STUDY X
PROPOSED REMEDIES--SOCIAL AND FINANCIAL

Prohibition and Female Suffrage--Free Silver and Protective Tariff-- "Communism"--"They Had All Things in Common"--"Anarchism"--"Socialism" or "Collectivism"--Babbitt on Social Upbuilding--Herbert Spencer on Socialism--Examples of Two Socialist Communities--"Nationalism" --General Mechanical Education as a Remedy--The "Single Tax" Remedy--Henry George's Answer to Pope Leo XIII on Labor--Dr. Lyman Abbott on the Situation--An M. E. Bishop's Suggestions--Other Hopes and Fears--The Only Hope--"That Blessed Hope"--The Attitude Proper for God's People Who See These Things--In the World but Not of It.

Prohibition and Female Suffrage as Remedies

These two remedies are usually compounded, it being conceded that prohibition can never command a majority support unless women have a free ballot--and doubtful even then. The advocates of this remedy show statistics to prove that much of the trouble and poverty of Christendom are traceable to the liquor traffic, and they aver that if it were abolished, peace and plenty would be the rule and not the exception.

We heartily sympathize with much that is claimed along this line: drunkenness is certainly one of the most noxious fruits of civilization; it is rapidly spreading, too, to the semi-civilized and barbarous. We would rejoice to see it abolished now and forever. We are willing to grant, too, that its abolition would relieve much of the poverty of today, and that by it hundreds of millions of wealth are annually far worse than wasted. But this is not the remedy to cure the evils arising from present, selfish social conditions, and to meet and parry the grinding pressure of the "Law of Supply and Demand," which would progress as relentlessly as ever, squeezing the lifeblood from the masses.

All this should not deter us from desiring the removal of the curse, if it were possible to get a majority to consent to it. But a majority will never be found (save in exceptional localities). The majority is composed of slaves to this appetite and those interested in it financially, either directly or indirectly. Prohibition will not be established until the Kingdom of God is established. We merely point out here that the removal of this curse, even if practicable, would not cure the present social-financial malady.

The Free Silver and Protective Tariff Remedies

Under the law of supply and demand every borrower is interested in having plenty of money--silver, gold and paper; under the same law every banker and money-lender is interested in abolishing paper money and in discrediting silver; for the less money there is of a debt-canceling value, the more that little is demanded. Hence, while labor and commercial values are dropping, money is in demand and interest nearly holds its own.

Some features of Communism we could commend (see Socialism), but as a whole it is quite impracticable. Such an arrangement would probably do very well for heaven, where all are perfect, pure and good, and where love reigns; but a moment's reflection should prove to any man of judgment and experience that in the present condition of men's hearts such a scheme is thoroughly impracticable. The tendency would be to make drones of all. We would soon have a competition as to who could do the least and the worst work; and society would soon lapse into barbarism and immorality, tending to the rapid extinction of the race.

But some fancy that Communism is taught in the Bible and that consequently it must be the true remedy--God's remedy. With many this is the strongest argument in its favor. The supposition that it was instituted by our Lord and the Apostles, and that it should have continued to be the rule and practice of Christians since, is very common. We therefore present below an article on this phase of the subject from our own magazine, The Watch Tower:

"They Had All Things in Common"

Then we learned, not only that the weaknesses of the flesh of other men had to be taken into account, but that our own weaknesses of the flesh needed constant guarding. We found that whilst all had shared Adam's fall, all had not fallen alike, or in exactly the same particulars. All have fallen from God's likeness and spirit of love, to Satan's likeness and spirit of selfishness; and as love has diversities of operations, so has selfishness. Consequently, selfishness working in one has wrought a desire for ease, sloth, indolence; in another it produced energy, labor for the pleasures of this life, self-gratification, etc.

Among those actively selfish some take self-gratification in amassing a fortune, and having it said, He is wealthy; others gratify their selfishness by seeking honor of men; others in dress, others in travel, others in debauchery and the lowest and meanest forms of selfishness.

(1) Sound judgment says that if the saints with divine help have a constant battle to keep selfishness subject to love, a promiscuous colony or community would certainly not succeed in ruling itself by a law utterly foreign to the spirit of the majority of its members. And it would be impossible to establish a communism of saints only, because we cannot read the hearts--only "the Lord knoweth them that are his." And if such a colony of saints could be gotten together, and if it should prosper with all things in common, all sorts of evil persons would seek to get their possessions or to share them; and if successfully excluded they would say all manner of evil against them; and so, if it held together at all, the enterprise would not be a real success.

Some saints, as well as many of the world, are so fallen into selfish indolence that nothing but necessity will help them to be, "not slothful in business, but fervent in spirit, serving the Lord." And many others are so selfishly ambitious that they need the buffetings of failure and adversity to mellow them and enable them to sympathize with others, or even to bring them to deal justly with others. For both these classes "community" would merely serve to hinder the learning of the proper and needed lessons.

Such communities, if left to the rule of the majority, would sink to the level of the majority; for the progressive, active minority, finding that nothing could be gained by energy and thrift over carelessness and sloth, would also grow careless and indolent. If governed by organizers of strong will, as Life Trustees and Managers, on a paternal principle, the result would be more favorable financially; but the masses, deprived of personal responsibility, would degenerate into mere tools and slaves of the Trustees.

To sound judgment it therefore appears that the method of individualism, with its liberty and responsibility, is the best one for the development of intelligent beings; even though it may work hardships many times to all, and sometimes to many.

