Morris William

Table of contents

WILLIAM MORRIS : BIOGRAPHY 5

AN OLD FABLE RETOLD 28

ART AND SOCIALISM – 31

ART, WEALTH, AND RICHES 59

COMMUNISM 81

DAWN OF A NEW EPOCH 95

HOW I BECAME A SOCIALIST – 117

HOW SHALL WE LIVE THEN ? 123

MAKESHIFT 145

OUR POLICY 161

SOCIALISM: THE ENDS AND THE MEANS 167

STATEMENT OF PRINCIPLES OF THE HAMMERSMITH SOCIALIST SOCIETY 183

THE CLAIM OF SOCIALISM 189

THE DEPRESSION OF TRADE 190

THE MANIFESTO OF THE SOCIALIST LEAGUE 208

THE POLICY OF ABSTENTION 215

THE PRESENT OUTLOOK IN POLITICS 236

THE PRESENT OUTLOOK OF SOCIALISM IN ENGLAND 253

THE SOCIALIST IDEAL: ART 264

THE WORKER’S SHARE OF ART 274

TRUE AND FALSE SOCIETY 279

WHAT SOCIALISTS WANT 305

WHERE ARE WE NOW? 325

WHIGS, DEMOCRATS, & SOCIALISTS * 333

WILLIAM MORRIS : WORKS 347

William Morris : Biography

"it is Morris... who can properly be called the first English Marxist"

A. L. Morton, Political Writings of William Morris.

William Morris was born on 24th March, 1834, in Walthamstow, then a suburban village on the edge of Epping Forest. His first contact with the working class and first political activity came through his involvement in the struggle to stop Disraeli's Tory government going to war with Russia between 1876 and 1878.

In 1883 Morris joined the Democratic Federation (soon to be renamed the Social Democratic Federation (S.D.F.)). In December 1884, with the support of Engels, Morris and 8 out of the 10 members of the Executive of the S.D.F. resigned and set up the Socialist League. The Socialist League was split with Parliamentarians on one side and anarchists on the other,

Morris, though no anarchist, sided with them against the Parliamentarians. Morris left the Socialist League at the end of 1890 and continued to work in the Hammersmith Socialist Society, which was formed around the Hammersmith branch of the Socialist League. When William Morris died on 9th January 1896 the following obituary was published in the Clarion:

"I cannot help thinking that it does not matter what goes into the Clarion this week, because William Morris is dead. And what socialist will care for any other news this week, beyond that one said fact? He was our best man, and he is dead ...

It is true that much of his work still lives, and will live. But we have lost him, and, great as was his work, he himself was greater ... he was better than the best. Though his words fell like sword strokes, one always felt that the warrior was stronger than the sword. For Morris was not only a genius, he was a man. Strike at him where you would, he rang true ... he was our best man. We cannot spare him; we cannot replace him. In all England there lives no braver, kinder, honester, cleverer, heartier man than William Morris. He is dead, and we cannot help feeling for a while that nothing else matters."

Thanks to Tony Benn MP, for providing this quote.

THE POLICY OF ABSTENTION

WILLIAM MORRIS

The William Morris Internet Archive : Works "http://www.marxists.org/archive/morris/works/index.htm"

All Socialists who can be considered to have any claim to that title agree in putting forward the necessity of transforming the means of production from individual into common property: that is the least that the party can accept as terms of peace with the capitalists; and obviously they are hard terms of peace for the latter, since they mean the destruction of individualist capital. This minimum which we claim therefore is a very big thing: its realization would bring about such a revolution as the world has not yet seen, and all minor reforms of civilization which have been thought of or would be possible to think of would be included in it: no political party has ever had a programme at once so definite and so inclusive: many Socialists would be satisfied if the party were to put forward nothing save this claim; and if there were no party which put forward anything else I think all Socialists would feel themselves bound to support the party that had this platform to the utmost: but the shadow of the stupendous revolution which the abolition of private property in the means of production would bring about is cast upon our present opinions and policy. We cannot help speculating on what would be the consequences of the change, and how it would affect what would be left of our civilization, not only as to the production of wealth, but also as to religion, morals, the relation between the sexes, the methods of government or administration, and in short the whole of social life: of most of these matters I shall say nothing further in this paper, but will only briefly allude to matters directly connected with industrial production, and the administration of affairs.

Now amongst Socialists there are some who think that the abolition of private property in the means of production only would bring about a stable condition of society which would carry out communism no further, that the product of labour working on raw material and aided by instruments which were common property, should not be common, but would be the prize of energy, industry, and talent: `to each one according to his deeds.' In case there are any non-Socialists in the room, I may point out that this condition of things would be quite different from the present one, under which people can live idle and force others to work for them if they chance to be possessed of a share in the monopoly of the means of production, which is the privilege of their class; if it could be carried out and maintained without artificial bolstering up, it would be that real `career open to talent' which Napoleon ignorantly supposed his bourgeois Caesarism was to sustain: but some of us suppose that without such artificial bolstering up it would lead us back again into a new form of class society; that those who developed the greatest share of certain qualities not necessarily the most useful to the community, would gain a superior position from which they would be able to force the less gifted to serve them. And in fact those who limit the revolution of Socialism to the abolition of private property merely in the means of production do contemplate a society in which production shall be in tutelage to the state; in which the centralized state would draw arbitrarily the line where public property ends and private property begins, would interfere with inheritance and with the accumulation of wealth, and in many ways would act as a master, and take the place of the old masters: acting with benevolent intention indeed, but with conscious artificiality and by means of the employment of obvious force which would be felt everywhere and would sometimes at least be evaded or even resisted, and so at last might even bring on a new revolution which might lead us backward for a while, or might carry us forward into a condition of true Communism according to the ripeness or unripeness of the State Socialist revolution: in short to some of us it seems as if this view of Socialism simply indicates the crystallization of what can only be a transitional condition of society, and cannot in itself be stable: we on the other hand consider the aim of Socialism to be equality of condition: since the production of wares and the service of the community must always be a matter of co-operation; you cannot, if it were desirable, find out what each man's `deeds' are; and if you could, we see no reason for setting up a higher standard of livelihood for A because he can turn out more work than B, while the needs of the two are just the same: if society is to be of use to B, it must defend him against the tyranny of nature; and if instead of defending him against nature it turns round and helps her to punish poor B for not being born of the same capacity of developing muscle as A, society is a traitor to B, and if he be a man of any spirit will be rebel against it. We Communists therefore say that it is not possible really to proportion the reward to the labour, and that if you were able to do so you would still have to redress by charity the wrongs of the weak against the strong, you would still not be able to avoid a poor-law: the due exercise of one's energies for the common good and capacity for personal use we say form the only claims to the possession of wealth, and the right of property, the only safeguard against the creation of fresh privilege, which would have to be abolished like the old privilege. All this is admitted by many who will not call themselves Communists, because they do not wish anything to be put before people at present except the transitional state of things: and many of us Communists for our part are willing to admit that the communization of the means of production will inevitably lead to the communization of the products of labour also, and that, as I began by saying, it is a programme sufficiently big to put before the people of our generation, and the consequences of its realization can for the present be left to take care of themselves. So you see there is hardly a question at issue on this point between the Socialists and Communists. I will therefore assume in this paper that the immediately object of Socialists is the transformation of the raw material and the instruments of labour from private into common property, and then go on to inquire what are the means by which that object can be carried out. I would not have spoken as to the different opinions about the aims of Socialism if I had not felt that those opinions, as I have said elsewhere, would be likely to influence people's views as to the means of realization. The opinions as to the means are not quite conterminous with the two schools of so-called Socialists and Communists, but they are nearly so, and naturally, since the former are prepared to accept as a necessity a central all-powerful authoritative government, a reformed edition, one may say, of the state government at present existing; whereas the Communists, though they are not clear as to what will take the place of that in the meanwhile, are at least clear that when the habit of social life is established, nothing of the kind of authoritative central government will be needed or endured.

The moderate Socialists or those who can see nothing but the transitional period therefore, believe in what may be called a system of cumulative reforms as the means towards the end; which reforms must be carried out by means of Parliament and a bourgeois executive, the only legal power at present existing, while the Communists believe that it would be [a] waste of time for the Socialists to expend their energy in furthering reforms which so far from bringing us nearer to Socialism would rather serve to bolster up the present state of things; and not believing in the efficacy of reforms, they can see no reason for attempting to use Parliament in any way; except perhaps by holding it up as an example to show what a contemptible thing a body can be which poses as the representative of a whole nation, and which really represents nothing but the firm determination of the privileged or monopolist class to stick to their privilege and monopoly till they are forced to relinquish it.

Well there are, it seems, two policies before us, which, if you will allow me, I will call for short the Policy of Parliamentary Action, and the Policy of Abstention. But before I go further I must say that though the question as to which of the two policies is to be adopted in the long run is doubtless a most interesting one, yet that at present there is only one policy open to us, that of preaching Socialism to as many people as we can get at. This no doubt seems to many a dull job, offering no rewards to any of us in the way of notoriety or position: but after all it is the way which all new creeds have to go on, and if we neglect it in our haste or impatience, we shall never come to the point at which more definite action will be forced upon us.

Now as to these two policies I will not dwell on the first, not because I do not agree with it, as I do not, but because it has been put before you often enough and with copious enough arguments and advocacy: to convince the voters that they ought to send Socialists to Parliament who should try to get measures passed in the interests of the working-classes, and gradually transform the present Parliament, which is a mere instrument in the hands of the monopolizers of the means of production, into a body which should destroy monopoly, and then direct and administer the freed labour of the community. That is I think a correct statement of the views of those who further the policy of parliamentary action.

Such a scheme or plan of campaign will sound practical and reasonable to many, or to most if you will: and although it is right, in considering any scheme, to consider the drawbacks to it, yet even when we admit that those drawbacks exist, we do not necessarily condemn the scheme: so I will not at present say anything about the drawbacks which after all must be patent to those even who think the policy a good and necessary one. Indeed if no other plan of campaign were possible for the attack on monopoly, we should have to accept all drawbacks, stifle all doubts and carry it out with all our might. But there is another plan of campaign possible which I must lay before you at rather greater length under the nick-name, as I said, of the Policy of Abstention.

This plan is founded on the necessity of making the class-struggle clear to the workers, of pointing out to them that while monopoly exists they can only exist as its slaves: so that the Parliament and all other institutions at present existing are maintained for the purpose of upholding this slavery; that their wages are but slaves' rations, and if they were increased tenfold would be nothing more: that while the bourgeois rule lasts they can indeed take part in it, but only on the terms that they shall do nothing to attack the grand edifice of which their slavery is the foundation. Nay more than that: that they are asked to vote and send representatives to Parliament (if `working-men' so much the better) that they may point out what concessions may be necessary for the ruling class to make in order that the slavery of the workers may last on: in a word that to vote for the continuance of their own slavery is all the parliamentary action that they will be allowed to take under the present regime: Liberal Associations, Radical clubs, working men members are at present, and Socialist members will be in the future, looked on with complacency by the governing classes as serving towards the end of propping the stability of robber society in the safest and least troublesome manner by beguiling them to take part in their own government. A great invention, and well worthy of the reputation of the Briton for practicality - and swindling! How much better than the coarse old-world iron repression of that blunderer Bismark, which at once irritates and consolidates the working-men, and depends for its temporary success even on the absence of such accidents as a sudden commercial crisis or a defeat of the German army.

The Policy of Abstention then is founded on this view: that the interests of the two classes, the workers and the capitalists, are irreconcilable, and as long as the capitalists exist as a class, they have the monopoly of the means of production, have all the power of ordered and legal society; but on the other hand that the use of this power to keep down a wronged population, which feels itself wronged, and is organizing itself for illegal resistance when the opportunity shall serve, would impose such a burden on the governing classes as they will not be able to bear; and they must finally break down under it, and take one of two courses, either of them the birth of fear acting on the instinct to prolong and sustain their life which is essential in all organisms. One course would be to try the effect of wholesale concessions, or what seemed to be such in order to diminish the number of the discontented; and this course would be almost certain to have a partial success; but I feel sure not so great a success in delaying revolution, as it would have if taken with the expressed agreement of Socialist representatives in Parliament: in the latter case the concessions would be looked upon as a victory; whereas if they were the work of a hated government from which the people were standing aloof, they would be dreaded as a bait, and scorned as the last resource of a tyranny growing helpless. The other course which a government recognized as a mere tyranny would be driven to by a policy of abstention, would be stern repression of whatever seemed to be dangerous to it; that is to say of the opinions and aspirations of the working classes as a whole: for in England at least there would be no attempt to adopt this course until opinion was so grown and so organized that the danger to monopoly seemed imminent. In short the two courses are fraud and force, and doubtless in a commercial country like this the resources of fraud would be exhausted before the ruling class betook itself to open force.

Now I say that either of these courses will indicate a breakdown of the class government, and in my belief it would be driven to them more speedily by abstaining from rendering it any help in the form of pushing palliative measures in parliament, and thereby pointing out to it a way to stave off revolution; but it is a matter of course that this abstention which we put forward as a weapon to drive the ruling class to extremities must be backed up by widespread opinion, by the conviction of a vast number of persons that the basis of society must be changed, and labour set free by the abolition of monopoly in the means of production, which monopoly is at present the basis of our society. But of course the necessity for obtaining this body of opinion is not confined to those Socialists that advocate abstention from parliamentary action: the making of Socialists must be a preliminary to the settling of the question, What are Socialists to do? Now it is clear that the first step towards this end is the putting forward of the principles of Socialism, preaching them as widely as possible; this is practically all that up to the present we have been able to do, and whatever success we have had in the undertaking (people will have different opinions about that) we have worked at it with very considerable energy. But it has been said that the mere preaching of principles, however much the acceptance of them may involve definite action in the future, is not enough; that you must offer your recruits something to do beyond merely swelling the army of preachers in one way or another. Well I agree with that, so far as this, that the time comes in such a movement as ours when it is ready to change from a mere intellectual movement into a movement of action, and that that time must be taken advantage of, and if there is no good plan of action ready the movement will certainly take up a bad one in default of none at all. The plan offered by some of our friends I have stated before as an attempt to get hold of Parliament by constitutional means in order to use if for unconstitutional purposes: that plan I think a bad one for reasons that I have hinted at already and shall try to state more fully and consecutively before I have done. Yet if the plan has its birth from anything more solid than impatience, and the weariness that is sure to beset a small minority preaching revolution, it is a hopeful sign that it should be put forward, and it being put forward in a manner that compels us who do not agree with it to put forward some alternative to it, even though we think, as I confess I for one do, that all plans of action are at present premature.

But again you may say before we can begin boycotting we must have numbers; how are they to be obtained otherwise than by interesting a large body of people in reforms which will have a plausible look of bettering their position? This is a shrewd question, but I hope I can answer it satisfactorily. It will be our business to give a new turn to all the smouldering discontent of the workers and the perpetual struggle of labour against capital which is now feebly and incompletely organized by the Trades Unions. Those bodies, which grew into power at a time when the principle of capitalism was not attacked, can until they are radically altered only deal with its accidental abuses; and they have also the essential quality of being benefit societies, which would be all very well if they denied the rights of capital altogether and were complete fighting bodies; because the benefit society business would then mean just the army chest; but at present when the rights of capital are admitted and all that is claimed is a proportional share in the profits, it means a kind of relief to the employers, an additional poor-rate levied from the workers. As things now go the position of the Trades Unions, as anything but benefit societies, has become an impossible one; the long and short of what they say to the masters is this: We are not going to interfere with your management of our affairs except so far as we can reduce your salary as our managers. We acknowledge that we are machines and that you are the hands that guide us; but we will pay as little as we can help for your guidance and fight you on that point. Well the masters can and do reply: My friends, you are making an end not of our profits only but of our function of guidance, and since you are, as you admit, our machines, when our guidance is gone, gone also is your livelihood. No, we know your interests better than you do yourselves, and shall resist your feeble attempts to reduce our salaries; and since we organize your labour and the market of the world which it supplies, we shall manage your wages amongst other matters.

Now that's the blind alley which the Trades Unions have now got into: I say again if they are determined to have masters to manage their affairs, they must expect in turn to pay for that luxury. To go any further they must get out of that blind alley and into the open highway that leads to Socialism. They must aim at managing their own business, which is indeed the business of the world: remembering that the price they pay for their so-called captains of industry is no mere money-payment - no mere tribute which once paid leaves them free to do as they please, but an authoritative ordering of the whole tenor of their lives, what they shall eat, drink, wear, what houses they shall have, books, or newspapers rather, they shall read, down to the very days on which they shall take their holidays like a drove of cattle driven out from the stable to grass.

Well, I say that the real business of us propagandists is to instil this aim of the workers becoming the masters of their own destinies, their own lives, and this can be effected when a sufficient number of them are convinced of the fact by the establishment of a vast labour organization - the federation according to their crafts, if you will, of all the workmen who have awoke to the fact that they are the slaves of monopoly, and therefore being awaked, its rebels also; men who are convinced that the raw material and instruments of labour can only belong to those who can use them: let them announce that transformation of these things into common property as their programme, and look upon anything else they may have to do before they have conquered that programme, as so much necessary work by the way to enable them to live till they have marched to the great battlefield. Let them settle e.g. what wages are to be paid by their temporary managers, what numbers of hours it may be expedient to work; let them arrange for the filling of their military chest, the care of the sick, the unemployed, the dismissed: let them learn also how to administer their own affairs. Time and also power fails me to give any scheme for how all this could be done; but granting the formation of such a body I cannot help thinking that for the two last purposes they might make use of the so-called plan of co-operation.

Well now, as to this great labour body I expect all Socialists to agree with me in advocating its formation, and also to admit that the furtherance of such a body is very great work and worth all our efforts to bring about; where some Socialists will differ from me will be that they will not be able to see why all this should not go on pari passu with Parliamentary action.

Well, I also expect them to agree with me in thinking it necessary in pointing out to the workers the irreconcilability between true free labour and individualist capitalism; surely in order to drive this fact home, it is necessary to keep the two camps of labour and monopoly as distinct as possible.

If such a labour organization as I have been putting before you were set on foot, and it took root and grew, and spread as it would if things were ripe either for that or another form of preparation for action, what would be the condition of things in the country? On the one hand the useful classes banded together for the purpose of a change in the basis of society which would acknowledge their usefulness and the usefulness of all others; which would abolish classes altogether; on the other hand a committee of the useless or monopolist class, authoritative because it holds the sway over the army, navy and police, but with no power of doing anything but launching that power of destruction at those who make all that is made, and so destroying their own livelihood along with that of their enemy; with no power of bribing them by concessions, because the popular party claim one thing only, the abolition of the class that on its side claims to rule. What could come out of the opposition of these two forces, the useful working society, and the useless class that claims nothing but to live on the former? What could come of this opposition but destruction of the useless? Could armed reaction triumph? Certainly only for a while; that at the worst; but probably it would not even appear to conquer: there would be perhaps some feeble attempt at putting down the popular combination by force; but it would be half-hearted and would soon come to an end if that party were true to itself and felt its power in combination. What would be the use of the authoritative government making laws for people who denied its right, and felt it to be their duty to evade or resist them at every point? Nothing would come of them, they would simply drop dead. And now mark that this movement, this force for the revolution that we all call for can only be fully evolved from this conscious opposition of the two powers, monopolist authority and free labour: everything that tends to mask that opposition, to confuse it, weakens the popular force, and gives a new lease of life to the reaction, which can indeed create nothing, can only hang on a while by favour of such drags on such weaknesses of the popular force. If our own people are forming part of parliament, the instruments of the enemy, they are helping to make the very laws we will not obey. Where is the enemy then? What are we to do to attack him? The enemy is a principle, you say: true, but the principle must be embodied; and how can it be better embodied than in that assembly delegated by the owners of monopoly to defend monopoly at all points? to smooth away the difficulties of the monopolists even at the expense of apparent sacrifice of their interests `to the amelioration of the lot of the working classes'? to profess friendship with the so-called moderates (as if there could be any moderation in dealing with a monopoly, anything but for or against)? in short to detach a portion of the people from the people's side, to have it in their midst helpless, dazed, wearied with ceaseless compromise, or certain defeat, and yet to put it before the world as the advanced guard of the revolutionary party, the representative of all that is active or practical of the popular party?

This is the advantage not speculative but certain which sending Socialist members to Parliament would hand over to the reactionists: let us try rather, I say once more, to sustain a great body of workers outside Parliament, call it the labour parliament if you will, and when that is done be sure that its decrees will be obeyed and not those of the Westminster Committee. And whatever may be said of the possibility of such a plan in other countries, in Britain it is possible, because the mere political position of the workers is better here than elsewhere in Europe; even though there are countries in which the suffrage is more extended: the habit of democracy has gained sway over those persons and parties even who in feeling and aspiration are least democratic; and they cannot do what they would, so that any English government Tory as well as Liberal is hampered in its reactionary attempts and does not dare to attack the expression of opinion openly unless driven to despair; the Labour Combination I have been putting before you will not be openly attacked by its enemy the Parliament till it is too late, till it has done the first part of its work by instilling hope in the whole of the workers, the hope of their managing their own affairs and freeing themselves from Monopoly.

Now it will be said and of course truly that the advocates of parliamentary action amongst us are just as desirous of seeing this great labour organization established as we are: but in the first place I cannot help thinking that the scheme of parliament would be found in practice to stand in the way of the formation of that widespread organization with its singleness of aim and directness of action which it seems to me is what we want: that the effort towards success in parliament will swallow up all other effort, that such success in short will come to be looked upon as the end. However, you may say that this mistake can be guarded against and avoided; I am far from sure that it can be, but let that pass: the organization I am thinking of would have a serious point of difference from any that could be formed as a part of a parliamentary plan of action: its aim would be to act directly, whatever was done in it would be done by the people themselves; there would consequently be no possibility of compromise, of the association becoming anything else than it was intended to be; nothing could take its place: before all its members would be put but one alternative to complete success, complete failure, namely. Can as much be said for any plan involving the representatives of the people forming a part of a body whose purpose is the continuous enslavement of the people?

I think I can explain better what is in my mind as to these two plans of action if I give a sketch of what I think would happen if either were adopted: only understand I don't mean to prophesy, only to try to draw out the logical consequences of that adoption. Take the policy of abstention first, and start from where we are now, the Socialist movement still in its intellectual stage: a stage at which only those who have thought about the matter see the necessity of placing society on a new basis; a time in which the necessity is not forced upon them by their immediate needs. While this lasts only those will join the movement with sincerity who have intelligence enough to accept principles and to forecast events from them; but they will form a solid body impossible to suppress or to be discouraged by hope deferred just for that reason; they will teach others, and be taught by the teaching; and as the approaching break-down of the monopolist system comes closer conviction will be forced on the minds of more and more people, till at last the mere necessities of life will force the main part of the workers to join them; and they will find in them no mere aggregation of discontent, but a body of persons who can teach the aims of Socialism and consult coolly about its methods. They will then be grown into that powerful body I have spoken of, the representative of the society of production, the direct opposition to the society of exploitation which will be represented by the constitutional government, the laws it has made and supports and the organized brute force which it wields. The revolutionary body will find its duties divided into two parts, the maintenance of its people while things are advancing to the final struggle, and resistance to the constitutional authority, including the evasion or disregard of the arbitrary laws of the latter. Its chief weapons during this period will be co-operation and boycotting, the latter including all strikes that may be necessary: whether it will be driven to use further weapons depends on the attitude of the Reaction: that party will probably be paralysed before the steady advance of revolution, and will, as in France in the earlier revolution, use its mechanical brute-force in a wavering undecided half-hearted manner: it is by no means certain now, as it was in the Chartist times, that the threat of the imminence of a general strike would be the signal for the reaction to launch its army upon the people. Indeed supposing such a crisis at hand, the revolutionists might forestall the actual battle by using for once and for a definite purpose its enemy parliament by sending members to outvote the reactionists on that occasion: by doing which if they did not get actual command of the army &c. they would at least paralyse its action by making that action of doubtful legality: for though a revolutionist may fight well with a rope round his neck, such a necklace is an awkward adornment for your counter-revolutionist. I have nothing further to say of the revolutionists beyond this stage except that the long experience they would have had in their earlier stage of a labour organization, of administering the affairs of the real producers, and still more the experience of administration they would have spread during that period would make the Morrow of the Revolution a much easier time to them than it would be to a party that had not already learned to help itself. For the rest I should say that our friend Paul Lafargue's late article in Commonweal points out clearly enough the direction of the steps to be taken in the re-organization of society.

Now for a brief history of the plan of parliamentary action: Starting from the same point as the abstentionists they have to preach an electioneering campaign as an absolute necessity, and to set about it as soon as possible: they will then have to put forward a programme of reforms deduced from the principles of Socialism, which we will admit they will always keep to the front as much as possible; they will necessarily have to appeal for support (i.e. votes) to a great number of people who are not convinced Socialists, and their programme of reforms will be the bait to catch these votes: and to the ordinary voter it will be this bait which will be the matter of interest, and not the principle for whose furtherance they will be intended to act as an instrument: when the voting recruit reads the manifesto of a parliamentary body, he will scarcely notice the statement of principles which heads it, but he will eagerly criticize the proposals of measures to be carried which he finds below it: and yet if he is to be honestly dealt with, he will have to be told that these measures are not put forward as a solution of the social question, but are - in short, groundbait for him so that he may be led at last to search into and accept the real principles of Socialism. So it will be impossible to deal with him honestly, and the Socialist members when they get into Parliament will represent a heterogeneous body of opinion, ultra-radical, democratic, discontented non-politics, rather than a body of Socialists; and it will be their opinions and prejudices that will sway the action of the members in Parliament. With these fetters on them the Socialist members will have to act, and whatever they propose will have to be a mere matter of compromise: yet even those measures they will not carry: because long before their party gets powerful enough to form even a formidable group for alliance with other parties, one section or other of ordinary politicians will dish them, and will carry measures that will pass current for being the very thing the Socialists have been asking for; because once get Socialist M.P.s, and to the ordinary public they will be the representatives of the only Socialists. Now the result of such a `success' will be the necessity of a new Socialist programme on the one hand and on the other an accession of strength to the moderates; and this kind of thing will go on again and again with at least an appearance of defeat every time; and every time a temporary gain not for the Socialists but either for the reactionists or at least for the progressive Democratic party. Which latter (always a weak and inefficient party in this country) will be to a certain extent permeated with a kind of semi-Socialism, but will by that very fact lose many of their members to the `moderate' reactionists on one hand, though on the other they will offer a recruiting ground for the Socialists. Well so it will go on till either the Socialist party in Parliament disappears into the advanced Democratic party, or until they look round and find that they, still Socialists, have done nothing but give various opportunities to the reactionists for widening the basis of monopoly by creating a fresh middle-class under the present one, and so staving off the day of the great change. And when they become conscious of that and parliamentary action has been discovered to be a failure, what can they do but begin all over again, and try to form the two camps, each of them conscious of their true position of being the one monopolists, and the other the slaves of monopoly.

Yet even supposing that they succeed and by means of tormenting the constitutional Parliament into cumulative reforms manage to bring us to the crisis of revolution, their difficulties would be far from an end then: for they would then have to govern a people who had rather been ignorantly betrayed into Socialism than have learned to accept it as an understood necessity: and in governing such a people they would have this disadvantage, that they would not have the education which their helping in the organization of the society of production would have given them, teaching them as it were by the future and forming the habits of social life without which any scheme of Socialism is but the mill-wheel without the motive power. Their very success would lead to counter revolution; because they would have to repress the ignorance which they had not grappled with in their militant times, by brute force. Doubtless this counter revolution would lead us in the long run into a condition of true society again: but need we go through all that trouble, confusion and misery? let us begin to work against the counter revolution, by being sure that we who call ourselves Socialists understand what we are aiming at, and should feel at home in our new country when we get there - we and all that we lead into the new country.

But I will say no more at present against that parliamentary action, which some of our friends think the step now necessary to the furtherance of Socialism, but will rather try to sum up what I have had to say in favour of the plan of abstention from that action. It is above all things necessary that the working-classes should feel their present position, that they understand that they are in an inferior position not accidentally but as a necessary consequence of the position of the classes that live by monopoly. When they have learnt this lesson they will learn with it the necessity for a change in the basis of society: they are strong enough if they combine duly to bring that change about; but their due combination depends on their knowing that from the present rules of society they will get nothing but concessions intended to perpetuate their present slavery: they must know they are invited to vote and take some part in government in order that they may help their rulers to find out what must be conceded, and what may be refused to the workers; and to give an appearance of freedom of action to them. But the workers can form an organization which without heeding Parliament can force from the rulers what concessions may be necessary in the present and whose aim would be the total abolition of the monopolist classes and rule. The action such an organization would be compelled to take would educate its members in administration, so that on the morrow of the revolution they would be able, from a thorough knowledge of the wants and capabilities of the workers, to carry on affairs with the least possible amount of blunders, and would do almost nothing that would have to be undone, and thereby offer no opportunity to the counter revolution. This seems to me the direct way to the realization of Socialism, and therefore in the long run the shortest way. I admit that it will ask for qualities of patience, devotion and forgetfulness of self in its pioneers, but it is a commonplace to say that impatience, carelessness and egotism are hindrances to any cause, and have to be fought against; and if Socialism militant cannot reckon on enlisting persons who are somewhat above the average, and on staving off others who are a good deal below it, there is nothing to be done but to sit still and see what will happen. That however we shall not and cannot do; something we must do however fatalistic we may be: my hope is that what we shall do will show us to be Socialists in essence and in spirit even now when we cannot be Socialists economically.

An Old Fable Retold

William Morris

In the days before man had completely established his dominion over the animal world, the poultry of a certain country, unnamed in my record, met in solemn conference in the largest hall they could hire for the money: the period was serious, for it was drawing near Christmas, and the question in debate partook of the gravity of the times; for, in short, various resolutions, the wording of which has not come down to us were to be moved on the all important subject, 'with what sauce shall we be eaten?'

Needless to say that the hall was crowded to suffocation, or that an overflow meeting (presided over by working-class leaders) was held on the neighboring dung-hill.

All went smoothly; the meeting was apparently unanimous and certainly enthusiastic, abundant wisdom was poured out on the all-important question, and the hearts of all glowed with satisfaction at the progress of the race of -- poultry. The very bantam-hens were made happy by the assurance that their claims to cackling were to be seriously considered.

But when the hands of the clock were pointing to ten minutes to ten the excited audience, as they recovered from the enthusiasm produced by one of the great speeches of the evening, saw on the platform beside the chairman a battered looking middle-aged barn-door cock, who they perceived was holding forth in a lugubrious voice, praising the career and motives of every advanced politician of the poultry yard. This bored the audience a good deal, but being used to it they stood it with patience for some time, till at last the orator's voice got rather clearer and louder, and he spoke somewhat as follows:

Sir, I know I have little right to air my own theories (cheers) after the remarkable and clear exposition of the rights of the poultry, which has been delivered in various ways on this platform to-night (loud cheers), but I am free to confess that one idea has occurred to me which seems to have escaped the more educated minds of our leaders to-night; (cries of Oh, Oh) -- the idea is this!

Here he stopped dead, and amid ironical cheers tried nervously to help himself to water from the long ago emptied decanter, than at last blurted out in a trembling, shrieking voice not without a suspicion of tears in it;

In short, I don't want to be eaten at all; is it poss - -

But here a storm of disapproving cries broke out, amongst which could be heard loudest the words 'practical Politics!' . . . 'great liberal party'. . . which at last all calmed themselves down into a steady howl of 'question, question!' in the midst of which the ragged, middle-aged cock withdrew, apparently not much more depressed than when he first stood up.

After his departure the meeting ended in all harmony, and a resolution was passed with great enthusiasm that the conclusions come to as embodied in the foregoing resolutions should be engrossed and forwarded to the farmer's wife (or widow was it?) and the head poulterer.

A rumor has reached us that while there were doubts as to the sauce to be used in the serving up, slow stewing was settled on as the least revolutionary form of cookery.

Moral: Citizens, pray draw it for ourselves.

- -Justice, January 19, 1884

from: William Morris: Political Writings; contributions to Justice and Commonweal 1883-1890, edited and introduction by Nicholas Salmon. Bristol, England, Thoemmes Press, c1994.

ART AND SOCIALISM –

WILLIAM MORRIS

INTRODUCTION

Art and Socialism was delivered, as a lecture, to the Leicester Secular Society on January 23rd, 1884.

"Art and Socialism's outstanding feature is perhaps the stress laid on work as a necessity of human life, not merely as a means of obtaining a livelihood. Morris insists that only Socialism can restore work to its proper, central position." — A. L. Morton.

First published as a pamphlet at Leek, 1884 reprinted in The Collected Works of William Morris, XXIII, 192-214, Cole, 624-45, Jackson, 96-I 14 and and Political Writings of William Morris, ed. A. L. Morton, 109-133.

Art and Socialism was transcribed from the Political Writings of William Morris by Chris Croome for the William Morris Internet Archive, a subarchive of the Marxists Internet Archive, in November 1997.

ART AND SOCIALISM

My friends, I want you to look into the relations of Art to Commerce, using the latter word to express what is generally meant by it; namely, that system of competition in the market which is indeed the only form which most people now-a-days suppose that Commerce can take.

Now whereas there have been times in the world's history when Art held the supremacy over Commerce; when Art was a good deal, and Commerce, as we understand the word, was a very little; so now on the contrary it will be admitted by all, I fancy, that Commerce has become of very great importance and Art of very little.

I say this will be generally admitted, but different persons will hold very different opinions not only as to whether this is well or ill, but even as to what it really means when we say that Commerce has become of supreme importance and that Art has sunk into an unimportant matter.

Allow me to give you my opinion of the meaning of it; which will lead me on to ask you to consider what remedies should be applied for curing the evils that exist in the relations between Art and Commerce.

Now to speak plainly it seems to me that the supremacy of Commerce (as we understand the word) is an evil, and a very serious one; and I should call it an unmixed evil— but for the strange continuity of life which runs through all historical events, and by means of which the very evils of such and such a period tend to abolish themselves.

For to my mind it means this: that the world of modern civilization in its haste to gain a very inequitably divided material prosperity has entirely suppressed popular Art: or in other words that the greater part of the people have no share in Art—which as things now are must be kept in the hands of a few rich or well-to-do people, who we may fairly say need it less and not more than the laborious workers.

Nor is that all the evil, nor the worst of it; for the cause of this famine of Art is that whilst people work throughout the civilized world as laboriously as ever they did, they have lost—in losing an Art which was done by and for the people—the natural solace of that labour; a solace which they once had, and always should have, the opportunity of expressing their own thoughts to their fellows by means of that very labour, by means of that daily work which nature or long custom, a second nature, does indeed require of them, but without meaning that it should be an unrewarded and repulsive burden.

But, through a strange blindness an error in the civilization of these latter days, the world's work almost all of it—the work some share of which should have been the helpful companion of every man—has become even such a burden, which every man, if he could, would shake off. I have said that people work no less laboriously than they ever did; but I should have said that they work more laboriously.

The wonderful machines which in the hands of just and foreseeing men would have been used to minimize repulsive labour and to give pleasure—or in other words added life—to the human race, have been so used on the contrary that they have driven all men into mere frantic haste and hurry, thereby destroying pleasure, that is life, on all hands: they have instead of lightening the labour of the workmen, intensified it, and thereby added more weariness yet to the burden which the poor have to carry.

Nor can it be pleaded for the system of modern civilization that the mere material or bodily gains of it balance the loss of pleasure which it has brought upon the world; for as I hinted before those gains have been so unfairly divided that the contrast between rich and poor has been fearfully intensified, so that in all civilized countries, but most of all in England, the terrible spectacle is exhibited of two peoples, living street by street, and door by door—people of the same blood, the same tongue, and at least nominally living under the same laws—but yet one civilized and the other uncivilized.

All this I say is the result of the system that has trampled down Art, and exalted Commerce into a sacred religion; and it would seem is ready, with the ghastly stupidity which is its principal characteristic, to mock the Roman satirist for his noble warning by taking it in inverse meaning, and now bids us all "for the sake of life to destroy the reasons for living."

And now in the teeth of this stupid tyranny I put forward a claim on behalf of labour enslaved by Commerce, which I know no thinking man can deny is reasonable, but which if acted on would involve such a change as would defeat Commerce; that is, would put Association instead of Competition, Social order instead of Individualist anarchy.

Yet I have looked at this claim by the light of history and my own conscience, and it seems to me so looked at to be a most just claim, and that resistance to it means nothing short of a denial of the hope of civilization.

This then is the claim:

It is right and necessary that all men should have work to do which shall he worth doing, and be of itself pleasant to do; and which should he done under such conditions as would make it neither over-wearisome nor over-anxious.

Turn that claim about as I may, think of it as long as I can, I cannot find that it is an exorbitant claim; yet again I say if Society would or could admit it, the face of the world would be changed; discontent and strife and dishonesty would be ended. To feel that we were doing work useful to others and pleasant to ourselves, and that such work and its due reward could not fail us! What serious harm could happen to us then? And the price to be paid for so making the world happy is Revolution: Socialism instead of laissez-faire.

How can we of the middle classes help to bring such a state of things about; a state of things as nearly as possible the reverse of the present state of things?

The reverse; no less than that. For first, The work must be worth doing: think what a change that would make in the world! I tell you I feel dazed at the thought of the immensity of work which is undergone for the making of useless things.

It would be an instructive day's work for any one of us who is strong enough to walk through two or three of the principal streets of London on a week-day, and take accurate note of everything in the shop windows which is embarrassing or superfluous to the daily life of a serious man. Nay, the most of these things no one, serious or unserious, wants at all; only a foolish habit makes even the lightest-minded of us suppose that he wants them, and to many people even of those who buy them they are obvious encumbrances to real work, thought and pleasure. But I beg you to think of the enormous mass of men who are occupied with this miserable trumpery, from the engineers who have had to make the machines for making them, down to the hapless clerks who sit day-long year after year in the horrible dens wherein the wholesale exchange of them is transacted, and the shopmen, who not daring to call their souls their own, retail them amidst numberless insults which they must not resent, to the idle public which doesn't want them but buys them to be bored by them and sick to death of them.

I am talking of the merely useless things; but there are other matters not merely useless, but actively destructive and poisonous which command a good price in the market; for instance, adulterated food and drink. Vast is the number of slaves whom competitive Commerce employs in turning out infamies such as these. But quite apart from them there is an enormous mass of labour which is just merely wasted; many thousands of men and women making nothing with terrible and inhuman toil which deadens the soul and shortens mere animal life itself.

All these are the slaves of what is called luxury, which in the modern sense of the word comprises a mass of sham wealth, the invention of competitive Commerce, and enslaves not only the poor people who are compelled to work at its production, but also the foolish and not overhappy people who buy it to harass themselves with its encumbrance.

Now if we are to have popular Art, or indeed Art of any kind, we must at once and for all be done with this luxury; it is the supplanter, the changeling of Art; so much so that by those who know of nothing better it has even been taken for Art, the divine solace of human labour, the romance of each day's hard practice of the difficult art of living.

But I say Art cannot live beside it, nor self-respect in any class of life. Effeminacy and brutality are its companions on the right hand and the left. This, first of all, we of the well-to-do classes must get rid of if we are serious in desiring the new birth of Art: and if not then corruption is digging a terrible pit of perdition for society, from which indeed the new birth may come, but surely from amidst of terror, violence and misery.

Indeed if it were but ridding ourselves, the well-to-do people, of this mountain of rubbish that would be something worth doing: things which everybody knows are of no use; the very capitalists know well that there is no genuine healthy demand for them, and they are compelled to foist them off on the public by stirring up a strange feverish desire for petty excitement, the outward token of which is known by the conventional name of fashion—a strange monster born of the vacancy of the lives of rich people, and the eagerness of competitive Commerce to make the most of the huge crowd of workmen whom it breeds as unregarded instruments for what is called the making of money.

Do not think it a little matter to resist this monster of folly; to think for yourselves what you yourselves really desire, will not only make men and women of you so far, but may also set you thinking of the due desires of other people, since you will soon find when you get to know a work of Art, that slavish work is undesirable.

And here furthermore is at least a little sign whereby to distinguish between a rag of fashion and a work of Art: whereas the toys of fashion when the first gloss is worn off them do become obviously worthless even to the frivolous—a work of Art, be it ever so humble, is long lived; we never tire of it; as long as a scrap hangs together it is valuable and instructive to each new generation. All works of Art in short have the property of becoming venerable amidst decay: and reason good, for from the first there was a soul in them, the thought of man, which will be visible in them so long as the body exists in which they were implanted.

And that last sentence brings me to considering the other side of the necessity for labour only occupying itself in making goods that are worth making. Hitherto we have been thinking of it only from the user's point of view; even so looked at it was surely important enough; yet from the other side—as to the producer—it is far more important still.

For I say again that in buying these things

'Tis the lives of men you buy!

Will you from mere folly and thoughtlessness make yourselves partakers of the guilt of those who compel their fellow men to labour uselessly?

For when I said it was necessary for all things made to be worth making, I set up that claim chiefly on behalf of Labour; since the waste of making useless things grieves the workman doubly. As part of the public he is forced into buying them, and the more part of his miserable wages are squeezed out of him by an universal kind of truck system; as one of the producers he is forced into making them, and so into losing the very foundations of that pleasure in daily work which I claim as his birthright; he is compelled to labour joylessly at making the poison which the truck system compels him to buy. So that the huge mass of men who are compelled by folly and greed to make harmful and useless things are sacrificed to Society. I say that this would be terrible and unendurable even though they were sacrificed to the good of Society—if that were possible; but if they are sacrificed not for the welfare of Society but for its whims, to add to its degradation, what do luxury and fashion look like then? On one side ruinous and wearisome waste leading through corruption to corruption on to complete cynicism at last, and the disintegration of all Society; and on the other side—implacable oppression destructive of all pleasure and hope in life, and leading—whitherward?

Here then is one thing for us of the middle classes to do before we can clear the ground for the new birth of Art, before we can clear our own consciences of the guilt of enslaving men by their labour. One thing; and if we could do it perhaps that one thing would be enough, and all other healthy changes would follow it; but can we do it? Can we escape from the corruption of Society which threatens us? Can the middle classes regenerate themselves?

At first sight one would say that a body of people so powerful, who have built up the gigantic edifice of modern Commerce, whose science, invention and energy have subdued the forces of nature to serve their every-day purposes, and who guide the organization that keeps these natural powers in subjection in a way almost miraculous; at first sight one would say surely such a mighty mass of wealthy men could do anything they please.

And yet I doubt it: their own creation, the Commerce they are so proud of, has become their master; and all we of the well-to-do classes—some of us with triumphant glee, some with dull satisfaction, and some with sadness of heart—are compelled to admit not that Commerce was made for man, but that man was made for Commerce.

On all sides we are forced to admit it. There are of the English middle class to-day, for instance, men of the highest aspirations towards Art, and of the strongest will; men who are most deeply convinced of the necessity to civilization of surrounding men's lives with beauty; and many lesser men, thousands for what I know, refined and cultivated, follow them and praise their opinions: but both the leaders and the led are incapable of saving so much as half a dozen commons from the grasp of inexorable Commerce: they are as helpless in spite of their culture and their genius as if they were just so many overworked shoemakers: less lucky than King Midas, our green fields and clear waters, nay the very air we breathe are turned not to gold (which might please some of us for an hour may be) but to dirt; and to speak plainly we know full well that under the present gospel of Capital not only there is no hope of bettering it, hut that things grow worse year by year, day by day. Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die—choked by filth.

