected to authority and to the order of an arbitrary will, whose rude directorship effected some approach to the combination and division of labor, more lately established.

Next, in the struggle and as the consequent growth of leadership in their interminable wars and the rise of monarchical rule, the warlike organization of labor was effected, under the militant spirit, and became compulsorily coöperative, system characterized by Hobbes as having “selfishness everywhere and unlimited power somewhere.” On the decline of the militant spirit end as the rule of law obtained and constitutional governments became established, what may be termed the litigant organization of labor took place and became semi-voluntary in place of wholly involuntary; but of the apparent freedom under this now existing form much is the result of a compulsory assent effected through the various fictions and subtle devices of our transmitted legalities, not less invasive than the sword of the freebooter or the lash of the slaveholder. In nothing is this so conspicuous and so fatal to social life nod progress as in the falseness of the law of property and of thin unlimited dominion of the laud, under the law of the market.

The inability to defend our land system on any ethical or economic grounds, the agreement of all thinkers that it is incompatible with any rule hut one of despotism, and the necessity for a system of organization of labor and cooperation which shall embrace division as well as production, indicates a possible future type of labor organization wherein a broader freedom and a clearer sense of mutual help and mutual benefit will secure a more fully developed sustaining system, and one which will promote, not the military, civic, or material aggrandizement of a nation or of an individual, that the development of higher activities and the pursuit of nobler aims. It is simply idle to suppose that the dangerous class who aspire to profit by making, interpreting, and enforcing, and also in evading, our system of legal quiddities will ever willingly further any such reform whatever, or propose to aid any salutary cause except for the purpose of betraying it.

* * * * * *

The well-intentioned efforts of Mr. Evans and his confreres had been pertinaciously followed up for an entire generation. It is true that they looked to political action and legislative expedients as effective agencies of reform, and so in that regard their labors were fruitless. But Mr. George has not learned from their failure, but has repeated their blunders, even if he has not used the reform as a means to political preferment and the advancement of party aims. The land reformers of 1848 who followed the lead of Mr. Evans have kept alive the embers of the fire that glowed in that early day, and now by placing their reform upon the broad ground of economic and industrial law have made the scientific consideration of land ownership imperative. Mr. George’s remedy is wholly empirical, and is suggested by no principle of law or fact of economy. In subjecting the question to careful analysis, and to the test of the social good, we have placed it in the line of positive settlement, without or in spite of political scheming, caucus dictation, purchased votes, stuffed ballet-boxes; for nothing can stand before the advance of exact knowledge. There is no rebellion against mathematics; and no demonstrated truths can be suppressed by any despotic rule. In the words of Ruskin: “We live in an epoch of change, and probably of revolution; thoughts that cannot be put aside are in the minds of all men capable of thought. One principle can, in the end will, close all epochs of revolution,—that each man shall possess the ground he can use and no more.”

A peaceful evolution of industry and society will then ensue; and the rule of ignorant, arbitrary will of monarch or majority will end, when helpful science and progressive thought shall free mankind from their superstitious reverence for ecclesiastical dogmas and legal fictions.