(2) Experience proves the failure of communistic methods in the present time. There have been several such communities; and the result has always been failure. The Oneida community of New York is one whose failure has long been recognized. Another, the Harmony Society of Pennsylvania, soon disappointed the hopes of its founders, for so much discord prevailed that it divided. The branch known as Economites located near Pittsburgh, Pa. It flourished for a while, after a fashion, but is now quite withered; and possession of its property is now being disputed in the Society and in the courts of law.

Other communistic societies are starting now, which will be far less successful than these because the times are different; independence is greater, respect and reverence are less, majorities will rule, and without superhuman leaders are sure to fail. Wise worldly leaders are looking out for themselves, while wise Christians are busy in other channels -- obeying the Lord's command, "Go thou and preach the Gospel."

(3) The Bible does not teach Communism, but does teach loving, considerate Individualism, except in the sense of family communism--each family acting as a unit, of which the father is the head and the wife one with him, his fellow-heir of the grace of life, his partner in every joy and benefit as well as in every adversity and sorrow.

True, God permitted a communistic arrangement in the primitive Church, referred to at the beginning of this article; but this may have been for the purpose of illustrating to us the unwisdom of the method; and lest some, thinking of the scheme now, should conclude that the apostles did not command and organize communities, because they lacked the wisdom to devise and carry out such methods; for not a word can be quoted from our Lord or the apostles advocating the communistic principles; but much can be quoted to the contrary.

True, the Apostle Peter (and probably other apostles) knew of, and cooperated in, that first communistic arrangement, even if he did not teach the system. It has been inferred, too, that the death of Ananias and Sapphira was an indication that the giving of all the goods of the believers was compulsory; but not so: their sin was that of lying, as Peter declared in reviewing the case. While they had the land there was no harm in keeping it if they got it honestly; and even after they had sold it no harm was done: the wrong was in misrepresenting that the sum of money turned in was their all, when it was not their all. They were attempting to cheat the others by getting a share of their alls without giving their own all.

As a matter of fact, the Christian Community at Jerusalem was a failure. "There arose a murmuring"--"Because their widows were neglected in the daily ministrations." Although under the Apostolic inspection the Church was pure, free from "tares," and all had the treasure of the new spirit or "mind of Christ," yet evidently that treasure was only in warped and twisted earthen vessels which could not get along well together.

The apostles soon found that the management of the community would greatly interfere with their real work -- the preaching of the gospel. So they abandoned those things to others. The Apostle Paul and others traveled from city to city preaching Christ and him crucified; but, so far as the record shows, they never mentioned communism and never organized a community; and yet St. Paul declares, "I have not shunned to declare unto you the whole counsel of God." This proves that Communism is no part of the gospel, nor of the counsel of God for this age.

"We do not share the views of those who believe that the State may be converted into a beneficent institution. The change would be as difficult as to convert a wolf into a lamb. Nor do we believe in the centralization of all production and consumption, as aimed at by the Socialists. That would be nothing but the present State in a new form, with increased authority, a veritable monstrosity of tyranny and slavery.

"What the Anarchists want is equal liberty for all. The talents and inclination of all men differ from each other. Every one knows best what he can do and what he wants; laws and regulations only hamper, and forced labor is never pleasant. In the state aimed at by the Anarchists, every one will do the work that pleases him best, and will satisfy his wants out of the common store as pleases him best."

It would seem that even the poorest judgment and the least experience would see in this proposal nothing but the sheerest folly. In it there is no remedy either proposed or expected: it is but the gnashing of teeth of the hopeless and despairing; yet it is the extremity toward which multitudes are being driven by the force of circumstances propelled by selfishness.

Socialism or Collectivism as a Remedy

It differs from "Nationalism" in that it does not propose to reward all individuals alike. It differs from "Communism" in that it does not advocate a community of goods or property. It thus, in our judgment, avoids the errors of both, and is a very practical theory if it could be introduced gradually and by wise, moderate, unselfish men. This principle has already accomplished much on a small scale in various localities. In many cities in the United States the water supply, street improvements, schools and fire and police departments are so conducted, to the general welfare. But Europe is in advance of us along these lines; for many of their railroads and telegraphs are so conducted. In France the tobacco business with all its profits belongs to the government, the people. In Russia the liquor business has been seized by the government and is hereafter to be conducted by it for the public benefit financially, and it is claimed also morally.

The following interesting statistics are from

"Social Upbuilding"

by E. D. Babbitt, LL. D., of the College of Fine Forces, New Jersey:

"Sixty-eight governments own their telegraph lines.

"Fifty-four governments own their railroads in whole or in part, while only nineteen, the United States among them, do not.

"In Hungary, where the roads are state-owned, one can ride six miles for a cent, and since the government bought the roads, wages have doubled.

"In Belgium, fares and freight rates have been cut down one-half and wages doubled. But for all that the roads pay a yearly revenue to the government of $4,000,000.

"In Germany, the government-owned roads will carry a person four miles for a cent, while the wages of the employees are 120 per cent higher than when the corporations owned them. Has such a system proved ruinous? No. During the last ten years the net profits have increased 41 per cent. Last year (1894), the roads paid the German government a net profit of $25,000,000.

"It has been estimated that government ownership of railroads would save the people of the United States a billion dollars in money and give better wages to its employees, two millions of whom would doubtless then be needed instead of 700,000 as at present.