Or let me give you a direct example of the slavery to competitive Commerce, in which we hapless folk of the middle classes live. I have exhorted you to the putting away of luxury, to the stripping yourselves of useless encumbrances, to the simplification of life, and I believe that there are not a few of you that heartily agree with me on that point. Well, I have long thought that one of the most revolting circumstances that cling to our present class-system, is the relation between us, of the well-to-do, and our domestic servants: we and our servants live together under one roof, but are little better than strangers to each other, in spite of the good nature and good feeling that often exists on both sides: nay strangers is a mild word; though we are of the same blood, bound by the same laws, we live together like people of different tribes. Now think how this works on the job of getting through the ordinary day's work of a household, and whether our lives can be simplified while such a system lasts. To go no further, you who are housekeepers know full well (as I myself do, since I have learned the useful art of cooking a dinner) how it would simplify the day's work, if the chief meals could be eaten in common; if there had not got to be double meals, one upstairs, another down stairs. And again, surely we of this educational century, cannot be ignorant of what an education it would be for the less refined members of a household to meet on common easy terms the more refined once a day, at least; to note the elegant manners of well-bred ladies, to give and take in talk with learned and travelled men, with men of action and imagination: believe me that would beat elementary education.

Furthermore this matter cleaves close to our subject of Art: for note, as a token of this stupidity of our sham civilization, what foolish rabbit warrens our well-to-do houses are obliged to be; instead of being planned in the rational ancient way which was used from the time of Homer to past the time of Chaucer, a big hall, to wit, with a few chambers tacked on to it for sleeping or sulking in. No wonder our houses are cramped and ignoble when the lives lived in them are cramped and ignoble also.

Well, and why don't we who have thought of this, as I am sure many of us have, change this mean and shabby custom, simplifying our lives thereby and educating our friends, to whose toil we owe so many comforts? Why do not you—and I—set about doing this to-morrow?

Because we cannot; because our servants wouldn't have it, knowing, as we know, that both parties would be made miserable by it.

The civilization of the nineteenth century forbids us to share the refinement of a household among its members!

So you see, if we middle-class people belong to a powerful folk, and in good sooth we do, we are but playing a part played in many a tale of the world's history: we are great but hapless; we are important dignified people, but bored to death; we have bought our power at price of our liberty and our pleasure.

So I say in answer to the question Can we put luxury from us and live simple and decent lives? Yes, when we are free from the slavery of Capitalist Commerce; but not before.

Surely there are some of you who long to be free; who have been educated and refined, and had your perceptions of beauty and order quickened only that they might be shocked and wounded at every turn, by the brutalities of competitive Commerce; who have been so hunted and driven by it that, though you are well-to-do, rich even may be, you have now nothing to lose from social revolution: love of Art, that is to say of the true pleasure of life, has brought you to this, that you must throw in your lot with that of the wage-slave of competitive Commerce; you and he must help each other and have one hope in common, or you at any rate will live and die hopeless and unhelped. You who long to be set free from the oppression of the money grubbers, hope for the day when you will be compelled to be free!

Meanwhile if otherwise that oppression has left scarce any work to do worth doing, one thing at least is left us to strive for, the raising of the standard of life where it is lowest, where it is low: that will put a spoke in the wheel of the triumphant car of competitive Commerce.

Nor can I conceive of anything more likely to raise the standard of life than the convincing some thousands of those who live by labour, of the necessity of their supporting the second part of the claim I have made for Labour; namely That their work should be of itself pleasant to do. If we could but convince them that such a strange revolution in Labour as this would be of infinite benefit not to them only, but to all men; and that it is so right and natural that for the reverse to be the case, that most men's work should be grievous to them, is a mere monstrosity of these latter days, which must in the long run bring ruin and confusion on the Society that allows it—If we could but convince them, then indeed there would be chance of the phrase Art of the People being something more than a mere word.

At first sight, indeed, it would seem impossible to make men born under the present system of Commerce understand that labour may be a blessing to them: not in the sense in which the phrase is sometimes preached to them by those whose labour is light and easily evaded: not as a necessary task laid by nature on the poor for the benefit of the rich; not as an opiate to dull their sense of right and wrong, to make them sit down quietly under their burdens to the end of time, blessing the squire and his relations: all this they could understand our saying to them easily enough, and sometimes would listen to it I fear with at least a show of complacency—if they thought there were anything to be made out of us thereby. But the true doctrine that labour should be a real tangible blessing in itself to the working man, a pleasure even as sleep and strong drink are to him now: this one might think it hard indeed for him to understand, so different as it is to anything which he has found labour to be.

Nevertheless though most men's work is only borne as a necessary evil like sickness, my experience as far as it goes is, that whether it be from a certain sacredness in handiwork which does cleave to it even under the worst circumstances, or whether it be that the poor man who is driven by necessity to deal with things which are terribly real, when he thinks at all on such matters, thinks less conventionally than the rich; whatever it may be, my experience so far is that the working man finds it easier to understand the doctrine of the claim of Labour to pleasure in the work itself than the rich or well-to-do man does. Apart from any trivial words of my own, I have been surprised to find, for instance, such a hearty feeling toward John Ruskin among working-class audiences: they can see the prophet in him rather than the fantastic rhetorician, as more superfine audiences do.

That is a good omen, I think, for the education of times to come. But we who somehow are so tainted by cynicism, because of our helplessness in the ugly world which surrounds and presses on us, cannot we somehow raise our own hopes at least to the point of thinking that what hope glimmers on the millions of the slaves of Commerce is something better than a mere delusion, the false dawn of a cloudy midnight with which 'tis only the moon that struggles? Let us call to mind that there yet remain monuments in the world which show us that all human labour was not always a grief and a burden to men. Let us think of the mighty and lovely architecture, for instance, of medi?val Europe: of the buildings raised before Commerce had put the coping stone on the edifice of tyranny by the discovery that fancy, imagination, sentiment, the joy of creation and the hope of fair fame are marketable articles too precious to be allowed to men who have not the money to buy them, to mere handicraftsmen and day labourers. Let us remember there was a time when men had pleasure in their daily work, but yet as to other matters hoped for light and freedom even as they do now: their dim hope grew brighter, and they watched its seeming fulfilment drawing nearer and nearer, and gazed so eagerly on it that they did not note how the ever watchful foe, oppression, had changed his shape and was stealing from them what they had already gained in the days when the light of their new hope was but a feeble glimmer; so they lost the old gain, and for lack of it the new gain was changed and spoiled for them into something not much better than loss.

Betwixt the days in which we now live and the end of the Middle Ages, Europe has gained freedom of thought, increase of knowledge, and huge talent for dealing with the material forces of nature; comparative political freedom withal and respect for the lives of civilized men, and other gains that go with these things: nevertheless I say deliberately that if the present state of Society is to endure, she has bought these gains at too high a price in the loss of the pleasure in daily work which once did certainly solace the mass of men for their fears and oppressions: the death of Art was too high a price to pay for the material prosperity of the middle classes.

Grievous indeed it was, that we could not keep both our hands full, that we were forced to spill from one while we gathered with the other: yet to my mind it is more grievous still to be unconscious of the loss; or being dimly conscious of it to have to force ourselves to forget it and to cry out that all is well.

For, though all is not well, I know that men's natures are not so changed in three centuries that we can say to all the thousands of years which went before them; You were wrong to cherish Art, and now we have found out that all men need is food and raiment and shelter, with a smattering of knowledge of the material fashion of the universe. Creation is no longer a need of man's soul, his right hand may forget its cunning, and he be none the worse for it.

Three hundred years, a day in the lapse of ages, has not changed man's nature thus utterly, be sure of that: one day we shall win back Art, that is to say the pleasure of life; win back Art again to our daily labour. Where is the hope then, you may say; Show it us.

There lies the hope, where hope of old deceived us. We gave up Art for what we thought was light and freedom, but it was less than light and freedom which we bought: the light showed many things to those of the well-to-do who cared to look for them: the freedom left the well-to-do free enough if they cared to use their freedom; but these were few at the best: to the most of men the light showed them that they need look for hope no more, and the freedom left the most of men free—to take at a wretched wage what slave's work lay nearest to them or starve.

There is our hope, I say. If the bargain had been really fair, complete all round, then were there nought else to do but to bury Art, and forget the beauty of life: but now the cause of Art has something else to appeal to: no less than the hope of the people for the happy life which has not yet been granted to them. There is our hope: the cause of Art is the cause of the people.

Think of a piece of history, and so hope! Time was when the rule of Rome held the whole world of civilization in its poisonous embrace. To all men—even the best, as you may see in the very gospels—that rule seemed doomed to last for ever: nor to those who dwelt under it was there any world worth thinking of beyond it: but the days passed and though none saw a shadow of the coming change, it came none the less, like a thief in the night, and the Barbarians, the world which lay outside the rule of Rome, were upon her; and men blind with terror lamented the change and deemed the world undone by the Fury of the North. But even that fury bore with it things long strange to Rome, which once had been the food its glory fed on: hatred of lies, scorn of riches, contempt of death, faith in the fair fame won by steadfast endurance, honourable love of women—all these things the Northern Fury bore with it, as the mountain torrent bears the gold; and so Rome fell and Europe rose, and the hope of the world was born again.

To those that have hearts to understand, this tale of the past is a parable of the days to come; of the change in store for us hidden in the breast of the Barbarism of civilization—the Proletariat; and we of the middle class, the strength of the mighty but monstrous system of competitive Commerce, it behoves us to clear our souls of greed and cowardice and to face the change which is now once more on the road; to see the good and the hope it bears with it amidst all its threats of violence, amidst all its ugliness, which was not born of itself but of that which it is doomed to destroy.

Now once more I will say that we well-to-do people, those of us who love Art, not as a toy, but as a thing necessary to the life of man, as a token of his freedom and happiness, have for our best work the raising of the standard of life among the people; or in other words establishing the claim I made for Labour-which I will now put in a different form, that we may try to see what chiefly hinders us from making that claim good and what are the enemies to be attacked. Thus I put the claim again:

Nothing should be made by man's labour which is not worth making; or which must be made by labour degrading to the makers.

Simple as that proposition is, and obviously right as I am sure it must seem to you, you will find, when you come to consider the matter, that it is a direct challenge to the death to the present system of labour in civilized countries. That system, which I have called competitive Commerce, is distinctly a system of war; that is of waste and destruction: or you may call it gambling if you will, the point of it being that under it whatever a man gains he gains at the expense of some other man's loss. Such a system does not and cannot heed whether the matters it makes are worth making; it does not and cannot heed whether those who make them are degraded by their work: it heeds one thing and only one, namely, what it calls making a profit; which word has got to be used so conventionally that I must explain to you what it really means, to wit the plunder of the weak by the strong! Now I say of this system, that it I is of its very nature destructive of Art, that is to say of the happiness of life. Whatever consideration is shown for the life of the people in these days, whatever is done which is worth doing, is done in spite of the system and in the teeth of its maxims; and most true it is that we do, all of us, tacitly at least, admit that it is opposed to all the highest aspirations of mankind.

Do we not know, for instance, how those men of genius work who are the salt of the earth, without whom the corruption of society would long ago have become unendurable? The poet, the artist, the man of science, is it not true that in their fresh and glorious days, when they are in the heyday of their faith and enthusiasm, they are thwarted at every turn by Commercial war, with its sneering question "Will it pay?" Is it not true that when they begin to win worldly success, when they become comparatively rich, in spite of ourselves they seem to us tainted by the contact with the commercial world?

Need I speak of great schemes that hang about neglected; of things most necessary to be done, and so confessed by all men, that no one can seriously set a hand to because of the lack of money; while if it be a question of creating or stimulating some foolish whim in the public mind, the satisfaction of which will breed a profit, the money will come in by the ton. Nay, you know what an old story it is of the wars bred by Commerce in search of new markets, which not even the most peaceable of statesmen can resist; an old story and still it seems for ever new, and now become a kind of grim joke, at which I would rather not laugh if I could help it, but am even forced to laugh from a soul laden with anger.

And all that mastery over the powers of nature which the last hundred years or less has given us: what has it done for us under this system? In the opinion of John Stuart Mill, it was doubtful if all the mechanical inventions of modern times have done anything to lighten the toil of labour: be sure there is no doubt, that they were not made for that end, but to "make a profit." Those almost miraculous machines, which if orderly forethought had dealt with them might even now be speedily extinguishing all irksome and unintelligent labour, leaving us free to raise the standard of skill of hand and energy of mind in our workmen, and to produce afresh that loveliness and order which only the hand of man guided by his soul can produce—what have they done for us now? Those machines of which the civilized world is so proud, has it any right to be proud of the use they have been put to by Commercial war and waste?

I do not think exultation can have a place here: Commercial war has made a profit of these wonders; that is to say it has by their means bred for itself millions of unhappy workers, unintelligent machines as far as their daily work goes, order to get cheap labour, to keep up its exciting but deadly game for ever. Indeed that labour would have been cheap enough—cheap to the Commercial war generals, and deadly dear to the rest of us—but for the seeds of freedom which valiant men of old have sowed amongst us to spring up in our own day into Chartism and Trades Unionism and Socialism, for the defence of order and a decent life. Terrible would have been our slavery, and not of the working classes alone, but for these germs of the change which must be.

Even as it is, by the reckless aggregation of machine-workers and their adjoints in the great cities and the manufacturing districts, it has kept down life amongst us, and keeps it down to a miserably low standard; so low that any standpoint for improvement is hard to think of even. By the means of speedy communication which it has created, and which should have raised the standard of life by spreading intelligence from town to country, and widely creating modest centres of freedom of thought and habits of culture—by the means of the railways and the like it has gathered to itself fresh recruits for the reserve army of competing lack-ails on which its gambling gains so much depend, stripping the country-side of its population, and extinguishing all reasonable hope and life in the lesser towns.

Nor can I, an artist, think last or least of the outward effects which betoken this rule of the wretched anarchy of Commercial war. Think of the spreading sore of London swallowing up with its loathsomeness field and wood and heath without mercy and without hope, mocking our feeble efforts to deal even with its minor evils of smokeladen sky and befouled river: the black horror and reckless squalor of our manufacturing districts, so dreadful to the senses which are unused to them that it is ominous for the future of the race that any man can live among it in tolerable cheerfulness: nay in the open country itself the thrusting aside by miserable jerry-built brick and slate of the solid grey dwellings that are still scattered about, fit emblems in their cheery but beautiful simplicity of the yeomen of the English field, whose destruction at the hands of yet young Commercial war was lamented so touchingly by the high-minded More and the valiant Latimer. Everywhere in short the change from old to new involving one certainty, whatever else may be doubtful, a worsening of the aspect of the country.

This is the condition of England: of England the country of order, peace and stability, the land of common sense and practicality; the country to which all eyes are turned of those whose hope is for the continuance and perfection of modern progress. There are countries in Europe whose aspect is not so ruined outwardly, though they may have less of material prosperity, less wide-spread middle-class wealth to balance the squalor and disgrace I have mentioned: but if they are members of the great Commercial whole, through the same mill they have got to go, unless something should happen to turn aside the triumphant march of War Commercial before it reaches the end.

That is what three centuries of Commerce have brought that hope to which sprung up when feudalism began to fall to pieces. What can give us the day-spring of a new hope? What, save general revolt against the tyranny of Commercial war? The palliatives over which many worthy people are busying themselves now are useless: because they are but unorganized partial revolts against a vast wide-spreading grasping organization which will, with the unconscious instinct of a plant, meet every attempt at bettering the condition of the people with an attack on a fresh side; new machines, new markets, wholesale emigration, the revival of grovelling superstitions, preachments of thrift to lack-alls, of temperance to the wretched; such things as these will baffle at every turn all partial revolts against the monster we of the middle classes have created for our own undoing.

I will speak quite plainly on this matter, though I must say an ugly word in the end if I am to say what I think. The one thing to be done is to set people far and wide to think it possible to raise the standard of life. If you think of it, you will see clearly that this means stirring up general discontent.

And now to illustrate that I turn back to my blended claim for Art and Labour, that I may deal with the third clause in it: here is the claim again:—

It is right and necessary that all men should have work to do—

First—Work worth doing;

Second—Work of itself pleasant to do;

Third—Work done under such conditions as would make it neither over-wearisome nor over-anxious.

With the first and second clauses, which are very nearly related to each other, I have tried to deal already. They are as it were the soul of the claim for proper labour; the third clause is the body without which that soul cannot exist. I will extend it in this way, which will indeed partly carry us over ground already covered:

No one who is willing to work should ever fear want of such employment as would earn for him all due necessaries of mind and body.

All due necessaries—what are the due necessaries for a good citizen?

First, honourable and fitting work: which would involve giving him a chance of gaining capacity for his work by due education; also, as the work must be worth doing and pleasant to do, it will be found necessary to this end that his position be so assured to him that he cannot be compelled to do useless work, or work in which he cannot take pleasure.

The second necessity is decency of surroundings: including (a) good lodging; (b) ample space; (c) general order and beauty. That is (a) our houses must be well built, clean and healthy; (b) there must be abundant garden space in our towns, and our towns must not eat up the fields and natural features of the country; nay I demand even that there be left waste places and wilds in it, or romance and poetry—that is Art—will die out amongst us. (c) Order and beauty means, that not only our houses must be stoutly and properly built, but also that they be ornamented duly: that the fields be not only left for cultivation, but also that they be not spoilt by it any more than a garden is spoilt: no one for instance to be allowed to cut down, for mere profit, trees whose loss would spoil a landscape: neither on any pretext should people be allowed to darken the daylight with smoke, to befoul rivers, or to degrade any spot of earth with squalid litter and brutal wasteful disorder.

The third necessity is leisure. You will understand that in using that word limply first that all men must work for some portion of the day, and secondly that they have a positive right to claim a respite from that work: the leisure they have a right to claim, must be ample enough to allow them full rest of mind and body; a man must have time for serious individual thought, for imagination—for dreaming even—or the race of men will inevitably worsen. Even of the honourable and fitting work of which I have been speaking, which is a whole heaven asunder from the forced work of the Capitalist system, a man must not be asked to give more than his fair share; or men will become unequally developed, and there will still be a rotten place in Society.

Here then I have given you the conditions under which work worth doing, and undegrading to do, can be done: under no other conditions can it be done: if the general work of the world is not worth doing and undegrading to do it is a mockery to talk of civilization.

Well then can these conditions be obtained under the present gospel of Capital, which has for its motto "The devil take the hindmost"?

Let us look at our claim again in other words:

In a properly ordered state of Society every man willing to work should be ensured—

First—Honourable and fitting work;

Second—A healthy and beautiful house;

Third—Full leisure for rest of mind and body.

Now I don't suppose that anybody here will deny that it would be desirable that this claim should be satisfied: but what I want you all to think is that it is necessary that it be satisfied; that unless we try our utmost to satisfy it, we are but part and parcel of a society founded on robbery and injustice, condemned by the laws of the universe to destroy itself by its own efforts to exist for ever. Furthermore, I want you to think that as on the one hand it is possible to satisfy this claim, so on the other hand it is impossible to satisfy it under the present plutocratic system, which will forbid us even any serious attempt to satisfy it: the beginnings of Social Revolution must he the foundations of the re-building of the Art of the People, that is to say of the Pleasure of Life.

To say ugly words again. Do we not know that the greater part of men in civilized societies are dirty, ignorant, brutal—or at best, anxious about the next week's subsistence—that they are in short poor? And we know, when we think of it, that this is unfair.

It is an old story of men who have become rich by dishonest and tyrannical means, spending in terror of the future their ill-gotten gains liberally and in charity as 'tis called: nor are such people praised; in the old tales 'tis thought that the devil gets them after all. An old story—but I say "De te fabula"—of thee is the story told: thou art the man!

I say that we of the rich and well-to-do classes are daily doing it likewise: unconsciously, or half consciously it may be, we gather wealth by trading on the hard necessity of our fellows, and then we give driblets of it away to those of them who in one way or other cry out loudest to us. Our poor laws, our hospitals, our charities, organized and unorganized, are but tubs thrown to the whale; blackmail paid to lame-foot justice, that she may not hobble after us too fast.

When will the time come when honest and clear-seeing men will grow sick of all this chaos of waste, this robbing of Peter to pay Paul, which is the essence of Commercial war? When shall we band together to replace the system whose motto is "The devil take the hindmost" with a system whose motto shall be really and without qualification "One for all and all for one."

Who knows but the time may be at hand, but that we now living may see the beginning of that end which shall extinguish luxury and poverty? when the upper, middle, and lower classes shall have melted into one class, living contentedly a simple and happy life.

That is a long sentence to describe the state of things which I am asking you to help to bring about: the abolition of slavery is a shorter one and means the same thing. You may be tempted to think the end not worth striving for on one hand; or on the other to suppose, each one of you, that it is so far ahead, that nothing serious can be done towards it in our own time, and that you may as well therefore sit quiet and do nothing: let me remind you how only the other day in the lifetime of the youngest of us many thousand men of our own kindred gave their 'lives on the battle-field to bring to a happy ending a mere episode in the struggle for the abolition of slavery: they are blessed and happy, for the opportunity came to them, and they seized it and did their best, and the world is the wealthier for it; and if such an opportunity is offered to us shall we thrust it from us that we may sit still in ease of body, in doubt, in disease of soul? These are the days of combat: who can doubt that as he hears all round him the sounds that betoken discontent and hope and fear in high and low, the sounds of awakening courage and awakening conscience? These, I say, are the days of combat, when there is no external peace possible to an honest man; but when for that very reason the internal peace of a good conscience founded on settled convictions is the easier to win, since action for the cause is offered us.

Or, will you say that here in this quiet, constitutionally governed country of England there is no opportunity for action offered to us: if we were in gagged Germany, in gagged Austria, in Russia where a word or two might land us in Siberia or the prison or fortress of Peter and Paul— why then, indeed—

Ah! my friends, it is but a poor tribute to offer on the tombs of the martyrs of liberty, this refusal to take the torch from their dying hands! Is it not of Goethe it is told, that on hearing one say he was going to America to begin life again, he replied, "Here is America, or nowhere!" So for my part I say, "Here is Russia, or nowhere."

To say the governing classes in England are not afraid of freedom of speech, therefore let us abstain from speaking freely, is a strange paradox to me. Let us on the contrary press in through the breach which valiant men have made for us: if we hang back we make their labours, their sufferings, their deaths of no account.

Believe me we shall be shown that it is all or nothing: or will anyone here tell me that a Russian moujik is in a worse case than a sweating tailor's wage-slave? Do not let us deceive ourselves, the class of victims exists here as in Russia. There are fewer of them? May be—then are they of themselves more helpless, and so have more need of our help.

And how can we of the middle classes, we the capitalists and our hangers-on, help them? By renouncing our class, and on all occasions when antagonism rises up between the classes casting in our lot with the victims: with those who are condemned at the best to lack of education, refinement, leisure, pleasure and renown; and at the worst to a life lower than that of the most brutal of savages—in order that the system of competitive Commerce may endure.

There is no other way: and this way I tell you plainly, will in the long run give us plentiful occasion for self-sacrifice without going to Russia. I feel sure that in this assembly there are some who are steeped in discontent with the miserable anarchy of the century of Commerce: to them I offer a means of renouncing their class by supporting a Socialist propaganda in joining the Democratic Federation, which I have the honour of representing before you, and which I believe is the only body in this country which puts forward constructive Socialism as its program.

This to my mind is opportunity enough for those of us who are discontented with the present state of things and long for an opportunity of renunciation; and it is very certain that in accepting the opportunity you will have at once to undergo some of the inconveniences of martyrdom, though without gaining its dignity at present. You will at least be mocked and laughed at by those whose mockery is a token of honour to an honest man; but you will, I don't doubt it, be looked on coldly by many excellent people, not all of whom will be quite stupid. You will run the risk of losing position, reputation, money, friends even: losses which are certainly pin pricks to the serious martyrdom I have spoken of; but which none the less do try the stuff a man is made of—all the more as he can escape them with little other reproach of cowardice than that which his own conscience cries out at him.

Nor can I assure you that you will for ever escape scot-free from the attacks of open tyranny. It is true that at present Capitalist Society only looks on Socialism in England with dry grins. But remember that the body of people who have for instance ruined India, starved and gagged Ireland, and tortured Egypt, have capacities in them—some ominous signs of which they have lately shown — for openly playing the tyrants' game nearer home.

So on all sides I can offer you a position which involves sacrifice; a position which will give you your "America" at home, and make you inwardly sure that you are at least of some use to the cause: and I earnestly beg you, those of you who are convinced of the justice of our cause, not to hang back from active participation in a struggle which—who ever helps or who ever abstains from helping—must beyond all doubt end at last in Victory!

ART, WEALTH, AND RICHES

WILLIAM MORRIS

Art, Wealth, and Riches are the words I have written at the head of this paper. Some of you may think that the two latter words, wealth and riches, are tautologous; but I cannot admit it. In truth these are no real synonyms in any language, I mean unless in the case of words borrowed from another tongue; and in the early days of our own language no one would have thought of using the word rich as a synonym for wealthy. He would have understood a wealthy man to mean one who had plentiful livelihood, and a rich man one who had great dominion over his fellow-men. Alexander the Rich, Canute the Rich, Alfred the Rich; these are familiar words enough in the early literature of the North; the adjective would scarcely be used except of a great king or chief, a man pre-eminent above other kings and chiefs. Now, without being a stickler for etymological accuracy, I must say that I think there are cases where modern languages have lost power by confusing two words into one meaning, and that this is one of them. I shall ask your leave therefore to use the words wealth and riches somewhat in the way in which our forefathers did, and to understand wealth as signifying the means of living a decent life, and riches the means for exercising dominion over other people. Thus understood the words are widely different to my mind; yet, indeed, if you say that the difference is but one of degree I must needs admit it; just so it is between the shepherd's dog and the wolf. Their respective views on the subject of mutton differ only in degree.

Anyhow, I think the following question is an important one: Which shall art belong to, wealth or riches? Whose servant shall she be? or rather, Shall she be the slave of riches, or the friend and helpmate of wealth? Indeed, if I put the question in another form, and ask: Is art to be limited to a narrow class who only care for it in a very languid way, or is it to be the solace and pleasure of the whole people? the question finally comes to this: Are we to have art or the pretence of art? It is like enough that to many or even most of you the question will seem of no practical importance. To most people the present condition of art does seem in the main to be the only condition it could exist in among cultivated people, and they are (in a languid way, as I said) content with its present aims and tendencies. For myself, I am so discontented with the present conditions of art, and the matter seems to me so serious, that I am forced to try to make other people share my discontent, and am this evening risking the committal of a breach of good manners by standing before you, grievance in hand, on an occasion like this, when everybody present, I feel sure, is full of goodwill both towards the arts and towards the public. My only excuse is my belief in the sincerity of your wish to know any serious views that can be taken of a matter so important. So I will say that the question I have asked, whether art is to be the helpmate of wealth or the slave of riches, is of great practical import, if indeed art is important to the human race, which I suppose no one here will gainsay.

Now I will ask those who think art is in a normal and healthy condition to explain the meaning of the enthusiasm (which I am glad to learn the people of Manchester share) shown of late years for the foundation and extension of museums, a great part of whose contents is but fragments of the household goods of past ages. Why do cultivated, sober, reasonable people, not lacking in a due sense of the value of money, give large sums for scraps of figured cloth, pieces of roughly made pottery, worm-eaten carving, or battered metal work, and treasure them up in expensive public buildings under the official guardianship of learned experts? Well, we all know that these things are supposed to teach us something; they are educational. The type of our museums, that at South Kensington, is distinctly an educational establishment. Nor is what they are supposed to teach us mere dead history; these things are studied carefully and laboriously by men who intend making their living by the art of design. Ask any expert of any school of opinion as to art what he thinks of the desirability of those who are to make designs for the ornamental part of industrial art studying from these remains of past ages, and he will be certain to answer you that such study is indispensable to a designer. So you see this is what it comes to. It is not to the best works of our own time that a student is sent; no master or expert could honestly tell him that that would do him good, but to the mere wreckage of a bygone art, things which, when they were new, could be bought for the most part in every shop and market-place. Well, need one ask what sort of a figure the wreckage of our ornamental art would cut in a museum of the twenty-fourth century? The plain truth is that people who have studied these matters know that these remnants of the past give tokens of an art which fashioned goods not only better than we do now, but different in kind, and better because they are different in kind, and were made in quite other ways than we make such things.

Before we ask why they were so much better, and why they differ in kind and not merely in degree of goodness, I want you to note specially once more that they were common wares, bought and sold in any market. I want you to note that, in spite of the tyranny and violence of the days when they were fashioned, the beauty of which they formed a part surrounded all life; that then, at all events, art was the helpmate of wealth and not the slave of riches. True it is that then as now rich men spent great sums of money in ornament of all kinds, and no doubt the lower classes were wretchedly poor (as they are now); nevertheless, the art that rich men got differed only in abundance and splendour of material from what other people could compass. The thing to remember is that then everything which was made by man's hand was more or less beautiful.

Contrast that with the state of art at present, and then say if my unmannerly discontent is not somewhat justified. So far from everything that is made by man being beautiful, almost all ordinary wares that are made by civilized man are shabbily and pretentiously ugly; made so (it would almost seem) by perverse intent rather than by accident, when we consider how pleasant and tempting to the inventive mind and the skilful hand are many of the processes of manufacture. Take for example the familiar art of glass-making. I have been in a glass-house, and seen the workmen in the process of their work bring the molten glass into the most elegant and delicious forms. There were points of the manufacturer when, if the vessel they were making had been taken straight to the annealing house, the result would have been something which would have rivalled the choicest pieces of Venetian glass; but that could not be, they had to take their callipers and moulds and reduce the fantastic elegance of the living metal to the due marketable ugliness and vulgarity of some shape, designed most likely by a man who did not in the least know or care how glass was made; and the experience is common enough in other arts. I repeat that all manufactured goods are now divided into two classes; one class vulgar and ugly, though often pretentious enough, with work on it which it is a mockery to call ornamental, but which probably has some wretched remains of tradition still clinging to it; that is for poor people, for the uncultivated. The other class, made for some of the rich, intends to be beautiful, is carefully and elaborated designed, but usually fails of its intent partly because it is cast loose from tradition, partly because there is no co-operation in it between the designer and the handicraftsman. Thus is our wealth injured, our wealth, the means of living a decent life, and no one is the gainer; for while on the one hand the lower classes have no real art of any kind about their houses, and have instead to put up with shabby and ghastly pretences of it which quite destroy their capacity for appreciating real art when they come across it in museums and picture-galleries, so on the other hand, not all the superfluous money of the rich can buy what they profess to want; the only real art they can have is that which is made by unassisted individual genius, the laborious and painful work of men of rare attainments and special culture, who, cumbered as they are by unromantic life and hideous surroundings, so in spite of all manage now and then to break through the hindrances and produce noble works of art, which only a very few people even pretend to understand or be moved by. This art rich people can buy and possess sometimes, but necessarily there is little enough of it; and if there were tenfold what there is, I repeat it would not move the people one jot, for they are deadened to all art by the hideousness and squalor that surrounds them. Nor can I honestly say that the lack is wholly on their side, for the great artists I have been speaking of are what they are in virtue of their being men of very peculiar and especial gifts, and are mostly steeped in thoughts of history, wrapped up in contemplation of the beauty of past times. If they were not so constituted, I say, they would not in the teeth of all the difficulties in their way be able to produce beauty at all. But note the result. Everyday life rejects and neglects them; they cannot choose but let it go its way, and wrap themselves up in dreams of Greece and Italy. The days of Pericles and the days of Dante are the days through which they move, and the England of our own day with its millions of eager struggling people neither helps nor is helped by them: yet it may be they bide their time of usefulness, and in days to come will not be forgotten. Let us hope so.

That, I say, is the condition of art amongst us. Lest you doubt it, or think I exaggerate, let me ask you to note how it fares with that art which is above all others co-operative: the art of architecture, to wit. Now, none know better than I do what a vast amount of talent and knowledge there is amongst the first-rate designers of buildings nowadays; and here and there all about the country one sees the buildings they have planned, and is rejoiced by them. Yet little enough does that help us in these days when, if a man leaves England for a few years, he finds when he comes back half a county of bricks and mortar added to London. Can the greatest optimists say that the style of building in that half county has improved meanwhile? Is it not true, on the contrary, that it goes on getting worse, if that be possible? the last house built being always the vulgarest and ugliest, till one is beginning now to think with regret of the days of Gower Street, and to look with some complacency on the queer little boxes of brown brick which stand with their trim gardens choked up amongst new squares and terraces in the suburbs of London? It is a matter of course that almost every new house shall be quite disgracefully and degradingly ugly, and if by chance we come across a new house that shows any signs of thoughtfulness in design and planning we are quite astonished, and want to know who built it, who owns it, who designed it, and all about it from beginning to end; whereas when architecture was alive every house built was more or less beautiful. The phrase which called the styles of the Middle Ages Ecclesiastical Architecture has been long set aside by increased knowledge, and we know now that in that time cottage and cathedral were built in the same style and had the same kind of ornaments about them; size and, in some cases, material were the only differences between the humble and the majestic building. And it will not be till this sort of beauty is beginning to be once more in our towns, that there will be a real school of architecture; till every little chandler's shop in our suburbs, every shed run up for mere convenience, is made without effort fit for its purpose and beautiful at one and the same time. Now just think what a contrast that makes with our present way of housing ourselves. It is not easy to imagine the beauty of a town all of whose houses are beautiful, at least unless you have seen (say) Rouen or Oxford thirty years ago. But what a strange state art must be in when we either won't or can't take any trouble to make our houses fit for reasonable human beings to live in! Cannot, I suppose: for once again, except in the rarest cases, rich men's houses are no better than common ones. Excuse an example of this, I beg you. I have lately seen Bournemouth, the watering place south-west of the New Forest. It is a district (scarcely a town) of rich men's houses. There was every inducement there to make them decent, for the place, with its sandy hills and pine-trees, gave really a remarkable site. It would not have taken so very much to have made it romantic. Well, there stand these rich men's houses among the pine-trees and gardens, and not even the pine-trees and gardens can make them tolerable. They are (you must pardon me the word) simply blackguardly, and while I speak they are going on building them by the mile.

And now why cannot we amend all this? Why cannot we have, for instance, simple and beautiful dwellings fit for cultivated, well-mannered men and women, and not for ignorant, purse-proud digesting-machines? You may say because we don't wish for them, and that is true enough; but that only removes the question a step further, and we must ask: why don't we care about art? Why has civilized society in all that relates to the beauty of man's handiwork degenerated from the time of the barbarous, superstitious, unpeaceful Middle Ages? That is indeed a serious question to ask, involving questions still more serious, and the mere mention of which you may resent if I should be forced to speak of them.

I said that the relics of past art which we are driven to study nowadays are of a work which was not merely better than what we do now, but differed in kind from it. Now this difference in kind explains our shortcomings so far, and leaves us only one more question to ask: How shall we remedy the fault? For the kind of the handiwork of former times down to at least the time of the Renaissance was intelligent work, whereas ours is unintelligent work, or the work of slaves; surely this is enough to account for the worsening of art, for it means the disappearance of popular art from civilization. Popular art, that is, the art which is made by the co-operation of many minds and hands varying in kind and degree of talent, but all doing their part in due subordination to a great whole, without any one losing his individuality - the loss of such an art is surely great, nay, inestimable. But hitherto I have only been speaking of the lack of popular art being a grievous loss as a part of wealth; I have been considering the loss of the thing itself, the loss of the humanizing influence which the daily sight of beautiful handiwork brings to bear upon people; but now, when we are considering the way in which that handiwork was done, and the way in which it is done, the matter becomes more serious still. For I say unhesitatingly that the intelligent work which produced real art was pleasant to do, was human work, not over burdensome or degrading; whereas the unintelligent work which produces sham art, is irksome to do, it is unhuman work, burdensome and degrading; so that it is but right and proper that it should turn out nothing but ugly things. And the immediate cause of this degrading labour which oppresses so large a part of our people is the system of the organization of labour, which is the chief instrument of the great power of modern Europe, competitive commerce. That system has quite changed the way of working in all matters that can be considered as art, and the change is a very much greater one than people know of or think of. In times past these handicrafts were done on a small, almost a domestic, scale by knots of workmen who mostly belonged to organized gilds, and were taught their work soundly, however limited their education was in other respects. There was little division of labour among them; the grades between master and man were not many; a man knew his work from end to end, and felt responsible for every stage of its progress. Such work was necessarily slow to do and expensive to buy; neither was it always finished to the nail; but it was always intelligent work; there was a man's mind in it always, and abundant tokens of human hopes and fears, the sum of which makes life for all of us.

Now think of any kind of manufacturer which you are conversant with, and note how differently it is done nowadays; almost certainly the workmen are collected in huge factories, in which labour is divided and sub-divided, till a workman is perfectly helpless in his craft if he finds himself without those above to feed his work, and those below to be fed by it. There is a regular hierarchy of masters over him; foreman, manager, clerk, and capitalist, every one of whom is more important than he who does the work. Not only is he not asked to put his individuality into his share of the work, but he is not allowed to. He is but part of a machine, and has but one unvarying set of tasks to do; and when he has once learned these, the more regularly and with the less thought he does them, the more valuable he is. The work turned out by this system is speedily done, and cheap to buy. No wonder, considering the marvellous perfection of the organization of labour that turns it out, and the energy with which it is carried through. Also, it has a certain high finish, and what I should call shop-counter look, quite peculiar to the wares of this century; but it is of necessity utterly unintelligent, and has no sign of humanity on it; nit even so much as to show weariness here and there, which would imply that one part of it was pleasanter to do than another. Whatever art or semblance of art is on it has been doled out with due commercial care, and applied by a machine, human or otherwise, with exactly the same amount of interest in the doing it as went to the non-artistic parts of the work. Again I say that if such work were otherwise than ugly and despicable to look at one's sense of justice would be shocked; for the labour which went to the making of it was thankless and unpleasurable, little more than a mere oppression on the workman.

Must this sort of work last for ever? As long as it lasts the mass of the people can have no share in art; the only handicraftsmen who are free are the artists, as we call them to-day, and even they are hindered and oppressed by the oppression of their fellows. Yet I know that this machine-organized labour is necessary to competitive commerce; that is to say, to the present constitution of society; and probably most of you think that speculation on a root and branch change in that is mere idle dreaming. I cannot help it; I can only say that that change must come, or at least be on the way, before art can be made to touch the mass of the people. To some that might seem an unimportant matter. One must charitably hope that such people are blind on the side of art, which I imagine is by no means an uncommon thing; and that blindness will entirely prevent them from understanding what I have been saying as to the pleasure which a good workman takes in his handiwork. But all those who know what art means will agree with me in asserting that pleasure is a necessary companion to the making of everything that can be called a work of art. To those, then, I appeal and ask them to consider if it is fair and just that only a few among the millions of civilization shall be partakers in a pleasure which is the surest and most constant of all pleasures, the unfailing solace of misfortune, happy and honourable work. Let us face the truth, and admit that a society which allows little other human and undegrading pleasure to the greater part of its toilers save the pleasure that comes of rest after the torment of weary work - that such a society should not be stable if it is; that it is but natural that such a society should be honeycombed with corruption and sick with oft-repeated sordid crimes.

Anyhow, dream or not as we may about the chances of a better kind of life which shall include a fair share of art for most people, it is no dream, but a certainty, that change is going on around us, though whitherward the change is leading us may be a matter of dispute. Most people though, I suppose, will be inclined to think that everything tends to favour the fullest development of competitive commerce and the utmost perfection of the system of labour which it depends upon. I think that is likely enough, and that things will go on quicker and quicker till the last perfection of blind commercial war has been reached; and then? May the change come with as little violence and suffering as may be!

It is the business of all of us to do our best to that end of preparing for change, and so softening the shock of it; to leave as little as possible that must be destroyed to be destroyed suddenly and by violence of some sort or other. And in no direction, it seems to me, can we do more useful work in forestalling destructive revolution than in being beforehand with it in trying to fill up the gap that separates class from class. Here is a point surely where competitive commerce has disappointed our hopes; she has been ready enough to attack the privilege of feudality, and successful enough in doing it, but in levelling the distinctions between upper and middle classes, between gentleman and commoner, she has stopped as if enough had been done: for, alas, most men will be glad enough to level down to themselves, and then hold their hands obstinately enough. But note what stopping short here will do for us. It seems to me more than doubtful, if we go no further, whether we had better have gone as far; for the feudal and hierarchical system under which the old gild brethren whose work I have been praising lived, and which undoubtedly had something to do with the intelligence and single-heartedness of their work: this system, while it divided men rigorously into castes, did not actually busy itself to degrade them by forcing on them violent contrasts of cultivation and ignorance. The difference between lord and commoner, noble and burgher, was purely arbitrary; but how does it fare now with the distinction between class and class? Is it not the sad fact that the difference is no longer arbitrary but real? Down to a certain class, that of the educated gentleman, as he is called, there is indeed equality of manners and bearing, and if the commoners still choose to humble themselves and play the flunkey, that is their own affair; but below that class there is, as it were, the stroke of a knife, and gentlemen and non-gentlemen divide the world.

Just think of the significance of one fact; that here in England in the nineteenth century, among all the shouts of progress that have been raised for many years, the greater number of people are doomed by the accident of their birth to misplace their aitches; that there are two languages talked in England; gentleman's English and workman's English. I do not care who gainsays it, I say that this is barbarous and dangerous; and it goes step by step with the lack of art which the same classes are forced into; it is a token, in short, of that vulgarity, to use a hateful word, which was not in existence before modern times and the blossoming of competitive commerce.

Nor, on the other hand, does modern class-division really fall much short of the caste system of the Middle Ages. It is pretty much as exclusive as that was. Excuse an example: I was talking with a lady friend of mine the other day who was puzzled as to what to do with her growing son, and we discussed the possibility of his taking to one of the crafts, trades as we call them now: say cabinet-making. Now neither of us was much cumbered with social prejudices, both of us had a wholesome horror of increasing the army of London clerks, yet we were obliged to admit that unless a lad were of strong character and could take the step with his own eyes open and face the consequences on his own account, the thing could not be done; it would be making him either a sort of sloppy amateur or an involuntary martyr to principle. Well really after that we do not seem to have quite cast off even the mere medieval superstition founded, I take it, on the exclusiveness of Roman landlordism (for our Gothic forefathers were quite free from the twaddle), that handiwork is a degrading occupation. At first sight the thing seems so monstrous that one almost expects to wake up from a confused dream and find oneself in the reign of Henry the Eighth, with the whole paraphernalia in full blossom, from the divine right of kings downwards. Why in the name of patience should a carpenter be a worse gentleman than a lawyer? His craft is a much more useful one, much harder to learn, and at the very worst, even in these days, much pleasanter; and yet, you see, we gentlemen and ladies durst not set our sons to it unless we have found them to be enthusiasts or philosophers who can accept all consequences and despise the opinion of the world; in which case they will lie under the ban of that terrible adjective, eccentric.