"Berlin, Germany, is called the cleanest, best paved and best governed city in the world. It owns its gas works, electric lights, water works, street railways, city telephones, and even its fire insurance, and thus makes a profit every year of 5,000,000 mark, or $1,250,000, over all expenses. In that city the citizens can ride five miles as often as they please every day in the whole year for $4.50, while two trips a day on the elevated railroads of New York would cost $36.50.

"Mr. F. G. R. Gordon has given in the Twentieth Century the statistics with reference to lighting a number of American cities and finds that the average price of each arc light by the year, when under municipal control, is $52.12 1/2 while the average price paid to private parties by the various cities is $105.13 per light each year, or a little more than twice as much as when run by the cities themselves.

Very good, we answer, so far as it goes. But still no sane man will claim that the poor of Europe are enjoying the Millennial blessings, even with all these Socialist theories in operation in their midst. No well informed man will undertake to say that the working classes of Europe are anywhere near on a par with workmen in general in the United States. This is still their Paradise, and laws are even now being formed to limit the thousands who desire still to come to share this Paradise.

But while we rejoice in every amelioration of the condition of Europe's poor, let us not forget that the nationalization movement, except in Great Britain, results not from greater sagacity on the part of the people, nor from benevolence or indolence on the part of Capital, but from another cause which does not operate in the United States -- from the governments themselves. They have taken possession of these to avoid bankruptcy. They are under immense expense in supporting armies, navies, fortresses, etc., and must have a source of revenue. The cheap rates of travel are with a view to please the people and also to draw business; for if the rates were not low the many who earn small wages could not ride. As it is, the fourth-class cars in Germany are merely freight cars, without seats of any kind.

In full view of such facts let us not delude ourselves with the supposition that such measures would solve the Labor Problem, or even relieve matters for more than six years, and that but slightly.

We can but rejoice to see principles of equity set in motion, even though they be but temporary and partial. And all whose interests would be affected thereby should endeavor to take a broad view, and to relinquish a portion of their personal advantage for the general good.

As intimated the movement will be crushed under the combined power of Church, State and Capital and later lead to the great explosion of anarchy, in which, as indicated in the Scriptures, all present institutions will be wrecked--"a time of trouble such as was not since there was a nation."

Communists and Nationalists see that so long as differences of compensation are permitted selfishness will warp and twist truth and justice; and in order to gratify pride and ambition it will surmount every barrier against poverty that men can erect. To meet this difficulty they go to the impractical extremes which their claims present -- impractical because men are sinners, not saints; selfish, not loving.

Herbert Spencer's View of Socialism

Mr. Herbert Spencer, the noted English philosopher and economist, noticing the statement that the Italian Socialist Ferri supports his theories, wrote: "The assertion that any of my views favor Socialism causes me great irritation. I believe the advent of Socialism to be the greatest disaster the world has ever known."

While great thinkers agree that competition or "individualism" has its evils that require drastic remedies, they deprecate the enslavement of the individual to social organization: or rather the burial of all individuality in Socialism, as eventually the greater disaster; since it would create armies of public employees, make politics still more of a trade than at present, and consequently open the way more than ever to rings and general corruption.

"Two Socialist Communities"

"Two practical trials of Socialism attract the attention of students of social economy abroad. In both cases the original promoters of Socialist communities are doing fairly well, in one they are even prosperous. But the attempt to live up to the teachings of Socialistic theorists has failed in both instances. The erstwhile communists have returned to methods which scarcely differ from those of the bourgeoise around them. A little more than two years ago a party of Australian workingmen, tired of a life of wage-slavery relieved only by the hardships of enforced idleness, set out for Paraguay, where they obtained land suitable for farmers who have no large machines at their disposal. They called their settlement New Australia, and hoped to convert it into a Utopia for workingmen. The British foreign Office, in its latest official report, gives a short history of the movement which caused many men to exchange Australia, 'the workingman's Eldorado,' for South America. We take the following from the report mentioned:

"The aims of the colony were set forth in its constitution, in which one of the articles runs as follows: 'It is our intention to form a community in which all labor will be for the benefit of every member, and in which it will be impossible for one to tyrannize another. It will be the duty of each individual to regard the well-being of the community as his chief aim, thus insuring a degree of comfort, happiness and education which is impossible in a state of society where no one is certain that he will not starve.'

"The experience of the miners of Monthieux is somewhat different. In their case it was prosperity that caused the Socialistic theories to be set aside. The Gewerbe Zeitung, Berlin, tells their story as follows:

"'At Monthieux, near St. Etienne, is a pit which was given up by the company which owned it a couple of years ago, and the miners were discharged. As there was no chance for employment in the neighborhood, the workmen begged the company to turn over the pit to them, and as the owners did not believe that the pit could be made to pay, they consented. The miners had no machinery, but they worked with a will and managed to find new veins. They made almost superhuman efforts and managed to save enough of their earnings to purchase machinery, and the discarded mines of Monthieux became a source of wealth to the new owners. The former owners then endeavored to regain possession, but lost their suit, and the labor press did not fail to contrast the avarice of the capitalists with the nobility of the miners who shared alike the proceeds of their labor. The mines of Monthieux were pointed out as an instance of the triumph of Collectivism over the exploitation of private capital.

Nationalism as a Remedy

Nationalism is a later development of theory along the lines of socialism. It claims that all industries should be conducted by the nation, on the basis of common obligation to work and a general guarantee of livelihood; all workers to do the same amount of work, and to get the same wages.

Nationalists claim that --

"The combinations, trusts and syndicates, of which the people at present complain, demonstrate the practicability of our basic principle of association. We merely seek to push this principle a little further and have all industries operated in the interest of all, by the nation--the people organized --the organic unity of the whole people.

"The present industrial system proves itself wrong by the immense wrongs it produces; it proves itself absurd by the immense waste of energy and material which is admitted to be its concomitant. Against this system we raise our protest: for the abolition of the slavery it has wrought and would perpetuate, we pledge our best efforts."

Several colonies on this Nationalist plan have started and failed within the past few years, in the United States. One of the most noted failures is that known as the Altruria Colony, of California, founded by Rev. E. B. Payne, on the theory "One for all and all for one." It had many advantages over other colonies in that it picked out its members, and did not accept all sorts. Moreover, it had a Lodge form of government of very thorough control. Its founder, giving the reasons for the failure, in the San Francisco Examiner, Dec. 10, 1896, said:

"Altruria was not a complete failure;...we demonstrated that trust, good will and sincerity--which prevailed for a part of the time--made a happy community life, and on the other side, that suspicion, envy and selfish motives diabolize human nature and make life not worth while.... We did not continue to trust and consider one another as we did at first, but fell back into the ways of the rest of the world."

General Education of Mechanics a Remedy

In The Forum some years ago an article appeared by Mr. Henry Holt, in which he endeavored to show that education should be largely industrial, to fit a mechanic to readily turn from one employment to another--he should "learn a dozen" trades. While this might for a time help a few individuals, it is manifest that such a measure would not solve the problem. It is bad enough as it is, when plasterers and bricklayers may be busy while shoemakers and weavers are idle; but what would be the effect if the latter also understood bricklaying and plastering? It would multiply competition in every trade, if all the unemployed could compete for the busy jobs. The gentleman, however, deals well with two comprehensive truths, respecting which education is needed. He said:

"The other truth so difficult to impart clearly, but not impossible to give some conception of, is the more important. It is difficult, not so much because it calls for some preliminary education, as because dogma has been fighting it for thousands of years, and fights it still. To most who read this, every one of these assertions will probably appear strange, when the truth is named in the familiar phraseology --The Universal Reign of Law. Yet it is the fact that hosts of men who think they believe in it, pray every day that it may not be--that exceptions may be made in their cases. People generally--and legislators generally--in a matter of physiology, would send for a doctor; or in a matter of machinery, for an engineer; or in chemistry, for a chemist; and would follow his opinion with childlike faith; but in economics they want no opinions but their own. They have no idea that such matters are, like physical matters, under the control of natural laws--that to find those laws, or learn those already found, requires special study; and that to go counter to them, in ignorance, must bring disaster as fatal as in perversity....

Yes, it is well that all should learn that these two laws control in our present social system, and that it is not in the power of man to change nature or nature's laws; and hence that it is impossible for him to do more than tinker present social conditions, and temporarily improve them a little. The new and more desirable laws necessary to the perfect, the ideal society, will require supernatural powers for their introduction. Learning this lesson will help to bring (instead of a discontent which aggravates itself) "godliness with contentment," while waiting for the Kingdom of God and praying, "Thy Kingdom come; thy will be done on earth as in heaven."

The Single Tax Remedy

The effect would of course be to open to actual settlement thousands of town lots and barren fields now held for speculative purposes; because all taxes being consolidated into one, and being removed from cattle, machinery, business and improvements of every kind, and all concentrated upon the land would make the land-tax quite an item; graduated, however, so as to show no favoritism, poor farm lands or remote from transportation being taxed less in proportion than better lands, and those nearer to transportation. City lots similarly would be assessed according to value, location and surroundings considered.

An Extract from an Open Letter
by Mr. Henry George to Pope Leo XIII, in Answer
to the Latter's Encyclical on the
Perplexing Labor Question.

"It seems to us that your Holiness misses its real significance in intimating that Christ, in becoming the son of a carpenter and himself working as a carpenter, showed merely that 'there is nothing to be ashamed of in seeking one's bread by labor.' To say that is almost like saying that by not robbing people he showed that there is nothing to be ashamed of in honesty. If you will consider how true in any large view is the classification of all men into workingmen, beggarmen and thieves, you will see that it was morally impossible that Christ, during his stay on earth, should have been anything else than a workingman, since he who came to fulfil the law must by deed as well as word obey God's law of labor.

*"Nor should it be forgotten that the investigator, the philosopher, the teacher, the artist, the poet, the priest, though not engaged in the production of wealth, are not only engaged in the production of utilities and satisfactions to which the production of wealth is only a means, but by acquiring and diffusing knowledge, stimulating mental powers and elevating the moral sense, may greatly increase the ability to produce wealth. For man does not live by bread alone....He who by any exertion of mind or body adds to the aggregate of enjoyable wealth increases the sum of human knowledge, or gives to human life higher elevation or greater fulness--he is, in the large meaning of the words, a 'producer,' a 'working man,' a 'laborer,' and is honestly earning honest wages. But he who without doing aught to make mankind richer, wiser, better, happier, lives on the toil of others--he, no matter by what name of honor he may be called, or how lustily the priests of Mammon may swing their censers before him, is in the last analysis but a beggarman or a thief."

"In assuming that laborers, even ordinary manual laborers, are naturally poor, you ignore the fact that labor is the producer of wealth, and attribute to the natural law of the Creator an injustice that comes from man's impious violation of his benevolent intention. In the rudest state of the arts it is possible, where justice prevails, for all well men to earn a living. With the labor-saving appliances of our time it should be possible for all to earn much more. And so, in saying that poverty is no disgrace, you convey an unreasonable implication. For poverty ought to be a disgrace, because in a condition of social justice, it would, where unimposed by unavoidable misfortune, imply recklessness or laziness.