Well, I have thought we might deduce part of this folly from a superstition of past ages, that it was partly a remnant of the accursed tyranny of ancient Rome; but there is another side to the question which puts a somewhat different face upon it. I bethink me that amongst other things the lady said to me: "You know, I wouldn't mind a lad being a cabinet-maker if he only made `Art' furniture." Well, there you see! she naturally, as a matter of course, admitted what I have told you this evening is a fact, that even in a craft so intimately connected with fine art as cabinet-making there could be two classes of goods, one the common one, quite without art; the other exceptional and having a sort of artificial art, so to say, tacked on to it. But furthermore, the thought that was in her mind went tolerably deep into the matter, and cleaves close to our subject; for in fact these crafts are so mechanical as they are now carried on, that they don't exercise the intellectual part of a man; no, scarcely at all; and perhaps after all, in these days, when privilege is on its death-bed, that has something to do with the low estimate that is made of them. You see, supposing a young man to enter the cabinet-maker's craft, for instance (one of the least mechanical, even at present): when he had attained to more than average skill in it, his next ambition would be to better himself, as the phrase goes; that is, either to take to some other occupation thought more gentlemanly, or to become, not a master cabinet-maker, but a capitalist employer of cabinet-makers. Thus the crafts lose their best men because they have not in themselves due reward for excellence. Beyond a certain point you cannot go, and that point is not set high enough. Understand, by reward I don't mean only money wages, but social position, leisure, and above all, the self-respect which comes of our having the opportunity of doing remarkable and individual work, useful for one's fellows to possess, and pleasant for oneself to do; work which at least deserves thanks, whether it gets them or not. Now, mind you, I know well enough that it is the custom of people when they speak in public to talk largely of the dignity of labour and the esteem in which they hold the working classes, and I suppose while they are speaking they believe what they say; but will their respect for the dignity of labour bear the test I have been speaking of? to wit, will they, can they, being of the upper or middle classes, put their sons to this kind of labour? Do they think that, so doing, they will give their children a good prospect in life? It does not take long to answer that question, and I repeat that I consider it a test question; therefore I say that the crafts are distinctly marked as forming part of a lower class, and that this stupidity is partly the remnant of the prejudices of the hierarchical society of the Middle Ages, but also is partly the result of the reckless pursuit of riches, which is the main aim of competitive commerce. Moreover, this is the worst part of the folly, for the mere superstition would of itself wear away, and not very slowly either, before political and social progress; but the side of it which is fostered by competitive commerce is more enduring, for there is reality about it. The crafts really are degraded, and the classes that form them are only kept sweet by the good blood and innate good sense of the workmen as men out of their working hours, and by their strong political tendencies, which are wittingly or unwittingly at war with competitive commerce, and may, I hope, be trusted slowly to overthrow it. Meanwhile, I believe this degradation of craftsmanship to be necessary to the perfection and progress of competitive commerce: the degradation of craftsmanship, or, in other words, the extinction of art. That is such a heavy accusation to bring against the system, that, crazy as you may think me, I am bound to declare myself in open rebellion against it; against, I admit it, the mightiest power which the world has ever seen. Mighty, indeed, yet mainly to destroy, and therefore I believe short-lived; since all things which are destructive bear their own destruction with them.

And now I want to get back before I finish to my first three words, Art, Wealth, and Riches. I can conceive that many people would be like to say to me: You declare yourself in rebellion against the system which creates wealth for the world. It is just that which I deny; it is the destruction of wealth of which I accuse competitive commerce. I say that wealth, or the material means for living a decent life, is created in spite of that system, not because of it. To my mind real wealth is of two kinds; the first kind, food, raiment, shelter, and the like; the second, matters of art and knowledge; that is, things good and necessary for the body, and things good and necessary for the mind. Many other things than these is competitive commerce busy about, some of them directly injurious to the life of man, some merely encumbrances to its honourable progress; meanwhile the first of these two kinds of real wealth she largely wastes, the second she largely destroys. She wastes the first by unjust and ill-managed distribution of the power of acquiring wealth, which we call shortly money; by urging people to the reckless multiplication of their kind, and by gathering population into unmanageable aggregations to satisfy her ruthless greed, without the least thought of their welfare.

As for the second kind of wealth, mental wealth, in many ways she destroys it; but the two ways which most concern our subject to-night are these: first, the reckless destruction of the natural beauty of the earth, which compels the great mass of the population, in this country at least, to live amidst ugliness and squalor so revolting and disgusting that we could not bear it unless habit had made us used to it; that is to say, unless we were far advanced on the road towards losing some of the highest and happiest qualities which have been given to men. But the second way by which competitive commerce destroys our mental wealth is yet worse: it is by the turning of almost all handicraftsmen into machines; that is to say, compelling them to work which is unintelligent and unhuman, a mere weariness to be borne for the greater part of the day; thus robbing men of the gain and victory which long ages of toil and thought have won from stern hard nature and necessity, man's pleasure and triumph in his daily work.

I tell you it is not wealth which our civilization has created, but riches, with its necessary companion poverty; for riches cannot exist without poverty, or in other words slavery. All rich men must have some one to do their dirty work, from the collecting of their unjust rents to the sifting of their ash heaps. Under the dominion of riches we are masters and slaves instead of fellow-workmen as we should be. If competitive commerce creates wealth, then should England surely be the wealthiest country in the world, as I suppose some people think it is, and as it is certainly the richest; but what shabbiness is this rich country driven into? I belong, for instance, to a harmless little society whose object is to preserve for the public now living and to come the wealth which England still possesses in historical and beautiful buildings; and I could give you a long and dismal list of buildings which England, with all her riches, has not been able to save from commercial greed in some form or another. "It's a matter of money" is supposed to be an unanswerable argument in these cases, and indeed we generally find that if we answer it our answer is cast on the winds. Why, to this day in England (in England only, I believe, amongst civilized countries) there is no law to prevent a madman or an ignoramus from pulling down a house which he chooses to call his private property, though it may be one of the treasures of the land for art and history.

Or again, of how many acres of common land has riches robbed the country, even in this century? a treasure irreplaceable, inestimable, in these days of teeming population. Yet where is the man who dares to propose a measure for the reinstatement of the public in its rights in this matter? How often, once more, have railway companies been allowed for the benefit of the few to rob the public of treasures of beauty that can never be replaced, owing to the cowardly and anarchical maxims which seem always to be favoured by those who should be our guardians herein; but riches has no bowels except for riches. Or you of this part of the country, what have you done with Lancashire? It does not seem to be above ground. I think you must have been poor indeed to have been compelled to bury it. Were not the brown moors and the meadows, the clear streams and the sunny skies, wealth? Riches has made a strange home for you. Some of you, indeed, can sneak away from it sometimes to Wales, to Scotland, to Italy; some, but very few. I am sorry for you; and for myself too, for that matter, for down by the Thameside there we are getting rid of the earth as fast as we can also; most of Middlesex, most of Surrey, and huge cantles of Essex and Kent are buried mountains deep under fantastic folly or hideous squalor; and no one has the courage to say: "Let us seek a remedy while any of our wealth in this kind is left us."

Or, lastly, if all these things may seem light matters to some of you, grievously heavy as they really are, no one can think lightly of those terrible stories we have been hearing lately of the housing of poor people in London; indeed and indeed no country which can bear to sit quiet under such grievances has any right to be called wealthy. Yet you know very well that it will be long indeed before any party or any Government will have the courage to face the subject, dangerous as they must needs know it is to shut their eyes to it.

And what is to amend these grievances? You must not press me too close on that point. I believe I am in such a very small minority on these matters that it is enough for me if I find here and there some one who admits the grievances; for my business herein is to spread discontent. I do not think that this is an unimportant office; for, as discontent spreads, the yearning for bettering the state of things spreads with it, and the longing of many people, when it has grown deep and strong, melts away resistance to change in a sure, steady, unaccountable manner. Yet I will, with your leave, tell the chief things which I really want to see changed, in case I have not spoken plainly enough hitherto, and lest I should seem to have nothing to bid you to but destruction, the destruction of a system by some thought to have been made to last for ever. I want, then, all persons to be educated according to their capacity, not according to the amount of money which their parents happen to have. I want all persons to have manners and breeding according to their innate goodness and kindness, and not according to the amount of money which their parents happen to have. As a consequence of these two things I want to be able to talk to any of my countrymen in his own tongue freely, and feeling sure that he will be able to understand my thoughts according to his innate capacity; and I also want to be able to sit at table with a person of any occupation without a feeling of awkwardness and constraint being present between us. I want no one to have any money except as due wages for work done; and, since I feel sure that those who do the most useful work will neither ask nor get the highest wages, I believe that this change will destroy that worship of a man for the sake of his money, which everybody admits is degrading, but which very few indeed can help sharing in. I want those who do the rough work of the world, sailors, miners, ploughmen, and the like, to be treated with consideration and respect, to be paid abundant money-wages, and to have plenty of leisure. I want modern science, which I believe to be capable of overcoming all material difficulties, to turn from such preposterous follies as the invention of anthracine colours and monster cannon to the invention of machines for performing such labour as is revolting and destructive of self-respect to the men who now have to do it by hand. I want handicraftsmen proper, that is, those who make wares, to be in such a position that they may be able to refuse to make foolish and useless wares, or to make the cheap and nasty wares which are the mainstay of competitive commerce, and are indeed slave-wares, made by and for slaves. And in order that the workmen may be in this position, I want division of labour restricted within reasonable limits, and men taught to think over their work and take pleasure in it. I also want the wasteful system of middlemen restricted, so that workmen may be brought into contact with the public, who will thus learn something about their work, and so be able to give them due reward of praise for excellence.

Furthermore, I want the workmen to share the good fortunes of the business which they uphold, in due proportion to their skill and industry, as they must in any case share its bad fortunes. To which end it would be necessary that those who organize their labour should be paid no more than due wages for their work, and should be chosen for their skill and intelligence, and not because they happen to be the sons of money-bags. Also I want this, and, if men were living under the conditions I have just claimed for them, I should get it, that these islands which make the land we love should no longer be treated as here a cinder-heap, and there a game preserve, but as the fair green garden of Northern Europe, which no man on any pretence should be allowed to befoul or disfigure. Under all these conditions I should certainly get the last want accomplished which I am now going to name. I want all the works of man's hand to be beautiful, rising in fair and honourable gradation from the simplest household goods to the stately public building, adorned with the handiwork of the greatest masters of expression which that real new birth and the dayspring of hope come back will bring forth for us.

These are the foundations of my Utopia, a city in which riches and poverty will have been conquered by wealth; and however crazy you may think my aspirations for it, one thing at least I am sure of, that henceforward it will be no use looking for popular art except in such an Utopia, or at least on the road thither; a road which, in my belief, leads to peace and civilization, as the road away from it leads to discontent, corruption, tyranny, and confusion. Yet it may be we are more nearly on the road to it than many people think; and however that may be, I am cheered somewhat by thinking that the very small minority to which I belong is being helped by every one who is of goodwill in social matters. Every one who is pushing forward education helps us; for education, which seems such a small power to classes which have been used to some share of it for generations, when it reaches those who have grievances which they ought not to bear spreads deep discontent among them, and teaches them what to do to make their discontent fruitful. Every one who is striving to extinguish poverty is helping us; for one of the greatest causes of the dearth of popular art and the oppression of joyless labour is the necessity that is imposed on modern civilization for making miserable wares for miserable people, for the slaves of competitive commerce. All who assert public rights against private greed are helping us; every foil given to common-stealers, or railway-Philistines, or smoke-nuisance-breeders, is a victory scored to us. Every one who tries to keep alive traditions of art by gathering together relics of the art of bygone times, still more if he is so lucky as to be able to lead people by his own works to look through Manchester smoke and squalor to fair scenes of unspoiled nature or deeds of past history, is helping us. Every one who tries to bridge the gap between the classes, by helping the opening of museums and galleries and gardens and other pleasures which can be shared by all, is helping us. Every one who tries to stir up intelligence in their work in workmen, and more especially every one who gives them hope in their work and a sense of self-respect and responsibility to the public in it, by such means as industrial partnerships and the like, is helping the cause most thoroughly.

These, and such as these, are our helpers, and give us a kind of hope that the time may come when our views and aspirations will no longer be considered rebellious, and when competitive commerce will be lying in the same grave with chattel slavery, with serfdom, and with feudalism. Or rather, certainly the change will come, however long we shall have been dead by then; how, then, can we prevent its coming with violence and injustice that will breed other grievances in time, to be met by fresh discontent? Once again, how good it were to destroy all that must be destroyed gradually and with a good grace!

Here in England, we have a fair house full of many good things, but cumbered also with pestilential rubbish. What duty can be more pressing than to carry out the rubbish piecemeal and burn it outside, lest some day there be no way of getting rid of it but by burning it up inside with the goods and house and all?

COMMUNISM

WILLIAM MORRIS

While I think that the hope of the new-birth of society is certainly growing, and that speedily, I must confess myself puzzled about the means toward that end which are mostly looked after now; and I am doubtful if some of the measures which are pressed, mostly, I think, with all honesty of purpose, and often with much ability, would, if gained, bring us any further on the direct road to a really new-born society, the only society which can be a new birth, a society of practical equality. Not to make any mystery about it, I mean that the great mass of what most non-Socialists at least consider at present to be Socialism, seems to me nothing more than a machinery of Socialism, which I think it probable that Socialism must use in its militant condition; and which I think it may use for some time after it is practically established; but does not seem to me to be of its essence. Doubtless there is good in the schemes for substituting business-like administration in the interests of the public for the old Whig muddle of laissez faire backed up by coercion and smoothed by abundant corruption, which, worked all of it in the interest of successful business men, was once thought such a wonderful invention, and which certainly was the very cement of society as it has existed since the death of feudalism. The London County Council, for instance, is not merely a more useful body for the administration of public business than the Metropolitan Board of Works was: it is instinct with a different spirit; and even its general intention to be of use to the citizens and to heed their wishes, has in it a promise of better days, and has already done something to raise the dignity of life in London amongst a certain part of the population, and down to certain classes. Again, who can quarrel with the attempts to relieve the sordidness of civilized town life by the public acquirement of parks and other open spaces, planting of trees, establishment of free libraries and the like? It is sensible and right for the public to push for the attainment of such gains; but we all know very well that their advantages are very unequally distributed, that they are gains rather for certain portions of the middle-classes than for working people. Nay, this Socialist machinery may be used much further: it may gain higher wages and shorter working-hours for the working-men themselves: industries may be worked by municipalities for the benefit both of producers and consumers. Working-people's houses may be improved, and their management taken out of the hands of commercial speculators. More time might be insisted on for the education of children; and so on, and so on. In all this I freely admit a great gain, and am glad to see schemes tried which would lead to it. But great as the gain would be, the ultimate good of it, the amount of progressive force that might be in such things would, I think, depend on how such reforms were done - in what spirit; or rather what else was being done, while these were going on, which would make people long for equality of condition; which would give them faith in the possibility & workableness of Socialism; which would give them courage to strive for it and labour for it; and which would do this for a vast number of people, so that the due impetus might be gained for the sweeping away of all privilege. For we must not lose sight of the very obvious fact that these improvements in the life of the larger public can only be carried out at the expense of some portion of the freedom and fortunes of the proprietary classes. They are, when genuine, one and all attacks I say on the "liberty and property" of the non-working or useless classes, as some of those classes see clearly enough. And I admit that if the sum of them should become vast and deep reaching enough to give to the useful or working classes intelligence enough to conceive of a life of equality and co-operation; courage enough to accept it and to bring the necessary skill to bear on working it; and power enough to force its acceptance on the stupid and the interested, the war of classes would speedily end in the victory of the useful class, which would then become the new Society of Equality.

Intelligence enough to conceive, courage enough to will, power enough to compel. If our ideas of a new Society are anything more than a dream, these three qualities must animate the due effective majority of the working people; and then, I say, the thing will be done.

Intelligence, courage, power enough. Now that enough means a very great thing. The effective majority of the working people must I should think be something as great in numbers as an actual mechanical majority; because the non-working classes (with, mind you, their sworn slaves and parasites, man who can't live without them) are even numerically very strong, and are stronger still in holding in their hand the nine points of the law, possession to wit; and as soon as these begin to think there is any serious danger to their privilege - i.e., their livelihood - they will be pretty much unanimous in defending it, and using all the power which they possess in doing so. The necessary majority therefore of intelligence, courage, and power is such a big thing to bring about, that it will take a long time to do so; and those who are working for this end must clearly not throw away time and strength by making more mistakes than they can possibly help in their efforts for the conversion of the working people to an ardent desire for a society of equality. The question then, it seems to me, about all those partial gains above mentioned, is not so much as to what advantage they may be to the public at large in the passing moment, or even to the working people, but rather what effect they will have towards converting the workers to an understanding of, and ardent desire for Socialism; true and complete Socialism I mean, what I should call Communism. For though making a great many poor people, or even a few, somewhat more comfortable than they are now, somewhat less miserable, let us say, is not in itself a light good; yet it would be a heavy evil, if it did anything towards dulling the efforts of the whole class of workers towards the winning of a real society of equals. And here again come in those doubts and the puzzlement I began by taking about. For I want to know and to ask you to consider, how far the betterment of the working people might go and yet stop at last without having made any progress on the direct road to Communism. Whether in short the tremendous organization of civilized commercial society is not playing the cat and mouse game with us Socialists. Whether the Society of Inequality might not accept the quasi-socialist machinery above mentioned, and work it for the purpose of upholding that society in a somewhat shorn condition, maybe, but a safe one. That seems to me possible, and means the other side of the view: instead of the useless classes being swept away by the useful, the useless classes gaining some of the usefulness of the workers, and so safeguarding their privilege: the workers better treated, better organized, helping to govern themselves, but with no more pretence to equality with the rich, nor any more hope for it than they have now. But if this be possible, it will only be so on the grounds that the working people have ceased to desire real Socialism and are contented with some outside show of it joined to an increase in prosperity enough to satisfy the cravings of men who do not know what the pleasures of life might be if they treated their own capacities and the resources of nature reasonably with the intention and expectation of being happy. Of course also it could not be possible if there be, as we may well hope, an actual necessity for new development of society from out of our present conditions: but granting this necessity, the change may and will be exceedingly slow in coming if the working people do not show their sense of the necessity by being overtaken by a longing for the change and by expressing that longing. And moreover it will not only be slow in coming but also in that case it can only come through a period of great suffering and misery, by the ruin of our present civilization: and surely reasonable men must hope that if Socialism be necessary its advent shall both be speedy and shall be marked by the minimum of suffering and by ruin not quite complete. Therefore, I say, what we have to hope for is that the inevitable advance of the Society of Equality will speedily make itself felt by the consciousness of its necessity being impressed upon the working people, and that they will consciously and not blindly strive for its realization. That in fact is what we mean by the education into Socialism of the working classes. And I believe that if this is impossible at present, if the working people refuse to take any interest in Socialism, if they practically reject it, we must accept that as a sign that the necessity for an essential change in society is so far distant, that we need scarcely trouble ourselves about it. This is the text: and for this reason it is so deadly serious for us to find out whether those democratic tendencies and the schemes of new administration they give birth to are really of use in educating the people into direct Socialism. If they are not, they are of use for nothing else; and we had best try if we can't make terms with intelligent Tories and benevolent Whigs, and beg them to unite their intelligence and benevolence, and govern us as kindly and wisely as they can, and to rob us in moderation only. But if they are of use, then in spite of their sordid and repellent details, and all the sickness of hope deferred that the use of such instruments assuredly brings us, let us use them as far as they will go, and refuse to be disappointed if they will not go very far: which means if they will not in a decade turn into a united host of heroes and sages a huge mass of men living under a system of society so intricate as to look on the surface like a mere chance-hap muddle, many millions of necessitous people, oppressed indeed, and sorely, not by obvious individual violence and ill-will, but by an economic system so far reaching, so deeply seated, that it may well seem like the operation of a natural law to men so uneducated that they have not even escaped the reflexion of the so-called education of their masters, but in addition to their other mishaps are saddled also with the superstitions and hypocrisies of the upper classes, with scarce a whit of the characteristic traditions of their own class to help them: an intellectual slavery which is a necessary accompaniment of their material slavery. That as a mass is what revolutionists have got to deal with: such a mass indeed I think could and would be vivified by some spark of enthusiasm, some sudden hopeful impulse towards aggression, if the necessity for sudden change were close at hand. But is it? There are doubtless not a few in this room, myself perhaps amongst them (I say perhaps for one's old self is apt to grow dim to one) - some of us I say once believed in the inevitableness of a sudden and speedy change. That was no wonder with the new enlightenment of Socialism gilding the dulness of civilisation for us. But if we must now take soberer views of our hopes, do not reproach us with that. Remember how hard other tyrannies have died, though to the economical oppression of them was added obvious violent individual oppression, which as I have said is lacking to the heavy tyranny of our times: and can we hope that it will be speedier in its ending than they? I say that the time is not now for the sudden kindling of the impulse of direct aggression amongst the mass of the workmen. But what then! are we to give up all hope of educating them into Socialism? Surely not. Let us use all means possible for drawing them into Socialism, so that they may at last find themselves in such a position that they understand themselves to be face to face with false society, themselves the only possible elements of true society.

So now I must say that I am driven to the conclusion that those measures I have been speaking of, like everything that under any reasonable form does tend towards Socialism (present conditions being understood) are of use toward the education of the great mass of the workers; that it is necessary in the present to give form to vague aspirations which are in the air about them, and to raise their aims above the mere businesslike work of the old trades unions of raising wages with the consent (however obtained) of the employers; of making the workers see other employers* than those who live on the profit wrung out of their labour. I think that taking up such measures, directly tending towards Socialism, is necessary also in getting working people to raise their standard of livelihood so that they may claim more and yet more of the wealth produced by society, which as aforesaid they can only get at the expense of the non-producing classes who now rob them. Lastly, such measures, with all that goes towards getting them carried, will train them into organization and administration; and I hope that no one here will assert that they do not need such training, or that they are not at a huge disadvantage from the lack of it as compared with their masters who have been trained in these arts.

But this education by political and corporate action must, as I hinted above, by supplemented by instilling into the minds of the people a knowledge of the aims of Socialism, and a longing to bring about the complete change which will supplant civilization by communism. For the Social-democratic measures above mentioned are all of them either make-shift alleviations to help us through the present days of oppression, or means for landing us in the new country of equality. And there is a danger that they will be looked upon as ends in themselves. Nay it is certain that the greater number of those who are pushing for them will at the time be able to see no further than them, and will only recognize their temporary character when they have passed beyond them, and are claiming the next thing. But I must hope that we can instil into the mass of people some spirit of expectation, however vague, beyond the needs of the year; and I know that many who are on the road to Socialism will from the first and habitually look toward the realization of the society of equality, and try to realize it for themselves - I mean they will at least try to think what equality will turn out to be, and will long for it above all things. And I look to this spirit to vivify the striving for the mere machinery of Socialism; and I hope and believe that it will so spread as the machinery is attained that however much the old individualist spirit may try to make itself master of the corporate machinery, and try by means of the public to govern the public in the interests of the enemies of the public, it may be defeated.

All this however is talking about the possible course of the Socialist movement; but since, as you have just heard, it seems to me necessary that in order to make any due use of Socialist machinery one should have some sort of idea as to the life which is to be the result of it, let me now take up the often told tale of what we mean by Communism or Socialism; for between complete Socialism and Communism there is no difference whatever in my mind. Communism is in fact the completion of Socialism: when that ceases to be militant and becomes triumphant, it will be Communism.

The Communist asserts in the first place that the resources of nature, mainly the land and those other things which can only be used for the reproduction of wealth and which are the effect of social work, should not be owned in severalty, but by the whole community for the benefit of the whole. That where this is not the case the owners of these means of production must of necessity be the masters of those who do not own a sufficiency of them to free them from the need of paying with a portion of their labour for the use of the said means of production; and that the masters or owners of the means of production do practically own the workers; very practically, since they really dictate to them the kind of life they shall lead, and the workers cannot escape from it unless by themselves becoming owners of the means of production, i.e. of other men. The resources of nature therefore, and the wealth used for the production of further wealth, the plant and stock in short, should be communized. Now if that were done, it would at once check the accumulation of riches. No man can become immensely rich by the storing up of wealth which is the result of the labour of his own brain and hands: to become very rich he must by cajolery or force deprive others of what their brains or hands have earned for them: the utmost that the most acquisitive man could do would be to induce his fellow citizens to pay him extra for his special talents, if they specially longed for his productions. But since no one could be very rich, and since talent for special work is never so very rare, and would tend to become less rare as men were freer to choose the occupations most suitable for them, producers of specialities could not exact very exorbitant payment, so that the aristocracy of talent, even if it appeared, would tend to disappear, even in this first state of incomplete Communism. In short there would be no very rich men: and all would be well off: all would be far above the condition of satisfaction of their material necessities. You may say how do I know that? The answer is because there could not be so much waste as there is now. Waste would tend to disappear. For what is waste? First, the causeless destruction of raw material; and secondly, the diverting of labour from useful production. You may ask me what is the standard of usefulness in wares? It has been said, and I suppose the common view of that point is, that the price in the market gives us the standard; but is a loaf of bread or a saw less useful than a Mechlin lace veil or a diamond necklace? The truth is that in a society of inequality, a society in which there are very rich people and very poor ones, the standard of usefulness is utterly confused: in such a society the market price of an article is given us by the necessities of the poor and the inordinate cravings of the rich; or rather indeed their necessity for spending their wealth - or rather their riches - somehow: by no means necessarily in pleasure. But in a society of equality the demand for an article would be a standard of its usefulness in one way or other. And it would be a matter of course that until everybody had his absolute necessities and his reasonable comforts satisfied, there would be no place for the production of luxuries; and always labour would be employed in producing things that people (all the people, since classes would have disappeared) really want.

Remember what the waste of a society of inequality is: 1st: The production of sordid makeshifts for the supply of poor folk who cannot afford the real article. 2nd: the production of luxuries for rich folk, the greater part of which even their personal folly does not make them want. And 3rdly: the wealth wasted by the salesmanship of competitive commerce, to which the production of wares is but a secondary object, its first object being the production of profit for the individual manufacturer. You understand that the necessary distribution of goods is not included in this waste; but the endeavour of each manufacturer to get as near as he can to a monopoly of the market which he supplies.

The minimization of waste therefore, which would take place in the incomplete first stages of a society of equality - a society only tending to equality - would make us wealthy: labour would not be wasted: workmen would not be employed in producing either slave-wares, or toys for rich men: their genuine well made wares would be made for other workmen who would know what they wanted. When the wares were of such a kind as required very exquisite skill and long training to produce, or when the material used was far fetched and dear bought, they would not cease to be produced, even though private citizens could not acquire them: they would be produced for the public use, and their real value be enormously increased thereby, and the natural and honest pride of the workman duly satisfied. For surely wealthy people will not put up with sordid surroundings or stinginess in public institutions: they will assuredly have schools, libraries, museums, parks and all the rest of it real and genuine, not makeshifts for such things: especially as being no longer oppressed by fears for their livelihood, and all the dismal incidents of the battle for mere existence, they will be able to enjoy these things thoroughly: they will be able in fact to use them, which they cannot do now. But in all I have been saying about this new society hitherto I have been thinking, I must remind you, of its inchoate and incomplete stages: the means of production communized but the resulting wealth still private property. Truth to tell, I think that such a state of things could only embrace a very short period of transition to complete communism: a period which would only last while people were shaking down into the new Society; for if there were no poor people I don't see how there could be any rich. There would indeed be a natural compulsion, which would prevent any man from doing what he was not fitted for, because he could not do it usefully; and I need not say that in order to arrive at the wealth I have been speaking of we must all work usefully. But if a man does work usefully you can't do without him; and if you can't do without him you can only put him into an inferior position to another useful citizen by means of compulsion; and if you compel him to it, you at once have your privileged classes again. Again, when all people are living comfortably or even handsomely, the keenness of the strife for the better positions, which will then no longer involve a life of idleness or power over one's neighbours, will surely tend to abate: men get rich now in their struggles not to be poor, and because their riches shield them from suffering from the horrors which are a necessary accompaniment of the existence of rich men; e.g., the sight of slums, the squalor of a factory country, the yells and evil language of drunken and brutalized poor people and so forth. But when all private life was decent and, apart from natural accident, happy; and when public institutions satisfied your craving for splendour and completeness; and when no one was allowed to injure the public by defiling the natural beauty of the earth, or by forbidding men's cravings for making it more beautiful to have full sway, what advantage would there be in having more nominal wealth than your neighbour? Therefore, as on the one hand men whose work was acknowledged as useful would scarcely subject themselves to a new system of caste; and, on the other, people living happily with all their reasonable needs easily satisfied would hardly worry themselves with worrying others into giving them extra wealth which they could not use, so I think the communization of the means of industry would speedily be followed by the communization of its product: that is that there would be complete equality of condition amongst all men. Which again does not mean that people would (all round) use their neighbours' coats, or houses or tooth-brushes, but that every one, whatever work he did, would have the opportunity of satisfying all his reasonable needs according to the admitted standard of the society in which he lived: i.e., without robbing any other citizen. And I must say it is in the belief that this is possible of realization that I continue to be a Socialist. Prove to me that it is not; and I will not trouble myself to do my share towards altering the present state of society, but will try to live on, as little a pain to myself and a nuisance to my neighbour as I may. But yet I must tell you that I shall be more or less both a pain to myself (or at least a disgrace) and a nuisance to my neighbour. For I do declare that any other state of society but Communism is grievous and disgraceful to all belonging to it.

Some of you may expect me to say something about the machinery by which a communistic society is to be carried on. Well, I can say very little that is not merely negative. Most anti-socialists and even some Socialists are apt to confuse, as I hinted before, the co-operative machinery towards which modern life is tending with the essence of Socialism itself; and its enemies attack it, and sometimes its friends defend it on those lines; both to my mind committing a grievous error, especially the latter. E.g. An anti-socialist will say, How will you sail a ship in a socialist condition? How? Why with a captain and mates and sailing-master and engineer (if it be a steamer) and A.B.s and stokers and so on and so on. Only there will be no 1st 2nd and 3rd class among the passengers: the sailors and stokers will be as well fed and lodged as the captain or passengers; and the captain and the stoker with have the same pay.

There are plenty of enterprises which will be carried on then, as they are now (and probably must be, to be successful), under the guidance of one man. The only difference between then and now will be, that he will be chosen because he is fit for the work, and not because he must have a job found for him; and that he will do his work for the benefit of each and all, and not for the sake of making a profit. For the rest, time will teach us what new machinery may be necessary to the new life; reasonable men will submit to it without demur; and unreasonable ones will find themselves compelled to by the nature of things, and can only I fear console themselves, as the philosopher did when he knocked his head against the doorpost, by damning the Nature of things.

Well, since our aim is so great and so much to be longed for, the substituting throughout all society of peace for war, pleasure and self-respect for grief and disgrace, we may well seek about strenuously for some means for starting our enterprise; and since it is just these means in which the difficulty lies, I appeal to all Socialists, while they express their thoughts and feelings about them honestly and fearlessly, not to make a quarrel of it with those whose aim is one with theirs, because there is a difference of opinion between them about the usefulness of the details of the means. It is difficult or even impossible not to make mistakes about these, driven as we are by the swift lapse of time and the necessity for doing something amidst it all. So let us forgive the mistakes that others make, even if we make none ourselves, and be at peace amongst ourselves, that we may the better make war upon the monopolist.

* The public to wit, i.e., the workers themselves in their other position of consumers.

DAWN OF A NEW EPOCH

WILLIAM MORRIS

Perhaps some of my readers may think that the above title is not a correct one: it may be said, a new epoch is always dawning, change is always going on, and it goes on so gradually that we do not known when we are out of an old epoch and into a new one. There is truth in that, at least to this extent, that no age can see itself: we must stand some way off before the confused picture with its rugged surface can resolve itself into its due order, and seem to be something with a definite purpose carried through all its details. Nevertheless, when we look back on history we do distinguish periods in the lapse of time that are not merely arbitrary ones, we note the early growth of the ideas which are to form the new order of things, we note their development into the transitional period, and finally the new epoch is revealed to us bearing in its full development, unseen as yet, the seeds of the newer order still which shall transform it in its turn into something else.

Moreover, there are periods in which even those alive in them become more or less conscious of the change which is always going on; the old ideas which were once so exciting to men's imaginations, now cease to move them, though they may be accepted as dull and necessary platitudes: the material circumstances of man's life which were once only struggled with in detail, and only according to a kind of law made manifest in their working, are in such times conscious of change, and are only accepted under protest until some means can be found to alter them. The old and dying order, once silent and all-powerful, tries to express itself violently, and becomes at once noisy and weak. The nascent order once too weak to be conscious of need of expression, or capable of it if it were, becomes conscious now and finds a voice. The silent sap of the years is being laid aside for open assault; the men are gathering under arms in the trenches, and the forlorn hope is ready, no longer trifling with little solacements of the time of weary waiting, but looking forward to mere death or the joy of victory.

Now I think, and some who read this will agree with me, that we are now living in one of these times of conscious change; we not only are, but we feel also ourselves to be living between the old and the new; we are expecting something to happen, as the phrase goes: at such times it behoves us to understand what is the old which is dying, what is the new which is coming into existence? That is a question practically important to us all, since these periods of conscious change are also, in one way or other, times of serious combat, and each of us, if he does not look to it and learn to understand what is going on, may find himself fighting on the wrong side, the side with which he really does not sympathize.

What is the combat we are now entering upon - who is it to be fought between? Absolutism and Democracy, perhaps some will answer. Not quite, I think; that contest was practically settled by the great French Revolution; it is only its embers which are burning now: or at least that is so in the countries which are not belated, like Russia, for instance. Democracy, or at least what used to be considered Democracy, is now triumphant; and though it is true that there are countries where freedom of speech is repressed besides Russia, as e.g., Germany and Ireland, * that only happens when the rulers of the triumphant Democracy are beginning to be afraid of the new order of things, now becoming conscious of itself, and are being driven into reaction in consequence. No, it is not Absolutism and Democracy as the French Revolution understood those two words that are the enemies now: the issue is deeper than it was; the two foes are now Mastership and Fellowship. This is a far more serious quarrel than the old one, and involves a much completer revolution. The grounds of conflict are really quite different. Democracy said and says, men shall not be the masters of others because hereditary privilege has made a race or a family so, and they happen to belong to such race; they shall individually grow into being the masters of others by the development of certain qualities under a system of authority which artificially protects the wealth of every man, if he has acquired it in accordance with this artificial system, from the interference of every other, or from all others combined.

The new order of things says, on the contrary, why have masters at all? let us be fellows working in the harmony of association for the common good, that is, for the greatest happiness and completest development of every human being in the community.

This ideal and hope of a new society founded on industrial peace and forethought, bearing with it its own ethics, aiming at a new and higher life for all men, has received the general name of Socialism, and it is my firm belief that it is destined to supersede the old order of things founded on industrial war, and to be the next step in the progress of humanity.

Now, since I must explain further what are the aims of Socialism, the ideal of the new epoch, I find that I must begin by explaining to you what is the constitution of the old order which it is destined to supplant. If I can make that clear to you, I shall have also made clear to you the first aim of Socialism: for I have said that the present and decaying order of things, like those which have gone before it, has to be propped up by a system of artificial authority; when that artificial authority has been swept away, harmonious association will be felt by all men to be a necessity of their happy and undegraded existence on the earth, and Socialism will become the condition under which we shall all live, and it will develop naturally, and probably with no violent conflict, whatever detailed system may be necessary: I say the struggle will not be over these details, which will surely vary according to the difference of unchangeable natural surroundings, but over the question, shall it be mastership or fellowship?

Let us see then what is the condition of society under the last development of mastership, the commercial system, which has taken the place of the Feudal system.

Like all other systems of society, it is founded on the necessity of man conquering his subsistence from Nature by labour, and also, like most other systems that we know of, it presupposes the unequal distribution of labour among different classes of society, and the unequal distribution of the results of that labour: it does not differ in that respect from the system which it supplanted; it has only altered the method whereby that unequal distribution should be arranged. There are still rich people and poor people amongst us, as there were in the Middle Ages; nay, there is no doubt that, relatively at least to the sum of wealth existing, the rich are richer and the poor are poorer now than they were then. However that may be, in any case now as then there are people who have much more work and little wealth living beside other people who have much wealth and little work. The richest are still the idlest, and those who work hardest and perform the most painful tasks are the worst rewarded for their labour.

To me, and I should hope to my readers, this seems grossly unfair; and I may remind you here that the world has always had a sense of its injustice. For century after century, while society has strenuously bolstered up this injustice forcibly and artificially, it has professed belief in philosophies, codes of ethics, and religions which have inculcated justice and fair dealing between men: nay, some of them have gone so far as to bid us bear one another's burdens, and have put before men the duty, and in the long run the pleasure, of the strong working for the weak, the wise for the foolish, the helpful for the helpless; and yet these precepts of morality have been set aside in practice as persistently as they have been preached in theory; and naturally so, since they attack the very basis of class society. I as a Socialist am bound to preach them to you once more, assuring you that they are no mere foolish dreams bidding us to do what we now must acknowledge to be impossible, but reasonable rules of action, good for our defence against the tyranny of Nature. Anyhow, honest men have the choice before them of either putting these theories in practice or rejecting them altogether. If they will but face that dilemma, I think we shall soon have a new world of it; yet I fear they will find it hard to do so: the theory is old, and we have got used to it and its form of words: the practice in new, and would involve responsibilities we have not yet thought much of.

Now the great difference between our present system and that of the feudal period is that, as far as the conditions of life are concerned, all distinction of classes is abolished except that between rich and poor: society is thus simplified; the arbitrary distinction is gone, the real one remains and is far more stringent than the arbitrary one was. Once all society was rude, there was little real difference between the gentleman and the non-gentleman, and you had to dress them differently from one another in order to distinguish them. But now a well-to-do man is a refined and cultivated being, enjoying to the full his share of the conquest over Nature which the modern world has achieved, while the poor man is rude and degraded, and has no share in the wealth conquered by modern science from Nature: he is certainly no better as to material condition than the serf of the Middle Ages, perhaps he is worse: to my mind he is at least worse than the savage living in a good climate.

I do not think that any thoughtful man seriously denies this: let us try to see what brings it about; let us see it as clearly as we all see that the hereditary privilege of the noble caste, and the consequent serf slavery of the workers of the Middle Ages, brought about the peculiar conditions of that period.

Society is now divided between two classes, those who monopolize all the means of production of wealth save one; and those who possess nothing except that one, the Power of Labour. That power of labour is useless to its possessors and cannot be exercised without the help of the other means of production; but those who have nothing but labour-power - i.e., who have no means of making others work for them, must work for themselves in order to live; and they must therefore apply to the owners of the means of fructifying labour - i.e., the land, machinery, &c., for leave to work that they may live. The possessing class (as for short we will call them) are quite prepared to grant this leave, and indeed they must grant it if they are to use the labour-power of the non-possessing class for their own advantage, which is their special privilege. But that privilege enables them to compel the non-possessing class to sell them their labour-power on terms which ensure the continuance of their monopoly. These terms are at the outset very simple. The possessing class, or masters, allow the men just so much of the wealth produced by their labour as will give them such a livelihood as is considered necessary at the time, and will permit them to breed and rear children to a working age: that is the simple condition of the "bargain" which obtains when the labour-power required is low in quality, what is called unskilled labour, and when the workers are too weak or ignorant to combine so as to threaten the masters with some form of rebellion. When skilled labour is wanted, and the labourer has consequently cost more to produce, and is rarer to be found, the price of the article is higher: as also when the commodity labour takes to thinking and remembers that after all it is also men, and as aforesaid holds out threats to the masters; in that case they for their part generally think it prudent to give way, when the competition of the market allows them to do so, and so the standard of livelihood for the workers rises.

But to speak plainly, the greater part of the workers, in spite of strikes and Trades' Unions, do get little more than a bare subsistence wage, and when they grow sick or old they would die outright if it were not for the refuge afforded them by the workhouse, which is purposely made as prison-like and wretched as possible, in order to prevent the lower-paid workers from taking refuge in it before the time of their industrial death.

Now comes the question as to how the masters are able to force the men to sell their commodity labour-power so dirt-cheap without treating them as the ancients treated their slaves - i.e., with the whip. Well, of course you understand that the master having paid his workmen what they can live upon, and having paid for the wear and tear of machinery and other expenses of that kind, has for his share whatever remains over and above, the whole of which he gets from the exercise of the labour-power possessed by the worker: he is anxious therefore to make the most of this privilege, and competes with his fellow-manufacturers to the utmost in the market: so that the distribution of wares is organized on a gambling basis, and as a consequence many more hands are needed when trade is brisk than when it is slack, or even in an ordinary condition: under the stimulus also of the lust for acquiring this surplus value of labour, the great machines of our epoch were invented and are yearly improved, and they act on labour in a threefold way: first they get rid of many hands; next they lower the quality of the labour required, so that skilled work is wanted less and less; thirdly, the improvement in them forces the workers to work harder while they are at work, as notably in the cotton-spinning industry. Also in most trades women and children are employed, to whom it is not even pretended that a subsistence wage is given. Owing to all these causes, the reserve army of labour necessary to our present system of manufactures for the gambling-market, the introduction of labour-saving machines (labour saved for the master, mind you, not the man), and the intensifying of the labour while it lasts, the employment of the auxiliary labour of women and children: owing to all this there are in ordinary years even, not merely in specially bad years like the current one, ** more workers than there is work for them to do. The workers therefore undersell one another in disposing of their one commodity, labour-power, and are forced to do so, or they would not be allowed to work, and therefore would have to starve or go to the prison called the workhouse. This is why the masters at the present day are able to dispense with the exercise of obvious violence which in bygone times they used towards their slaves.

This then is the first distinction between the two great classes of modern Society: the upper class possesses wealth, the lower lacks wealth; but there is another distinction to which I will now draw your attention: the class which lacks wealth is the class that produces it, the class that possesses it does not produce it, it consumes it only. If by any chance the so-called lower class were to perish or leave the community, production of wealth would come to a standstill, until the wealth-owners had learned how to produce, until they had descended from their position, and had taken the place of their former slaves. If, on the contrary, the wealth-owners were to disappear, production of wealth would at the worst be only hindered for awhile, and probably would go on pretty much as it does now.

But you may say, though it is certain that some of the wealth-owners, as landlords, holders of funds, and the like, do nothing, yet there are many of them who work hard. Well, that is true, and perhaps nothing so clearly shows the extreme folly of the present system than this fact that there are so many able and industrious men employed by it, in working hard at - nothing: nothing or worse. They work, but they do not produce.

It is true that some useful occupations are in the hands of the privileged classes, physic, education, and the fine arts, e.g. The men who work at these occupations are certainly working usefully; and all that we can say against them is that they are sometimes paid too high in proportion to the pay of other useful persons, which high pay is given them in recognition of their being the parasites of the possessing classes. But even as to numbers these are not a very large part of the possessors of wealth, and, as to the wealth they hold, it is quite insignificant compared with that held by those who do nothing useful.

Of these last, some, as we all agree, do not pretend to do anything except amuse themselves, and probably these are the least harmful of the useless classes. Then there are others who follow occupations which would have no place in a reasonable condition of society, as, e.g., lawyers, judges, jailers, and soldiers of the higher grades, and most Government officials. Finally comes the much greater group of those who are engaged in gambling or fighting for their individual shares of the tribute which their class compels the working-class to yield to it: these are the group that one calls broadly business men, the conductors of our commerce, if you please to call them so.

To extract a good proportion of this tribute, and to keep as much as possible of it when extracted for oneself, is the main business of life for these men, that is, for most well-to-do and rich people; it is called, quite inaccurately, "money-making"; and those who are most successful in this occupation are, in spite of all hypocritical pretences to the contrary, the persons most respected by the public.

A word or two as to the tribute extracted from the workers as aforesaid. It is no trifle, but amounts to at least two-thirds of all that the worker produces; but you must understand that it is not all taken directly from the workman by his immediate employer, but by the employing class. Besides the tribute or profit of the direct employer, which is in all cases as much as he can get amidst his competition or war with other employers, the worker has also to pay taxes in various forms, and the greater part of the wealth so extorted is at best merely wasted: and remember, whoever seems to pay the taxes, labour in the long run is the only real taxpayer. Then he has to pay house-rent, and very much heavier rent in proportion to his earnings than well-to-do people have. He has also to pay the commission of the middle-men who distribute the goods which he has made, in a way so wasteful that now all thinking people cry out against it, though they are quite helpless against it in our present society. Finally, he has often to pay an extra tax in the shape of a contribution to a benefit society or trades' union, which is really a tax on the precariousness of his employment caused by the gambling of his masters in the market. In short, besides the profit or the result of unpaid labour which he yields to his immediate master he has to give back a large part of his wages to the class of which his master is a part.