"God's commands cannot be evaded with impunity. If it be God's command that men shall earn their bread by labor, the idle rich must suffer. And they do. See the utter vacancy of the lives of those who live for pleasure; see the loathsome vices bred in a class who, surrounded by poverty, are sated with wealth. See that terrible punishment of ennui of which the poor know so little that they cannot understand it; see the pessimism that grows among the wealthy classes--that shuts out God, that despises men, that deems existence in itself an evil, and fearing death yet longs for annihilation.

"Men who are sure of getting food when they shall need it eat only what appetite dictates. But with the sparse tribes who exist on the verge of the habitable globe, life is either a famine or a feast. Enduring hunger for days, the fear of it prompts them to gorge like anacondas when successful in their quest of game. And so, what gives wealth its curse is what drives men to seek it, what makes it so envied and admired --the fear of want. As the unduly rich are the corollary of the unduly poor, so is the soul-destroying quality of riches but the reflex of the want that imbrutes and degrades. The real evil lies in the injustice from which unnatural possession and unnatural deprivation both spring.

"But this injustice can hardly be charged on individuals or classes. The existence of private property in land is a great social wrong from which society at large suffers, and of which the very rich and the very poor are alike victims, though at the opposite extremes. Seeing this, it seems to us like a violation of Christian charity to speak of the rich as though they individually were responsible for the sufferings of the poor. Yet, while you do this, you insist that the cause of monstrous wealth and degrading poverty shall not be touched. Here is a man with a disfiguring and dangerous excrescence. One physician would kindly, gently, but firmly remove it. Another insists that it shall not be removed, but at the same time holds up the poor victim to hatred and ridicule. Which is right?

"In seeking to restore all men to their equal and natural rights we do not seek the benefit of any class, but of all. For we both know by faith and see by fact that injustice can profit no one and that justice must benefit all.

"Nor do we seek any 'futile and ridiculous equality.'... The equality we would bring about is not the equality of fortune, but the equality of natural opportunity....

"Your Holiness in the Encyclical gives an example of this. Denying the equality of right to the material basis of life, and yet conscious that there is a right to live, you assert the right of laborers to employment, and their right to receive from their employers a certain indefinite wage. No such rights exist. No one has a right to demand employment of another, or to demand higher wages than the other is willing to give, or in any way to put pressure on another to make him raise such wages against his will. There can be no better moral justification for such demands on employers by workingmen than there would be for employers to demand that workingmen shall be compelled to work for them when they do not want to and to accept wages lower than they are willing to take. Any seeming justification springs from a prior wrong, the denial to workingmen of their natural rights....

"Christ justified David, who when pressed by hunger committed what ordinarily would be sacrilege, by taking from the temple the loaves of proposition. But in this he was far from saying that the robbing of temples was a proper way of getting a living.

"This is the only way in which they can be satisfactorily regulated.

"Your Holiness seems to assume that there is some just rate of wages that employers ought to be willing to pay and that laborers should be content to receive, and to imagine that if this were secured there would be an end of strife. This rate you evidently think of as that which will give workingmen a frugal living, and perhaps enable them by hard work and strict economy to lay by a little something.

"But how can a just rate of wages be fixed without the 'higgling of the market' any more than the just price of corn or pigs or ships or paintings can be so fixed? And would not arbitrary regulation in the one case as in the other check that interplay that most effectively promotes the economical adjustment of productive forces? Why should buyers of labor any more than buyers of commodities, be called on to pay higher prices than in a free market they are compelled to pay? Why should the sellers of labor be content with anything less than in a free market they can obtain? Why should workingmen be content with frugal fare when the world is so rich? Why should they be satisfied with a lifetime of toil and stinting, when the world is so bountiful? Why should not they also desire to gratify the higher instincts, the finer tastes? Why should they be forever content to travel in the steerage when others find the cabin more enjoyable?

"Nor will they. The ferment of our time does not arise merely from the fact that workingmen find it harder to live on the same scale of comfort. It is also, and perhaps still more largely, due to the increase of their desires with an improved scale of comfort. This increase of desire must continue; for workingmen are men, and man is the unsatisfied animal.

"This restless discontent is of the nature of man--of that nobler nature that raises him above the animals by so immeasurable a gulf, and shows him to be indeed created in the likeness of God. It is not to be quarreled with, for it is the motor of all progress. It is this that has raised St. Peter's dome, and on dull, dead canvas made the angelic face of the Madonna to glow; it is this that has weighed suns and analyzed stars, and opened page after page of the wonderful works of creative intelligence; it is this that has narrowed the Atlantic to an ocean ferry and trained the lightning to carry our messages to the remotest lands; it is this that is opening to us possibilities beside which all that our modern civilization has as yet accomplished seem small. Nor can it be repressed save by degrading and imbruting men; by reducing Europe to Asia.

"Hence, short of what wages may be earned when all restrictions on labor are removed, and access to natural opportunities on equal terms secured to all, it is impossible to fix any rate of wages that will be deemed just, or any rate of wages that can prevent workingmen striving to get more. So far from it making workingmen more contented to improve their condition a little, it is certain to make them more discontented.

"Nor are you asking justice when you ask employers to pay their workingmen more than they are compelled to pay--more than they could get others to do the work for. You are asking charity. For the surplus that the rich employer thus gives is not in reality wages, it is essentially alms.

"In speaking of the practical measures for the improvement of the condition of labor which your Holiness suggests, I have not mentioned what you place much stress upon--charity. But there is nothing practical in such recommendations as a cure for poverty, nor will any one so consider them. If it were possible for the giving of alms to abolish poverty there would be no poverty in Christendom.

"Charity is indeed a noble and beautiful virtue, grateful to man and approved by God. But charity must be built on justice. It cannot supersede justice.

"What is wrong in the condition of labor through the Christian world is that labor is robbed. And while you justify the continuance of that robbery it is idle to urge charity. To do so--to commend charity as a substitute for justice, is indeed something akin in essence to those heresies, condemned by your predecessors, that taught that the gospel had superseded the law, and that the love of God exempted men from moral obligations.

"All that charity can do where injustice exists is here and there to somewhat mollify the effects of injustice. It cannot cure them. Nor is even what little it can do to mollify the effects of injustice without evil. For what may be called the superimposed, as in this sense, secondary virtues, work evil where the fundamental or primary virtues are absent. Thus sobriety is a virtue, and diligence is a virtue. But a sober and diligent thief is all the more dangerous. Thus patience is a virtue. But patience under wrong is the condoning of wrong. Thus it is a virtue to seek knowledge and to endeavor to cultivate the mental powers. But the wicked man becomes more capable of evil by reason of his intelligence. Devils we always think of as intelligent.

"But worse, perhaps, than all else is the way in which this substituting of vague injunctions to charity for the clear-cut demands of justice opens an easy means for the professed teachers of the Christian religion of all branches and communions to placate Mammon while persuading themselves that they are serving God....

"No, your Holiness, as faith without works is dead, as men cannot give to God his due while denying to their fellows the rights he gave them, so charity, unsupported by justice, can do nothing to solve the problem of the existing condition of labor. Though the rich were to 'bestow all their goods to feed the poor and give their bodies to be burned,' poverty would continue while property in land continues.

"Take the case of the rich man today who is honestly desirous of devoting his wealth to the improvement of the condition of labor. What can he do?

"Bestow his wealth on those who need it? He may help some who deserve it, but he will not improve general conditions. And against the good he may do will be the danger of doing harm.

"Build churches? Under the shadow of churches poverty festers, and the vice that is born of it breeds.

"Build schools and colleges? Save as it may lead men to see the iniquity of private property in land, increased education can effect nothing for mere laborers, for as education is diffused the wages of education sink.

"Establish hospitals? Why, already it seems to laborers that there are too many seeking work, and to save and prolong life is to add to the pressure.

"Institute laboratories, scientific schools, workshops for physical experiments? He but stimulates invention and discovery, the very forces that, acting on a society based on private property in land, are crushing labor as between the upper and the nether millstone.

"Promote emigration from places where wages are low to places where they are somewhat higher? If he does, even those whom he at first helps to emigrate will soon turn on him to demand that such emigration shall be stopped, as it is reducing their wages.

"Give away what land he may have, or refuse to take rent for it, or let it at lower rents than the market price? He will simply make new land owners or partial land owners; he may make some individuals the richer, but he will do nothing to improve the general condition of labor.

"Or bethinking himself of those public-spirited citizens of classic times who spent great sums in improving their native cities, shall he try to beautify the city of his birth or adoption? Let him widen and straighten narrow and crooked streets, let him build parks and erect fountains, let him open tramways and bring in railroads, or in any way make beautiful and attractive his chosen city, and what will be the result? Must it not be those who appropriate God's bounty will take his also? Will it not be that the value of land will go up, and that the net result of his benefactions will be an increase of rents and a bounty to land owners? Why, even the mere announcement that he is going to do such things will start speculation and send up the value of land by leaps and bounds.

"What, then, can the rich man do to improve the condition of labor?

"He can do nothing at all except to use his strength for the abolition of the great primary wrong that robs men of their birthright. The justice of God laughs at the attempts of men to substitute anything else for it."

* * *

"Or take even such moderate measures as the limitation of working hours and of the labor of women and children. They are superficial in looking no further than to the eagerness of men and women and little children to work unduly, and in proposing forcibly to restrain overwork while utterly ignoring its cause, the sting of poverty that forces human beings to it. And the methods by which these restraints must be enforced, multiply officials, interfere with personal liberty, tend to corruption and are liable to abuse.

"We differ from the Socialists in our diagnosis of the evil, and we differ from them as to remedies. We have no fear of capital, regarding it as the natural handmaiden of labor; we look on interest in itself as natural and just; we would set no limit to accumulation, nor impose on the rich any burden that is not equally placed on the poor; we see no evil in competition, but deem unrestricted competition to be as necessary to the health of the industrial and social organism as the free circulation of the blood is to the health of the bodily organism--to be the agency whereby the fullest cooperation is to be secured. We would simply take for the community what belongs to the community; the value that attaches to land by the growth of the community; leave sacredly to the individual all that belongs to the individual; and, treating necessary monopolies as functions of the state, abolish all restrictions and prohibitions save those required for public health, safety, morals and convenience.

"But the fundamental difference--the difference I ask your Holiness specially to note, is in this: Socialism in all its phases looks on the evils of our civilization as springing from the inadequacy or inharmony of natural relations, which must be artificially organized or improved. In its idea there devolves on the state the necessity of intelligently organizing the industrial relations of men; the construction, as it were, of a great machine whose complicated parts shall properly work together under the direction of human intelligence. This is the reason why socialism tends toward atheism. Failing to see the order and symmetry of natural law, it fails to recognize God.