The privilege of the possessing class therefore consists of their living on this tribute, they themselves either not working or working unproductively - i.e., living on the labour of others; no otherwise than as the master of ancient days lived on the labour of his slave, or as the baron lived on the labour of his serf. If the capital of the rich man consists of land, he is able to force a tenant to improve his land for him and pay him tribute in the form of rack-rent; and at the end of the transaction has his land again, generally improved, so that he can begin again and go on for ever, he and his heirs, doing nothing, a mere burden on the community for ever, while others are working for him. If he has houses on his land he has rent for them also, often receiving the value of the building many times over, and in the end house and land once more. Not seldom a piece of barren ground or swamp, worth nothing in itself, becomes a source of huge fortune to him from the development of a town or a district, and he pockets the results of the labour of thousands upon thousands of men, and calls it his property: or the earth beneath the surface is found to be rich in coal or minerals, and again he must be paid vast sums for allowing others to labour them into marketable wares, to which labour he contributes nothing.

Or again, if his capital consists of cash, he goes into the labour market and buys the labour-power of men, women, and children, and uses it for the production of wares which shall bring him in a profit, buying it of course at the lowest price that he can, availing himself of their necessities to keep their livelihood down to the lowest point which they will bear: which indeed he must do, or he himself will be overcome in the war with his fellow-capitalists. Neither in this case does he do any useful work, and he need not do any semblance of it, since he may buy the brain-power of managers at a somewhat higher rate that he buys the hand-power of the ordinary workman. But even when he does seem to be doing something, and receives the pompous title of "organizer of labour," he is not really organizing labour, but the battle with his immediate enemies, the other capitalists, who are in the same line of business with himself.

Furthermore, though it is true, as I have said, that the working-class are the only producers, yet only a part of them are allowed to produce usefully; for the men of the non-producing classes having often much more wealth than they can use are forced to waste it in mere luxuries and follies, that on the one hand harm themselves, and on the other withdraw a very large part of the workers from useful work, thereby compelling those who do produce usefully to work the harder and more grievously: in short, the essential accompaniment of the system is waste.

How could it be otherwise, since it is a system of war? I have mentioned incidentally that all the employers of labour are at war with each other, and you will probably see that, according to my account of the relations between the two great classes, they also are at war. Each can only gain at the other's loss: the employing class is forced to make the most of its privilege, the possession of the means for the exercise of labour, and whatever it gets to itself can only be got at the expense of the working-class; and that class in its turn can only raise its standard of livelihood at the expense of the possessing class; it is forced to yield as little tribute to it as it can help; there is therefore constant war always going on between these two classes, whether they are conscious of it or not.

To recapitulate: In our modern society there are two classes, a useful and a useless class; the useless class is called the upper, the useful the lower class. The useless or upper class, having the monopoly of all the means of the production of wealth save the power of labour, can and does compel the useful or lower class to work for its own disadvantage, and for the advantage of the upper class; nor will the latter allow the useful class to work on any other terms. This arrangement necessarily means an increasing contest, first of the classes one against the other, and the next of the individuals of each class among themselves.

Most thinking people admit the truth of what I have just stated, but many of them believe that the system, though obviously unjust and wasteful, is necessary (though perhaps they cannot give their reasons for their belief), and so they can see nothing for it but palliating the worst evils of the system: but, since the various palliatives in fashion at one time or another have failed each in its turn, I call upon them, firstly, to consider whether the system itself might not be changed, and secondly, to look round and note the signs of approaching change.

Let us remember first that even savages live, though they have poor tools, no machinery, and no co-operation, in their work: but as soon as a man begins to use good tools and work with some kind of co-operation he becomes able to produce more than enough for his own bare necessaries. All industrial society is founded on that fact, even from the time when workmen were mere chattel slaves. What a strange society then is this of ours, wherein while one set of people cannot use their wealth, they have so much, but are obliged to waste it, another set are scarcely if at all better than those hapless savages who have neither tools nor co-operation! Surely if this cannot be set right, civilized mankind must write itself down a civilized fool.

Here is the workman now, thoroughly organized for production, working for production with complete co-operation, and through marvellous machines; surely if a slave in Aristotle's time could do more than keep himself alive, the present workman can do much more - as we all very well know that he can. Why therefore should he be otherwise than in a comfortable condition? Simply because of the class system, which with one hand plunders, and with the other wastes the wealth won by the workman's labour. If the workman had the full results of his labour he would in all cases be comfortably off, if he were working in an unwasteful way. But in order to work unwastefully he must work for his own livelihood, and not to enable another man to live without producing: if he has to sustain another man in idleness who is capable of working for himself, he is treated unfairly; and, believe me, he will only do so as long as he is compelled to submit by ignorance and brute force. Well, then, he has a right to claim the wealth produced by his labour, and in consequence to insist that all shall produce who are able to do so; but also undoubtedly his labour must be organized, or he will soon find himself relapsing into the condition of a savage. But in order that his labour may be organized properly he must have only one enemy to contend with - Nature to wit, who as it were eggs him on to the conflict against herself, and is grateful to him for overcoming her; a friend in the guise of an enemy. There must be no contention of man with man, but association instead; so only can labour be really organized, harmoniously organized. But harmony cannot co-exist with contention for individual gain: men must work for the common gain if the world is to be raised out of its present misery; therefore that claim of the workman (that is of every able man) must be subject to the fact that he is but a part of a harmonious whole: he is worthless without the co-operation of his fellows, who help him according to their capacities: he ought to feel, and will feel when he has his right senses, that he is working for his own interest when he is working for that of the community.

So working, his work must always be profitable, therefore no obstacle must be thrown in the way of his work: the means whereby his labour-power can be exercised must be free to him. The privilege of the proprietary class must come to an end. Remember that at present the custom is that a person so privileged is in the position of a man (with a policeman or so to help) guarding the gate of a field which will supply livelihood to whomsoever can work in it: crowds of people who don't want to die come to that gate; but there stands law and order, and says "pay me five shillings before you go in"; and he or she that hasn't the five shillings has to stay outside, and die - or live in the workhouse. Well, that must be done away with; the field must be free to everybody that can use it. To throw aside even this transparent metaphor, those means of the fructification of labour, the land, machinery, capital, means of transit, &c., which are now monopolized by those who cannot use them, but who abuse them to force unpaid labour out of others, must be free to those who can use them; that is to say, the workers properly organized for production; but you must remember that this will wrong no man, because as all will do some service to the community - i.e., as there will be no non-producing class, the organized workers will be the whole community, there will be no one left out.

Society will thus be recast, and labour will be free from all compulsion except the compulsion of Nature, which gives us nothing for nothing. It would be futile to attempt to give you details of the way in which this would be carried out; since the very essence of it is freedom and the abolition of all arbitrary or artificial authority; but I will ask you to understand one thing: you will no doubt want to know what is to become of private property under such a system, which at first sight would not seem to forbid the accumulation of wealth, and along with that accumulation the formation of new classes of rich and poor.

Now private property as at present understood implies the holding of wealth by an individual as against all others, whether the holder can use it or not: he may, and not seldom he does, accumulate capital, or the stored-up labour of past generations, and neither use it himself nor allow others to use it: he may, and often he does, engross the first necessity of labour, land, and neither use it himself or allow any one else to use it; and though it is clear that in each case he is injuring the community, the law is sternly on his side. In any case a rich man accumulates property, not for his own use, but in order that he may evade with impunity the law of Nature which bids man labour for his livelihood, and also that he may enable his children to do the same, that he and they may belong to the upper or useless class: it is not wealth that he accumulates, well-being, well-doing, bodily and mental; he soon comes to the end of his real needs in that respect, even when they are most exacting: it is power over others, what our forefathers called riches, that he collects; power (as we have seen) to force other people to live for his advantage poorer lives than they should live. Understand that that must be the result of the possession of riches.

Now this power to compel others to live poorly Socialism would abolish entirely, and in that sense would make an end of private property: nor would it need to make laws to prevent accumulation artificially when once people had found out that they could employ themselves, and that thereby every man could enjoy the results of his own labour: for Socialism bases the rights of the individual to possess wealth on his being able to use that wealth for his own personal needs, and, labour being properly organized, every person, male or female, not in nonage or otherwise incapacitated from working, would have full opportunity to produce wealth and thereby to satisfy his own personal needs; if those needs went in any direction beyond those of an average man, he would have to make personal sacrifices in order to satisfy them; he would have, for instance, to work longer hours, or to forgo some luxury that he did not care for in order to obtain something which he very much desired: so doing he would at the worst injure no one: and you will clearly see that there is no other choice for him between so doing and his forcing some one else to forego his special desires; and this latter proceeding by the way, when it is done without the sanction of the most powerful part of society, is called theft; though on the big scale and duly sanctioned by artificial laws, it is, as we have seen, the ground-work of our present system. Once more, that system refuses permission to people to produce unless under artificial restrictions; under Socialism, every one who could produce would be free to produce, so that the price of an article would be just the cost of its production, and what we now call profit would no longer exist: thus, for instance, if a person wanted chairs, he would accumulate them till he had as many as he could use, and then he would stop, since he would not have been able to buy them for less than their cost of production and could not sell them for more: in other words, they would be nothing else than chairs; under the present system they may be means of compulsion and destruction as formidable as loaded rifles.

No one therefore would dispute with a man the possession of what he had acquired without injury to others, and what he could use without injuring them, and it would so remove temptations toward the abuse of possession, that probably no laws would be necessary to prevent it.

A few words now as to the differentiation of reward of labour, as I know my readers are sure to want an exposition of the Socialist views here as to those who direct labour or who have specially excellent faculties towards production. And, first, I will look on the super-excellent workman as an article presumably needed by the community; and then say that, as with other articles so with this, the community must pay the cost of his production: for instance, it will have to seek him out, to develop his special capacities, and satisfy any needs he may have (if any) beyond those of an average man, so long as the satisfaction of those needs is not hurtful to the community.

Furthermore, you cannot give him more than he can use, so he will not ask for more, and will not take it: it is true that his work may be more special than another's, but it is not more necessary if you have organized labour properly; the ploughman and the fisherman are as necessary to society as the scientist or the artist, I will not say more necessary: neither is the difficulty of producing the more special and excellent work at all proportionate to its speciality or excellence: the higher workman produces his work as easily perhaps as the lower does his work; if he does not do so, you must give him extra leisure, extra means for supplying the waste of power in him, but you can give him nothing more. The only reward that you can give the excellent workman is opportunity for developing and exercising his excellent capacity. I repeat, you can give him nothing more worth his having: all other rewards are either illusory or harmful. I must say in passing, that our present system of dealing with what is called a man of genius is utterly absurd: we cruelly starve him and repress his capacity when he is young; we foolishly pamper and flatter him and again repress his capacity when he is middle-aged or old: we get the least out of him, not the most.

These last words concern mere rarities in the way of workmen, but in this respect it is only a matter of degree; the point of the whole thing is this, that the director of labour is in his place because he is fit for it, not by a mere accident; being fit for it, he does it easier than he would do other work, and needs no more compensation for the wear and tear of life than another man does, and not needing it will not claim it, since it would be no use to him; his special reward for his special labour is, I repeat, that he can do it easily, and so does not feel it a burden; nay, since he can do it well he likes doing it, since indeed the main pleasure of life is the exercise of energy in the development of our special capacities. Again, as regards the workmen who are under his direction, he needs no special dignity or authority; they know well enough that so long as he fulfils his function and really does direct them, if they do not heed him it will be at the cost of their labour being more irksome and harder. All this, in short, is what is meant by the organization of labour, which is, in other words, finding out what work such and such people are fittest for and leaving them free to do that: we won't take the trouble to do that now, with the result that people's best faculties are wasted, and that work is a heavy burden to them, which they naturally shirk as much as they can; it should be rather a pleasure to them: and I say straight out that, unless we find some means to make all work more or less pleasurable, we shall never escape from the great tyranny of the modern work.

Having mentioned the difference between the competitive and commercial ideas on the subject of the individual holding of wealth and the relative position of different groups of workmen, I will very briefly say something on what for want of a better word I must call the political position which we take up, or at least what we look forward to in the long run. The substitution of association for competition is the foundation of Socialism, and will run through all acts done under it, and this must act as between nations as well as between individuals: when profits can no more be made, there will be no necessity for holding together masses of men to draw together the greatest proportion of profit to their locality, or to the real or imaginary union of persons and corporations which is now called a nation. What we now call a nation is a body whose function it is to assert the special welfare of its incorporated members at the expense of all other similar bodies: the death of competition will deprive it of this function; since there will be no attack there need be no defence, and it seems to me that this function being taken away from the nation it can have no other, and therefore must cease to exist as a political entity. On this side of the movement opinion is growing steadily. It is clear that, quite apart from Socialism, the idea of local administration is pushing out that of centralized government: to take a remarkable case: in the French Revolution of 1793, the most advanced party was centralizing: in the latest French Revolution, that of the Commune of 1871, it was federalist. Or take Ireland: the success which is to-day attending the struggles of Ireland for independence is, I am quite sure, owing to the spread of this idea: it no longer seems a monstrous proposition to liberal-minded Englishmen that a country should administer its own affairs: the feeling that it is not only just, but also very convenient to all parties for it to do so, is extinguishing the prejudices fostered by centuries of oppressive and wasteful mastership. And I believe that Ireland will show that her claim for self-government is not made on behalf of national rivalry, but rather on behalf of genuine independence; the consideration, on the one hand, of the needs of her own population, and, on the other, goodwill towards that of other localities. Well, the spread of this idea will make our political work as Socialists the easier; men will at last come to see that the only way to avoid the tyranny and waste of bureaucracy is by the Federation of Independent Communities: their federation being for definite purposes: for furthering the organization of labour, by ascertaining the real demand for commodities, and so avoiding waste: for organizing the distribution of goods, the migration of persons - in short, the friendly intercommunication of people whose interests are common, although the circumstances of their natural surroundings made necessary differences of life and manners between them.

I have thus sketched something of the outline of Socialism, by showing that its aim is first to get rid of the monopoly of the means of fructifying labour, so that labour may be free to all, and its resulting wealth may not be engrossed by a few, and so cause the misery and degradation of the many: and, secondly, that it aims at organizing labour so that none of it may be wasted, using as a means thereto the free development of each man's capacity; and, thirdly, that it aims at getting rid of national rivalry, which in point of fact means a condition of perpetual war, sometimes of the money-bag, sometimes of the bullet, and substituting for this worn-out superstition a system of free communities living in harmonious federation with each other, managing their own affairs by the free consent of their members; yet acknowledging some kind of centre whose function it would be to protect the principle whose practice the communities should carry out; till at last those principles would be recognized by every one always and intuitively, when the last vestiges of centralization would die out.

I am well aware that this complete Socialism, which is sometimes called Communism, cannot be realized all at once; society will be changed from its basis when we make the form of robbery called profit impossible by giving labour full and free access to the means of its fructification - i.e., to raw material. The demand for this emancipation of labour is the basis on which all Socialists may unite. On more indefinite grounds they cannot meet other groups of politicians; they can only rejoice at seeing the ground cleared of controversies which are really dead, in order that the last controversy may be settled that we can at present foresee, and the question solved as to whether or no it is necessary, as some people think it is, that society should be composed of two groups of dishonest persons, slaves submitting to be slaves yet for ever trying to cheat their masters, and masters conscious of their having no support for their dishonesty of eating the common stock without adding to it save the mere organization of brute force, which they have to assert for ever in all details of life against the natural desire of man to be free.

It may be hoped that we of this generation may be able to prove that it is unnecessary; but it will, doubt it not, take many generations yet to prove that it is necessary for such degradation to last as long as humanity does; and when that is finally proved we shall at least have one hope left - that humanity will not last long.

* And the brick and mortar country London, also, it seems (Feb. 1888). back

** 1886, to wit. back

HOW I BECAME A SOCIALIST –

WILLIAM MORRIS

INTRODUCTION

How I Became a Socialist was first published in Justice, June 16th, 1894.

"In his last years Morris modified his long-held anti-Parliamentarian position, agreeing that the time had now come for the formation of a Socialist Party. He did not rejoin the Socialist Democratic Federation (S.D.F.) but ended his breach with Hyndman to the extent of writing several articles for the S.D.F. journal, Justice. In this one he looks back over his life and sums up his development." — A. L. Morton.

How I Became a Socialist was reprinted in William Morris: selected Writings, ed. G. D. H. Cole, 655-59 and Political Writings of William Morris, ed. A. L. Morton, 240-245.

HOW I BECAME A SOCIALIST

I am asked by the Editor to give some sort of a history of the above conversion, and I feel that it may be of some use to do so, if my readers will look upon me as a type of a certain group of people, but not so easy to do clearly, briefly and truly. Let me, however, try. But first, I will say what I mean by being a Socialist, since I am told that the word no longer expresses definitely and with certainty what it did ten years ago. Well, what I mean by Socialism is a condition of society in which there should be neither rich nor poor, neither master nor master's man, neither idle nor overworked, neither brain-sick brain workers, nor heart-sick hand workers, in a word, in which all men would be living in equality of condition, and would manage their affairs unwastefully, and with the full consciousness that harm to one would mean harm to all—the realization at last of the meaning of the word COMMONWEALTH.

Now this view of Socialism which I hold to-day, and hope to die holding, is what I began with; I had no transitional period, unless you may call such a brief period of political radicalism during which I saw my ideal clear enough, but had no hope of any realization of it. That came to an end some months before I joined the (then) Democratic Federation, and the meaning of my joining that body was that I had conceived a hope of the realization of my ideal. If you ask me how much of a hope, or what I thought we Socialists then living and working would accomplish towards it, or when there would be effected any change in the face of society, I must say, I do not know. I can only say that I did not measure my hope, nor the joy that it brought me at the time. For the rest, when I took that step I was blankly ignorant of economics; I had never so much as opened Adam Smith, or heard of Ricardo, or of Karl Marx. Oddly enough, I had read some of Mill, to wit, those posthumous papers of his (published, was it in the Westminster Review or the Fortnightly?) in which he attacks Socialism in its Fourierist guise. In those papers he put the arguments, as far as they go, clearly and honestly, and the result, so far as I was concerned, was to convince me that Socialism was a necessary change, and that it was possible to bring it about in our own days. Those papers put the finishing touch to my conversion to Socialism. Well, having joined a Socialist body (for the Federation soon became definitely Socialist), I put some conscience into trying to learn the economical side of Socialism, and even tackled Marx, though I must confess that, whereas I thoroughly enjoyed the historical part of Capital, I suffered agonies of confusion of the brain over reading the pure economics of that great work. Anyhow, I read what I could, and will hope that some information stuck to me from my reading; but more, I must think, from continuous conversation with such friends as Bax and Hyndman and Scheu, and the brisk course of propaganda meetings which were going on at the time, and in which I took my share. Such finish to what of education in practical Socialism as I am capable of I received afterwards from some of my Anarchist friends, from whom I learned, quite against their intention, that Anarchism was impossible, much as I learned from Mill against his intention that Socialism was necessary.

But in this telling how I fell into practical Socialism I have begun, as I perceive, in the middle, for in my position of a well-to-do man, not suffering from the disabilities which oppress a working man at every step, I feel that I might never have been drawn into the practical side of the question if an ideal had not forced me to seek towards it. For politics as politics, i.e., not regarded as a necessary if cumbersome and disgustful means to an end, would never have attracted me, nor when I had become conscious of thewrongs of society as it now is, and the oppression of poor people, could I have ever believed in the possibility of a partial setting right of those wrongs. In other words, I could never have been such a fool as to believe in the happy and "respectable" poor.

If, therefore, my ideal forced me to look for practical Socialism, what was it that forced me to conceive of an ideal? Now, here comes in what I said of my being (in this paper) a type of a certain group of mind.

Before the uprising of modern Socialism almost all intelligent people either were, or professed themselves to be, quite contented with the civilization of this century. Again, almost all of these really were thus contented, and saw nothing to do but to perfect the said civilization by getting rid of a few ridiculous survivals of the barbarous ages. To be short, this was the Whig frame of mind, natural to the modern prosperous middle-class men, who, in fact, as far as mechanical progress is concerned, have nothing to ask for, if only Socialism would leave them alone to enjoy their plentiful style.

But besides these contented ones there were others who were not really contented, but had a vague sentiment of repulsion to the triumph of civilization, but were coerced into silence by the measureless power of Whiggery. Lastly, there were a few who were in open rebellion against the said Whiggery—a few, say two, Carlyle and Ruskin. The latter, before my days of practical Socialism, was my master towards the ideal aforesaid, and, looking backward, I cannot help saying, by the way, how deadly dull the world would have been twenty years ago but for Ruskin! It was through him that I learned to give form to my discontent, which I must say was not by any means vague. Apart from the desire to produce beautiful things, the leading passion of my life has been and is hatred of modern civilization. What shall I say of it now, when the words are put into my mouth, my hope of its destruction—what shall I say of its supplanting by Socialism?

What shall I say concerning its mastery of and its waste of mechanical power, its commonwealth so poor, its enemies of the commonwealth so rich, its stupendous organization—for the misery of life! Its contempt of simple pleasures which everyone could enjoy but for its folly? Its eyeless vulgarity which has destroyed art, the one certain solace of labour? All this I felt then as now, but I did not know why it was so. The hope of the past times was gone, the struggles of mankind for many ages had produced nothing but this sordid, aimless, ugly confusion; the immediate future seemed to me likely to intensify all the present evils by sweeping away the last survivals of the days before the dull squalor of civilization had settled down on the world. This was a bad look-out indeed, and, if I may mention myself as a personality and not as a mere type, especially so to a man of my disposition, careless of metaphysics and religion, as well as of scientific analysis, but with a deep love of the earth and the life on it, and a passion for the history of the past of mankind. Think of it! Was it all to end in a counting-house on the top of a cinder-heap, with Podsnap's drawing-room in the offing, and a Whig committee dealing out champagne to the rich and margarine to the poor in such convenient proportions as would make all men contented together, though the pleasure of the eyes was gone from the world, and the place of Homer was to be taken by Huxley? Yet, believe me, in my heart, when I really forced myself to look towards the future, that is what I saw in it, and, as far as I could tell, scarce anyone seemed to think it worth while to struggle against such a consummation of civilization. So there I was in for a fine pessimistic end of life, if it had not somehow dawned on me that amidst all this filth of civilization the seeds of a great change, what we others call Social-Revolution, were beginning to germinate. The whole face of things was changed to me by that discovery, and all I had to do then in order to become a Socialist was to hook myself on to the practical movement, which, as before said, I have tried to do as well as I could.

To sum up, then the study of history and the love and practice of art forced me into a hatred of the civilization which, if things were to stop as they are, would turn history into inconsequent nonsense, and make art a collection of the curiosities of the past, which would have no serious relation to the life of the present.

But the consciousness of revolution stirring amidst our hateful modern society prevented me, luckier than many others of artistic perceptions, from crystallizing into a mere railer against "progress" on the one hand, and on the other from wasting time and energy in any of the numerous schemes by which the quasi-artistic of the middle classes hope to make art grow when it has no longer any root, and thus I became a practical Socialist.

A last word or two. Perhaps some of our friends will say, what have we to do with these matters of history and art? We want by means of Social-Democracy to win a decent livelihood, we want in some sort to live, and that at once. Surely any one who professes to think that the question of art and cultivation must go before that of the knife and fork (and there are some who do propose that) does not understand what art means, or how that its roots must have a soil of a thriving and unanxious life. Yet it must be remembered that civilization has reduced the workman to such a skinny and pitiful existence, that he scarcely knows how to frame a desire for any life much better than that which he now endures perforce. It is the province of art to set the true ideal of a full and reasonable life before him, a life to which the perception and creation of beauty, the enjoyment of real pleasure that is, shall be felt to be as necessary to man as his daily bread, and that no man, and no set of men, can be deprived of this except by mere opposition, which should be resisted to the utmost.

HOW SHALL WE LIVE THEN ?

William Morris

How Shall We Live Then ? is taken from the manuscript of a lecture first given by Morris at a meeting sponsored by the Fabian Society at Bloomsbury Hall London on March 1st 1889 and repeated two days later at a meeting of the Hammermith Branch of the Socialist League. It was given at least three times more in London and Leicester during January and February the following year.

The manuscript was believed lost until it was discovered in the International Institute for Social History. First published in the Institutes journal, International Review of Social History, vol. XVI (1971). The manuscript is reproduced on the Institutes web site.

What I have to say to you relates to matters that may be discussed amongst Socialists, mingled or not with their declared opponents, but can not be altogether a matter of controversy amongst Socialists. I want to give you my personal view of the Promised Land of Socialism, with the hope of eliciting an account of the views of several of this audience; and I do not think the hour and a half so employed ought to be waste time if we tell each other honestly and as clearly as we can what our ideals are, if we have any, or confess to our having none if that is the case. We are engaged in a common adventure for the present, the abolition of the individual ownership or monopoly of the means of production; the attainment of that immediate end will bring about such a prodigious and overwhelming change in society, that those of us with a grain of imagination in them cannot help speculating as to how we shall live then : and the expression of the results of our speculations, of our hopes and fears will certainly give our friends and associates some insight into our characters, and temperaments, will make us know each other better; and that in turn will save much friction and loss of time, will in short make us better friends; to come sometimes from out of the hedge of party formulas and show each other our real desires and hopes ought to be something of a safeguard against the danger of pedantry which besets the intellectual side of the Socialist movement and the danger of machine politics which besets its practical and work-a-day side.

It is true that as some of you may have anticipated my paper must necessarily under these conditions take a personal character and be somewhat egoistical. I do not offer an apology for that but I may offer an explanation. I have some 55 years experience, I won't say of the world, but of myself ; the result of which is that I am almost prepared to deny that there is such a thing as an individual human being : I have found out that my valuable skin covers say about a dozen persons, who in spite of their long alliance do occasionally astonish each other very much by their strange and unaccountable vagaries; by their profound wisdom, their extreme folly, their height of elevation, and their depth of baseness. So that though it may be possible that the complex animal who has now the pleasure of addressing you has not his double in the world, ( though I decline to admit that also ) it is impossible but that the men inside my skin who go to make up that complexity are but types of many others in the world, and probably even some of those are in this room at present. So that when I tell you of my so-called personal desires for and hopes of the future the voice is mine, but the desires and hopes are not only mine, but are those of, I really think, many others, and you as practical men, as I hope you are, cannot afford to disregard them.

Now I will ask what draws men into the Socialist ranks at this stage of the movement ? I mean of course what makes them genuine socialists. I do not think it can be any hope of personal advancement; such hopes would be much too wild to be entertained by anyone who had wits enough to feed himself with a fork; for the most sanguine of us know that there will be such heaps of trouble of one kind or another before the first serious blow has got any reason at all out of the monopolists, that mere trouble is pretty certain to be part of our reward for daring to hope that society can be improved. Is it intellectual conviction deduced from the study of philosophy or from that of politics or economics in the abstract ? I suppose that there are many people who think that this has been the means of their conversion; but on reflection they will surely find that this was only its second stage : the first stage must have been the observation that there is a great deal of suffering in the world that might be done away with. That is I think the first thing that draws a man toward the socialists, whether he feels the suffering in his own person, and becomes conscious of a wrong done to him by what we now call society; a wrong which is not accidental but can be fixed on a certain set of events; or whether he himself is unconsciously one of those who do the wrong, but has the ordinary good-natured wish which any one who is not a mere ill-conditioned blackguard will have, to see all men as happy as they can be.

Now in this respect the corporation which I call I is not at all peculiar : from the earliest time that I can remember catching myself thinking ( an operation which all healthy and happy young people avoid as much as possible ) the thought was from time to time thrust upon me that the greater part of people were ill-fed ill-clad ill-housed overworked, and as a consequence nasty and disagreeable. These thoughts made me uncomfortable and discouraged and took the flavour out of my amusements and my work ( there was not much distinction between the two ) so of course I thrust them aside as much as I could. Yet I was conscious that I was acting a shabby part in doing so, for I was not such a fool as not to see clearly that these degraded persons that came between me and my pleasure had not degraded themselves, and that consequently there was something or other which a strong and honest man could attack. In all this there was nothing peculiar : you would say that a natural sense of the injustice of our Society was growing up in me, as it has surely in many others of my class and condition. But in what followed I was perhaps peculiar. I was indifferent honest, I was by no means strong; for I must tell you that one of those persons inside my skin is the peaceablest, and another the laziest of all persons -- in that again I am not peculiar. So it is probable that that rising sense of injustice would have been damped down till I had grown old enough and tough enough to bear it easily : but something happened to me that prevented that. Though my work was pretty much my amusement, yet it was serious enough to me : I daresay some of you would be astonished if you could understand the pleasure it has given me; but at last it gave me perhaps as keen a pain. It was a big job that I had taken in hand; no less than the regeneration of popular art as it used to be called. I was not fully conscious how big a job it was for a long time; though I was fully conscious of the complete degradation of the arts in general. Well the time came when I found out that those unpleasant thoughts about the greater part of the population were intimately connected with the very essence of my work, and at last that I had undertaken a job quite impossible under the present conditions of life. You may well think that I did not come to that conclusion all at once; in fact I tried to wriggle out of it for a long time till at last I was pinned, and there was the greater part gone of my pleasure in my work : which indeed was a serious matter for me, since I cared for it so much and so heartily. Well I cannot tell you whether it was about this time that I first heard of socialism as a definite movement, but I know that I had come to these conclusions a good deal through reading John Ruskin's works, and that I focussed so to say his views on the matter of my work and my rising sense of injustice, probably more than he intended, and that the result of all that was that I was quite ready for Socialism when I came across it in a definite form, as a political party with distinct aims for a revolution in society. My position then which I am sure has been and is the position of many others, was profound discontent with the whole of modern life, a feeling of the deadly sickness of the world of civilization, which if I could have found no outlet for it would have resulted in sheer pessimism, as I think it often does. That outlet as you know I found, and I was hindered from coming to the conclusion that the art to which I had devoted myself was a mere idle folly, that I must go on with partly because I knew no other way of earning my livelihood, partly because I must have something more or less pleasant to do on some terms or other. My Socialism began where that of some others ended, with an intense desire for complete equality of condition for all men; for I saw and am still seeing that without that equality, whatever else the human race might gain it would at all events have to relinquish art and imaginative literature, and that to my temperament did and does imply the real death of mankind -- the second death. Of course with the longing for equality went the perception of the necessity for the abolition of private property; so that I became a Communist before I knew anything about the history of Socialism or its immediate aims. And I had to set to work to read books decidedly distasteful to me, and to do work which I thought myself quite unfit for and get myself into absurd messes and quarrel like a schoolboy with people I liked in order to become a practical Socialist -- which rank I have no doubt some of you don't think I have gained yet. But all that did not matter because I had once again fitted a hope to my work and could take more than all the old pleasure in it; my bitterness disappeared and -- in short I was born again.

Now I repeat that I would not have said a word of all this, but that I know that what has happened to me has happened to other people though not quite in the same way. We, ( I will say we now ) are alive in the world and not in the least pessimists, but we are most sorely discontented with all things as they are, except the bare elements of life, and the hope for the future which we have somehow or other got into our heads.

We are alive and we can take the keenest pleasure in all those elements of life which the barbarian has in full measure but which civilization has largely deprived us of : the sensuous pleasures of life is the technical word for them; or shall I say the innocent sensuous pleasures ? e.g. we keep our eyes in our heads and take in impressions through them; whereas civilization bids us put them in our pockets, and is mostly obeyed. And it must be said that there is reason in this since civilization is such a foul slut, and wherever she can manage it gives us nothing pleasant to look at, so that we are driven to have to thank her, like my friend Shaw, for the wreaths of steam which float from the funnel of a locomotive; at all events when they are not defiled by the smoke of the coal which the Company has no business to burn but which it generally does. However from such impressions, we take our pleasure as well as our pain; but there is so much pain in them that on the whole they do but add to our discontent; for as things go whatever we see almost has some share of that sickness in it, and we long and long to better these things : we cannot look upon the world merely as if it were an impressionist picture, or be pleasantly satisfied with some ruinous piece of picturesque which is but the envelope for dullness and famine. But there again comes in our hope : for if we live in the present on such crumbs as we can pick up amidst the general waste and ruin, we live generously enough in the future; and one part of our pleasure in the ordinary life of today, the animal life I mean and the goings on in field and flood and sky and the rest of it, comes from the fact that we see in them the elements of which the life of the future will be built up far more than of the thought of to day, its literature, its so-called art, its so-called science.

In sum our hope is so generous that whatever there is which is distinctive of the sickness of civilization will disappear before our regained freedom : what we aim at, the purpose for which we want to use the instrument of the transition, which is what some understand by the word Socialism is no mere rectification of our present society, but the construction of a new society in which we shall adore what we used to burn, and burn what we used to adore.

How shall we live then ? Whatever system of production and exchange we may come to, however justly we may arrange the relations of men to one another we shall not be happy unless we live like good animals, unless we enjoy the exercise of the ordinary functions of life : eating sleeping loving walking running swimming riding sailing we must be free to enjoy all these exercises of the body without any sense of shame; without any suspicion that our mental powers are so remarkable and godlike that we are rather above such common things. Also I will say in the teeth of the very natural repulsion to bodily labour that our present conditions force upon us we must be strong and healthy enough to enjoy bodily labour, a good stout wrestle with the forces of nature which will make us feel our power. I do e.g. hope most sincerely that we shall manage not to be so driven for the production of food as not to allow ourselves the pleasure of getting in the harvest by hand, or, a great many of us, raising our own potherbs, of course with due knowledge and skill. ( Also I should hope that we should not find it necessary to shorten our lives as we do now by spending a great part of them in the condition of parcels sent from one place to another. I hold that going from one place to another ( on the surface of the earth ) may be made by no means a waste of time if we don't do it as parcels, especially if one can be happy enough not to think on the road. Indeed even when I am sent on as a parcel I do my best to get my eyes out of the brown paper sometimes. ) Now all this would mean that our views on the subject of education would have to change somewhat : the equipment for life on the new terms would not and could not be the same as on the old : it is true that the capacities for dealing properly with the bodily side of life would grow to be a kind of habit : still I suppose except among the South-sea islands and such like places men have to learn swimming, and except in the Pampas, riding. And I cannot easily conceive a lad knowing how to dig and plough and reap and sow without learning, although that learning would not be gained in the technical school method, but as apprentices learn when it is anybody's business to teach them. Besides I think most people would want to learn two or three of the elementary crafts whether they intended to practice them as a main occupation or not, smithying carpentering ( not cabinet-making ) and mason's or bricklayers work, I am thinking about, and that would need definite instruction, lasting some time. Various minor arts like cooking and sewing would be learned very easily by children when they are very young; and they again would mean little more than the gaining of an easily acquired habit. The education set on foot we should have first a great body of out-door occupations, dealing with work necessary to be done, agreeable to healthy and strong persons, and capable of being done excellently, that is of developing real pleasure in the doing, some of them perhaps to be done by individual work but most by means of cooperative; and all the parts of them in which excellence was not possible to be much developed could be done with little effort, almost as a habit : Add to these occupations a few of what for shortness I would call indoor work, and also ( an important addition ) what we call art, in which I would include, beside the plastic and decorative arts, imaginative and measured literature and the pursual of knowledge for its own sake, and these I think will give most of the occupations necessary for a happy community : and for the life of me I cannot see why we should bother ourselves with occupations which are unnecessary. Let me try if I cannot arrange these occupations in groups a little more systematically adding some few perhaps doubtful ones.

1st. The open air arts; ( I had better call them arts at once, because to my mind all work which is done by a man in the course of the due exercise of his faculties and therefore pleasurably is an art. )

Agriculture and its kindred arts; gardening, fishing, butchering, ship and boat-sailing. Driving carts, trains, omnibuses and the like ( a cross division here with distribution ). The habits of swimming, good walking and running, and riding would be mixed up with these, and also an habitual knowledge of the ways and manners of non-human beasts.

Now as we shall live then I declare that anybody who did not take a pleasurable interest in some part of these arts and was not capable of working in them, would have to be considered as a diseased person -- something less than a man, a burden on the community, if there were many such persons it would tend to the creation of a class of slaves, people doing the rougher work of the world only.

2nd. The domestic arts : The arrangement of a house in all its details, marketing, cleaning, cooking baking and so on; sewing with its necessary concomitant of embroidery and so forth. Once more whoever was incapable of taking interest and a share in some parts of such work would have to be considered diseased; and the existence of many such diseased persons would tend to the enslavement of the weaker sex.

3rd. The building arts : masons, bricklayers, smiths, carpenters and the like and also the planners of buildings, engineers, and so forth. Of these arts what we now call art, i.e. decoration, appeals to the intellect through the eyesight, would form a necessary and integral part; therefore possibilities of excellence would here run high, and consequently only those would take a part in them who had some faculty for creation, as I believe most free men have; but doubtless there would be some lacking this faculty or possessing but little of it, who would prefer the rougher arts above mentioned; but as they would be doing their share of the necessary work and with pleasure, they would not be injuring any one by disease. For the rest it is clear that these arts are cooperative in the highest degree, no one necessary person's work being really separable from the whole mass of it.

4th. The workshop arts, weaving, pottery, dyeing, printing ( textiles and book ) etc. Into most of these also art would enter and much the same thing is to be said of these as of the last group. In cases where art could not be an integral part of the work if it turned out to be necessary work it would have to be done by machines as nearly automatic as possible ; but I should consider it a matter of course that those who tended such machines would do other work at once more pleasurable and more responsible; and whatever drudgery of this sort we could do without we should drop at once.

5th. The disagreeable arts. I will assume though I am not sure that it is so, that there would be such indispensable arts, and then proceed to divide them into :

a - The rough disagreeable arts.

b - The smooth disagreeable arts.

By the first I mean such occupations as mining, skindressing, scavengering, and so on. By the second I mean -- well quill-driving of the less amusing kind, clerks work, official sauntering and so on. Of both these groups I say the same thing; as above, machines where possible, and the workers to have other occupation : but also strict enquiry as to whether they are necessary; and if not, abolition.

6th. The arts concerning the distribution of goods; shipping of goods shopkeeping and market-managing of all kinds. I daresay it will be possible to find people to like such work and let them do their best at it; but I am sure that they will find digging and reaping, or even perhaps leather-dressing restful to them : and such rest they ought to have.

7th. The fine or intellectual arts : i.e. picture painting, sculpture, and the lesser or reproductive fine arts, such as engraving. Also imaginative literature, and the study of history and nature. Some of these in which a good deal of actual manual labour, is necessary might be followed exclusively; the others certainly not; and even in the first, or manual fine arts, rougher manual work would be desirable, unless in cases, if there be any such, ( which again I doubt ) where extreme finesse of hand is so necessary that it would not do to roughen the hand by harder labour. In any case I feel sure that it would not do for men to be absorbed entirely in such arts. It would tend to disease, to anti-social habits which would burden the community with a new set of idlers, and ( if the others were such fools ) in the long run to a new set of masters.

Before I go further I ought to say that though I don't doubt that a due amount of organization and direction would be required in the diverse branches of occupation I am very far from thinking that it would be either necessary or desirable to prescribe to people what occupation they should follow; I am assuming only that opportunity will be afforded for people to do what they can do well, and that the work as far as the relations of men go will be voluntary; nature will be the compeller, in a sense the only enemy : yet an enemy that asks to be vanquished.

Now having given you my ideal as to the occupations of men in a free community, I have but to add my views as to the possibility of its being realized sometime or other : it is what might be called the political side of the question.

Decentralization and equality of condition are the necessary concomitants of my ideal of occupation : but I am not clear as to whether they should be looked on as the cause or the effect of the state of things foreshadowed by that ideal. But I think, that granted the second, the first will tend to come naturally. Difficult or if you please impossible, as it may be to conceive of such a change as will come of the abolition of the great central power of modern times the world-market as we know it with all the ingenious and intricate system which profit hunting commerce has built up about it, because of it and by means of it, yet after all it must develop into something else, and that something else can hardly be a perfecting of its perfection, but rather its contradiction, which is the conscious mutual exchange of services between equals. Nay if things now going on can be fairly understood by us who live amongst them are there not signs of the coming change already visible to us ? The Republic one and indivisible of 100 years ago is passing through a phase of bourgeois corruption and the only hope of France is that it will come out at the other end a Federation of Free Communes. The Unity of Germany has been accomplished but a few years; yet here are we waiting for but one event, quite certain to happen sooner or later, the defeat of the German Army, to break it up again into a federation with socialism as its aim. And at home the principle of Federation is conceded in the matter of Ireland by all but the stupidest of the reactionaries; while the Tories themselves, driven on I believe by a blind fate, have given us in the County Councils the germs of revolutionary local opposition to centralised reaction. Thus then before centralization is quite complete even, the change in the direction of its opposite seems to have begun, and once begun will surely go on till the necessary practical decentralization has been arrived at. That decentralization seems to me looking out from our present condition to be necessary in order to give all men a share in the responsibility of the administration of things which I hope will take the place of the government of persons : you will understand that I admit the possible necessity of a certain amount of mechanical centralization, such as a central administration of railways in such and such a geographical district, which after all would not be centralization but the direct outcome of Federation.

I also admit that the form which the decentralization or Federation will take is bound to be a matter of experiment and growth : what the unit of administration is to be, what the groups of Federation are to be; whether or no there will be any cross Federation as e.g. Craft-gilds and Cooperative Societies going side by side with the geographical division of wards, communes, and the like -- all this is a matter for speculation, and I don't pretend to prophecy about it.

I may say however in parenthesis that my temperament leads me to believe that we shall be able to get rid of one outward and visible sign of commercial and official centralization; our great cities, and closely packed manufacturing districts.

As for the first, the great centres like London, Paris and Berlin, they are surely the outcome of the desperate struggle for life which competition under monopoly engenders on both sides the monopolizers and their slaves. They are counting houses of commerce; the jobbing houses of officialism; the lairs for the beasts of prey big and little that prey upon the follies and necessities of a huge mass of people who have no time to find out what they want; and must have all their wares from the bread they eat down to a new novel or a play at the theatre forced upon them like a sharper forces a card : they are the sweating dens to which starvation drives up the starvelings of the rest of the country, so that they may eat a morsel of bread while they cast the dice desperately for that twenty millionth part of a chance to escape from the proletariat which is the yard of earth between modern society and the volcano it stands upon. I do not deny lastly that they are the camps to which the soldiers of revolution must flock if they are impelled to do anything to further their hope before they die. But granted the change of conditions which we all hope for, of what use will be these monstrous aggregations of confusion ? No camp will be needed, for militant socialism will be over : no man will hurry up to be sweated, for his decent livelihood will be assured to him. People will have leisure to think what they want and resources to have the reality of it; so that the parasites above mentioned will not exist, for there will be no carrion for them to feed on. Official jobbery will be dead; and profit-hunting will need no counting house or will have to seek it of the Father of Lies to whom it will have returned. There will be no use for this monstrous muck heap in which we swelter to-day. But in case anyone should be inclined to regret what I have heard called the stir and movement of a big city, I will just say two things : first, that in those post-monopoly days, when at the very least there will be more of an approach to equality, there will relatively to men be more intelligent and thoughtful men : we do everything wastefully now; so if you want a dozen highly cultivated and thoughtful persons you must have 12000 proletarians at their back in order to produce the due element of stir and movement for those 12 treasures : as a practical man I cannot approve of the plan. Again you must remember that the dullness and monotony of country-life at present, of which many complain ( but not I ) is the wrong side of the hubbub of town life; since the town sucks the blood of the country in all things : in postmonopolist days I hope, as I have already said that we should reform this.