"And it is because that in what we propose--the securing to all men of equal natural opportunities for the exercise of their powers and the removal of all legal restriction on the legitimate exercise of those powers--we see the conformation of human law to the moral law, that we hold with confidence, not merely that this is the sufficient remedy for all the evils you so strikingly portray, but that it is the only possible remedy.

"Nor is there any other. The organization of man is such, his relations to the world in which he is placed are such-- that is to say, the immutable laws of God are such--that it is beyond the power of human ingenuity to devise any way by which the evils born of the injustice that robs men of their birthright can be removed otherwise than by doing justice, by opening to all the bounty that God has provided for all.

"This is not to say that all wages must fall to this point, but that the wages of that necessarily largest stratum of laborers who have only ordinary knowledge, skill and aptitude must so fall. The wages of special classes, who are fenced off from competition by peculiar knowledge, skill or other causes, may remain above that ordinary level. Thus, where the ability to read and write is rare, its possession enables a man to obtain higher wages than the ordinary laborer. But as the diffusion of education makes the ability to read and write general, this advantage is lost. So, when a vocation requires special training or skill, or is made difficult of access by artificial restrictions, the checking of competition tends to keep wages in it at a higher level. But as the progress of invention dispenses with peculiar skill, or artificial restrictions are broken down, these higher wages sink to the ordinary level. And so, it is only so long as they are special that such qualities as industry, prudence and thrift can enable the ordinary laborer to maintain a condition above that which gives a mere living. Where they become general, the law of competition must reduce the earnings or savings of such qualities to the general level -- which, land being monopolized and labor helpless, can be only that at which the next lowest point is the cessation of life.

"Thus, where private property in land has divided society into a land-owning class and a landless class, there is no possible invention or improvement, whether it be industrial, social or moral, which, so long as it does not affect the ownership of land, can prevent poverty or relieve the general condition of mere laborers. For whether the effect of any invention or improvement be to increase what labor can produce or to decrease what is required to support the laborer, it can, so soon as it becomes general, result only in increasing the income of the owners of land, without at all benefiting the mere laborers. In no events can those possessed of the mere ordinary power to labor, a power utterly useless without the means necessary to labor, keep more of their earnings than enough to enable them to live.

"How true this is we may see in the facts of today. In our own time invention and discovery have enormously increased the productive power of labor, and at the same time greatly reduced the cost of many things necessary to the support of the laborer. Have these improvements anywhere raised the earnings of the mere laborer? Have not their benefits mainly gone to the owners of land--enormously increased land values?

"Nay, would not these very blessings bring starvation to many of those who now manage to live? Is it not true, that if there were proposed today, what all Christian men ought to pray for, the complete disbandment of all the armies of Europe, the greatest fears would be aroused for the consequences of throwing on the labor market so many unemployed laborers?

"The explanation of this and of similar paradoxes that in our time perplex on every side may be easily seen. The effect of all inventions and improvements that increase productive power, that save waste and economize effort, is to lessen the labor required for a given result, and thus to save labor, so that we speak of them as labor-saving inventions or improvements. Now, in a natural state of society where the rights of all to the use of the earth are acknowledged, labor-saving improvements might go to the very utmost that can be imagined without lessening the demand for men, since in such natural conditions the demand for men lies in their own enjoyment of life and the strong instincts that the Creator has implanted in the human breast. But in that unnatural state of society where the masses of men are disinherited of all but the power to labor when opportunity to labor is given them by others, there the demand for them becomes simply the demand for their services by those who hold this opportunity, and man himself becomes a commodity. Hence, although the natural effect of labor-saving improvement is to increase wages, yet in the unnatural condition which private ownership of the land begets, the effect, even of such moral improvements as the disbandment of armies and the saving of the labor that vice entails, is by lessening the commercial demand, to lower wages and reduce mere laborers to starvation or pauperism. If labor-saving inventions and improvements could be carried to the very abolition of the necessity for labor, what would be the result? Would it not be that land owners could then get all the wealth the land is capable of producing, and would have no need at all for laborers, who must then either starve or live as pensioners on the bounty of the land owners?

"Thus, so long as private property in land continues--so long as some men are treated as owners of the earth and other men can live on it only by their sufferance--human wisdom can devise no means by which the evils of our present condition may be avoided."

This theory of free land (except for taxes thereon) is a broad and a just theory which we would be pleased to see put into operation at once, although we would not profit by it personally. It would doubtless prove a temporary relief to society, although its destruction of land values would create as much or more of a shock than Socialism proposes, unless graduated, as above suggested, by previous announcement. It would readily combine with the more moderate features of Socialism and would give them greater lasting quality; because, the land, one source of wealth, being in the hands of all the people on such conditions, it never would be necessary for healthy, industrious people to starve: all could at least grow crops sufficient to feed themselves. While this, we believe, would be a wise and just measure, and one in accordance with the divine law, as very ably shown by Mr. George, yet it would not be the panacea for all the ills of humanity. The groaning creation would still groan until righteousness and truth are fully established in the earth and all hearts are brought into accord with it, and selfishness would still find opportunity to take all the cream, and leave only enough skimmed milk for the barest necessities of others.

When we grant that the single tax or free land proposition would prove to be only one factor of a temporary relief, it is all that we can grant; for if selfishness be thwarted in one direction it will only break out in another: nothing will effectually avail but "new hearts" and "right spirits"; and these neither the Single Tax theory nor any other human theory can produce.