As for the great factory districts, it seems to me that they also could disappear : granted that it is possible to produce goods cheaper when you have labour and material gathered together in the closest space possible; I am sure that in post monopolist days when the "sword of cheapness" is no longer necessary as an offensive weapon against other nations, we should come to the conclusion that we might buy cheapness too dear, that hell was altogether too high a price for it, and that it would be worth while to work a little longer in order to live in a pleasant place. Of course we must all admit that these last centres are centres of profit-bearing manufacture and huckstering, but of nothing else - save dirt. But now I must say that this decentralization with all the decent life and manly responsibility that will come of it can only be got in any measure at all as a forecast of advancing equality, and can only be reached fully when we have attained to practical equality; that equality is in fact our ideal.

Indeed I can only explain the fact that some socialists do not put this before them steadily by supposing that their eager pursuit of the means have somewhat blinded them to the end.

Surely there are but two theories of society; slavery on the one side; equality on the other. The first theory supposes that use must be made of the natural diversity of capacities in men to cultivate a class of superior beings, who are to live on the lack, the unhappiness in short, of the inferior class. The second theory says, when you have got hold of the strongest and cultivated him into a stronger, you can by no means be sure that you have got hold of the best; he is only the strongest under certain artificial conditions which you yourselves have made; and you can never tell how many far better than he you have oppressed into nothingness by your masterful folly : satisfy a man's needs, and what there is in him will come out of him for your benefit and his, and you can't get out of him more than he can do. That is what communism says, and the only way I can see to traverse it is to say, I intend to have that man for my property, and all that he does is mine, whether it is little or much, only if he doesn't make more than enough to keep himself, he will be of no use to me and I will kill him as I would an old worn out horse. Any stage between these two theories I can only understand on the grounds that the antislavery man is bribing the slave owner to keep him quiet until he becomes too weak to resist having his slave taken from him and made free. As a transitional step I say nothing about this proceeding, as an ideal I cannot fail to see that it is incomplete and illogical. No other ideal on this matter of livelihood in a post-monopolist community appears to me worth considering than the satisfaction of each man's needs in return for the exercise of his faculties for the benefit of each and all : to me this seems the only rational society. And this means practical equality. For when you have satisfied the man's needs what else can you do for him ?

You will say doubtless what are his needs ? Well of course in such an audience I need not deal with the usual quibbles of people who think that we socialists have never thought of any of the difficulties which arise in anyones mind when such questions are started. But those of you, if there are any here, who think that one useful person should have ( compulsorily ) a different scale of livelihood than another useful person I want to put a point or two to you that have occurred to me ( and very likely to you also ). 1st - Given a poor community which could satisfy the average elementary needs of each man for food and shelter, but could do nothing else; would you think it right ( or ideal let us say ) for the so called more useful man to have anything extra for his excellence ? If he did so, wouldn't he starve the others, since they would then have so much less of necessaries as he had so much more ? wouldn't they be his slaves then, whatever the nature of the compulsion was which he used ? for they clearly wouldn't do it without compulsion. Well carry it further and suppose the community wealthier, even quite wealthy. There is still surely a due standard of livelihood, of leisure and pleasure which can be upheld for the citizens in general, why should they be deprived, against their will of what they can have and what they desire, of what they can have if they are not compelled to give it up. Either they have more than they need, in which case they had better not produce so much, or they have only as much as they need, and in that case if they are compelled to give up some of that, they are not free men. Again I seem to see another draw-back to this new class of ability : I assume that all men's needs will be satisfied according to the measure of the general wealth : well the superior man will have his needs satisfied; and once again what more can you do for him than satisfy his genuine needs. It seems to me that even at the best what he would do with his extra pay would be to surround himself with extra luxuries, and that the result of that again would be the creation of a new parasitical and servile class which could not fail to be an injury to the Community. In short I can think of no special reward that you can give to a man of special gifts but licence to do harm to his fellow citizens, which is a strange reward for having been of special service to them. Lastly remember that when a man has special gifts the exercise of those special gifts are a pleasure to him which he will not forego if he can help it; therefore while on the one hand it is unjust and unsocial to compel the citizens to give up their ordinary advantages for the nourishment of this Queen Bee, so on the other hand nature does not compel them. Whatever is in him he will give freely if you leave him free and provide him with due opportunity for the exercise of his faculties. That is if you let him have due unprecarious livelihood with leisure and pleasure according to his desires, and the free use of raw material and the instruments of labour.

Other things I can see of the way in which we should live then, which you can also see I suppose : the splendour of public and the quiet dignity of private life, and in general all the real pleasures which would come of our being wealthy and no longer rich ; of all which pleasures the greatest now seems to be a negative one, the relief of no longer living in one or the other of two opposed camps of enemies, which we feel certain must one day fall upon each other ruining many a hope and many a quiet life in the process; while in the meantime ethics are in hopeless confusion and pessimism increases in days when we find it hard to understand what vices and virtues mean since the collective crime of class wrong is so overshadowing and overwhelming. Of course I do not pretend to have given anything like an inclusive account in detail of what our ideal of the new world is ; since I feel I have been somewhat disjointed in what I have said, I will very briefly run over the points concerning which I may differ with some here.

First the change, from Monopoly to Freedom, when it is complete, will make a new world for us, and will be far greater than any change that has yet taken place in the world.

2nd. - We may have in appearance to give up a great deal of what we have been used to call material progress, in order that we may be freer happier and more completely equal.

3rd. - This would be compensated ( a ) by our taking pleasurable interest in all the details of life, and ( b ) by our regaining the pleasure of the eyesight, much of which we have already lost, and more of which we are losing everyday.

4th. - Instead of toiling for some blind force, a mixture of necessity and nightmare, we should be conscious of doing useful work for our neighbours who were doing the like for us. As a result there would be no waste of labour, as useless occupations would be got rid of speedily.

5th. - Work thus obviously useful, and also adapted to the capacity of the worker would mostly be a pleasant exercise of the faculties; necessary work that would otherwise be drudgery would be done by machinery or in short spells : no one being condemned to work at unpleasant work all his life.

6th. - As no incentive to work would be needed save its obvious necessity and the pleasure involved in it; and as the division of labour into more or less worthy work deserving different standards of livelihood would create fresh classes, enslave the ordinary man, and give rise to parasitical groups, there would be no differentiation of the "reward of labour". ( This last phrase I consider a misleading one, involving a begging of the question ). I am aware that this implies the abolition of private property.

7th. - Nationalities as rival corporations would have ceased to exist and centralization in our present sense of the word would give place to Federation for definite purposes of small units of administration, so that the greatest possible number of persons might be interested in public affairs.

Some such ideal as this I believe will be realized, and I earnestly hope it will be. We have been told that the logical sequence of the development of man's ingenuity will involve the gradual loss of his bodily faculties, and this seems probable : but the logical sequence of events is sometimes interrupted and turned aside by the historical; and my hope is, that now we know, or have been told that we have been evolved from unintelligent germs ( or whatever the word is ) we shall consciously resist the reversal of the process, which to some seems inevitable, and do our best to remain men, even if in the struggle we become barbarians; which latter fate I must confess would not seem to me a very dreadful one.

MAKESHIFT

WILLIAM MORRIS

As other ages are called, e.g., the ages of learning, of chivalry, of faith and so forth, so ours I think may be called the Age of makeshift. In other times of the world's history if a thing was not to be had, people did without it, and there was an end. Nay, most often they were not conscious of the lack. But to-day we are so rich in information, that we know of many and many things which we ought to have and cannot, and not liking to sit down under the lack pure and simple, we get a makeshift instead of it; and once more it is just this insistence on makeshifts, and I fear content with them, which is the essence of what we call civilization.

Now I want to run through certain of these makeshifts, and see what there is of evil in them, what of present good and what of future hope. For I must tell you that I have come here to rail to-day, and to rail at a state of things without trying to mend it is a futile business I think.

It is quite likely that you will think many of these cases of makeshifts matters of very small importance, but makeshift is so thoroughly interwoven into the web of society at present, there are so many cases of it, that I can only take a few instances of which I personally know something; yet in the end I think I shall be able to show you that the sum of all these cases makes a serious matter enough; to wit, that the life of civilization is but a makeshift for what the life of man upon the earth ought to be.

Now I will begin very low down in the scale; with the common vulgar un-ideal subjects of food and drink. Have we no makeshifts there? Alas! only too many. You have all heard of the thing called bread, but I suspect very few of those here present have ever tasted the real article, although they are familiar enough with the makeshift. A makeshift which I have no doubt is of somewhat long standing. In my youth genuine bread was usually eaten in the country-sides, but was not for the most part sold in the big towns; but now the country bread made by the bakers in the small town is worse than the town bread. For the country-people, at all events in the country I know, have quite given up baking at home and buy of the small town baker. Even thirty years ago they used to bake in the cottages and in almost all old cottages about us (in Oxfordshire, Gloucestershire) you will see from without the little round oven built at the back of the fire-place: but as aforesaid it is never used now. Perhaps you will say, But people can bake at home if they like still. No, they cannot. For to bake a good loaf you must have good flour, and that is unattainable; the ideal of the modern miller (imported from America, I believe, that special land of makeshift) seems to be to reduce the rich oily wheat grains into a characteristic white powder like chalk. Whiteness and fineness are what they seem to aim at, at the expense of the qualities which are discoverable by the palate.

So you see, bread is not to be had now by anybody almost; and this you must understand is an essential characteristic of the Social makeshift; it is forced on the whole population, and in a very short time supplants the original and genuine article entirely.

I suppose, to take another example of makeshift, that it will not be very long before butter will cease to be made and margarine will take its place. Already it is extremely difficult to get decent fresh butter either in town or country. You see it takes trouble to make it well, and it is now made on a scale which brings it under the force of the motto: Save trouble, make money, and who cares for the rest? Now having just mentioned two typical and important articles of food I must dwell no longer on that subject; but before I leave it I recommend you to read William Cobbett's Cottage Economy, both because it is a very charming and amusing little book, and because it gives us in its contrast between now and then a good measure of the rapid advance of makeshift in this detail of life.

How easily we are satisfied with makeshift in the matter of raiment you have only to look around you to see. If you look on any modern crowd; whether it is the ordinary toing and froing of people in the streets going about their business or pleasure, or some definite gathering for politics or amusement, or what not, the general colour of the crowd is a dirty sooty black-brown-drab with a few spots of discordant and ill chosen bright hues due always to the feminine part of it; though what should hinder us from wearing harmonious and beautiful colour, save the tyranny of customary makeshift no one can say. As to the shape of our garments it is for the most part so hideous, that a newcomer from another planet would surely look upon our aspect as an indication of our degradation in the scale of life. Even the ladies, who have a little more license in this matter than the non-ornamental sex, cannot help us much; I have noticed that if ever they do hit upon a pretty form of dress, that fashion always passes away quicker than any other; while some gross piece of deformity, like e.g. the horrible bunching up of the shoulders which is still common, is sure to be very long-lived. Here again in the matter of dress the makeshift is forced upon us, and that with grinding tyranny; so far from its being possible to dress decently nowadays, even a mere protest in words, however futile it may be, is a difficult thing to do. Even now, I see you all think the worst of me because I have mentioned the subject. But at least one final shot I will take, and ask you what you think of the makeshift shoes of this generation, and all the consequences of deformed feet and legs which they entail?

Again no doubt it is but a little matter, yet I should like to be able to buy good cutlery even if I had to pay a high price for it. Thirty years ago this was possible, it is so no longer. A knife with blades which will cut for any time is not to be bought anywhere. The other day I lost a pair of nail-scissors which would cut and which I had had for a long time; I set myself to buy another pair, and had to buy three before I came on the fourth, which would cut only rather badly.

I do not consider the subject of public amusements to be a trifling one; I think it a very serious matter on the contrary, that the standard of excellence at theatres should be so low, and that such sorry makeshifts should be forced on us at a great expense of the labour of many honest and often not unintelligent people. I say this is serious, because I know the sad reason for it, to wit, that the greater part of the town-dwellers live such woful lives, that their work is so mechanical and dull, their rest so vacuous, and too often so weary because of their overwork that anything which pretends to be an amusement will draw them to it. I know more of this dismal makeshift, because I am one of the very luck ones whose work is a constant pleasure; so that I find I do not want much of what is usually called amusement, though I thoroughly appreciate the benefit of sheer rest: but in good truth the amusement which amuses me most is a quiet time without immediate anxiety, in which I can get on with my work free from disturbance. And I feel sure that this ought to be the case more or less with all people. And only when this is the case can amusements cease to be wretched makeshifts. There is another kind of makeshift amusement, however, which consists in going [on] a railway journey to some place and then coming back again. There are two things that force persons into this business; one acts upon rich people the other on poor. With the rich people it is the uneasy longing to be somewhere where you are not, which drives people to Switzerland and the Rhine and Italy and Jerusalem and the North Pole, and where not: and for the most part people go to these places with their eyes in the pockets, and except that they have satisfied their above mentioned craving for perpetual motion had much better have stayed at home. With the poor people of our great cities and manufacturing districts it is I admit different. Their homes are so devoid of all pleasure of the senses, that they may well long to have a look now and again at the green fields and the sun shining upon them or the wind and the rain sweeping over them. Yet to my mind to go from a weary ugly place to a beautiful one, and to have a look at it and then go back to the weariness and ugliness is but a poor makeshift after all. I want to see the beautiful face of the earth not once a month, or once a week, not every day, but generally. I could no more agree to that other once a month business than I could to dining once a month. The real pleasure of which this tripping is a makeshift is making the place in which you live, in which you work, beautiful and pleasant. Then you can stay at home and enjoy yourself, learning as you should and would so the countenance and expression of every tree, nay every bough, every little sweep of bank or hollow, till they become dear friends to you - and such dear friends. And then now and again you may go from that friendly home to see fresh beauties and wonders in other places and to store your mind with memories for quiet days, always with the confidence that the well known untiring beauties of your home will welcome you back to the old unbroken pleasure. This I say is what ought to be; when you have thoroughly learnt why it cannot be now, you will, I hope and think, make up your minds that it shall be before long, and act on that resolution.

Now let us take the houses we dwell in, and consider what kind of a makeshift that is if it has been built within the last hundred years. It must be clear to all of you even those who use your eyes least that almost all modern houses are base in idea and ugly to look on, that the aggregation of them in our big towns makes our streets repulsive, and degrading to move amidst, and that when we come upon them in the country side they are just so many blots upon the beauty of the landscape, so that we avoid them unless we are driven to them by sheer necessity; nor can it be pleaded of them they are at least useful according to the trouble and cost of making them; it is by no means so; on the contrary, of all the walls and roofs that have been got together for shelter from wind and weather they are the worst planned, the most uncomfortable, the most unreasonable; in a word they are idiotic. Doubtless the greater part of you have no idea of what helpless feckless makeshifts they are for real houses fit for sober and thoughtful men; because you have never seen anything better, and are so used to these, that you think that they are about what houses must be according to their size, and the fortunes of the dwellers in them: whether they have six small rooms or sixty big ones, whether there indwellers earn sixty pounds a year or steal sixty thousand. But I must ask you to take my word for it at present, that such houses there have been as have made the streets in which they stand lovely to the eye and elevating to the mind; that the plan of them was handy and reasonable according to what their indwellers demanded in a house; that so far from blotching a fair landscape with ugliness they themselves made, yes and in some rare instances yet make, the chief building of the landscape; that in fact they are useful and not utilitarian; which word instead expresses as I think a quality pretty nearly the opposite of useful, and means something which is useful for nothing save squeezing money out of other people's necessities.

As for the towns and cities made up of these makeshift houses, how could they be anything but makeshift under the circumstances? in the special cases which are representative of the civilized manufacturing district or the cities which have grown, not great but big, because they are the seat of the government of the country, the mere size if nothing else seems bound to make them unmanageable; contrast such monstrosities of haphazard growth as your Manchester-Salford-Oldham etc., or our great sprawling brick and mortar country of London, with what a city might be; the centre with its big public buildings, theatres, squares and gardens: the zone round the centre with its lesser gildhalls grouping together the houses of the citizens; again with its parks and gardens; the outer zone again, still its district of public buildings, but with no definite gardens to it because the whole of this outer zone would be a garden thickly besprinkled with houses and other buildings. And at last the suburb proper, mostly fields and fruit gardens with scanty houses dotted about till you come to the open country with its occasional farm-steads. There would be a city for you. I do not say that any such has existed, because in ancient and medieval times the cities were fortresses, and the thick of them were confined by walls; but what is to hinder such kind of cities being the type of the future dwelling places of aggregated men? Nothing, it seems to me, if men shall be free to build them; what hinders it being done now, I will tell you presently.

Meantime amidst all these makeshifts that have to do with the industrial productions of men, I must admit there is one class of work which produces things which are not made in a makeshifty way, as far as the making of them goes; I mean setting aside their purpose; one class, I have said, I should have said two: first instruments made for the destruction of wealth and the slaughter of man, on which indeed wonderful ingenuity almost amounting to genius is expended: which perhaps as things go is not altogether bad, for it makes war more expensive, and so puts a sort of check upon it. That is one class of things made with care forethought and success; the second is all that mass of machinery for the production of marketable wares, which is the speciality of this century, and which seems now gradually advancing towards perfection: but wonderful as is all the talent and skill used both in its making and in the organization of the use of it, yet that very use of it is after all but a makeshift. All these admirably ingenious machines approaching so near perfection already, what are they so ingeniously used for? Wholly and solely for the making of makeshifts; for the making that is of things which no one would attempt to use unless they were forced upon him as aforesaid by the fact that they supplant the genuine useful wares which we would use if we could.

Another makeshift which really cannot be dissociated from the makeshift of building above mentioned is a sad one indeed, which is that we must needs turn the fairness of the earth in the very countryside itself into a makeshift of what it should be. And you must understand that I am not here thinking only of the unspeakable horrors of the manufacturing districts in which the face of the country has been destroyed, but rather of the vulgarization of the country which is still country; partly by the utilitarian cultivation of the farmers, the cutting down of trees, the plashing of hedges and the shabbiness and squalor of the surroundings of their farmsteads; the pleasure which every public body, and especially educational ones, seems to take in supplanting beauty by ugliness; iron railings and barbed wire used for stone walls or living hedges, blue slates for stone slates or red tiles, the planting of larch and spruce instead of oak or other real trees, and so on and so forth, all the thousand and one ways in which we belie our foolish boast of our wealth and our common-sense: that is one side of the said makeshift; the other is a curious one, and almost makes one laugh amidst of one's anger: for it is done by people who are so sublimely unconscious of their vulgarity that they fairly consider themselves sublime rather than ridiculous I am thinking of the result of the residence of rich men in the countryside. The squalor of the farmers above mentioned is no doubt largely the result of stupidity, but with them poverty can be pleaded; but the rich squire-archy and nobility are not forced by lack of pence to cockneyize the countryside; but yet so soon as ever you come across a village turned smart but dull by idiotic architect-tooral-looral excrescences and changes; the cock-tailed school, the restored church, the Lady Bountiful cottages, the lodges of the Bayswater pattern, the carpet gardening of the vicar's garden and so forth, then look out for the big house of my lord or Sir Robert, or Captain Killmister, and you are sure to find it presently and unless it be an old house, or you have not got the real use of your eyes, you will be heartily sorry that you haven't missed it, such a lump of ugliness and vulgarity it will be.

Literature and the fine arts I will only just name; for to say the ugly truth there are so many makeshifts current in them that it would take more than all my time merely to run through them. Just one word however about the fine arts, by which I mean painting, sculpture and the like; I should like you to see one point with my eyes, and that is, that the very foundation of this fine or finest art, is that face of nature and the aspect of the ordinary dwellings of men, the condition of which I have been bewailing to you; they are in fact both fine art in themselves and also the material from which fine art is fashioned, and if they are degraded, it is impossible that the special arts can be anything else than makeshift. I can no more think of their being otherwise if their foundation is rotten, than I can of music existing without the sounds of nature, the song of birds, the voices of cattle, the ripple of streams, the wash of the sea, the noise of the wind and the rain and the thunder. So make up your minds to this that if you cannot have an ordinary working man's dwelling beautiful, you need not try after getting a beautiful picture.

I wish I could tell you what I really think of the makeshiftiness of education; how different the best which we have now is from what it ought to be. But at least I will say this that if we grudge for sake of cost making our national education as good for the passing hour as we can make it, we had better give up any claim that we have ever made to be a commonsense or practical people. it seems to me it comes to this; say you have determined to do something for 50,000 and you find that in order to do it properly you must spend another 10,000; that in fact you will spoil your work unless you spend it: wouldn't it be very much cheaper to spend 60,000 in doing it than 50,000 in not doing it? That is the way we should treat this matter of national education, it seems to me, i.e. determine to make it as decent an education as we know how whatever the cost may be. It will not be too good even then perhaps; but at least let us begin by discarding the foolish idea that we teach people in order to fit them to become workmen and women desirable to be employed by the capitalists: we should teach them with one aim in view, to make their lives pleasanter to them: any other aim will result in deplorable makeshift.

Well now, I have gone over a good many matters which are indeed but samples of the general great makeshift called civilization; and if I am right in my views as to the universality of makeshift nowadays, the present epoch must surely be sick of some sore disease of which these miseries and discomforts are the symptoms. So I will at once name the disease, and then we will have a few words about its cure, if you will listen to me so long. The name of the disease of which the civilized world is sick, is Poverty. The reason why we put up with all these makeshifts is because we are so poor that we cannot help it. We are too poor to have pleasant green fields and breezy moorland instead of these dreadful deserts that surround us here: too poor to have rational, properly planned cities, and beautiful houses fit for honest men to live in: too poor to prevent our children growing up in ignorance: too poor to pull down our prisons and work-houses and build fair halls and public buildings on their sites for the pleasure of the citizens: too poor above all things to give opportunity to every one to do the work which he can do the best and therefore with pleasure in the doing of it. What do I say! too poor to make peace in our midst, and make an end at last to the war between rich and poor, between the have-alls, and the lack-alls.

That, I say, is the disease: what is the cure? Well by this time I believe there are a good many present who know at least the kind of treatment necessary for this sick man. But let me once again say what I have so often said in Manchester already on that treatment. For I say the cause of the disease is poverty, from which not only all the nations but the whole of each nation suffers, is just that very war between the have-alls and lack-alls which I spoke of a minute ago: the have-alls perpetually fortifying their position, for they have no idea of how to live out of it: the lack-alls perpetually struggling to gain a little more, and yet a little more if they only can. Take note also that the result of this war is necessarily waste. I noticed that the other day Mr. Balfour was saying that Socialism was impossible because under it we should produce so much less than we do now. Now I say that we might produce half or a quarter of what we do now, and yet be much wealthier, and consequently much happier, than we are now: and that by turning whatever labour we exercised, into the production of useful things, things that we all want, and not by refusing to labour in producing useless things, things which none of us, not even fools want. What a strange sight would be a great museum of samples of all the market-wares which the labouring men of this country produce! What a many of them there would be which every reasonable man would have to ticket as useless!

My friends, a very great many people are employed in producing mere nuisances, like barbed wire, 100 ton guns, sky signs and advertising boards for the disfigurement of the green fields along the railways and so forth. But apart from these nuisances, how many more are employed in making market wares for rich people which are of no use whatever except to enable the said rich to `spend their money' as 'tis called; and again how many more in producing wretched makeshifts for the working classes because they are so poor that they can afford nothing better? Slave-wares for wage-slaves I have called them before, and I call them so now again. In short in one way or another all the industry of the country is wasted, because the system we are undertaking, we one with another, just allows us to live, some honestly but miserably, some dishonestly and emptily, and no more.

For after all the producers though they do incidentally produce some utilities, or we couldn't go on at all, yet the essence of the reason of their production is not the production of goods but of profits for those who are privileged to live on other people's labour. That is what our present commercial and governmental system is organized for, and for that it organizes labour and does it splendidly, magnificently, unfailingly. But if you try to get it to organize anything else, it breaks down directly. It can do that one thing only and nothing else.

I tell you that the whole people can never be happy under such a system, that under it their life must be a wretched makeshift. The whole people can only be happy when it is working for the whole people, and is organized to that end. Then we have an end of makeshifts, for when we are working to supply our own wants why should we work worse than well? and then too everybody would have due sympathy with his neighbour besides due confidence; it is only the craftsman that can know the real difficulties of the craftsman, and estimate the excellence of his work: only when the carpenter is working for the blacksmith, the blacksmith for the ploughman and so on each for each, that all labour becomes interesting and friendly betwixt all men; when we shall not be living in separate camps armed to keep out the others, but in different workshops whose secrets shall be open to all.

The old question: How shall we bring it about? My friends, you know a good deal of that now, and I need not tell you much about it. Yet I will not shirk the question. The present makeshift system would keep you machines as you have been so long, fed like machines, tended like machines, made to work like machines - and cast away like machines, when you are no longer capable of being kept in working order. Your answer to that is to claim to be considered as citizens. I think that you are already beginning to do. The claim for a living wage, for dealing with the matter of the unemployed, for a legal shortening of the hours of labour and other things of that kind, I do not believe to be each of them infallible nostrums for the immediate change of society; but the sum of these demands even now (and they will go on increasing year by year, no doubt) do mean to my mind the awakening to that claim; to the claim for the workmen to deal with their own affairs; and that again means the driving of the thin edge of the wedge into the present system of property, which, as I have said before, must be broken up before we can produce rationally and happily, and put an end to makeshifts.

But in bringing this about, I much fear that we must use one makeshift, politics to wit, the grievous makeshift forced upon us in the place of serious and wise discussion of our own affairs which will one day take its due place. If we could do without this nuisance, it would be well; but I do think that it is as things go the shortest or perhaps the only road to the change which we can follow. Yet one caution I would give to all those who are trying to bring about the beginnings of true Society; namely that political action must be looked on as the means and not the end of the struggle: that seems obvious, but I am sure it is a necessary warning; for people in the heat of electioneering are very apt to forget what we are striving for (which I here say downright is practical equality) and to think they have done all when they have got their candidate into parliament; or if they are beaten get so discouraged that they are apt to throw up the whole matter. So I say propaganda first, i.e. teaching people what it is that we want and how reasonable and necessary it is. A great deal has been done in this direction, but surely not enough. No, not enough till every working-man and woman has had the hope of the future put before him or her to reject or accept; yes and put before them in such a way, so often, so clearly, so honestly that almost all will accept it.

Now I for my part believe that when that has been done, when Socialism has been accepted, the means of attaining that end will at least in this country be found ready to hand, and we shall soon find by practice, that we the heirs of all the ages have been poverty stricken by a sort of magic, and not by the unalterable conditions of nature which environ us; or in other words that it is our own faults that we live this makeshift life under which if we but knew it both rich and poor suffer; but the poor so much the more that they are in fact another nation than the rich living in another country, which most surely would seem to the rich if they were condemned to live in it like a mere prison ruled over by the cruel jailers' folly and greed.

One word more: I am now growing an old man, and it is little likely that I shall see the coming about of the great change from privilege and competition to equality and mutual help. But many of you I hope will do so, and even now I seem at least to see the beginning of it and how great a difference there is between the opinion of the working classes now and fifteen years ago; and hereabouts in the northern manufacturing districts the change has been, I fully believe, somewhat sudden even. I must tell you that when I first came preaching Socialism in Manchester the prospect was by no means hopeful; and now it is on the contrary very hopeful. The working men of South Lancashire are now at last touched, and I hope and think that their progress will be speedy. Now many things no doubt have helped to bring this about, no doubt chiefly this, that though we could not see it those years ago, yet people were getting ready for the change.

Nevertheless though the fields be white for harvest, there needs must be labourers for that harvest; and here you have had some very sturdy labourers: and amongst all of these I must needs particularize, the editor of The Clarion and his fellow-workers. It is difficult to exaggerate the service which has been rendered to the cause by their uncompromising straightforward, generous, and at the same time good-tempered advocacy of Socialism. And I for one am glad to have the opportunity of thanking them for its publicly here in Manchester, as I have long done privately at home. Let us hope then, my friends, that this new Manchester School; the school which advocated civil and religious liberty, equality of all citizens before the law, abolishing of feudal survivals, freedom of markets, but made the one essential mistake of having no eyes to see any inhabitants in this country below the level of the prosperous middle classes whose mouthpiece it was.

Let us learn our lesson better than that and take care that our present struggle leaves behind it no class distinction, but brings about one condition of equality for all; which condition of society is the only one which can draw out to the full the varying capacities of the citizens and make the most of the knowledge and skill of mankind, the gain of so many ages, and thus do away for ever with MAKESHIFT.

OUR POLICY

WILLIAM MORRIS

The recent "disturbance" as the word goes, the stir in the dry bones of labour, is a strange phenomenon to most people, and even to us, who having been working towards a change in the basis of Society, is unexpected; amidst the routine of our ordinary educational work we have been surprised, as it were, by something which, whatever else may be said of it, does look like the first skirmish of the Revolution.

The riot, or whatever it may be called, of February 8th, though a small matter in itself, became of importance because it has got to be a fixed idea in the heads of - well - most men, men of all classes, that the English workman had at last been brought to the point of incapacity of expressing his grievances by anything more threatening than an election riot; which expressed nothing at all except a certain pleasure in a "rough and tumble," joined perhaps to the irritation which comes of the indigestion of the "lower classes," an indigestion bred of garbage-eating, and want of fresh air and leisure.

But here was a crowd composed in the main, in spite of the watch-stealing, which was the work of professional thieves on the look out for plunder, of genuine working-men, who were angry, or excited, or miserable enough to cast off their habitual fear of consequences for an hour or two, and indulge in a threat to the Society which had made them the lower classes; as to the details of that threat I will not say much. I have no doubt that the shoeing-horn to the riot was the "truly gentlemanly" behaviour of the fools at the Carton Club, who took for granted the axiom above stated, that a crowd of the English "lower classes" will stand anything, and threw jeers and milk cans at them accordingly. However, let that pass. Apart from what actual plunder there was, the wrecking of shops to carry the contents away, the proceedings of the crowd seemed like a sort of gigantic practical joke against the tyrant - Sham Society. A joke mingled with threatening, embittered by anger and contempt; characterised by the English tendency towards brutality masked by good humour, which is so apt amongst our countrymen to accompany the first stages of a great tragedy. These seem to me to have been the outward aspects of this strange, and, in spite of all drawbacks, most memorable scene.

What was the meaning of it? At bottom misery, illuminated by a faint glimmer of hope, raise by the magic word SOCIALISM, the only hope of these days of confusion. That was what the crowd represented, whatever other elements were mingled with it.

What has come of it? The first outcome was on the Tuesday and Wednesday following, a panic at first sight inexplicable. There were no mobs in the streets, no placards threatening revolution, no processions - "no nothing" in short, - and the respectabilities were terribly afraid. Such abject cowardice has perhaps seldom been so frankly shown as was shown by the middling bourgeoisie on those two days. Whatever were they afraid of? Of nothing? No; they were afraid of their own position, so suddenly revealed to them as by a flash of lightning; their position as a class dominating a class injured by them, and more numerous than they. No doubt this insight into the depths of Society will be of service to the dominated class; who will also remember the terror it caused, after their masters have forgotten it.

As another result: the money which was coming into the Mansion House Fund very slowly, is now coming in in sacksful. I would wish to be as fair as possible to the richer classes; and I must say, therefore, that I think this comes partly from people's conscience being touched by the distress now at last become visible to them; yet partly also, I think, from fear. "Let us show them how kind we are, it may keep them quiet!"

What will come from these "disturbances"? First, some palliative measures. That is the regular course of events in England of late years; every reform has been blindly resisted till obvious violence has been brought to bear upon the question. Witness the Irish "difficulty," which has made great steps since I heard John Morley in St. James's Hall, before the Westminster electors in 1880, declare that Home Rule was a subject inadmissible of discussion. Well, furthermore, these palliatives must necessarily take the form of an interference with the sanctity of the labour market; an artificial raising of wages by authority, which in its turn will be a spoke in the wheel of our commercial system, will hasten its disruption, in other words, will tend to bring on Revolution.

Another thing may happen, at first sight very unpleasant to us of the Socialist League. We may be suppressed; practically at least, if not formally. It is true that just now cool-headed people of the middle-classes rather smile at the ravings of the Telegraph. And yet I think that those ravings are prophetic. Already something or other, probably the Leicester strike riots, has forced the government to turn back on its resolution of letting the speakers at the Demonstration alone, and they are now on their trial.

Well, what will be the result of that attempt at the suppression of opinion? Of course, opinion cannot be suppressed; we shall find means of disseminating our opinions; but repressive interference with us will make those opinions a kind of mystery, a thing to conjure with. The upper classes will, of course, look upon that mystery as a hateful but also a fearful thing; on the other hand the lower classes will be eager to know what this Socialism is, which professes to be altogether in their interest, and which the upper classes think so dangerous that no man must know anything about it if it can be helped. Repression will attract the working-classes to us. Opinion which must be suppressed is Revolutionary; under such conditions fear and hope are abroad, the mere dramatic situation forces people into enquiry, action is dreaded and is hoped for; the Socialist Party will become a political force when all these things happen.

Now I should like to say a few words with the utmost seriousness to our comrades and supporters, on the policy of the Socialist League. I have said that we have been overtaken unprepared, by a revolutionary incident, but that incident was practically aimless. This kind of thing is what many of us have dreaded from the first, and we may be sure that it will happen again and again while the industrial outlook is what it is; but every time it happens it will happen with ever-increasing tragedy. It is above all things our business to guard against the possible consequences of these surprises. At the risk of being misunderstood by hot-heads, I say that our business is more than ever Education.

The Gospel of Discontent is in a fair way towards forcing itself on the whole of the workers; how can that discontent be used so as to bring about the New Birth of Society? That is the question we must always have before us. It is too much to hope that the whole working-class can be educated in the aims of Socialism in due time, before other surprises take place. But we must hope that a strong party can be so educated. Educated in economics, in organisation, and in administration. To such a body of men all the aspirations and vague opinion of the oppressed multitudes would drift, and little by little they would be educated by them, if the march of events should give us time; or if not, even half-educated they would follow them in any action which it was necessary to take.

To forge this head of the spear which is to pierce the armour of Capitalism is our business, in which we must not fail.

Let we ask our comrades to picture to themselves the consequences of an aimless revolt unexpectedly successful for the time; we will even suppose that it carries with it a small number of men capable of government and administration, though that is supposing a great deal. What would be the result unless the people had some definite aim, however limited?

The men thus floated to the surface would be powerless, their attempts at legislation would be misunderstood; disappointment and fresh discontent would follow, and the counter revolution would sweep they (sic) away at once.

But, indeed, it would not even come to that. History teaches us that no revolts that are without aim are successful even for a time; even the failures (some of them glorious indeed) had a guiding aim in them, which only lacked completeness.

This educational process, therefore, the forming a rallying point for definite aims is necessary to our success; but I must guard against misunderstanding. We must be no mere debating club, or philosophical society; we must take part in all really popular movements when we can make our own views on them unmistakably clear; that is a most important part of the education in organisation.

Education towards Revolution seems to me to express in three words what our policy should be; towards that New Birth of Society which we know must come, and which, therefore, we must strive to help forward so that it may come with as little confusion and suffering as may be.

One word to Socialists who do not belong to the League. I think there is a tendency abroad towards holding aloof from union on insufficient grounds. I do not urge formal union between those who really disagree as to principles, or the tactics which follow from them, since this results in quarrelling instead of the friendly difference which might otherwise be. But when the principles and tactics held are practically the same, it seems to me a great mistake for Socialist bodies to hold aloof from each other. The present is no time for the formation of separate societies, whether central or local. Habitual and organised intercourse is necessary to the education I have been speaking of; no independence is sacrificed by this intercourse, and propaganda is made much easier by it. I appeal, therefore, to all who agree with us, individuals, local bodies, or central ones, to give up the mere name of independence in order to attain its reality, and to join our League so that we may show a firm front to the common enemy in these troublous yet hopeful times that our coming on us.

SOCIALISM: THE ENDS AND THE MEANS

WILLIAM MORRIS

It is good, however much we may plume ourselves on our practicality, that is, I suppose, on our setting out towards an end which we are likely to attain, to set before us the actual end at which we aim. It is true that it is the custom of very practical people to taunt those whose end is or seems to be a long way off with being idealists: nevertheless I venture to think that without these idealists practical people would be in a much worse plight than they now are; they would have but a dull history of the past, a poor life in the present, and no hope for the future; on the other hand the idealists in their turn would make a great mistake if they were, in their vision of better things, to despise the `practical people,' even the narrowest of them. Indeed so much of the necessary work of progress is so dull and discouraging that it requires people of somewhat blunted sensibilities to carry it out, and even perhaps people short-sighted to the verge of blindness. Yet again it is not a good thing to be blind or blunt; and moreover there are doubtless some people who are sensitive enough, apt to be discouraged by the roughness, incompleteness and dullness of their fellows who are not necessarily far-sighted or steady as to the end to be reached through all this weary struggle: if any of these can be shown the glorious end and made to feel it in their hearts, will it not transfigure for them that dullness and weariness aforesaid, change its relative proportions, at least make it seem small and easy to bear? Nay enduring steadiness of purpose is surely impossible without some high ideal to aim at, nor will a wise man consent to take pains and trouble, to sacrifice his leisure or his pleasure unless he can see and feel that he has set before him something worthy of all that sacrifice. Nevertheless the end does seem to elude even far-sighted and earnest men in this way, that none of us can see clear enough: so that what all men are to-day sure is that an end turns out only to have been some halting-place on the road, which when we have reached it shows us the road stretching along still toward the new perspective blue in the distance. Doubtless with such vision incomplete and even vague we must be content; and it is indeed of the nature of idealists and their necessary defect to be somewhat vague in their views, while on the other hand those practical people aforesaid are apt to try to limit the vision not only of themselves but also of others and to see finality in the first short stage between them. Now I think that we who wish to further the progress of the race, should both try to see as far as we can, and also to look to everything that is at hand which may help us to move forward; and meantime the end and the means will always be harmonious to those who have insight and patience, though at first sight they may not seem so. The violence from which we may suffer in the present may indicate to us the freedom and energy of the time which is to come; the hum-drum toil that we labour through with no apparent result except the exercise of endless patience in the present may indicate to us the order and thrift and quiet pleasure of the future. And necessity, the evolution of man's life, is the bond that unites these struggles and troubles to the peace and success of the new order that we aspire to. And I must say that since this is so, though I shall have in the course of this lecture to speak strongly against the conditions of life which surround us all to-day, I blame no man merely for the position into which he has been thrust by those conditions: neither to me is any epoch wholly repulsive or worthless; I only attack the conscious or semi-conscious or unconscious blindness of the man who will not see that his position is hurtful to others (and therefore to himself). I only wish to see and to get others to see that the old order changes giving place to new, the new order which the old has long carried in its womb.

And now I will say of these present days in which we live that all thoughtful people and many unthoughtful are deeply discontented with the conditions of modern life; only those who are at once well-to-do and thoughtless and perhaps rather stupid are `contented.' From John Ruskin to the Dock-labourer at a meeting of the League or the Federation: from the ultra-radical artisan to the last pessimist prig who has written a bad novel to prove that some new and vague form of Toryism is the only thing that can save us, all are discontented, all are taking it for granted that something is going to happen. In short while constant change is the condition of man's society, there are some periods in which men are conscious of the changes of the world, both those which have lately happened and those that the present time of change points to in the future; such a period was that immediately preceding the French Revolution, and such a period is that in which we live. In spite of the disappointed hopes of the early part of the century we are forced to hope still because we are forced to move forward: the warnings of the past, the tales of bloodshed and terror and disorder and famine, they are all but tales to us and cannot scare us, because there is no turning back into the desert in which we cannot live, and no standing still on the edge of the enchanted wood; for there is nothing to keep us there, we must plunge in and through it to the promised land beyond.

This I say is the general feeling which has taken the place of the smug satisfaction in existing society, the tacit belief in its finality, which were general a few years since. Now I hope that the cause of this stir and aspiration lies deeper than the passing events of surface economics; yet it would be idle to deny that the present condition of trade and manufacture, its immediate condition, has something to do with it. For the greater part of this century people have been used to expect periodical crises in commerce about every ten or eleven years, and have so to say underwritten such crises, averaged them and been contented that the good years should pay for the bad; but as we stand now for five or six years at least we have been passing through a depression in trade, and during that time there have been many hopes of recovery about, which have been all disappointed one after the other; and if there is to-day, as I am told there is, a fresh hope springing up, I cannot find that it is based on anything more reassuring than the vague idea that since things have been bad for so long they must now begin to mend. There is doubtless a depression of things commercial which those of our generation have not experienced before; that is admitted on all sides, though people for a long time struggled against the admission. And I say this evil has no doubt a great deal to do with the widespread discontent I have mentioned: doubtless also, if things were to mend, as some hope they will shortly, and as for a short while they are likely enough to do, the discontent would be a great deal damped down: the opportunity for open and popular agitation would be deferred, because for the time we could not point so easily to the obvious evil fruits of our system and be so easily understood as we can now. But apart from the fact that such recovery would be and could be but temporary, I think once more that the discontent lies deeper than that, that it does not depend merely on the irritation of men who are feeling that they are getting poorer than they should be, and who feel vaguely that there is a remedy for this. There was an intellectual movement that preceded this political one, and which would go on working even if the discontent of poverty were lulled by a recovery of commerce. Indeed it would be strange if it were not so; for you must remember what that political discontent springing from the approach of poverty means: it is the discontent of the powerful part of the working-classes, of those who in roaring times of trade do not feel their inferior position of want of education and refinement, because they live well according to their standard of livelihood in material matters, have enough to eat and drink and wear, and are housed in a way which they think comfortable, however intolerable their sordid philistinism might be to a man of real refinement, and the roaring trade, the results of which content this upper part of the working-classes, leaves the lower part `contented' only because they have no power to make their voices heard or their hands felt: and it is with this discontent, which will always exist as long as our society of rich and poor exists, with which that discontent of thought is in sympathy, and consequently it is not affected by a rise in wages or a diminution of the hours of the working-day. The discontent of John Ruskin and Thomas Carlyle, of the men of the Commune of Paris, of Karl Marx and Peter Kropotkin is a protest against the whole system of modern Society and manifests itself even amidst the roaring trade of the period of leaps and bounds that only a short while before our present crisis began made those who were not thoughtful and who shared in the `prosperity' of those days so sure that there never had been any real system of society save the one under which they were living and never would be another.

Therefore I say that the discontent of the present times, which, having been long felt by the lowest workers and the highest thinkers is now enveloping all classes and conditions of men, is founded on a consciousness of the approaching break up of the present system, a system which has lasted since the end of the feudal period; and that with that discontent has been developed an insight of something which is to take the place of the old order. In times long past the break up of the old classical religion and the society which it betokened at last set men's aspirations towards primitive Christianity. The break up of the Roman Empire under which Christianity grew into youth and early manhood, set them a-longing for the hierarchical order of Medieval Feudalism, and the realization of the kingdom of God upon earth which the Middle Ages strove to sustain. The decrepitude of Feudalism made men see the would-be freedom in the enterprise and movement of the Commercial period; and now at last that that in its turn is breaking up, the vision of the New Order is again before us, the maxims of the competitive market no longer seem to us divine and eternal, and we grow impatient under the artificial famine which they would create for us; because we see that the conditions of human life under which they arose have fulfilled or nearly fulfilled their functions, and must give place to new ones. The Commercial order of Society now decaying under our eyes was born out of feudality from men's impatience of the narrow limits of a system which assigned to everyone his appointed place in the Kingdom of God upon earth, which was but a part of his Kingdom in Heaven and which forbade the questioning of that divine order, and so checked the thirst for knowledge and the lust for conquest over material nature, which man began with in the earliest days of his intelligence upon the earth. The new age after its first beginnings lived fast, and amply rewarded the aspirations of its founders; after the kingdom of God left the earth for the heavens, and its kings and princes who were once officers of the King of Heaven became masters of estate-offices and captains of police, the freedom which the richer classes had won blessed the world with wonderful discoveries and inventions: on all sides nature was conquered and had to yield her treasures to men without stint; so that where one man once lived hardly, a thousand may now live well, or might do if they would. All that the Commercial Period has won for us, nor can what it has won be lost any more; but now itself it has fallen into a snare that in the beginning no one could have forseen. It has won the treasure but it cannot use it. In bygone times men suffered from the scarcity of commodities; they are now suffering from their super-abundance. How the folk of the times who prayed (I can believe in sad earnest) `Give us peace in our time, O Lord!' would have stared astonished if they had been told that the time would come when those words though still used in the churches had lost their meaning, and that the real prayer among Commercial people was for war and destruction! Strange indeed, but true that the bounty of nature and the energetic ingenuity of man must under our system produce famine amongst us, let alone the waste of that bounty and energy in war or murder and rapine on a national scale. Yet it is true if there is anything in the cry of overproduction now so current, and there is truth in it under our present system of rewarding labour: if the stock of manufactured articles now in English warehouses could be diminished by one half there would be joy in many a household in Great Britain out of all proportion to the number of the households that would lament it. Or to give you an illustration more in detail, if in some country which you here supply with tools some accident or another should render all their stock of tools useless, their misfortune would `employ' many a man at Sheffield and make him and his wife and children happy. Here then you see the word I used just now, `artificial famine,' was not used lightly; nor is it easy on our present terms to see our way out of this frightful mess we have got into. For suppose the stocks lowered by war or other calamities all of which are `good for trade' as the phrase goes; what happens? All hands employed and good wages and easy livelihood at first. Yes and then? more energy produces more wares: the markets begin again to be glutted, prices fall, but production is not checked suddenly, for people hope that the crisis will soon be over, and in the period of fuller energy they have built more factories, increased their machinery, invented new machinery; they will not slack off until the last moment. And then? then it will all come on again; only worse than before because the markets will have been yet more exhausted than before by the last period of roaring trade, the competition of all the huge commerce of the world will have thrust our civilization just so much nearer to the edge of the pit. This then has come of the full development of the Commercial period, its elimination of all the old disturbing elements when it shall finally have eliminated them: perhaps it has not quite done so yet outside of England: most people seem to think that there will be a great European war before long; that the great armed powers of the continent driven by the survival of old instincts, acting, mind you, on their present commercial necessities, will fly at each other's throats: surely if that happens it will be the last of such monstrosities. It may well be indeed that among the clash of arms the hope of the people will be hushed and disregarded; but when it is over and the nations draw apart from each other with their wounds grown cold, exhausted by the waste and disgusted at the murder, surely the last rags of feudalism and absolutism will have disappeared, and the populations of Europe will be face to face with the great question, `What are we to do with the wealth which we civilized people produce in such huge quantities? it seems we cannot refrain from producing it, shall we waste it or use it?'

Now it seems to me that the time when the answer to that question can no longer be evaded is growing so near, that we should bestir ourselves at once to answer it. It is the question which those thinkers I have mentioned put to themselves; those persons who did not forget the poor at a time when the prosperity of the rich and the well-to-do was not threatened as it is now. It is the question which the artisan class are now beginning to ask, and which one day they may ask in a very preemptory fashion: nay it may be that the downright poor, dumb and unconsidered generally, recruited from the ranks of the once comparatively prosperous workers, will ask the question first in their fashion: and if they do it will make terrible times for the rich and well-to-do.

Shall we waste our wealth or use it? Why do we waste it now? Because we are cowards and therefore unjust. The wealth was made by all and should be used for the benefit of all; but we in our fear have forgotten what is meant by all. In this respect we have not gained but lost on the system we supplanted, the Feudal system of the Middle Ages: men did then feel themselves to be members each one of them of the great corporate body, the Church on earth and in Heaven. When we freed ourselves from their superstitions, we were not careful enough of the freedom of all men: the freedom that we claimed and got was the freedom of each to succeed at the expense of other people if only he were stronger and cleverer than they; that is, in other words, the freedom to enslave others. In our present society those who make the commodities are not those who get them; they are kept poor by those who have managed to make themselves their masters, and that is, very shortly, the cause of our not being able to use the wares we produce: they are too abundant to be used by slaves who have nothing to give in return for them when they have once bartered away the power of labour in their own bodies at a cheap rate to their masters. If you want to do a steady and safe business you must have many wealthy customers; but the customers for our wares are poor for the most part, only a small class is wealthy, so that we have to scour all over the world and try to make markets artificially, to force people to buy our wares, whether they will or not, often at the cannon's mouth. To such base courses has our one-sided freedom, our freedom to injure others brought us.

I must put this matter clearer before I go further lest you should think I am using some mere figures of speech; and I must do so at the risk of repeating myself, and though I daresay some of you have heard me say what I am now going to say on other occasions.

Since the full development of our present system the distinction between the classes of society has in the main merged itself into that of one class owning all the means of the production of wealth, and the other owning nothing but the labour power inherent in their bodies: so that the one so-called upper class need not produce at all, and does scarcely at all; the non-possessing class works for it for such wages (over and above what is necessary to keep the men and women alive and allow them to breed) as they can manage to force their masters to give them by violence or threats of violence direct or indirect, or by strikes, i.e., by destroying a certain part of the master's property. Now this arrangement differs little from that of the relation between the feudal lord and his serf; and the real reason why it has not been noticed to be a condition of serfdom is because the master-class is not necessarily an hereditary one; whoever by the exercise of special faculties or by accident can obtain money enough to employ others to produce instead of producing himself is protected by the laws in his privilege of mastership: and indeed the main business of all authority at present is just this protection of privilege. Now you may think that this privilege is less harmful than the old privilege of birth and race, and it may be so, though I doubt it: but the point of it is that it is a privilege, that is to say that the whole power of the state is put in force to enable anyone who by accident had become possessed of a certain amount of wealth to use that wealth for the purpose of compelling others to yield up to him a portion of what they have produced: or if you like to put it in another way, the authority of the state supports him in the monopoly of the means of production. Now I am prepared to go further into this matter in case you doubt this statement; but first I want to say something about the word `property' and see if we can come to an understanding as to what we mean by it; and I don't know that I can do better than quote John Ruskin on this point: property, he says, is something which is good in itself, which you have acquired justly, and when you can use rightly. Now we may accept this as the Communist view of property in the good sense: you must have worked towards its production or you will have injured the rest of the community by thrusting on them your share of work as well as their own: neither can you use it unless you use it personally, as indeed Ruskin goes on to point out by various familiar examples. Now on the contrary the view of property under our present system is that it is something which you can prevent other people from using, that is to say a monopoly. For instance a man owns a hundred acres of land: he cannot possibly use more than a small corner of it himself, but since he has got it the law supports him in preventing other people from using it; therefore he uses it not as land, to raise produce from it or to build a house for him to live in on it but as a means of compulsion for other people to work for him: for they cannot do without the land; they must have it; and if he were not arbitrarily protected in his monopoly they would make short work of it by using it in spite of him: but since the state will provide him with policemen and soldiers to put them in prison or kill them if they attempt to use it against his will, they cannot use it unless he gives them leave to do so, and he won't do this unless they give him a part of the results of their labour: this enables them to live indeed but it impoverishes them for the benefit of a man who has not done a stroke of work to help them. This comes of the monopoly of the land, the prime necessity for all production; and be sure that if the air or the sunlight or the rain could have been bottled up and monopolized for the profit of the individual it would have been. Well, the land is but one of the instruments of production; the man of property is allowed to monopolize past labour in the selfsame way whether it be embodied in money or in buildings or machinery: he can but use a small part of these things for his personal service; used as his property in our present sense they do but represent so much compulsion of others to work for a day for less than the produce of the day's work. They are means for enabling people to live without producing. And now it has come to this point that the claim to call this `property' in any good sense is manifestly absurd; the land, the machinery, the capital are used for the same purpose as those picturesque castles on the Rhine were used when `capitalists' were clad in plate and mail instead of broadcloth.

Or - will you tell me, when you hear that a man has been sentenced to 5, 6, 8 years penal servitude for stealing, have you not sometimes wondered why the poor devil had to be subjected to that terrible torture? What is he punished for? since I will suppose he has not used violence in his theft. Let us take a case: suppose I have been working hard and usefully all the week, and as I am taking the cash home and thinking of the necessary or pleasant things it will buy, a thief picks my pocket of two-thirds of it. Now that's hard on me: the next week I must work ever so much more, a great deal more than is good for me or go short; and if the thief does this often he causes much suffering by impoverishing people, all of which he might have avoided by working to produce things useful, for in that case there would have been more wealth produced and it would have been better distributed. Therefore we punish the thief to prevent others from inconveniencing us in the same way; if it is the first time he has done it we punish him lightly; if he has done it many times, i.e., if he is obviously living by this industry we punish him heavily. Now what is his offence? Simply living without producing: but I have said or hinted that the possessing or monopolizing class make it their business to live without producing, and consider it one of the holiest duties of man to put their children in the same position; and those that by this proceeding, for which they put thieves according to law in prison, manage to amass great fortunes, are much respected, are praised for giving back part of their ill-gotten wealth to those who ought to have had it all except the due livelihood of the worker that amassed it, and if they get rich enough have a title given them, and found a family of hereditary law-givers. For my part I think that the thief according to law is treated very unjustly since our legal society itself is founded on legal robbery.

Now since that is the case how can we wonder at the waste of wealth which we produce? We have seen what the nature of robbery is, how it means that he who produces does not get the produce of his toil, which goes to someone who has not worked for it; so that the worker is too poor to be able to use the things which he has created; and as he is the numerous class, it all means that our system must in the long run produce not more than it can consume, but more than it will consume. Clearly to an unprejudiced person industrial society should take care that the producers should also be the consumers or there will be waste and wrong.

Now then we come at last to what our end is: the end as far as we can see it of those who have not forgotten the poor even in days of roaring trade. It is very simply to bring Society to a basis of common honesty in the ordinary daily transactions of life; and if you think that is no such exalted aim, pause and consider: consider what a society founded on robbery means: how the meanest and most miserable vices flourish under it. I have said that our present system compelled us into cowardice and therefore injustice. Is not that the natural consequence of a society wherein each who would thrive must do so at his neighbour's expense; must live in short by stealing? Under such conditions there is nothing stable: for look you, it does not avail us that we have good capacities, that we are industrious, deft with our hands or our brains, well developed human beings, all that is no use to us unless others are worse than we are; unless we can conquer them they will conquer us, and in spite of our good qualities we shall be condemned to be their slaves, and thereby the greater part of our good qualities be wasted and lost. So that we live in daily terror lest we should lose, some of us our domination over others, some of us our leisure, some of us our decent livelihood; and that fear forces us, I say, to deal hardly with our fellow men, lest they should rise above us and take our places. Have you never thought any of you what a changed world it would be if this fear, the basest of all passions, were absent from our lives? how full the streets would be of pleasant faces instead of those worn and dragged and anxious features which are our wear now-a-days; how merry we should be over our work; how kind would be our intercourse with each other; how delightful, how rich with beauty and pleasure our contemplation of the past and the present, and our hopes for the future? And but one thing is needed to bring all that about, the society should be based on helpful honesty and not a wasteful robbery. This then is the end which I propose to you, a society whose basis is honesty: nor can you have such a society without a sense growing up in you of your unity with humanity; of that corporation you will feel yourself a member, and you will shrink from doing anything which may be an offence against it. Nor will this be an artificial matter, you will come to that with little consciousness of it on the road: for indeed your attempts to escape the consequences of the sham society of robbery will lead you to it whether you will or not, for you will find co-operation in labour and life and mutual goodwill the only road of escape from the fear and waste of robbery.

Now what are the conditions of an honest society? Surely to start with that every member of it should have a chance of a happy life, that is of a life which will develop his human faculties to the utmost, a chance which only his own will and not the will of anyone else can take away from him: and in order to have that chance he must be allowed to enjoy the fruits of his own labour; in which case he need have no fear for his livelihood, since every person not too young and not too old for productive work or not sick can produce more than is necessary for his own subsistence: if he be sick or otherwise incapacitated from work, it will be a sacred duty for his fellow men to sustain him in all comfort, as also before he is too young to work or after he is too old; since the debt which he will incur to the community in his youth his manhood will more than pay back and the community in its turn be indebted to him, which debt it will pay him back in his old age.

Let us again then look at the end: it is a Community striving for the happiness of the human race: each man striving for the happiness of the whole and therefore for his own through the whole. Surely such a community would develop the best qualities of man, and make such a world of it as it is difficult to conceive of now: a world in which sordid fear would be unknown and in which permanent injustice defended by authority would not exist, and in which acts of wrong would be but the result of sudden outbursts of passion repented of by the actors, acknowledged as wrongs by all.

Is that a vain ideal? If that be so and it is but an empty dream, then there is nothing to be looked for at all on this earth; and the business of each one must be to stave off pain and grasp at passing pleasures as well as he may without regarding others. I know that there are people who think that that is all we can do: and others who think that all our endeavours must be to secure a good position each for himself in a future life of which we know nothing. And I think that these two views are really pretty much the same, since each means despair of our life upon the earth.

STATEMENT OF PRINCIPLES OF THE HAMMERSMITH SOCIALIST SOCIETY

WILLIAM MORRIS

By Socialism, the Hammersmith Socialist Society understands the realization of a condition of true society all-embracing and all-sufficing.

It believes that this great change must be effected by the conscious exertions of those who have learned to know what Socialism is.

This change, it believes, must be an essential change in the basis of society: the present basis is privilege for the few and consequent servitude for the many; the further basis will be equality of condition for all, which we firmly believe to be the essence of true society.

As soon as any community begins to make differences in the condition and livelihood of its members, according to some imagined standard of estimation of their qualities, it finds itself driven to use a mere arbitrary system for the apportioning of responsibilities and rewards, which must of necessity injure some for the aggrandizement of others. But when a society habitually injures any groups of its members, it has become a tyranny; it has ceased to be a true society, and has lost its reason for existence.

As Socialists, we say, that society is embodied for two purposes, the increase of wealth by means of the combination and co-operation of the varying powers and capacities of men, and the equitable distribution of the wealth so produced; and as each man's capacities can be used for the benefit of the community, and as the needs of all men are at least similar, we claim the right for every person born into society to a full share of the sum of benefits produced by it: whosoever is kept out of this share, whether by force or fraud, is not a member of society, but has been thrust out of it, and owes no allegiance to it.

But the society of the present day, that of the capitalist wage-earner, of rich and poor, by no means admits this claim; on the contrary, the essence of it is the denial of this right and the assertion of an arbitrary inequality. It is an exclusive society, a combination of privileged persons united for the purpose of excluding the majority of the population from participation in the wealth which they (the workers) make. The system whereby this privilege is sustained, is the exclusive ownership by the privileged classes of the means of production, that is to say, the land, and the tolls and appliances necessary to combined labour, namely the factories; machinery; railways, and other means of transit. The working-classes are not allowed to use these means of production except on the terms of their giving up everything to the possessing classes, save the bare necessities of life. These so-called higher classes, therefore, are enabled to live upon the labour of the workers, who are thus deprived of all the advantages gained by an advanced state of civilization: the productivity of labour has increased enormously within the last 400 years, but the working-classes have not shared in the gains of that increase in power; all that they have done is to create a large and prosperous middle-class, which consists in part of their direct employers, i.e., their masters, and in part of those who minister to the pleasure and luxury of those masters.

The workers therefore, we repeat, are not a part of capitalist society, since they do not share in the wealth produced for it, they are but its machinery, and are not protected or sustained by it; for them it has ceased to be a society, and has become a tyranny; and it is a tyrannywhose subjects are not an inferior race of feeble and incapable persons, but the useful part of the population.

Such a society (so called) dominating populations, the useful part of which is out-lawed, cannot be stable; it holds within itself the elements of its own dissolution; and it can only go on existing by the repression by force and fraud of all serious and truthful thought and all aspirations for betterment. It is conceivable though, we believe, improbable, that it may still further degrade the working-classes, till it has crushed all resistance out of them, and made them slaves more hopeless and more hapless than the world has yet seen. But the whole evolution of society and all the signs of the times bid us hope for a better fate than this for our epoch. It is becoming clearer day by day that the thought and the hopes of the working classes (who are being gradually educated into a knowledge of their unworthy position), and the force lying latent in them for a new order of things cannot be repressed; that the tyranny of privilege is weakening, and that we are within sight of its overthrow.

It is beyond a doubt that if the workers unite to claim their heritage, the due membership of society, the tyranny of privilege must fall before them, and that true society will rise out of its ruins.

For here we must say that it is not the dissolution of society for which we strive, but its reintegration. The idea put forward by some who attack present society, of the complete independence of every individual, that is, for freedom without society, is not merely impossible of realization, but, when looked into, turns out to be inconceivable.

As Socialists, it is a true society which we desire. Of that true society the workers contain the genuine elements, although they are outcasts from the false society of the day, the tyranny of privilege; and it is their business to show the privileged that it is so, by constituting themselves even now, under the present tyranny, into a society of labour definitely opposed to the society of privilege. Such a society would be able to ameliorate the lot of the workers by wringing concessions from the masters, while it was sapping the strong-hold of privilege, the individual ownership of the means of production, and developing capacity for administration in its members; so that when the present system is overthrown they might be able to carry on the business of the community without waste or disaster.

To further this militant society of labour we believe to be the business of all Socialists, but we would say a word about the part in this business which we believe should be the special work of the Hammersmith Socialist Society and others, who are neither State Socialists nor Anarchists.

We believe then, that it should be our special aim to make Socialists, by putting before people, and especially the working-classes, the elementary truths of Socialism; since we feel sure, in the first place, that in spite of the stir in the ranks of labour, there are comparatively few who understand what Socialism is, or have had opportunities of arguing on the subject with those who have at least begun to understand it; and, in the second place, we are no less sure that before any definite Socialist action can be attempted, it must be backed up by a great body of intelligent opinion - the opinion of a great mass of people who are already Socialists, people who know what they want, and are prepared to accept the responsibilities of self-government, which must form a part of their claims.

It may be, nay, probably will be, necessary that various crude experiments in the direction of State Socialism should be tried, but we say if this be so, let them be advocated by those who believe that they see in them a solution of the social question, rather than by those who, not so believing, merely wish to use the advocacy of them as a political expedient for strengthening their position as exponents of Socialism.

On the other hand we deprecate spasmodic and desperate acts of violence, which will only increase the miseries of the poor and the difficulties of Socialists by alarming the timid, and giving opportunities for repression to the capitalist executive, and which must of necessity be carried on by men who know nothing of their position, except that they are suffering, and who, in consequence, will yield easily to those who may relieve their sufferings temporarily. At the same time, we know that it may be necessary to incur the penalties attaching to passive resistance, which is the true weapon of the weak and unarmed, and which embarrasses a tyranny far more than acts of hopeless violence can do, turning the apparent victories of the strong and unjust into real defeats for them.

Furthermore, as Socialists, we would remind our brethren generally that, though we cannot but sympathise with all struggles of the workers against their masters, however partial they may be, however much they may fall short of complete and effective combinations, yet we cannot fail to see that of themselves these partial struggles will lead nowhere; and that this must always be the case as long as the workers are the wage-slaves of the employers.

We, therefore, earnestly urge the workers to lose no time in constituting a general combination of labour, whose object will be the abolition of privilege by means of obtaining for labour the complete control of the means of production, which must be the first step in the realization of Socialism. With the object steadily in view, such a combination will gain ever fresh advantages for the workers: everyone of which, be it remembered must necessarily be gained at the expense of the capitalists. It will drive them from position after position, until at last they will find themselves burdened with a responsibility which carries no privilege, and will call upon the workers to take that responsibility on themselves, and themselves carry on the work of the world.

It is the business of all Socialists to do their best to bring it about, that in that day the masters will be addressing men who are willing and able to accept that responsibility, because they know, that they, who were once outcasts from society, have now become society itself.

In this hope, we appeal to all workers to learn to understand their true position; to understand that they have no hope of bettering their condition save by general combination; but, that, by means of that general combination they may become irresistible, that their demands must then be yielded to. But, unless they know what to demand, they will not be really strong, nay, without that knowledge, complete combination is impossible.

You that are not Socialists, therefore, learn, and in learning teach us, that when we know, we may be able to act, and so realize the new order of things, the beginnings of which we can already see, though we cannot picture to ourselves its happiness.

December, 1890.

The Claim of Socialism

William Morris

I have looked at this claim by the light of history and my own conscience, and it seems to me so looked at to be a most just claim, and that resistance to it means nothing short of a denial of the hope of civilization.

This then is the claim:

It is right and necessary that all men should have work to do which shall be worth doing, and be of itself pleasant to do; and which should be done under such conditions as would make it neither over-wearisome nor over-anxious.

Turn that claim about as I may, think of it as long as I can, I cannot find that it is an exorbitant claim; yet again I say that if Society would or could admit it, the face of the world would be changed; discontent and strife and dishonesty would be ended. To feel that we were doing work useful to others and pleasant to ourselves, and that such work and its due reward could not fail us! What serious harm could happen to us then? And the price to be paid for so making the world happy is Revolution.

- - William Morris

THE DEPRESSION OF TRADE

WILLIAM MORRIS

What is the essence of the society which took the place of feudalism: free competition - that is in other words a desperate war in which every man fights for his own hand; the aim of the struggle being to live free from labour at the expense of those that labour. This struggle results necessarily in the formation of two great classes, the successful and the unsuccessful, which in spite of minor divisions among them, have now taken the place of all the elaborate castes of feudality: the struggle therefore proposed for everyone born into the world of civilization is the getting, or the keeping of a place in the class which lives on the labour of others: the getting or the keeping; because there are some who are born privileged to be useless, and others who win that privilege by industry, talent, good-luck, and unscrupulousness: accordingly one solemn duty is recognized tacitly by all people who live under our present system of commercialism the formation of a family who shall become a group in the class of the non-producers: observe once more how entirely the necessities of the system which rules us flies in the face of the morals which, we, whatever our creed profess to believe: in all codes of morals it is thought wrong to take away from an unwilling fellow-man the means of subsistence or enjoyment; this is commonly called stealing; and when practised by an individual in an unorganized manner if we catch him we think ourselves justified in torturing him in various ways in order to frighten others off from the like courses: for we call him a thief and his unorganized interference with other people's livelihood and pleasure we call stealing: nevertheless there is no man in any of the creeds so pious, there is none in any of the philosophies of such rigid morality that he does not with the approbation of all men do his very best to raise (as we call it) himself or at least his children into the class of non-producers, that is to say of those who by force or fraud take away from their unwilling fellows the means of livelihood or pleasure: it [is] only the commonness and the organization of it that prevents this class from being called the class of thieves; so you see in spite of all our religion and all our morality we consider it a sacred duty to put those whom we love best, ourselves and our children into the position of thieves.

However [if] it were only a matter of a conflict between our professions of morality and our practice of it it would be no great matter perhaps; we should, as men always have done, make our morality square with our necessity; that we have not systematically done so no doubt points to the very transitory character of our present system, so that even almost as soon as it has been developed fully it begins to show signs of disruption: and no wonder for it is clear that the greater part of men cannot belong to the successful classes: obviously every one person who refuses to do his share of production must have attached to him at least one person who does his share of work; at least one; but as a matter of fact he has many more, because since he does no work and is served by others he considers himself a superior person above those who keep him by their labour, and claims successfully to live at a higher rate than they do; he eats and drinks, is clad and housed more expensively than they; although they do something and he does nothing: he keeps them toiling at making wares which they have no chance of using, if they cared to use them, their labour is forced from them to amuse and beguile the stupidity of his idleness: the result of all which is that many thousands of skilled and should-be useful hands and lives are utterly wasted and all the time the work that is absolutely necessary for sustaining the lives of men has inexorably to be done, and so both the burden of it falls on few people comparatively, also it is much worse done than it should be: indeed many matters that reasonable people would think of the first utility, to be done before anything else were attempted are never even set about at all: as for instance while I speak to you London is practically undrained; a huge mass of sewage, which should be used for fertilizing the fields of Kent and Essex now and especially the latter actually passing out of cultivation, a wall of filth is accumulating at the mouth of the Thames garnering up for us who knows what seeds of pestilence and death. While here in Lancashire you have allowed yourselves to be so hoodwinked and enslaved that you are forced to live amidst squalor and wretchedness which men of an earlier age could scarcely have conceived of in order that you may make wares of whose sale you are now beginning to have doubts, while at the same time you don't know what to do, what to turn your hands to save making ever-fresh relays of unsaleable wares: like the miserable debtors that one has heard of who have no resource for staving off importunate creditors than ordering more luxuries which cannot be paid for. Or take a last instance; with all the lines of competing railways that score the land like crackling on a leg of pork tons upon tons of fish wholesome, nay dainty food, if it could only be brought to the consumer are scattered for manure over the fields of Suffolk and Norfolk while people in the East End of London are becoming scarcely human for lack of decent food, and the fishermen of East Anglia risk their lives in cockle shells of boats on the sea living roughly and precariously for the noble reward of 12/0 a week: or yet again one last instance of the folly of slaves and slave-owners. Did you ever hear of the Irish famine? that found 8 millions of human beings in Ireland and left 5 million there? a famine we call it: but what is a famine? a great scarcity of food: now do you know that while all those people were dying of starvation, were clemming in Ireland quantities of food - butter, eggs, and bacon were being transported to England to be sold at a profit there. And what came between those starving people of Ireland and the food which their labour had produced? remember every one of those Irishmen that died, or went across the sea bearing with him a bitter load of hatred against those who to him represented the system of the civilization of the 19th century, was capable of producing more than he needed for his own subsistence if he had only been allowed to work on his own land and to have for himself the produce of his own labour: what came between him and the victuals he and his had produced and so slew him or drove him from home? the class system, the system of landlord and tenant, of capitalist and workman; in other words the system which has for one pillar a propertied, non-producing class and for the other a property-less, producing class, which as a class has no hope save revolution, which same revolution is staved off only so long as the members of the working-class can buoy themselves up with the hope of rising from the class of the employed into that of employers: this of course only a few of them can do even at the best, leaving behind them the great mass of hopeless labour, which has no choice or chance save to work tomorrow as today at a task which is a mere burden, and so always regarded, and the reward for which is precarious; subject at the best and in the epochs when trade is briskest to those periodical stagnations which mean diminished profit to the employer and diminished necessities to the employed: but in a period like the present when all trade is chronically stagnant what can we say of the worker's hope if he can see no further than a continuance of the present relations of employer and employed; if the system of capital and wage-earning is to go on? That system means, as I have been trying to show, a wasting of the worker's labour-power, his only possession, in the free competition of war which has for its object the securing a position of deedless ease for a lucky few - if indeed they can be called lucky. Let us for a few minutes see how that war is waged. In the first place this war is the chief, almost the only occupation of the possessing classes: just as the slave-owners of Greece and Rome used the leisure which the possession of slaves gave them to fight endlessly for the aggrandizement of their tribe or city, just as the ownership of lands tilled by serfs gave the Medieval baron leisure to fight ceaselessly for honour (and more land and serfs) so does the possession of capital, or the power of compelling unwilling labour from poor men, enable the modern monied man to fight ceaselessly in the markets of the world for his share of the profits wrung by his class from the labour-class; and this I say is almost his only occupation - his other ones being various forms of the less harmful occupation of obvious busy idling - amusements - such as yachting, travelling, shooting, or electioneering and legislation. Now in this war as in others the weakest goes to the wall, so that each combatant must of necessity be quite unsparing of all kinds of waste or else he will be beaten: understand that when I was speaking just now of the waste of the class system I was thinking chiefly of the waste of wealth consumed in the idle life of the rich, and not so much of the waste caused by the war for profits, that is the waste caused by the necessity of the capitalist to make money breed money: this necessity of course makes him quite careless of what kind of goods he gets produced; it is enough that there be a market for them; and a market he mostly ensures by means of cheapness: this cheapness he uses as a weapon against his fellow competitors and also he uses it as a petard, a charge of dynamite if you will, to open to him the markets of the world: now you will often have people preaching to you the beauty of this cheapness, and how easy it is to live because of it now-a-days especially if working men will only be `thrifty', as the said preachers call it, meaning thereby pinching and niggardly: well well thrift is often not a difficult virtue for the poor to exercise if it means, as it should not, the living on a little: but let that pass: for as to this cheapness there is another way to look at it than that of the enthusiastic praisers of the present system: for you see after all cheap goods as far as the workers are concerned means cheap labour - and do you like cheap labour? more about that presently, suffice it now to say that the capitalist can by means of the aforesaid cheapness force populations both at home and abroad to live a certain kind of life, the life namely which suits the profit-maker best: dare I venture to say in Oldham that there are places in the world that buy our cotton cloth, not because they want it but because they can't help it: of course you all know that there are some places where we have done this - well rather coarsely: I mean we have said "buy this or - take a bayonet in your belly!" That is undoubtedly part of the process, and is getting now-a-days to be nearly indispensable if commerce is to be kept alive: Mr. Goschen and the Pall Mall Gazette will tell you all about that; and they chuckle not without some reason at the conversion of the once peaceful `Manchester School' to the doctrines of `your money or you life!' which to them seem so eminently sensible and patriotic at one and the same time: but this coarser part of the process I will not say much of at present, because even without Lord Wolseley and his machine he can manage to force our wares on the natives of the countries we long to benefit by means of the weapon cheapness: people don't want the goods we offer them, but they are poor and have to buy something which [will] serve their turn anyhow, so they accept cheap and nasty, grumbling; their own goods made slowly and at greater cost are driven out of the market, and the metamorphosis begins which ends in turning fairly happy barbarians into very miserable half-civilized people surrounded by a fringe of exploiters and middle-men varied in nation but of one religion `Take care of number one'. Well, you may say "we are really sorry for them but we must sell our goods somewhere or we shouldn't get work and therefore we shouldn't be able to live." Truly if you don't raise your own victuals you must make something which people will take in exchange for victuals: but wait a bit we haven't done with this cheapness, the sword of commerce, yet; and the case of our workers at home as far as their conquest by the capitalists is concerned is much nearer to that of the Arab or Zulu or South Sea islander than seems at first. You also British workmen are forced by cheapness into a certain manner of life: for look you, the capitalist must needs sell as cheap as he can or as I said he succumbs; a fraction of a penny more of price in a yard or a pound will ruin him, will land a district in a crisis: now in order to turn out goods at their cheapest he must have the newest and best machinery and the most perfect organization in his great machine, the factory; and he must make himself as independent as he can of that part of his machinery which gets hungry twice or thrice every 24 hours; skilled work must get less and less necessary to him; women and children and labourers must replace the skilled workman: in short he must by all means reduce the expense of his wages, as compared with his other expenses. As you know his capital, the money which breeds money for him is expended first in raw material, machinery, rent, and the like and secondly in the labour or power of labour supplied by the bodies and minds of working people; I don't know whether I need tell you that the first part of this capital is always increasing at the expense of the latter half as manufacture gets more complex and capital rolls up into bigger balls, but so it is: and all this time the war goes on, and the capitalist has to provide for sudden emergencies of great bursts of trade and for that end must have ready to his hand more power of labour, men, women, and children that is, than can be employed in average times, let alone bad times; if he had not when the big orders came he would be out of the game which would be played out by his foreign competitors: for here I will say once for all that besides the war between the capitalists of our community there is also a constant war going on between country and country which sometimes takes the shot and gunpowder form: for please to understand that all wars now waged have at bottom a commercial cause: nor forget that in this struggle of nations for commercial supremacy natural circumstances and historic also complicate matters: for instance in some nations the workers are much thriftier than in others, or say can for various reasons live upon less, a circumstance much to the benefit of the capitalists of that nation because it gives them an advantage in the race for cheapness, but not at all for the workers who have their wages lowered and their hours lengthened exactly in proportion to their thriftiness and industry.

Well now I have been trying to show you how hard and consequently wasteful the battle is between the employers for their share of profit; and this battle they are able to keep up because there is another one going on between the workmen for their share of wages, of livelihood: and these things I have just been mentioning: the proportionate increase of plant and machinery as compared with wages; the increased productiveness of the unskilled labourer; the increased frequency of crises in trade, its increased precariousness, the huge reserve [of labourers] and lastly the continuous development of foreign countries containing populations hardy, industrious, and thrifty, combined with the international character of capital which will seek for employment wherever it can best be found all these things the civilized world over and especially among ourselves have made the competition of the workmen keener and bitterer than ever.

Now you may say is it not the office of Trades Unions and strikes or threats of strikes to deal with this competition and modify it in the interest of the workers? In answer I cheerfully admit that Trades Unions and strikes have done much in this direction; but that was under different conditions to those now existing: Let us look at the matter, it is pretty simple: England has been especially the country of Trades Unions, and why? Because she had some forty years ago and up to some 10 years ago the decided pre-eminence in trade, a pre-eminence unchallenged: that means that the capitalists were making large profits, and sooner than lose them or lose a month of them they would give way and consent to the terms of the workman: whereby the standard of life was raised for a certain part of the workers, notably for the factory hands: which they have not yet lost: but that is now a thing of the past: large profits are no longer made: if capitalists get rich it is because of the great aggregation of money and the great scale of the dealings; there is no longer a margin to give up to the demands of the workmen: the Trade Union revolt which in England has been during the years of prosperity the expression of that contest of classes which has existed all through the Commercial period has come to an end defeated by its own success: as all attacks of the workmen on capital must in the long run be defeated that are not international in their character.

For do not deceive yourselves: the Depression in Trade in this country is not accidental or transitory, nor is its cause hard to find: the overweening hopes of our capitalists 30 years ago were founded on the assumption that England was to be for ever the one serious manufacturing country in the world, supplying all other countries with manufactured goods and receiving from them raw materials for the non-human machines and food for the human ones to be constantly worked up into fresh goods: the market was to be unlimited, the expansion of production unchecked; changes had happened in the constitution of society before but could never happen again: the heaven of the well-to-do middle class was realized here in England.

You cannot need to be told at length how that hope has been deceived? a hope I will frankly say as base as any set of men ever held: other nations have as I said developed their resources for production, and England has to contend with them in the world-market on something like equal terms, to the terror of the more foreseeing of our rich middle-class, we are howling for fresh markets through the trumpet of patriotism, and are trying to persuade themselves that Australia and Canada will consider themselves one country with each other and with England so as to give weight to any attempts at Burglary which it may be convenient for us to make.

I cannot express better the desperate condition of those who see nothing before us but ever fresh development of our capitalist system than by quoting the words of the great Socialist economist F[rederick] Engels from the March [1885] number of the Commonweal: "Here is the vulnerable place, the heel of Achilles for capitalist production: its very basis is the necessity for constant expansion, and this constant expansion is now become impossible. It ends in a deadlock; every year England is brought nearer face to face with the question; either the country must go to pieces, or capitalist production must: which is it to be?"

Which indeed, for my part I think England, meaning by that much abused word the men and women of this community instinct with all the history of their fathers who have gone before them, will before long find out what the whole trick means and will refuse to sacrifice themselves to so base an end as the upholding of the idleness of the non-producers.

For it is of the nature of a system founded on mere war, which is always destructive, to wear itself out, to perish through its own endeavours to keep itself alive; and there are signs of this approaching end visible not only in England but all over the civilized world: I say the commercial system itself will kill itself: for instance, it could never have reached its present state of perfection in the organization of labour for the purpose of making a profit out of it without bringing the workers together in great masses, and making them feel that they are a class with interests of their own as a class: the necessities of capitalism have consolidated the workers and so fashioned a force which will do away with capitalism itself by taking its place; furthermore its necessities have compelled it to the invention of almost automatic machines which, though they are now wasted on the grinding of profits for individuals, will when the worker-class, the proletariat, is full-grown by the instrument which will make Socialism possible by making possible the equalization of labour as applied to the necessities of life, and will thereby leave open to men the higher field of intellectual effort full of opportunities for individual excellence and generous emulation. And this indeed it is on which the hopes of all reasonable revolutionists are founded; the certainty, for it is no less, that the process of evolution is building up with one hand while it pulls down with the other, so that revolution does always mean reconstruction.

It is this reconstruction which Socialism aims at, which we believe firmly is coming either with our help or without it. I have hinted at the present constitution of society - it is composed of two classes propertied-non-producers, and propertyless producers; and its motive power towards industrial production is competition or the struggle of each individual to get more than his share of what is produced, that is to say to advance himself at the expense of his neighbour: to put the matter shortly I should say of modern society that its aim is robbery and its instrument is war.

That is the firm believe of us Socialists: are you astonished that a body of men who hold that belief should turn their thoughts toward revolution, which as I have told you implies reconstruction? Will you blame them since this is their belief that they find themselves compelled to work actively towards a change in the basis of that society which they believe is founded on robbery and war? will you find it strange that they are willing to sacrifice their ease, their time, their money, their lives in short for that hope of revolution which shines before them like a candle in the dark. You must I am sure say no to all these questions.

And further remember how practical this question is: it is no matter of abstract rights, of speculative belief, of titles, of imaginary possession of things which do not exist: it might perhaps gall me sometimes that I were unable to vote on a question which [I] could understand as well as other people; but after all I could if I felt strongly about a subject find some other way of making my opinion felt besides voting for a member of parliament: it might annoy me to be scolded and denied access to heaven because I can't believe the literal truth of certain legends and historical documents; but I could live well and do my duty in spite of scolding and curses: and lastly I might in moments of ill temper resent being called plain Mister, while people no better than myself are called my lord, your grace, or your majesty; yet if that were all it doesn't matter, so long as I am as well educated as my lord is, and can satisfy all my reasonable requirements bodily and mental. But it is another matter if I am really of a different class: if I have no leisure which my lord has too much, if he is refined and I am degraded; if whatever my chances of heaven may be earth at any rate is to be a hell for me: if though I have a vote I tremble lest I may lack bread for myself and my children. I say then it is quite another matter, and I must see to it myself and try to amend the state of things, or brand myself as a helpless slave.

In short what I want you to understand is that it is not as some people think, and as some people who know better say, that Socialists envy rich men because they are rich and live in enjoyment: if a man could be rich and do no harm with his riches it wouldn't matter: nay even if he had stolen his riches once for all we could put up with it and pass him by with no more active feeling than contempt: but unhappily riches always do do harm because they go on stealing day by day: riches on one side imply poverty on the other: the rich man has taken from the poor, and daily takes from him in order to be rich; what he gains we lose: therefore he is our enemy and cannot help being so in spite of any personal good will he has towards us or some of us; nor while the present system lasts can we relieve him of his false position: the rich man like the King never dies; another takes his place at once, and we can only change the tyrant and not the tyranny as long as the system of capital and wages lasts: it is the class, understand, that is our enemy and not the individual; although most unhappily these class divisions do create and cannot help creating vices in the individuals composing them which we cannot help noticing.

This class division therefore is what Socialism attacks; and mind you the individuals of the rich class will not really suffer for its realization; we don't want to ruin and render unhappy a group amongst this class, though to my mind some of the semi-socialistic remedies now proposed would have that effect: what we want is that the rich, who as things go now are not necessarily happy should melt into the great community of labour and take their fair chance of happiness which Socialism would ensure to everyone: could they possibly complain of this as an injustice?

'Tis said that a man named Saul of Tarsus once said `If a man will not work neither should he eat.' This saying has been preserved in a book considered holy by many, and it will do to start with as a motto for Socialism: only you must remember that there is work and work; some work is destructive, other, and if you will believe me a great deal, useless: now you know saying that work is destructive or useless is another way of saying that nature won't reward such work: and if nature won't neither can we: the man who works uselessly must be fed, clothed, and housed by others who are working usefully: so we will extent Saul of Tarsus' motto and say `If a man will not work usefully neither should he eat.' Because in that case he can only live by stealing the wealth produced by others.

So you see what we socialists want to bring about is a state of society in which as all must consume wealth so all shall produce wealth: that I am sure cannot seem unreasonable to you, and it is only by carrying out this principle that we can avoid the Depression of Trade into the causes of which Lord Salisbury and his mates are going to enquire so diligently and - I hope - so successfully. Nevertheless reasonable as that proposition is, it will usually be considered a dangerous one, as indeed it is, since all reason must be dangerous to a Society founded on an unreasonable basis: and I freely admit that the realization of this Socialist hope can only be brought about by a change in the basis of society. Dangerous as it is it is surely a fair proposition, and mind it is the only condition of things under which we can have peace: because clearly men in general will only work for their own advantage unless they are compelled to work by other men: therefore it is that under the Commercial system constant war is necessary to keep the machine going: a war in which even quakers are compelled to take a part. But in a condition of things where all produce as all consume peace is possible, and war would at least be the exception and not the rule and only in a condition of peace can we make the most of the gifts of nature, instead of wasting them as we do now.

Now what must we do in order to realize this condition of things, a steady flow of wealth resulting from the labour of each and all, in the advantages of which each and all should share? We have been competing, we must combine - that is the revolution: we have been making war with each other: we must make peace - that is the revolution.

The labour of every man properly directed and helped by the inventions of centuries will more than supply him and his family not yet come to working age, or past it with all the necessaries of life: it is on this undeniable fact that all industrial society is based: and yet you see in all civilized countries a vast proportion of the population supplied with nothing more than the barest necessaries of life, and all except a few comparatively supplied with little more than those necessaries: as long as this lasts you cannot have peace: nay you ought not to: peace under such circumstances means the denial of the very nature of man, for it means unhappiness for most men, and all men must of their very nature strive for happiness.

Therefore when I bid you combine I know well that the first act of combination must be that of a class, when I bid you make peace I know that the first peace made must be between the individuals and the groups of a class; and that that combination and that [peace] will seem to many people like the beginning of war and not the ending of it as it really will be.

I say I bid you to class combination - but what class: the class of labour all over the world, the class which is the only necessary element of Society: if that class combines and combines for justice and reason, and for nothing else can it combine, who can resist it? The monopolists who now live on the labour of the rest of mankind could never have sustained their position by their own mere force: Divide to Govern has been their rule: they have always by means of the instinctive cunning of an organism resisting destruction pitted one section of the workers against another, and so have held on precariously, depending always on the continued ignorance of those that they ruled over.

But the time for the end of this ignorance is drawing near: the workers have seen the wonderful effects of combination in increasing the productivity of labour, it remains for them only to shake off a few superstitions about the necessity of their retaining masters of a higher class of beings than themselves, and then they, the workers, will stand out as what they are - society itself - the old masters of society will also be recognized as what they are, mere useless hangers-on and clogs to life and the progress of humanity: and what will they, what can they do then to uphold their separate existence as a class? It is possible that they may attempt resistance to the inevitable and by no means hard fate of their forming a part, on terms of absolute equality, of a happy and mutually helpful community; but remember if they do they can only do so as supporters of a conscious injustice; and when it comes to that and they feel the conscience of the world against them, it will avail them little that they have the resources of civilization on their side; arms, armies, and long-standing organization will turn to nothing in their hands before the irresistible force of opinion, and the last act of the revolution which is now preparing will have come.