Suppose, for instance, that the people had the land; it would be an easy matter for a combination of capital to refuse to purchase the farm products except at their own figures --barely enough to permit the producers to live--and on the other hand to control and fix high prices upon all the agriculturalist needs to purchase--from the farm fertilizer and farm implements to his family clothing and home furnishments.

This very condition is surely approaching--the Law of Supply and Demand operates too slowly to satisfy the greed for wealth today. Labor cannot stop the operation of this law, and is crowded both by machinery and growing population; but Capital can counteract it at least partially by forming Trusts, Combines, Syndicates, etc., for nearly or quite controlling supplies and prices. The Coal Combine is an illustration.

Of what avail, we ask, would Single Tax be against this spirit of selfishness? It would be powerless!

But suppose that the free land and single tax proposition were to go into operation tomorrow; suppose that tilled lands were exempted from all taxes; that each farm were provided with a house, horse, cow, plow and other necessities; suppose this meant the doubling of the present area of cultivation and doubling of present crops. It would insure plenty of corn and wheat and vegetables for the healthy and thrifty to eat; but the great overplus would bring so small a price that it would not pay to send it to market, except under favorable conditions. It is sometimes so, even under present conditions: thousands of bushels of potatoes and cabbage being left to rot, because it does not pay to handle them. The first year might draw from the cities to the aforesaid farms thousands of strong and willing men anxious to serve themselves: this would free the city labor market and temporarily raise the wages of those who would remain in the cities, but it would last only one year. The farmers, finding that they could not make clothing and household necessities out of corn and potatoes, either directly or by exchange, would quit farming and go back to the cities and compete vigorously for whatever they could get that would provide more for them than mere sustenance; for whatever would grant them a share of life's comforts and luxuries.

Other Hopes and Fears

We have hastily scanned the principal theories advanced for the betterment of present conditions, but it is manifest that none of them are adequate to the necessities of the case. Besides these there are any number of people who incessantly preach and pray about what they see wrong, and who want somebody to stop the course of the world, but who neither see nor suggest anything even simulating practicability.

But in this connection we should not forget to mention some honest but thoroughly impractical souls who vainly imagine that the churches, if awakened to the situation, could avert the impending social calamity, revolutionize society and re-establish it upon a new and better basis. They say, If only the churches could be awakened, they could conquer the world for Christ and could themselves establish on earth a Kingdom of God upon a basis of love and loyalty to God and equal love for fellowmen. Some of them even claim that this, the Christ-spirit in the churches, would be the second coming of Christ.

How hopelessly impracticable this theory is, need scarcely be pointed out. What they consider its strength is really its weakness--numbers. They look at the figures 300,000,000 Christians and say, What a power! We look at the same figures and say, What a weakness!

The Only Hope--"That Blessed Hope"

The Proper Attitude for God's People

But some may inquire, What must we who see these things in their true light do now? Shall we if we own vacant land give it away or abandon it? No; that would serve no good purpose unless you gave it to some poor neighbor actually needing it: and then, should he make a failure of its use, he doubtless would censure you as the author of his misfortunes.

If we are farmers or merchants or manufacturers, shall we attempt to do business on the Millennium basis? No; for, as already shown, to do so would bring upon you financial disaster, injurious to your creditors and to those dependent on you, as well as upon your employees.

We suggest that all that can now be done is to let our moderation be known unto all men: avoid grinding anybody; pay a reasonable wage or a share of the profits or else do not hire; avoid dishonesty of every form; "provide things honest in the sight of all men"; set an example of "Godliness with contentment," and always by word as well as by example discourage not only violence, but even discontent; and seek to lead the weary and heavy laden to Christ and the word of God's grace--through faith and full consecration. And should you, by God's grace, be the steward of more or less wealth, do not worship it, nor seek to see how much you can accumulate for your heirs to wrangle over and misuse; but use it, according to your covenant, for God's service and under his direction; remembering that it is not yours to keep, nor yours to use for yourself, but God's entrusted to your care, to be used in joyful service, to the glory of our King.

In the World but Not of the World
Pennsylvania

The difficulty is that the whole world is running on the depraved basis of selfishness, which is quite incongruous to love. With some the plane is higher, and with some lower: some limit their selfishness to the line of justice, others descend in selfishness to injustice and dishonesty, and the tendency is always downward. The "New Creature" in Christ must never go below justice and honesty, and must seek as much as possible to rise above this highest worldly standard, toward perfect love. It is the fault of the present competitive system that the interests of the buyer and those of the seller are ever in conflict. No power can correct, control and alter all this except the one power that God has promised--the Millennial Kingdom, which shall enforce the rule of love and liberate from the propensities and bonds of selfishness all who, when they see and know the better way, will accept the help then to be provided.

* * *

We have seen as inevitable under the present social law either the crush of the masses of humanity into the mire, as the slaves of wealth and intellect, or the crash of the present social order under the reign of anarchy, and the Scriptural declaration that it will be the latter; and that this will bring an awful retribution upon all men, rich and poor, learned and ignorant, and by actual demonstration teach men the folly of selfishness, and help them in future to appreciate the wisdom of God's law of love; and that the "great tribulation" will teach all a fearful, but eventually a most profitable lesson. We are therefore prepared to examine in our next chapter what the Scriptures have to tell us respecting the fall of "Babylon"--"Christendom"--in the great struggle in which this age shall end.