Even now that opinion is growing and gathering: you shall hardly meet a thoughtful and unprejudiced man who will not accept the indictment which we socialists bring against society as it now exists: how prodigious the change of opinion is from what it has been some of you are scarce old enough to know: but I have lived through and noted the most degrading epoch of public opinion that ever happened in England and have seen the triumphant rule of the swindler in private and public life, the rule of hypocrisy and so-called respectability begin to shake and totter; I can see the existence of the miserable millions of the poor forcing itself on the conscience and fears of the rich, and I know that the song of triumph of almighty Commerce over the perfection of a civilization in which so many thousands of men of the same blood as ourselves live a life of mere starvation and hopelessness has even in the last few years sunk quavering into a trembling silence and a hope that it will last our time at least.

Yet Friends, it is no time to be sluggish and hope to let the last dregs of the old system trickle out of themselves: true the change is inevitable: true the old political parties are breaking up and are striking out wildly on the empty air: yet all we who are thoughtful and kindly and orderly have a part to play, lest mere violence and disorder be the only remedy for hypocrisy and tyranny: the new order of things has to grow up from the disrupted elements of the old, and every reasonable man's help will be needed that we may get out of the troubled waters speedily and with as little suffering to humanity as may be: therefore I call upon you all to look into these matters and judge of them without fear or favour, in the firm belief that when you have once learned and understood what the present system of Society is, and have considered what the power of man in dealing with nature for his benefit may be you, the intelligence of labour, must one and all become Socialists and revolutionists: and then I repeat who and what can resist you: you will see to it that every man in this vast community shall have a fair chance [of] gaining ease and happiness, which, believe me is the birthright of every man, only to be taken from him as long as men are blinded by tyranny and slavery.

THE MANIFESTO OF THE SOCIALIST LEAGUE

WILLIAM MORRIS

Fellow Citizens,

We come before you as a body advocating the principles of Revolutionary International Socialism; that is, we seek a change in the basis of Society - a change which would destroy the distinctions of classes and nationalities.

As the civilised world is at present constituted, there are two classes of Society - the one possessing wealth and the instruments of its production, the other producing wealth by means of those instruments but only by the leave and for the use of the possessing classes.

These two classes are necessarily in antagonism to one another. The possessing class, or non-producers, can only live as a class on the unpaid labour of the producers - the more unpaid labour they can wring out of them, the richer they will be; therefore the producing class - the workers - are driven to strive to better themselves at the expense of the possessing class, and the conflict between the two is ceaseless. Sometimes it takes the form of open rebellion, sometimes of strikes, sometimes of mere widespread mendicancy and crime; but it is always going on in one form or other, though it may not always be obvious to the thoughtless looker-on.

We have spoken of unpaid labour: it is necessary to explain what that means. The sole possession of the producing class is the power of labour inherent in their bodies; but since, as we have already said, the richer classes possess all the instruments of labour, that is, the land, capital, and machinery, the producers or workers are forced to sell their sole possession, the power of labour, on such terms as the possessing class will grant them.

These terms are, that after they have produced enough to keep them in working order, and enable them to beget children to take their places when they are worn out, the surplus of their products shall belong to the possessors of property, which bargain is based on the fact that every man working in a civilised community can produce more than he needs for his own sustenance.

This relation of the possessing class to the working class is the essential basis of the system of producing for a profit, on which our modern Society is founded. The way in which it works is as follows. The manufacturer produces to sell at a profit to the broker or factor, who in his turn makes a profit out of his dealings with the merchant, who again sells for a profit to the retailer, who must make his profit out of the general public, aided by various degrees of fraud and adulteration and the ignorance of the value and quality of goods to which this system has reduced the consumer.

The profit-grinding system is maintained by competition, or veiled war, not only between the conflicting classes, but also within the classes themselves: there is always war among the workers for bare subsistence, and among their masters, the employers and middle-men, for the share of the profit wrung out of the workers; lastly, there is competition always, and sometimes open war, among the nations of the civilised world for their share of the world-market. For now, indeed, all the rivalries of nations have been reduced to this one - a degraded struggle for their share of the spoils of barbarous countries to be used at home forthe purpose of increasing the riches of the rich and the poverty of the poor.

For, owing to the fact that goods are made primarily to sell, and only secondarily for use, labour is wasted on all hands; since the pursuit of profit compels the manufacturer competing with his fellows to force his wares on the markets by means of their cheapness, whether there is any real demand for them or not. In the words of the Communist manifesto of 1847:-

"Cheap goods are the artillery for battering down Chinese walls and for overcoming the obstinate hatred entertained against foreigners by semi-civilised nations: under penalty of ruin the Bourgeoisie compel by competition the universal adoption of their system of production; they force all nations to accept what is called civilisation - to become Bourgeois - and thus the middle-class shapes the world after its own image."

Moreover, the whole method of distribution under this system is full of waste; for it employs whole armies of clerks, travellers, shopmen, advertisers, and what not, merely for the sake of shifting money from one person's pocket to another's; and this waste in production and waste in distribution, added to the maintenance of the useless lives of the possessing and non-producing class, must all be paid for out of the products of the workers, and is a ceaseless burden on their lives.

Therefore the necessary results of this so-called civilisation are only too obvious in the lives of its slaves, the working-class - in the anxiety and want of leisure amidst which they toil, in the squalor and wretchedness of those parts of our great towns where they dwell; in the degradation of their bodies, their wretched health, and the shortness of their lives; in the terrible brutality so common among them, and which is indeed but the reflection of the cynical selfishness found among the well-to-do classes, a brutality as hideous as the other; and lastly, in the crowd of criminals who are as much manufactures of our commercial system as the cheap and nasty wares which are made at once for the consumption and the enslavement of the poor.

What remedy, then, do we propose for this failure of our civilisation, which is now admitted by almost all thoughtful people?

We have already shown that the workers, although they produce all the wealth of society, have no control over its production or distribution: the people, who are the only really organic part of society, are treated as a mere appendage to capital - as a part of its machinery. This must be altered from the foundation: the land, the capital, the machinery, factories, workshops, stores, means of transit, mines, banking, all means of production and distribution of wealth, must be declared and treated as the common property of all. Every man will then receive the full value of his labour, without deduction for the profit of a master, and as all will have to work, and the waste now incurred by the pursuit of profit will be at an end, the amount of labour necessary for every individual to perform in order to carry on the essential work of the world will be reduced to something like two or three hours daily; so that every one will have abundant leisure for following intellectual or other pursuits congenial to his nature.

This change in the method of production and distribution would enable every one to live decently, and free from the sordid anxieties for daily livelihood which at present weigh so heavily on the greatest part of mankind.

But, moreover, men's social and moral relations would be seriously modified by this gain of economical freedom, and by the collapse of the superstitions, moral and other, which necessarily accompany a state of economical slavery: the test of duty would now rest on the fulfilment of clear and well-defined obligations to the community rather than on the moulding of the individual character and actions to some preconceived standard outside social responsibilities.

Our modern bourgeois property-marriage, maintained as it is by its necessary complement, universal venal prostitution, would give place to kindly and human relations between the sexes.

Education freed from the trammels of commercialism on the one hand and superstition on the other, would become a reasonable drawing out of men's varied faculties in order to fit them for a life of social intercourse and happiness; for mere work would no longer be proposed as the end of life, but happiness for each and all.

Only be such fundamental changes in the life of man, only by the transformation of Civilisation into Socialism, can those miseries of the world before mentioned be amended.

As to mere politics, Absolutism, Constitutionalism, Republicanism, have all been tried in our day and under our present social system, and all have alike failed in dealing with the real evils of life.

Nor, on the other hand, will certain incomplete schemes of social reform now before the public solve the question.

Co-operation so-called - that is, competitive co-operation for profit - would merely increase the number of small joint-stock capitalists, under the mask of creating an aristocracy of labour, while it would intensify the severity of labour by its temptations to overwork.

Nationalisation of the land alone, which many earnest and sincere persons are now preaching, would be useless so long as labour was subject to the fleecing of surplus value inevitable under the Capitalist system.

No better solution would be that of State Socialism, by whatever name it may be called, whose aim it would be to make concessions to the working class while leaving the present system of capital and wages still in operation: no number of merely administrative changes, until the workers are in possession of all political power, would make any real approach to Socialism.

The Socialist League therefore aims at the realisation of complete Revolutionary Socialism, and well knows that this can never happen in any one country without the help of the workers of all civilisation. For us neither geographical boundaries, political history, race, nor creed makes rivals or enemies; for us there are no nations, but only varied masses of workers and friends, whose mutual sympathies are checked or perverted by groups of masters and fleecers whose interest it is to stir up rivalries and hatreds between the dwellers in different lands.

It is clear that for all these oppressed and cheated masses of workers and their masters agreat change is preparing: the dominant classes are uneasy, anxious, touched in conscience even, as to the condition of those they govern; the markets of the world are being competed for with an eagerness never before known; everything points to the fact that the great commercial system is becoming unmanageable, and is slipping from the grasp of its present rulers.

The one change possible out of all this is Socialism. As chattel-slavery passed into serfdom, and serfdom into the so-called free-labour system, so most surely will this latter pass into social order.

To the realisation of this change the Socialist League addresses itself with all earnestness. As a means thereto it will do all in its power towards the education of the people in the principles of this great cause, and will strive to organise those who will accept this education, so that when the crisis comes, which the march of events is preparing, there may be a body of men ready to step into their due places and deal with and direct the irresistible movement.

Close fellowship with each other, and steady purpose for the advancement of the Cause, will naturally bring about the organisation and discipline amongst ourselves absolutely necessary to success; but we shall look to it that there shall be no distinctions of rank or dignity amongst us to give opportunities for the selfish ambition of leadership which has so often injured the cause of the workers. We are working for equality and brotherhood for all the world, and it is only through equality and brotherhood that we can make our work effective.

Let us all strive, then, towards this end of realising the change towards social order, the only cause worthy the attention of the workers of all that are proffered to them: let us work in that cause patiently, yet hopefully, and not shrink from making sacrifices to it. Industry in learning its principles, industry in teaching them, are most necessary to our progress; but to these we must add, if we wish to avoid speedy failure, frankness and fraternal trust in each other, and single-hearted devotion to the religion of Socialism, the only religion which the Socialist League professes.

THE POLICY OF ABSTENTION

William Morris

The Policy of Abstention is taken from the manuscript of a lecture titled 'The Policy of Abstention from Parliamentary Action' first given by Morris at a meeting of the Hammersmith Branch of the Socialist League at Kelmscott House, Hammersmith on July 30th 1887. It was given on at least one other occasion at a meeting of the Clerkenwell (Central) Branch of the Socialist League at the Socialist League Hall, 13 Farringdon Street on the 24th August 1887.

It was first published in William Morris : Artist, Writer, Socialist edited by May Morris, Oxford, 1936. It was reprinted in Reform and Revolution edited by Stephen Coleman, Thoemmes Press Bristol, 1996.

All Socialists who can be considered to have any claim to that title agree in putting forward the necessity of transforming the means of production from individual into common property : that is the least that the party can accept as terms of peace with the capitalists; and obviously they are hard terms of peace for the latter, since they mean the destruction of individualist capital. This minimum which we claim therefore is a very big thing : its realization would bring about such a revolution as the world has not yet seen, and all minor reforms of civilization which have been thought of or would be possible to think of would be included in it : no political party has ever had a programme at once so definite and so inclusive : many Socialists would be satisfied if the party were to put forward nothing save this claim; and if there were no party which put forward anything else I think all Socialists would feel themselves bound to support the party that had this platform to the utmost : but the shadow of the stupendous revolution which the abolition of private property in the means of production would bring about is cast upon our present opinions and policy. We cannot help speculating on what would be the consequences of the change, and how it would affect what would be left of our civilization, not only as to the production of wealth, but also as to religion, morals, the relation between the sexes, the methods of government or administration, and in short the whole of social life : of most of these matters I shall say nothing further in this paper, but will only briefly allude to matters directly connected with industrial production, and the administration of affairs.

Now amongst Socialists there are some who think that the abolition of private property in the means of production only would bring about a stable condition of society which would carry out communism no further, that the product of labour working on raw material and aided by instruments which were common property, should not be common, but would be the prize of energy, industry, and talent : 'to each one according to his deeds.' In case there are any non-Socialists in the room, I may point out that this condition of things would be quite different from the present one, under which people can live idle and force others to work for them if they chance to be possessed of a share in the monopoly of the means of production, which is the privilege of their class; if it could be carried out and maintained without artificial bolstering up, it would be that real 'career open to talent' which Napoleon ignorantly supposed his bourgeois Caesarism was to sustain : but some of us suppose that without such artificial bolstering up it would lead us back again into a new form of class society; that those who developed the greatest share of certain qualities not necessarily the most useful to the community, would gain a superior position from which they would be able to force the less gifted to serve them. And in fact those who limit the revolution of Socialism to the abolition of private property merely in the means of production do contemplate a society in which production shall be in tutelage to the state; in which the centralized state would draw arbitrarily the line where public property ends and private property begins, would interfere with inheritance and with the accumulation of wealth, and in many ways would act as a master, and take the place of the old masters : acting with benevolent intention indeed, but with conscious artificiality and by means of the employment of obvious force which would be felt everywhere and would sometimes at least be evaded or even resisted, and so at last might even bring on a new revolution which might lead us backward for a while, or might carry us forward into a condition of true Communism according to the ripeness or unripeness of the State Socialist revolution : in short to some of us it seems as if this view of Socialism simply indicates the crystallization of what can only be a transitional condition of society, and cannot in itself be stable : we on the other hand consider the aim of Socialism to be equality of condition : since the production of wares and the service of the community must always be a matter of co-operation; you cannot, if it were desirable, find out what each man's 'deeds' are; and if you could, we see no reason for setting up a higher standard of livelihood for A because he can turn out more work than B, while the needs of the two are just the same : if society is to be of use to B, it must defend him against the tyranny of nature; and if instead of defending him against nature it turns round and helps her to punish poor B for not being born of the same capacity of developing muscle as A, society is a traitor to B, and he if he be a man of any spirit will be rebel against it. We Communists therefore say that it is not possible really to proportion the reward to the labour, and that if you were able to do so you would still have to redress by charity the wrongs of the weak against the strong, you would still not be able to avoid a poor-law : the due exercise of one's energies for the common good and capacity for personal use we say form the only claims to the possession of wealth, and this right of property, the only safeguard against the creation of fresh privilege, which would have to be abolished like the old privilege. All this is admitted by many who will not call themselves Communists, because they do not wish anything to be put before people at present except the transitional state of things : and many of us Communists for our part are willing to admit that the communization of the means of production will inevitably lead to the communization of the products of labour also, and that, as I began by saying, it is a programme sufficiently big to put before the people of our generation, and the consequences of its realization can for the present be left to take care of themselves. So you see there is hardly a question at issue on this point between the Socialists and the Communists. I will therefore assume in this paper that the immediate object of Socialists is the transformation of the raw material and the instruments of labour from private into common property, and then go on to inquire what are the means by which that object can be carried out. I would not have spoken as to the different opinions about the aims of Socialism if I had not felt that those opinions, as I have said elsewhere, would be likely to influence people's views as to the means of its realization. The opinions as to the means are not quite conterminous with the two schools of so-called Socialists and Communists, but they are nearly so, and naturally, since the former are prepared to accept as a necessity a central all-powerful authoritative government, a reformed edition, one may, say, of the state government at present existing; whereas the Communists, though they are not clear as to what will take the place of that in the meanwhile, are at least clear that when the habit of social life is established, nothing of the kind of authoritative central government will be needed or endured.

The moderate Socialists or those who can see nothing but the transitional period therefore, believe in what may be called a system of cumulative reforms as the means towards the end; which reforms must be carried out by means of Parliament and a bourgeois executive, the only legal power at present existing, while the Communists believe that it would be waste of time for the Socialists to expend their energy in furthering reforms which so far from bringing us nearer to Socialism would rather serve to bolster up the present state of things; and not believing in the efficacy of reforms, they can see no reason for attempting to use Parliament in any way; except perhaps by holding it up as an example to show what a contemptible thing a body can be which poses as the representative of a whole nation, and which really represents nothing but the firm determination of the privileged or monopolist class to stick to their privilege and monopoly till they are forced to relinquish it.

Well there are, it seems, two policies before us, which, if you will allow me, I will call for short the Policy of Parliamentary Action, and the Policy of Abstention. But before I go further I must say that though the question as to which of the two policies is to be adopted in the long run is doubtless a most interesting one, yet that at present there is only one policy open to us, that of preaching Socialism to as many people as we can get at. This no doubt seems to many a dull job, offering no rewards to any of us in the way of notoriety or position : but after all it is the way which all new creeds have to go on, and if we neglect it in our haste or impatience, we shall never come to the point at which more definite action will be forced upon us.

Now as to these two policies I will not dwell on the first, not because I do not agree with it, as I do not, but because it has been put before you often enough and with copious enough arguments and advocacy : to convince the voters that they ought to send Socialists to Parliament who should try to get measures passed in the interests of the working-classes, and gradually transform the present Parliament, which is a mere instrument in the hands of the monopolizers of the means of production, into a body which should destroy monopoly, and then direct and administer the freed labour of the community. That is I think a correct statement of the views of those who further the policy of parliamentary action.

Such a scheme or plan of campaign will sound practical and reasonable to many, or to most if you will : and although it is right, in considering any scheme, to consider the drawbacks to it, yet even when we admit that those drawbacks exist, we do not necessarily condemn the scheme : so I will not at present say anything about the drawbacks which after all must be patent to those even who think the policy a good and necessary one. Indeed if no other plan of campaign were possible for the attack on monopoly, we should have to accept all drawbacks, stifle all doubts and carry it out with all our might. But there is another plan of campaign possible which I must lay before you at rather greater length under the nick-name, as I said, of the Policy of Abstention.

This plan is founded on the necessity of making the class-struggle clear to the workers, of pointing out to them that while monopoly exists they can only exist as its slaves : so that the Parliament and all other institutions at present existing are maintained for the purpose of upholding this slavery; that their wages are but slaves' rations, and if they were increased tenfold would be nothing more : that while the bourgeois rule lasts they can indeed take part in it, but only on the terms that they shall do nothing to attack the grand edifice of which their slavery is the foundation. Nay more than that : that they are asked to vote and send representatives to Parliament ( if 'working-men' so much the better ) that they may point out what concessions may be necessary for the ruling class to make in order that the slavery of the workers may last on : in a word that to vote for the continuance of their own slavery is all the parliamentary action that they will be allowed to take under the present regime : Liberal Associations, Radical clubs, working men members are at present, and Socialist members will be in the future, looked on with complacency by the governing classes as serving towards the end of propping the stability of robber society in the safest and least troublesome manner by beguiling them to take part in their own government. A great invention, and well worthy of the reputation of the Briton for practicality -- and swindling ! How much better than the coarse old-world iron repression of that blunderer Bismark, which at once irritates and consolidates the working-men, and depends for its temporary success even on the absence of such accidents as a sudden commercial crisis or a defeat of the German army.

The Policy of Abstention then is founded on this view : that the interests of the two classes, the workers and the capitalists, are irreconcilable, and as long as the capitalists exist as a class, they having the monopoly of the means of production, have all the power of ordered and legal society; but on the other hand that the use of this power to keep down a wronged population, which feels itself wronged, and is organizing itself for illegal resistance when the opportunity shall serve, would impose such a burden on the governing classes as they will not be able to bear; and they must finally break down under it, and take one of two courses, either of them the birth of fear acting on the instinct to prolong and sustain their life which is essential in all organisms. One course would be to try the effect of wholesale concessions, or what seemed to be such in order to diminish the number of the discontented; and this course would be almost certain to have a partial success; but I feel sure not so great a success in delaying revolution, as it would have if taken with the expressed agreement of Socialist representatives in Parliament : in the latter case the concessions would be looked upon as a victory; whereas if they were the work of a hated government from which the people were standing aloof, they would be dreaded as a bait, and scorned as the last resource of a tyranny growing helpless. The other course which a government recognized as a mere tyranny would be driven to by a policy of abstention, would be stern repression of whatever seemed to be dangerous to it; that is to say of the opinions and aspirations of the working classes as a whole : for in England at least there would be no attempt to adopt this course until opinion was so grown and so organized that the danger to monopoly seemed imminent. In short the two courses are fraud and force, and doubtless in a commercial country like this the resources of fraud would be exhausted before the ruling class betook itself to open force.

Now I say that either of these courses will indicate a breakdown of the class government, and in my belief it would be driven to them more speedily by abstaining from rendering it any help in the form of pushing palliative measures in parliament, and thereby pointing out to it a way to stave off revolution; but it is a matter of course that this abstention which we put forward as a weapon to drive the ruling class to extremities must be backed up by widespread opinion, by the conviction in a vast number of persons that the basis of society must be changed, and labour set free by the abolition of monopoly in the means of production, which monopoly is at present the basis of our society. But of course the necessity for obtaining this body of opinion is not confined to those Socialists that advocate abstention from parliamentary action : the making of Socialists must be a preliminary to the settling of the question, What are Socialists to do ? Now it is clear that the first step towards this end is the putting forward of the principles of Socialism, preaching them as widely as possible; this is practically all that up to the present we have been able to do, and whatever success we have had in the undertaking ( people will have different opinions about that ) we have worked at it with very considerable energy. But it has been said that the mere preaching of principles, however much the acceptance of them may involve definite action in the future, is not enough; that you must offer your recruits something to do beyond merely swelling the army of preachers in one way or another. Well I agree with that, so far as this, that the time comes in such a movement as ours when it is ready to change from a mere intellectual movement into a movement of action, and that that time must be taken advantage of, and if there is no good plan of action ready the movement will certainly take up a bad one in default of none at all. The plan offered by some of our friends I have stated before as an attempt to get hold of Parliament by constitutional means in order to use it for unconstitutional purposes : that plan I think a bad one for reasons that I have hinted at already and shall try to state more fully and consecutively before I have done. Yet if the plan has its birth from anything more solid than impatience, and the weariness that is sure to beset a small minority preaching revolution, it is a hopeful sign that it should be put forward, and its being put forward in a manner compels us who do not agree with it to put forward some alternative to it, even though we think, as I confess I for one do, that all plans of action are at present premature.

Well, I have put forward one part of our plan, viz. a strict holding aloof from taking part in a government whose object is the maintenance of monopoly : you will say of course that is not action : but I say that it is, if combined as it is sure to be, with the resolute preaching of principles with a view to action when that becomes possible without sullying it by alliance with the very tyranny which we are leagued to destroy : it then becomes the foundation of that great instrument of attack on a majority of brute force known as 'the boycott.' For before we can begin to use that we must be bound together by the full consciousness that we are oppressed by a class who cannot help oppressing us and whose oppression we cannot help resisting. But again you may say before we can begin boycotting we must have numbers; how are they to be obtained otherwise than by interesting a large body of people in reforms which will have a plausible look of bettering their position ? That is a shrewd question, but I hope I can answer it satisfactorily. It will be our business to give a new turn to all the smouldering discontent of the workers and the perpetual struggle of labour against capital which is now feebly and incompletely organized by the Trades Unions. Those bodies, which grew into power at a time when the principle of capitalism was not attacked, can until they are radically altered only deal with its accidental abuses; and they have also the essential quality of being benefit societies, which would be all very well if they denied the rights of capital altogether and were complete fighting bodies; because the benefit society business would then mean just the army chest; but at present when the rights of capital are admitted and all that is claimed is a proportional share in the profits, it means a kind of relief to the employers, an additional poor-rate levied from the workers. As things now go the position of the Trades Unions, as anything but benefit societies, has become an impossible one; the long and short of what they say to the masters is this : We are not going to interfere with your management of our affairs except so far as we can reduce your salary as our managers. We acknowledge that we are machines and that you are the hands that guide us; but we will pay as little as we can help for your guidance and fight you on that point. Well the masters can and do reply : My friends, you are making an end not of our profits only but of our function of guidance, and since you are, as you admit, our machines, when our guidance is gone, gone also is your livelihood. No, we know your interests better than you do yourselves, and shall resist your feeble attempts to reduce our salaries; and since we organize your labour and the market of the world which it supplies, we shall manage your wages amongst other matters.

Now that's the blind alley which the Trades Unions have now got into : I say again if they are determined to have masters to manage their affairs, they must expect in turn to pay for that luxury. To go any further they must get out of that blind alley and into the open highway that leads to Socialism. They must aim at managing their own business, which is indeed the business of the world : remembering that the price they pay for their so-called captains of industry is no mere money-payment -- no mere tribute which once paid leaves them free to do as they please, but an authoritative ordering of the whole tenor of their lives, what they shall eat, drink, wear, what houses they shall have, books, or newspapers rather, they shall read, down to the very days on which they shall take their holidays like a drove of cattle driven out from the stable to grass.

Well, I say that the real business of us propagandists is to instil this aim of the workers becoming the masters of their own destinies, their own lives, and this can be effected when a sufficient number of them are convinced of the fact by the establishment of a vast labour organization -- the federation according to their crafts, if you will, of all the workmen who have awoke to the fact that they are the slaves of monopoly, and therefore being awaked, its rebels also; men who are convinced that the raw material and instruments of labour can only belong to those who can use them : let them announce that transformation of these things into common property as their programme, and look upon anything else they may have to do before they have conquered that programme, as so much necessary work by the way to enable them to live till they have marched to the great battlefield. Let them settle e.g. what wages are to be paid by their temporary managers, what number of hours it may be expedient to work; let them arrange for the filling of their military chest, the care of the sick, the unemployed, the dismissed : let them learn also how to administer their own affairs. Time and also power fails me to give any scheme for how all this could be done; but granting the formation of such a body I cannot help thinking that for the two last purposes they might make use of the so-called plan of co-operation.

If such a labour organization as I have been putting before you were set on foot, and it took root and grew, and spread as it would if things were ripe either for that or another form of preparation for action, what would be the condition of things in the country ? On the one hand the useful classes banded together for the purpose of a change in the basis of society which would acknowledge their usefulness and the usefulness of all others; which would abolish classes altogether; on the other hand a committee of the useless or monopolist class, authoritative because it holds the sway over the army, navy and police, but with no power of doing anything but launching that power of destruction at those who make all that is made, and so destroying their own livelihood along with that of their enemy; with no power of bribing them by concessions, because the popular party claim one thing only, the abolition of the class that on its side claims to rule. What could come out of the opposition of these two forces, the useful working society, and the useless class that claims nothing but to live on the former ? What could come of this opposition but destruction of the useless ? Could armed reaction triumph ? Certainly only for a while; that at the worst; but probably it would not even appear to conquer : there would be perhaps some feeble attempt at putting down the popular combination by force; but it would be half-hearted and would soon come to an end if that party were true to itself and felt its power in combination. What would be the use of the authoritative government making laws for people who denied its right, and felt it to be their duty to evade or resist them at every point ? Nothing would come of them, they would simply drop dead. And now mark that this movement, this force for the revolution that we all call for can only be fully evolved from this conscious opposition of the two powers, monopolist authority and free labour : everything that tends to mask that opposition, to confuse it, weakens the popular force, and gives a new lease of life to the reaction, which can indeed create nothing, can only hang on a while by favour of such drags on such weaknesses of the popular force. If our own people are forming part of parliament, the instruments of the enemy, they are helping to make the very laws we will not obey. Where is the enemy then ? What are we to do to attack him ? The enemy is a principle, you say : true, but the principle must be embodied; and how can it be better embodied than in that assembly delegated by the owners of monopoly to defend monopoly at all points ? to smooth away the difficulties of the monopolists even at the expense of apparent sacrifice of their interests 'to the amelioration of the lot of the working classes' ? to profess friendship with the so-called moderates ( as if there could be any moderation in dealing with a monopoly, anything but for or against ) ? in short to detach a portion of the people from the people's side, to have it in their midst helpless, dazed, wearied with ceaseless compromise, or certain defeat, and yet to put it before the world as the advanced guard of the revolutionary party, the representative of all that is active or practical of the popular party ?

This is the advantage not speculative but certain which sending Socialist members to Parliament would hand over to the reactionists : let us try rather, I say once more, to sustain a great body of workers outside Parliament, call it the labour parliament if you will, and when that is done be sure that its decrees will be obeyed and not those of the Westminster Committee. And whatever may be said of the possibility of such a plan in other countries, in Britain it is possible, because the mere political position of the workers is better here than elsewhere in Europe; even though there are countries in which the suffrage is more extended : the habit of democracy has gained sway over those persons and parties even who in feeling and aspiration are least democratic; and they cannot do what they would, so that any English government Tory as well as Liberal is hampered in its reactionary attempts and does not dare to attack the expression of opinion openly unless driven to despair; the Labour Combination I have been putting before you will not be openly attacked by its enemy the Parliament till it is too late, till it has done the first part of its work by instilling hope in the whole of the workers, the hope of their managing their own affairs and freeing themselves from Monopoly.

Now it will be said and of course truly that the advocates of parliamentary action amongst us are just as desirous of seeing this great labour organization established as we are : but in the first place I cannot help thinking that the scheme of parliament would be found in practice to stand in the way of the formation of that widespread organization with its singleness of aim and directness of action which it seems to me is what we want : that the effort towards success in parliament will swallow up all other effort, that such success in short will come to be looked upon as the end. However, you may say that this mistake can be guarded against and avoided; I am far from sure that it can be, but let that pass : the organization I am thinking of would have a serious point of difference from any that could be formed as a part of a parliamentary plan of action : its aim would be to act directly, whatever was done in it would be done by the people themselves; there would consequently be no possibility of compromise, of the association becoming anything else than it was intended to be; nothing could take its place : before all its members would be put but one alternative to complete success, complete failure, namely. Can as much be said for any plan involving the representatives of the people forming a part of a body whose purpose is the continuous enslavement of the people ?

I think I can explain better what is in my mind as to these two plans of action if I give a sketch of what I think would happen if either were adopted : only understand I don't mean to prophesy, only to try to draw out the logical consequences of that adoption. Take the policy of abstention first, and start from where we are now, the Socialist movement still in its intellectual stage : a stage at which only those who have thought about the matter see the necessity of placing society on a new basis; a time in which the necessity is not forced upon them by their immediate needs. While this lasts only those will join the movement with sincerity who have intelligence enough to accept principles and to forecast events from them; but they will form a solid body impossible to suppress or to be discouraged by hope deferred just for that reason; they will teach others, and be taught by the teaching; and as the approaching breakdown of the monopolist system comes closer conviction will be forced on the minds of more and more people, till at last the mere necessities of life will force the main part of the workers to join them; and they will find in them no mere aggregation of discontent, but a body of persons who can teach the aims of Socialism and consult coolly about its methods. They will then be grown into that powerful body I have spoken of, the representative of the society of production, the direct opposition to the society of exploitation which will be represented by the constitutional government, the laws it has made and supports and the organized brute force which it wields. The revolutionary body will find its duties divided into two parts, the maintenance of its people while things are advancing to the final struggle, and resistance to the constitutional authority, including the evasion or disregard of the arbitrary laws of the latter. Its chief weapons during this period will be co-operation and boycotting, the latter including all strikes that may be necessary : whether it will be driven to use further weapons depends on the attitude of the Reaction : that party will probably be paralysed before the steady advance of revolution, and will, as in France in the earlier revolution, use its mechanical brute-force in a wavering undecided half-hearted manner : it is by no means certain now, as it was in the Chartist times, that the threat of the imminence of a general strike would be the signal for the reaction to launch its army upon the people. Indeed supposing such a crisis at hand, the revolutionists might forestall the actual battle by using for once and for a definite purpose its enemy parliament by sending members to outvote the reactionists on that occasion : by doing which if they did not get actual command of the army &c. they would at least paralyse its action by making that action of doubtful legality : for though a revolutionist may fight well with a rope round his neck, such a necklace is an awkward adornment for your counter-revolutionist. I have nothing further to say of the revolutionists beyond this stage except that the long experience they would have had in their earlier stage of a labour organization, of administering the affairs of the real producers, and still more the experience of administration they would have spread during that period would make the Morrow of the Revolution a much easier time to them than it would be to a party that had not already learned to help itself. For the rest I should say that our friend Paul Lafargue's late article in Commonweal points out clearly enough the direction of the steps to be taken in the re-organization of society.

Now for a brief history of the plan of Parliamentary action : Starting from the same point as the abstentionists they have to preach an electioneering campaign as an absolute necessity, and to set about it as soon as possible : they will then have to put forward a programme of reforms deduced from the principles of Socialism, which we will admit they will always keep to the front as much as possible; they will necessarily have to appeal for support ( i.e. votes ) to a great number of people who are not convinced Socialists, and their programme of reforms will be the bait to catch these votes : and to the ordinary voter it will be this bait which will be the matter of interest, and not the principle for whose furtherance they will be intended to act as an instrument : when the voting recruit reads the manifesto of a parliamentary body, he will scarcely notice the statement of principles which heads it, but he will eagerly criticize the proposals of measures to be carried which he finds below it : and yet if he is to be honestly dealt with, he will have to be told that these measures are not put forward as a solution of the social question, but are -- in short, ground-bait for him so that he may be led at last to search into and accept the real principles of Socialism. So that it will be impossible to deal with him honestly, and the Socialist members when they get into Parliament will represent a heterogeneous body of opinion, ultra-radical, democratic, discontented non-politicals, rather than a body of Socialists; and it will be their opinions and prejudices that will sway the action of the members in Parliament. With these fetters on them the Socialist members will have to act, and whatever they propose will have to be a mere matter of compromise : yet even those measures they will not carry : because long before their party gets powerful enough to form even a formidable group for alliance with other parties, one section or other of ordinary politicians will dish them, and will carry measures that will pass current for being the very thing the Socialists have been asking for; because once get Socialist M.P.s, and to the ordinary public they will be the representatives of the only Socialists. Now the result of such a 'success' will be the necessity of a new Socialist programme on the one hand and on the other an accession of strength to the moderates; and this kind of thing will go on again and again with at least an appearance of defeat every time; and every time a temporary gain not for the Socialists but either for the reactionists or at least for the progressive Democratic party. Which latter ( always a weak and inefficient party in this country ) will be to a certain extent permeated with a kind of semi-Socialism, but will by that very fact lose many of their members to the 'moderate' reactionists on one hand, though on the other they will offer a recruiting ground for the Socialists. Well so it will go on till either the Socialist party in Parliament disappears into the advanced Democratic party, or until they look round and find that they, still Socialists, have done nothing but give various opportunities to the reactionists for widening the basis of monopoly by creating a fresh middle-class under the present one, and so staving off the day of the great change. And when they become conscious of that and parliamentary action has been discovered to be a failure, what can they do but begin all over again, and try to form the two camps, each of them conscious of their true position of being the one monopolists, and the other the slaves of monopoly.

Yet even supposing that they succeed and by means of tormenting the constitutional Parliament into cumulative reforms manage to bring us to the crisis of revolution, their difficulties would be far from an end then : for they would then would have to govern a people who had rather been ignorantly betrayed into Socialism than have learned to accept it as an understood necessity : and in governing such a people they would have this disadvantage, that they would not have the education which their helping in the organization of the society of production would have given them, teaching them as it were by the future and forming the habits of social life without which any scheme of Socialism is but the mill-wheel without the motive power. Their very success would lead to counter revolution; because they would have to repress the ignorance which they had not grappled with in their militant times, by brute force. Doubtless this counter revolution would lead us in the long run into a condition of true society again : but need we go through all that trouble, confusion and misery ? let us begin to work against the counter revolution, by being sure that we who call ourselves Socialists understand what we are aiming at, and should feel at home in our new country when we got there -- we and all that we lead into the new country.

But I will say no more at present against that parliamentary action, which some of our friends think the step now necessary to the furtherance of Socialism, but will rather try to sum up what I have had to say in favour of the plan of abstention from that action. It is above all things necessary that the working-classes should feel their present position, that they understand that they are in an inferior position not accidentally but as a necessary consequence of the position of the classes that live by monopoly. When they have learnt this lesson they will learn with it the necessity for a change in the basis of society : they are strong enough if they combine duly to bring that change about; but their due combination depends on their knowing that from the present rulers of society they will get nothing but concessions intended to perpetuate their present slavery : they must know they are invited to vote and take some part in government in order that they may help their rulers to find out what must be conceded, and what may be refused to the workers; and to give an appearance of freedom of action to them. But the workers can form an organization which without heeding Parliament can force from the rulers what concessions may be necessary in the present and whose aim would be the total abolition of the monopolist classes and rule. The action such an organization would be compelled to take would educate its members in administration, so that on the morrow of the revolution they would be able, from a thorough knowledge of the wants and capabilities of the workers, to carry on affairs with the least possible amount of blunders, and would do almost nothing that would have to be undone, and thereby offer no opportunity to the counter revolution. This seems to me the direct way to the realization of Socialism, and therefore in the long run the shortest way. I admit that it will ask for qualities of patience, devotion and forgetfulness of self in its pioneers, but it is a commonplace to say that impatience, carelessness and egotism are hindrances to any cause, and have to be fought against; and if Socialism militant cannot reckon on enlisting persons who are somewhat above the average, and on staving off others who are a good deal below it, there is nothing to be done but to sit still and see what will happen. That however we shall not and cannot do; something we must do however fatalistic we may be : my hope is that what we shall do will show us to be Socialists in essence and in spirit even now when we cannot be Socialists economically.

THE PRESENT OUTLOOK IN POLITICS

WILLIAM MORRIS

It is good to review the state of political parties from time to time and to try to get an idea of what our relations as socialists are to the general mass of political opinion, whether we are advancing, or retro[gressing], or standing still: in fact we cannot help speculating on the influence ordinary parties may have upon our movement and in what direction they are pushing us as to tactics in carrying on that movement: there are dangers as well as hopes for us in the welter of political life so that it behooves us to look at the prospect with as clear eyes as we can lest we fall into traps. Perhaps however some of you may say that unless to the eyes of an electioneering agent the prospect is so clear that it doesn't need thinking about or looking into closely: but then there will be more than one set of people who will think this, and the prospect will be very different to the different sets of people. The Gladstonian Liberal e.g. thinks he can see quite clearly a speedy end of the present Tory Government, and his own hero in power again, carrying with a triumphant majority a home rule bill without a flaw: Ireland contented and prosperous: trade recovering in England, those tiresome, worrying, pertinacious Socialists shut up not by police attacks (unless on the sly) but by the good sense of the political working men who clearly understand that they are only sustained by Tory money, which by the [bye] accounts for their being so overburdened with the latter commodity; and in short the Great Liberal Party united or not settling down, Irish matters being arranged, to doing - I'm sure I don't know what - looking about them I suppose from the official benches. Then there are the Chamberlainites; they also have a vision of success it seems: limited however, as far as I can note it, to the keeping of Gladstone out of office till he is good enough to die, and meanwhile to have the noble reward of plenteous flattery from their Tory allies for their patriotism and freedom from faction. Again there are the definite Whigs belonging to the same party or semi-party, whose hopes are perhaps the clearest of all and the likeliest of fulfillment, for they hope and believe that parliament will do nothing at all in any direction whatever. Again there is the Irish parliamentary party who believe that they are within a measurable distance of a parliament (sham or otherwise) in Dublin. I wish I could hope that there were many of them who had any idea of what they can do in case they get the said parliament to utilize the steady heroism of the Irish people. Then there is the great Tory party who seem to be quite as clear that all is going on well with them as the Gladstonites are of the contrary, although to their confusion there is arising a Torier-than-Tory party among them who have taken down the old banner of protection from the dusty, mouldy, chaff-littered cock-loft where it has lain so many years, and for their parts also are very clear that it will lead them to victory.

It is clear that all these parties except the Irish are offering some bait to that part of the public which each one thinks is at once the most powerful, and the most easily influenced by their special dogma (if they have any). I say that this [is] clear because they are all of them so confident of success, or at least deem it politic to seem so. But of course the bait[s] offered by those parties which [have] any pretext to be considered as popular should be the clearest and biggest though I am not sure that they are. The Gladstonite party e.g. offers some relative extension of the franchise, in the hope that the new electors will vote for them, besides a half promise to disestablish the State Church as a bait to nonconformists. The Unionists offer some vague hope of progressive measures if they can succeed in keeping the Tories in office. The fair traders offer the working men higher and steadier wages; nay the very Tories throw out hints about dishing the Liberals with more Liberal measures in order to catch votes from the working men discontented with the party they have mostly supported; and on the look-out for some opportunity of bettering themselves and serving-out their misleaders at one and the same time.

Of course this has always been more or less the state of things in a country nominally governed by a party majority in Parliament; so far there is nothing much to differentiate the present condition of parties from other times; all the more since though there is an extra number of groups, there are still as regards the game of Ins and Outs but two parties; the Salisbury Tories and the Gladstone Liberals: the group of blended Whigs and Chamberlainites that call themselves Unionist Liberals whatever they may call themselves will vote Tory till the crisis is over, and mostly to the end of the chapter: and the protectionist Tories have no intention of rebelling against their leaders who on these fiscal matters have accepted the opinions of Cobden and Bright. For voting in Parliament and for parliamentary candidature there are but two parties only I repeat, and if the great Liberal Party ever comes together again, it will find that as far as numbers are concerned the coming together will not help it much, as the greater part of the dissentients will have declared themselves Tories or will stand out as Whig allies of the Tories. However it is probable that even this outward show of coming together will never take place: because (if I may leave this formal word-chopping about these contemptible factions for a minute) one must remember that glibly as people talk of the settlement of the Irish question it is not going to be settled by any Home Rule Bill big or little that Mr. Gladstone may succeed in carrying through parliament: the two sections can only come together by the Gladstonites abandoning every rag of principle that they yet hold; I don't say that it's impossible for them to do that: but then that will complicate the matter by losing them their Irish support. So I say there are the Ins and Outs: and if you say, but this is only a matter of the shifting groups of the M.P.s, I must remind you that the political public, the ordinary voters, follow the lead of these men with quite remarkable docility, and in fact they do represent the political public whatever they do for the people at large in that respect.

Now these Ins and Outs form two parties and no doubt the struggle between them is exciting enough to those engaged in it though somewhat dull to onlookers, but what real difference is there between them? Well on ordinary occasions none. In matters of administration none; in the leading of opinion, in the helping of that lame dog the working public over the stile of livelihood none. It is however necessary to find something or other which will serve as a bone of contention, and this function falls as a matter of course to the Liberal Party as progressists. It is their business to find something that can be fought over and which will not commit the progressive party too much if they carry the day; something also on which a compromise is possible and the fight over which will last long enough: such a subject has been found by the Gladstonites in the Irish question and in many respects the invention has been a useful one for parliamentary purposes: in the name of all patience it will last long enough: it needs not, to all appearance involve the Liberal party in revolutionary measures, and compromise was possible in the case of victory in the early stages at least, and that was enough since as you know no statesman ever looks six months ahead: so the Irish question was taken out of the "difference bag" and chosen as the bone to fight for, and I admit has not turned out well; being contrary to expectation too serious a subject to be played over by the two sides to the game. But we must not be too hard on Mr. Gladstone for this, or think that he acted recklessly: it would in fact have been a safe subject enough if it had not been for the growth of Socialism in some form or other in this island, and it would have been too much to expect of any statesman that he should have taken any account of an intellectual movement in an early stage. Besides he could not take anything else out of the difference-bag except the disestablishment of the Church, and after some hesitation he put that back; partly because he was afraid of his followers and of offending the respectability with which the establishment is so closely interwoven, and partly also I believe from a genuine personal love which he has (like Charles I) for that curious bundle of subterfuges and compromises the Anglican Communism. Also his last attempt at governing discontented Ireland was not a very happy one, and as of course he hoped to have a good long spell of office he did not want to start again on that tack: so in a way he was forced to make the battle over the Irish Question probably without foreseeing the serious split which followed, and which certainly was brought about by the Whigs and the more knowing of the advanced Liberals perceiving that the question was not a safe one but involved danger to property, threats against which were already in the air in other parts.

Of course the result of all this has been something which the English parliament never intended; it has been to land them in a real quarrel over Ireland; a quarrel too in which the Liberals are led by the Irish who are receiving real support from the democratic and socialist element in Great Britain. I don't mean to say that this latter element has done much if anything to further the matter in parliament, except so far as it has made the opposition to Home Rule more stubborn on the part of the Tories and their allies but it has certainly much embittered the reactionary feeling generally, of which more hereafter.

This then is the position in which we are landed as far as the parliamentary parties are concerned: the Ins and Outs game is being carried on as usual, though there has been a good deal of shuffling about of persons: but the cause of quarrel beyond the general agreement of both sides to fleece the people having been found has turned out to have a dangerous element of reality in it, partly because the Irish people is in deadly earnest to establish its practical independence, and partly because there is a gathering feeling towards revolution about which has been able to fix itself on the simple cases of exploitation by rack-rent going on in Ireland.

As a consequence of the Liberal party having stumbled on a revolutionary question it has weakened itself very much and has not only lost a great number of adherents but also great prestige, because under the grievous circumstances of its having to push forward a side of the popular cause it is compelled to fight soft and so encourage its foes and discourage its friends; and at present as far as ordinary parliamentary events go it is not easy to see anything which will unseat the present Tory majority.

So far as ordinary parliamentary events go indeed; but outside of those there are events brewing which though they do not directly threaten the present Tory government, the Tories will yet have to reckon with. Although the putting forward of Home Rule has not answered the purpose of the Liberal party, it has served another purpose than merely consolidating the Tory party and winning it the open alliance of the Whigs. It has changed and is changing the aspect of the Radicals and has given them something to hope for beyond the narrow circle of a few reforms scarcely any of which could be looked on as possible means to an end very vaguely foreseen by the great mass of radicals; of course it has acted on them as a solvent as it has on the Liberals and has turned some of them into Whigs, but those of them that are left are quite different from the radicals of a few years back; as they will find out after the first measure of Home Rule is passed and they are face to face with their old radical programme of electoral reform, peace, disestablishment, and what not. They will find all that very dull after the Irish campaign, and will no longer be content with it; for they have practically committed themselves to the attack on property which has scared the Tories into acting in their ancient manner, made the Liberals - well over-cautious - and petrified the Whigs, if that were necessary. In fact the spirit of the Radicals, where they remain Radicals, is getting to be much more like that of the Chartists than what we have known them; they have taken a step towards revolution, and consequently have pretty much lost all the importance they had, if ever they had much, in parliament, and their old allies are preparing to throw them off for good and all when they have squeezed the last drop of use out of them. This is what they must always expect: the constitutional or non-revolutionary game of play must in a cons[titutional] country be fought out between the respectable Tory reactionaries and the moderate Liberals: the latter will have nothing to do with the extreme progressive politicians except on the terms that they shall be their humble followers with no will of their own. The Radicals as a parliamentary party can never be strong, because at every advance in opinion the timid ones of their party drop off from them, and the genuine ones who have accepted the advances get further and further from anything that is likely to be put forward in parliament and as aforesaid become political outcasts: their true function we shall see presently.

Well I mentioned all the recognized groups of politicians, if indeed the last group the extreme radicals or democrats can be said to be recognized. Above this group all are engaged as aforesaid in playing the game of Ins and Outs; but this they only use for a cat's paw now and then. There remains another party lower even than the democrats, which party we are probably all of [us] much interested in, I mean the Socialists. As to their position we must all admit that it has much changed from what it was a few years ago, when there were in England but a few remains of the earlier school of Utopists, a certain number of foreign refugees, and a very few English people who were intimate with them. This made up what there was of socialism in England, and the influence it had upon general thought and politics was almost nil. I[t] was the common thing to say that in a country so advanced in political freedom as England socialism had no standpoint: that it was [the] disease of the absolutist countries where freedom of speech was unknown, or one of the forms of Chartism which was killed by the reform-bill and the repeal of the corn laws - And now what is it? Feeble enough numerically you may say if you count all the heads sheltered by the socialist organizations, but then see how the phrases about it have altered. `We are all socialists now', is the common phrase today: or `to a great extent I agree with your criticism of existing institutions but -' and so on and so on. In short socialism is permeating all society, and consequently following the analogy of the political position of the radicals stirring up furious enmity as well as attracting friendship and curiosity. Let us for a little consider its relations to the various groups of thought and political action, none of which venture quite to ignore it. First there are the declared reactionists, the pure Tories. They you see are beginning to pay it the compliment of persecution, which means they are growing afraid of it; partly because they at last have begun to see that they, once the old sham-feudal absolutist-bureaucratic party who were attached to that expiring system, have tacked themselves on to another system that is waning the commercial monopolist-bureaucracy; that is the essential and enduring part of their fear; the passing part of it is that unlucky business of Ireland which Gladstone has lugged into the parliamentary arena, and with which also they see that socialism is connected. So much for the Tories we frighten them. Next come the Whigs pure and simple, and perhaps one may have to withdraw the statement that no group ignored socialism, and [say] that the Whigs pure and simple do so. But then that's a way they have with everything outside the four walls of Mr. Barry's Gothic hall at St. Stephens: that as far as discussion is concerned is their world.

Let us pass to the Liberals: if we frighten the Tories I think we make the Liberals uneasy; for they note that the thing is spreading and wonder what the deuce it means, and are nervous lest perhaps they may have to learn something new, and perhaps have to shift their ground once more: I don't mean to say that they have begun to learn anything about it: Lord Roseberry e.g. said the other day that Socialism meant sharing up all wealth, and that if it were shared up it would soon become unequally distributed again. A favourite theory with some of these bold politicians, whose watchword is for God's sake don't break up the party, is that Socialism is a faddist theory made use of by the Tories to injure the Liberals at elections: in short they seem to confound us with the Kelly and Peters lot: and scent fair trade and sugar bounties in the wind when they pass by our meetings.

Then comes our relation to the true radicals: I think most of these will agree with me when I say that they are being very seriously permeated with Socialism; the old radicalism has become Whig-Liberalism, the new is fast becoming undecided socialism. When it becomes more decided the reactionists and the Whigs (stationaries) may perhaps cull a few more of the timider of the radicals, but there will be a democratic party instructed if not led by the socialists, indeed that is fast happening now, and perhaps it only needs a Liberal Bloody Sunday to complement the Tory one for such a consolidation. Meantime our radical friends will I hope pardon me for looking upon them chiefly as affording a recruiting ground for socialists, since I believe that almost all the present genuine radicals will soon become socialists: yet as a party in spite of their parliamentary weakness they have another function viz. that of pushing forward measures which will help forward the disintegration of society, but which are not really socialistic in principle: again more of this hereafter.

But we have something else to deal with outside all these political parties, to wit all that very large part of the public that is not political in any sense: with the upper-class portion of it we need not concern ourselves much, since the greater part of these people only want to be let alone to thrive on the privilege of robbing labour and are willing instruments in the hands of the reactionists. However there are here and there a few who have not troubled themselves about politics because they have supposed the Gladstonite creed to be the ultimatum of progress, and have not seen in it anything like salvation to the human race from its realization, and who are really ready for the reception of socialism when they come across it. I say a few, because I fancy most of those who are worth anything have been touched by Ruskin's writings and converted into Socialists of some kind.

The other non-politicals belong to the working classes and must I fear be set down as the majority of them: and these again can be divided into people fairly well off for workmen yet so harassed by the struggle for life that they are consciously rather on the side of the masters who rob them and relive them of responsibility, and those still more beaten down who are scarcely conscious of anything except that they are weary and hungry and cold: what can be done with these latter save feeding them in a miserable, hopeless way, before the social revolution comes to offer them useful work and due livelihood, makes men of them in short, I know not, nor does anybody else. But one thing I wish to say here that if you suppose you will find all the intelligence among the better-off workmen, and all the lack of it among the unemployed, the fringe of labour, you are deceived and that this is by no means the case: don't let anybody hug himself with the comforting notion that in the struggle for existence which the propertyless workman has to carry on, deftness, industry, thrift even ensure a man from falling into lack of employment and the lowest misery; that is by no means the case. Moreover it is quite as common to find that lack of intelligence which servile dependence on masters implies among the better-off workmen, and when you remember that even the Trades Unions are somewhat tarred with this stick (so far as they are not political) you must admit that this is a difficult element to deal with: in point of fact it is just this element which is what we mean when we speak of the apathy of the working-classes to their interests, and this slaves'-apathy really is analogous to the slave-holders' apathy among the well-to-do classes, and until it is thrown off it is little good abusing the latter for their apathy which is but an agreement with their comfortable position considering there are so many who acquiesce in their miserable position when they could alter it if they would but shake off their apathy. One cannot leave this subject without saying that amongst the most apathetic to their own interests are the workers who are usually assumed to be the most complete workmen, the hands in the great factory districts; it is easy to see why this should be; they are most under commercial drill, and are made to feel more than other workers that they are a mere part of the machinery of production for profit, and that if that machinery stops for a minute they are undone: therefore they refuse to take any responsibility on their own behoof further than helping the owners of the machinery not to strain the human part of it to the bursting-point or deprive it of fuel calculated according [to] the most economical scale: it is difficult to see any remedy for this slavishness until the workers find out that they are a part of the public as well as a part of the profit-grinding machine, and that the said machine is villainously ill-adapted to their welfare in the latter capacity.

Well now I will recapitulate as briefly as may be the way our movement looks at all these elements of the present of the present political outlook: First the definite reactionaries, people who instinctively feel that it is their business to resist all progress and will only yield when they are forced to do so. Their political representative is parliament generally but especially the Whig-Tory party therein. Their intellectual representatives for strange to say they have such are the prig litterateurs who once posed as advanced men, but are now shocked at the advance drawing near which they encouraged when it was a long way off: they are very superior persons. Next there is the party of the moderates who call themselves Liberals in parliament who, blinder than the definite reactionists, believe that the advance will go just as far as them and stop there - perhaps forever; but at any rate as long as they live: these are wholly parliamentary and are (justly) much despised by the intellectual prigs, who indeed despise all things good and bad.

Next come the Democrats with whom we must class the Irish party who are their only representatives in parliament. These include the mass of politically-minded working-men.

Next come the non-political, well-to-do, almost-entirely reactionaries. Lastly come the non-political working-men, mere slaves, and part of the profit-machine; whether they be `intelligent working-men' or the unhappy drudges of the fringe of labour.

Of these the first two, the reactionaries or Whig-Tory and the sham-progressists or Liberals, are our declared enemies and there is not a pin to choose between them; we can get nothing from them except under the influence of fear of immediate consequences: add to this that we are wholly governed by them - by our enemies in short. The democrats on the other hand although we differ from them and though they sometimes through ignorance oppose us are our allies; they are working for us whenever they are not dragged along by the left wing of the enemy, the sham-progressists.

The non-political well-to-do are but a part of the reactionary party. The non-political working men are material for us and circumstances to work on.

Now what is going on amidst these various groups is that the revolution is preparing, a fact which we and the reactionaries know, and which the other groups ignore. It is a commonplace to say that the economical situation is the chief factor in this approaching change, but it is well to remember this if we feel discouraged at the stupid and unsympathetic attitude of the workmen of Lancashire e.g. As time goes on the eyes of these men will be opened to the fact that they must accept their share of responsibility in the system of production and they will then have to admit that the system must be changed. Also it must be remembered that the disintegration of the old system will possibly be slow, and probably will be apparently interrupted by periods of "prosperity" and that during such periods the movement will have to depend on the face of it entirely on the intelligence of the workers and those who understand what `society' really means.

Well at present the economical situation has had more obvious influence on the political than it has had for many years, since the Chartist times, say: and consequently, (to set aside for a little the direct efforts of the socialists) our enemies, our governors, are growing afraid on the one hand, and on the other our allies, the democrats, are learning that there is something beyond what is known as mere political freedom; they are learning to know the difference between the means and the end; and just in proportion to their learning of that lesson will they become formidable really although they may appear to be weaker than they were; because whereas when their demands were for "political" reforms they were really helping our governors to govern, but now as their demands are assimilating to ours they are asking what our governors cannot yield without compulsion, and are therefore embarrassing our governors in their governing. This is in short the explanation of the Tory reaction so much crowed over by the Tory newspapers; the Liberals are melting into mere reactionaries, the democrats are preparing to accept Socialism; so that the Tories are not really attacking their parliamentary opponents, or the Liberals defending political progress; but the former are attacking the great social change, and the latter are - letting them do so.

As a result for the time the Tories are very strong and venture on proceedings which a few years ago they durst not have done. They know e.g. that if their conduct in London is called in question when Parliament meets that it will [be] a hollow affair; and that they will gain rather than lose votes by letting loose the police to attack peaceful citizens in the streets and imprisoning them afterwards for the crime of being bludgeoned and ridden down. Again as to the Irish question, although it is the fashion for speakers of either party to regret the waste of time that it causes, and though they both profess to be very anxious to get through it so as to deal with British matters: we all know that this is a most transparent piece of humbug, and that both parties will spread out the Irish question as far as it will go like scanty butter over sturdy bread, so as to prevent if possible any other question being dealt with, until the Liberals can pull out of that difference bag a good safe party question which will be of no importance at all to the general public.

The fact is that neither party knows what to do at present: the Liberals have reached the end of their tether, and the time has not yet come for the Tories to take their stand on mere commercial absolutism, although there are ominous signs that they will before long be able to do so: but that will mean the revolution (as people generally use the word) in full swing.

Meantime accidents may or rather will happen to confuse the logical development of events, which certainly does seem to point to the gradual building up of a great labour party. I have been only speaking about politics in Great Britain and Ireland, but continental Europe is not standing still to speak very mildly. It is possible that a system of oppression that depended wholly on armed force for its support might last as long as the world if you could shut out economical influences; but since you clearly cannot, the time will come when even the German Army will not be able to ride rough-shod over all the necessities and desires of a huge population: at the very worst when it has conquered all the world, all the world will conquer it. But to the worst we shall not come. Meantime in Germany at any rate reaction is going on merrily and it is a curious spectacle for civilization to see the most intelligent people in the world allowing themselves to be muzzled by one cynical old man. Well, you may be sure that the muzzle is clapped on because 'tis needed, and that when we need it we shall have it if an unlikely thing I admit we develop a Bismarck amongst us. The new Socialist law is no doubt a sign of progress; and may be a sign of approaching European war, though I decline to be any longer moved by war scares which are probably got up by statesmen-thieves or stockjobbing d[itt]o; however a European war is a possibility at any rate; and since England couldn't go to war unless at the last extremity such an event would no doubt make the Jingos very bold, and also would make for us a short period of factitious `prosperity' by dint of drawing off more labour from production of utilities: both of which in turn would help to strengthen the temporary reaction.

In any case we have got to remember this, that neither war scares, nor war, nor the shabby oppression of cowardly shopkeepers, nor the rigging of the markets, nor even the unconscious shifting of them under the influence of desperate competition for profits, will, or can get rid of the fact that the present system of production no longer suffices for the needs and aspiration[s] of the present population. That in spite of growing cooperation for production, and growing mastery over the forces of nature, in spite of all the elaborate organization of commerce, we are poor when we ought to be wealthy, because labour is not organized and wealth not distributed in the interest of the whole public but in the interest of a privileged class, who not only produce nothing themselves, and tax the whole people to support their idle lives, but also waste the greater part of the labour of those whom they idly live upon. That is one side of the situation, and the other is that the knowledge of this stupidity can no longer be kept from those that suffer from it: you shall hear sometimes a reactionist saying that people are better off now than they were and more discontented and therefore all is well: you need not argue against his premises, because if it is so it is a sure sign that the change is at hand.

It is this that makes such a strange jumble of politics today; that makes refined and superior persons set mere brute force on a pedestal to be worshipped, so that we seem to be going back to the days of Peterloo; and it is exactly this which we as socialists have to deal with: if we can but make it clear to the workers that they cannot live on comfortably as slaves even according to their present wretched standard, and that the first step that a slave must take in order to become a free man is to assume responsibility with all its attendant troubles, politics will have entered into a new phase: nothing will be allowed to pass current because it is `necessary to the stability of society', because it is `not within the scope of practical politics', and so on. We shall look our present system in the face and see what it is fit for, and shall not think it necessary to spend nine-pence on the mending of sixpence because it is called reform. It is certain that even now while we speak politics of the old kind, the shuffle of Ins and Outs, are waning away, and the new politics that are taking the place of the old mean a struggle against stupidity for the reconstruction of society on a tolerable instead of intolerable basis, so that at last we may be led into the happy days when society shall be what its name means, and politics will be no more.

THE PRESENT OUTLOOK OF SOCIALISM IN ENGLAND

WILLIAM MORRIS

The Whig revolution, which began on the fall of medieval society and culminated in the French revolution, on the one hand, and the establishment of the factory organization of production amidst the ruins of handicraft, on the other, seemed in the first half of this century to have stranded the civilized world on a period of academical coma, having some analogy to the great period of the classical civilization inaugurated by the accession of Augustus. In England at any rate a modus vivendi had been established between the employers of labor and their "hands," and free-trade and the abolition of the corn laws had so greased the wheels of factory production that, though profits were not made on the extravagant scale which obtained in the earlier years of the century, they were still very large, and the result was to increase enormously the wealth, numbers, and consequent power of the middle classes. In politics the Whigs, under the new name of Liberals, were marching on triumphantly, and of feudal survivals all but the semblance was abolished; and modern democracy, on the basis of irresistible, nay unquestionable, commercialism, seemed to be on the very point of being firmly established. It is true that in Britain religion lagged behind, and the "freethinking," which had long been accepted as an essential part of the Whig revolution on the continent, was here revolutionary and unrespectable, as an open and expressed opinion, though even then almost universal amongst intelligent persons. For the deep-seated hypocrisy of our nation (and perhaps race), which has often, wrongly as I think, been dignified with the historical title of "Puritanism," would not allow facts to be faced openly on this side of things.

As to literature and the fine arts, there had been for some time a stirring amongst the dry bones in the first, and the nonentity of the eighteenth century, of which the dullard Pope was the high-priest, had been invaded early in the nineteenth century by the men of genius of the dawning Romantic school. Poetry began again and it became once more possible to forget the miseries of real life by burying oneself in the idealities of the great inventors.

But literature, less than any of the arts, depends on its surroundings, and the imagination of those who have steeped themselves in the life of serious periods of history, as show us by their still existing works, can free itself from the ugliness and trivialities of to-day and produce something which is not alien in idea from the living art of the past. Art, in its narrower sense, is not so fortunate, and on all hands can be oppressed by its surroundings. On this side, when the whole world is sick, the men of special talent or genius share the sickness in one way or other; either their sense of beauty is deadened, or they seek for expression of it in fierce antagonism to the life and thought of the passing time, and the present public either corrupts or neglects them. In this period of Whig ascendency, therefore, art was, let us say, lying asleep, and its condition was not ill expressed by the stupidity and emptiness of the London Exhibition of 1851 - the first of the series of advertising shows which have since cursed the world with their pretentious triviality. Even the painters of pictures, the producers of art who approach nearer than others to the men of inventive literature, were sunk low indeed. Here and there was a man who rose above his fellows into something like genius, though even his aims were not high, nor his scope wide, as Turner for instance; here and there a man of unquestionable industry and conscientiousness, as Maclise; but, as for the general body of "artists" as they were called, they were about worthy of the somewhat vulgar contempt showered upon them in Thackeray's novels. In short, no man of sense ever troubled himself about "high art," exceptas a matter of officialism, or as a piece of affectation which his position in society forced upon him.

As for architecture and its kindred arts, people scarcely knew of the existence of such things. Stupid ugliness was worshipped under the name of simplicity or gentlemanly restraint. Beauty or incident was not so much as thought of. Even the active hatred of beauty, which the Philistine cultivates with such single-minded ardor to-day, implies a somewhat better position for the arts than the sordid dulness of the triumphant Whiggery of the "fifties."

Commerce, the only thing needful; politics, the slave of the markets; literature, existing only in rebellion; art forgotten, beauty dead: this, it seemed, was to be the ultimate gain of "The heir of all the ages in the foremost files of time."

Seemed - but, slowly as the course of events in modern times crawls along, a change has begun to show within the last twenty years. In economics the principle of laissez faire, which in the period above spoken of seemed to have been accepted as irrevocable by statesman and dustman alike, has been blown to the winds more in practice even than in theory, and collective action is admitted everywhere to be the machinery through which we must of necessity strive to make the best of our surroundings. In politics, if they have not become more democratic in the old sense of the word, the word itself has changed its meaning, and no longer signifies a consensus of the rich middle classes, but rather the gathering of opinion of the working classes, not, it must be admitted, for the purpose of enabling them to manage their own affairs ( i.e., the best method for the production of common utilities), but at least to let the governing or possessing class find out what steps may be necessary to be taken to make the only useful class of the community temporarily contented.

In literature and the arts again there has been some stirring of the dry bones, though I cannot think it has been either deep or widely spread. Yet we have seen a man, whose poetry was once thought the very acme of wild eccentricity, dying a peer of the realm without having to make any considerable recantation; and the Romantic school so successful that it is now rather rebelled against than rebelling. In the arts, owing chiefly to the energy and genius of three young men - Rossetti, Holman Hunt, and Millais, - it is at least possible for painters of pictures to live by giving their genius free scope, if they have it in them, however sore the struggle may be against their isolated position which denies them the support of a reasonable unbroken tradition. Furthermore, owing to the genuine instinct for the study of history which is a birth of these latter days, there has grown up some appreciation of the great architectural works of the Middle Ages, and a certain number of highly educated and refined men have now for some time been struggling against the hideousness of our modern streets by designing buildings which they have striven honestly and not without success to make at once beautiful and useful: though it is true that these buildings must of necessity be more or less imitative of the work of past ages; and also that the movement that has had its rise in the study of historic art has born with it the disadvantage that the public looks with favor on the preposterous attempt to "restore," as it is called, our ancient monuments, which have suffered so much from the neglect and ignorance of the post-medieval period, to their (supposed) original state; for though we may have learned history enough to cease to look upon our ancestors as a set of savages whose lives and deeds sprang from no visible causes in the past, and led to no consequences in the future, we have not yet grasped the knowledge that these monuments of art sprang from the conditions of society amidst which they wereproduced; that the art of a people, as distinct from a few ingenious and gifted men living isolated from the people, must of necessity be an essential growth from the life of the epoch.

Indeed, it is because I have so thoroughly learned this lesson myself (as I think), that I must needs look upon the art and literature of these days as but matters by the way, and something without root or organic growth. I believe that they will flourish again, rising maybe from the scanty tradition left us, or maybe from a new birth, - which we now cannot so much as conceive of, - when a new society has been realized, the hope of which (as I deem), is the one bright spot in the century and is now growing clearer to us.

For even now at the bottom of the change above said in economics and politics, in literature and art, lies a great change in opinion, which has produced the visible new birth of Socialism; a new birth dimly foreshadowed at the time of the French revolution by the opinions and attempts of such men as Babeuf and the Utopists. The public opinion points toward a new society founded on equality of condition, and the association of equals. The first of these has been mainly in abeyance since the time of the poverty of tribal society: the second, after playing a principal part in the development of society from the beginning of the great energy of the Middle Ages, fell with them under the triple attack of bureaucracy, political nationalism, and the lust for material advancement. But, unless they are once again to become the root principles of a true society, I for my part can see nothing for it but a continuous degradation of our false society until it disappears in a chaos caused by greed and suffering.

But I repeat that the assertion of these principles is already being made, not merely be small knots of Socialist preachers, but by the working-classes generally. Trades Unionism is losing its old narrowness, and is learning that it must not champion this or that trade or occupation against the general public; that it must no longer be the carpenters against the public, or the miners against the public, - but the whole body of producers against the non-producers who exploit them; that, in short, the producers must claim the right to manage their own affairs. When this lesson is learned thoroughly, I cannot see how the claim can be resisted; and that more especially in a country like Great Britain, the very existence of which depends upon highly organized industries.

Meantime, I say, the lesson is being learned, doubtless in a rough and unsystematic way enough; yet no one who is conversant with working-class politics can dispute that the attitude of the workmen toward Socialism has quite altered within the last twelve years, and that a claim for recognition as citizens has been put forward by them, to which all classes of society have been forced to pay some attention. Both the theory and practice of even ultra Liberals as to the relation of the workmen of the organized industries in Great Britain to their employers, in the days when John Bright was regarded by the prosperous middle class as a dangerous democrat and tribune of the people, was that the workman, as workman, was a part of the machinery of profitable production, that there were certain laws of nature that governed the action of the machine, - always in the interest of those who owned and controlled it, the successful middle class to wit, - and that the members of the machine must submit patiently to any suffering which resulted from the action of those natural laws. There was little for the workmen to complain of in this, it was thought, because it was not difficult for any of them who were above the average to rise at least into the lower middle class, and most probably into the higher ranks of it; to become in short from a mere "hand" a foreman, the manager of the department, or often enough of a factory itself. As for what was belowthe average that was its lookout, and its complaints would not do anything to turn the course of the "natural law." This, I say, was the theory or practice of such men as John Bright and his party; but the machine for the production of profits has protested against the action of the natural law - which must of necessity degrade every man who could not struggle up into the comparatively few places which were to be had amongst the superintendents of labor, - and by various revolts, strikes and so forth, the claim of citizenship has, as aforesaid, been made by working-men as living on weekly wages, and not as workingmen whose savings gave them some share in the privilege of capital.

For a long time the struggle was blind and narrow, but within the last few years it has become a conscious strife for at least some recognition of the social rights of citizens on behalf of all workmen willing to exercise their labor power; and, on the other hand, the possessing classes have practically admitted the necessity of a "living wage" for the workmen, even though that must be taken from the profits of the employers. A higher standard of comfort, more leisure, less precarious employment; these things at least, it is admitted, must be granted by the present system to the working-classes, - if the present system can do it - but can it? The answer to that must be found in the answer to another question: Are the interests of the employers and the employed the same? No, must be the answer, they are opposed. And if that be the case, how can the vital questions be discussed and settled with the mutual assent of the two parties to the quarrel? It is clear that they cannot be. When I mentioned the struggle of the working classes for citizenship I meant to use the word literally and not metaphorically. The battle must be fought out between the privileged and the useful classes, before the latter can win any solid or lasting benefits for the whole mass. And I have no doubt that it will go on with ever-increasing stress. The concessions made by the privileged classes to the useful ones will grow greater and more important, as the working-men see clearer into their position, and know what it is essential for them to claim; the privileged will concede these with much the same amount of pressure as forces them to yield to present and unimportant demands, some of which at any rate are now used for little else than banners to which to rally those who are yet purblind to the necessities of a real new society. So it will go on till it will be found at last that everything essential has been yielded by privilege, and probably the last opposition will be feeble and formal, and will be easily thrust aside.

It must be remembered that, on the one hand, the tokens that this great change in society is on the way are no longer merely the spread of academic discussion, or the setting forth of Utopias with their roots in the air, but the attempts to deal with "practical" questions concerning the present daily life of the greater part of the population; while, on the other hand, the ideas of a Socialist society are pretty much accepted by those who can by any stretch of language be called thinking people (among whom I do not include the professional politicians). Almost the only opposition offered to them comes from sheer pessimists, or those who are not ashamed to confess their adherence to the sordid cynicism of greed. How can the new society founded on equality and association be brought about? is the real question which is asked by all those who wish for conditions of life in the civilized world which will enable all groups of society to live with self-respect and manly pleasure.

Now I have practically said that, broadly speaking, the change must come about by the useful classes getting gradually educated to a sense of their due claims and responsibilities, and, as a result, going on steadily beating down commercial and economic privilege, as their forerunners the Whigs, whose day culminated in the French revolution, beat down thesurvivals of feudal privilege.

As to what is going on obviously at present in the world of politics, a few words will be enough on that subject, as I cannot deem it to be of so much importance as many people think. We have recently gone through a general election in Great Britain, the results of which have made the grossest reactionists (the Tories) jubilant, and I suspect have given some pleasure, even amidst their defeat, to the ordinary Liberal politicians.

The overwhelming Tory victory has indeed seemed to some of our party to mean rather a defeat of the Whigs than of the Progressives; but, though this seems plausible in view of some of the incidents of the contest, I should rather put down the victory to a strong rally of all that is reactionary against everything which seems progressive to the reactionists, from mere Whig Liberalism to definite Socialism, - which rally, if properly organized, was sure to be successful: so that it was rather the Liberals who were defeated along with the Socialists than the Socialists along with the Liberals. In other words there was, and is, an instinct amongst the reactionaries that the Socialists have been leading the Liberals and are the real enemies, and it is a true instinct, though politics, like poverty, makes strange bedfellows, and it is rather amusing to see some of our Whig friends dismissed from their seats on the ground of their being the allies of dangerous revolutionaries.

For the rest it was clear that whenever the reactionaries chose to administer such a check to Socialism they could do so with certainty of success, since there is no Socialist party in England; it has indeed ceased to be merely a sect or a "church" as it was some fifteen years ago, but has never gained any organization; its strength, as well as its weakness, lies in its being an opinion rather than a party. Yet it was largely the fear of the reactionists that it was becoming a party which caused the successful attack of the election on progress generally. And to my mind the answer to that attack should be to organize a real definite Socialist party, and, for the sake of the necessary gain, to accept the probable dangers of such a position. It is true that a wide-spread opinion cannot be defeated, and need not fear the temporary decision of the ballot-box; but to such a decision it must come at last, unless it is contented to act indirectly through other parties, which may throw it over at any political exigency, and must always be doing hesitatingly and blindly.

To sum up therefore as to the Socialist outlook: There is no progress possible to European civilization save in the direction of Socialism; for the Whig or Individualist idea which destroyed the medieval idea of association, and culminated in the French revolution and the rise of the great industries in England, has fulfilled its function or worked itself out.

The Socialistic idea has at last taken hold of the workmen, even in Great Britain, and they are pushing it forward practically, though in a vague and unorganized manner.

The governing classes feel themselves compelled to yield more or less to the vague demands of the workmen. But, on the other hand, the definitely reactionary forces of the country have woken up to the danger to privilege involved in those demands, and are attacking Socialism in front instead of passing it by in contemptuous silence.

The general idea of Socialism is widely accepted amongst the thoughtful part of the middle classes, even where their timidity prevents them from definitely joining the movement.

The old political parties have lost their traditional shibboleths, and are only hanging on till the new party (which can only be a Socialist one) is formed: the Whig and Tories will then coalesce to oppose it; the Radicals will some of them join this reactionary party, and some will be absorbed by the Socialist ranks. That this process is already going on is shown by the last general election. Socialism has not yet formed a party in Great Britain, but it is essential that it should do so, and not become a mere tail of the Whig Liberal party, which will only use it for its own purposes and throw it over when it conveniently can.

This Socialist party must include the whole of the genuine labor movement, that is, whatever in it is founded on principle, and is not a mere temporary business squabble; it must also include all that is definitely Socialist amongst the middle class; and it must have a simple text in accordance with one aim, - the realization of a new society founded on the practical equality of condition for all, and general association for the satisfaction of the needs of those equals.

The sooner this party is formed, and the reactionists find themselves face to face with the Socialists, the better. For whatever checks it may meet with on the way, it will get to its goal at last and Socialism will melt into society.

THE SOCIALIST IDEAL: ART

WILLIAM MORRIS

Some people will perhaps not be prepared to hear that Socialism has any ideal of art, for in the first place it is so obviously founded on the necessity for dealing with the bare economy of life that many, and even some Socialists, can see nothing save that economic basis; and moreover, many who might be disposed to admit the necessity of economic change in the direction of Socialism believe quite sincerely that art is fostered by the inequalities of condition which it is the first business of Socialism to do away with, and indeed that it cannot exist without them. Nevertheless, in the teeth of these opinions I assert first that Socialism is an all-embracing theory of life, and that as it has an ethic and a religion of its own, so also it has an aesthetic: so that to every one who wishes to study Socialism duly it is necessary to look on it from the aesthetic point of view. And, secondly, I assert that inequality of condition, whatever may have been the case in former ages of the world, has now become incompatible with the existence of a healthy art.

But before I go further I must explain that I use the word art in a wider sense than is commonly used amongst us to-day; for convenience sake, indeed, I will exclude all appeals to the intellect and emotions that are not addressed to the eyesight, though properly speaking, music and all literature that deals with style should be considered as portions of art; but I can exclude from consideration as a possible vehicle of art no production of man which can be looked at. And here at once becomes obvious the sundering of the ways between the Socialist and the commercial view of art. To the Socialist a house, a knife, a cup, a steam engine, or what not, anything, I repeat, that is made by man and has form, must either be a work of art or destructive to art. The Commercialist, on the other hand, divides "manufactured articles" into those which are prepensely works of art, and are offered for sale in the market as such, and those which have no pretence and could have no pretence to artistic qualities. The one side asserts indifference, the other denies it. The Commercialist sees that in the great mass of civilized human labour there is no pretence to art, and thinks that this is natural, inevitable, and on the whole desirable. The Socialist, on the contrary, sees in this obvious lack of art a disease peculiar to modern civilization and hurtful to humanity; and furthermore believes it to be a disease which can be remedied.

This disease and injury to humanity, also, he thinks is no trifling matter, but a grievous deduction from the happiness of man; for he knows that the all-pervading art of which I have been speaking, and to the possibility of which the Commercialist is blind, is the expression of pleasure in the labour of production; and that, since all persons who are not mere burdens on the community must produce, in some form or another, it follows that under our present system most honest men must lead unhappy lives, since their work, which is the most important part of their lives, is devoid of pleasure.

Or, to put it very bluntly and shortly, under the present state of society happiness is only possible to artists and thieves.

It will at once be seen from this statement how necessary it is for Socialists to consider the due relation of art to society; for it is their aim to realize a reasonable, logical, and stable society; and of the two groups above-named it must be said that the artists (using the word in its present narrow meaning) are few, and are too busy over their special work (small blame to them) to pay much heed to public matters; and that the thieves (of all classes) forma disturbing element in society.

Now, the Socialist not only sees this disease in the body politic, but also thinks that he knows the cause of it, and consequently can conceive of a remedy; and that all the more because the disease is in the main peculiar, as above-said, to modern civilization. Art was once the common possession of the whole people; it was the rule in the Middle Ages that the produce of handicraft was beautiful. Doubtless, there were eyesores in the palmy days of medieval art, but these were caused by destruction of wares, not as now by the making of them: it was the act of war and devastation that grieved the eye of the artist then; the sacked town, the burned village, the deserted fields. Ruin bore on its face the tokens of its essential hideousness; to-day, it is prosperity that is externally ugly.

The story of the Lancashire manufacturer who, coming back from Italy, that sad museum of the nations, rejoiced to see the smoke, with which he was poisoning the beauty of the earth, pouring out of his chimneys, gives us a genuine type of the active rich man of the Commercial Period, degraded into incapacity of even wishing for decent surroundings. In those past days the wounds of war were grievous indeed, but peace would bring back pleasure to men, and the hope of peace was at least conceivable; but now, peace can no longer help us and has no hope for us; the prosperity of the country, by whatever "leaps and bounds" it may advance, will but make everything more and more ugly about us; it will become more a definitely established axiom that the longing for beauty, the interest in history, the intelligence of the whole nation, shall be of no power to stop one rich man from injuring the whole nation to the full extent of his riches, that is, of his privilege of taxing other people; it will be proved to demonstration, at least to all lovers of beauty and a decent life, that private property is public robbery.

Nor, however much we say suffer from this if we happen to be artists, should we Socialists at least complain of it. For, in fact, the "peace" of Commercialism is not peace, but bitter war, and the ghastly waste of Lancashire and the ever-spreading squalor of London are at least object-lessons to teach us that this is so, that there is war in the land which quells all our efforts to live wholesomely and happily. The necessity of the time, I say, is to feed the commercial war which we are all of us waging in some way or another; if, while we are doing this, we can manage, some of us, to adorn our lives with some little pleasure of the eyes, it is well, but it is no necessity, it is a luxury, the lack of which we must endure.

Thus, in this matter also does the artificial famine of inequality, felt in so many other ways, impoverish us despite of our riches; and we sit starving amidst our gold, the Midas of the ages.

Let me state bluntly a few facts about the present condition of the arts before I try to lay before my readers the definite Socialist ideal which I have been asked to state. It is necessary to do this because no ideal for the future can be conceived of unless we proceed by way of contrast; it is the desire to escape from the present failure which forces us into what are called "ideals"; in fact, they are mostly attempts by persons of strong hope to embody their discontent with the present.

It will scarcely be denied, I suppose, that at present art is only enjoyed, or indeed thought of, by comparatively a few persons, broadly speaking, by the rich and the parasites that minister to them directly. The poor can only afford to have what art is given to them incharity; which is of the inferior quality inherent in all such gifts - not worth picking up except by starving people.

Now, having eliminated the poor (that is, almost the whole mass of those that make anything that has form, which, as before-said, must either be helpful to life or destructive of it) as not sharing in art from any side, let us see how the rich, who do share in it to a certain extent, get on with it. But poorly, I think, although they are rich. By abstracting themselves from the general life of man that surrounds them, they can get some pleasure from a few works of art; whether they be part of the wreckage of times past, or produced by the individual labour, intelligence, and patience of a few men of genius of to-day fighting desperately against all the tendencies of the age. But they can do no more than surround themselves with a little circle of hot-house atmosphere of art hopelessly at odds with the common air of day. A rich man may have a house full of pictures, and beautiful books, and furniture and so forth; but as soon as he steps out into the streets he is again in the midst of ugliness to which he must blunt his senses, or be miserable if he really cares about art. Even when he is in the country, amidst the beauty of trees and fields, he cannot prevent some neighbouring landowner making the landscape hideous with utilitarian agriculture; nay, it is almost certain that his own steward or agent will force him into doing the like on his own lands; he cannot even rescue his parish church from the hands of the restoring parson. He can go where he likes and do what he likes outside the realm of art, but there he is helpless. Why is this? Simply because the great mass of effective art, that which pervades all life, must be the result of the harmonious co-operation of neighbours. And a rich man has no neighbours - nothing but rivals and parasites.

Now the outcome of this is that though the educated classes (as we call them) have theoretically some share in art, or might have, as a matter of fact they have very little. Outside the circle of the artists themselves there are very few even of the educated classes who care about art. Art is kept alive by a small group of artists working in a spirit quite antagonistic to the spirit of the time; and they also suffer from the lack of co-operation which is an essential lack in the art of our epoch. They are limited, therefore, to the production of a few individualistic works, which are looked upon by almost everybody as curiosities to be examined, and not as pieces of beauty to be enjoyed. Nor have they any position or power of helping the public in general matters of taste (to use a somewhat ugly word). For example, in laying out all the parks and pleasure grounds which have lately been acquired for the public, as far as I know, no artist has been consulted; whereas they ought to have been laid out by a committee of artists; and I will venture to say that even a badly chosen committee (and it might easily be well chosen) would have saved the public from most of the disasters which have resulted from handing them over to the tender mercies of the landscape gardener.

This, then, is the position of art in this epoch. It is helpless and crippled amidst the sea of utilitarian brutality. It cannot perform the most necessary functions: it cannot build a decent house, or ornament a book, or lay out a garden, or prevent the ladies of the time from dressing in a way that caricatures the body and degrades it. On the one hand it is cut off from the traditions of the past, on the other from the life of the present. It is the art of a clique and not of the people. The people are too poor to have any share of it.

As an artist I know this, because I can see it. As a Socialist I know that it can never be bettered as long as we are living in that special condition of inequality which is produced bythe direct and intimate exploitation of the makers of wares, the workmen, at the hands of those who are not producers in any, even the widest, acceptation of the word.

The first point, therefore, in the Socialist ideal of art is that it should be common to the whole people; and this can only be the case if it comes to be recognized that art should be an integral part of all manufactured wares that have definite form and are intended for any endurance. In other words, instead of looking upon art as a luxury incidental to a certain privileged position, the Socialist claims art as a necessity of human life which society has no right to withhold from any one of the citizens; and he claims also that in order that this claim may be established people shall have every opportunity of taking to the work which each is best fitted for; not only that there may be the least possible waste of human effort, but also that that effort may be exercised pleasurably. For I must here repeat what I have often had to say, that the pleasurable exercise of our energies is at once the source of all art and the cause of all happiness: that is to say, it is the end of life. So that once again the society which does not give a due opportunity to all its members to exercise their energies pleasurably has forgotten the end of life, is not fulfilling its functions, and therefore is a mere tyranny to be resisted at all points.

Furthermore, in the making of wares there should be some of the spirit of the handicraftsman, whether the goods be made by hand, or by a machine that helps the hand, or by one that supersedes it. Now the essential part of the spirit of the handicraftsman is the instinct for looking at the wares in themselves and their essential use as the object of his work. Their secondary uses, the exigencies of the market, are nothing to him; it does not matter to him whether the goods he makes are for the use of a slave or a king, his business is to make them as excellent as may be; if he does otherwise he is making wares for rogues to sell to fools, and he is himself a rogue by reason of his complicity. All this means that he is making the goods for himself; for his own pleasure in making them and using them. But to do this he requires reciprocity, or else he will be ill-found, except in the goods that he himself makes. His neighbours must make goods in the same spirit that he does; and each, being a good workman after his kind, will be ready to recognize excellence in the others, or to note defects; because the primary purpose of the goods, their use in fact, will never be lost sight of. Thus the market of neighbours, the interchange of mutual good services, will be established, and will take the place of the present gambling-market, and its bond-slave the modern factory system. But the working in this fashion, with the unforced and instinctive reciprocity of service, clearly implies the existence of something more than a mere gregarious collection of workmen. It implies a consciousness of the existence of a society of neighbours, that is of equals; of men who do indeed expect to be made use of by others, but only so far as the services they give are pleasing to themselves; so far as they are services the performance of which is necessary to their own well-being and happiness.

Now, as on the one hand I know that no worthy popular art can grow out of any other soil than this of freedom and mutual respect, so on the other I feel sure both that this opportunity will be given to art and also that it will avail itself of it, and that, once again, nothing which is made by man will be ugly, but will have its due form, and its due ornament, will tell the tale of its making and the tale of its use, even where it tells no other tale. And this because when people once more take pleasure in their work, when the pleasure rises to a certain point, the expression of it will become irresistible, and that expression of pleasure is art, whatever form it may take. As to that form, do not let us trouble ourselves about it; remembering that after all the earliest art which we have record of is still art to us; thatHomer is no more out of date than Browning; that the most scientifically-minded of people (I had almost said the most utilitarian), the ancient Greeks, are still thought to have produced good artists; that the most superstitious epoch of the world, the early Middle Ages, produced the freest art; though there is reason enough for that if I had time to go into it.

For in fact, considering the relation of the modern world to art, our business is now, and for long will be, not so much attempting to produce definite art, as rather clearing the ground to give art its opportunity. We have been such slaves to the modern practice of the unlimited manufacture of makeshifts for real wares, that we run a serious risk of destroying the very material of art; of making it necessary that men, in order to have any artistic perception, should be born blind, and should get their ideas of beauty from the hearsay of books. This degradation is surely the first thing which we should deal with; and certainly Socialists must deal with it at the first opportunity; they at least must see, however much others may shut their eyes: for they cannot help reflecting that to condemn a vast population to live in South Lancashire while art and education are being furthered in decent places, is like feasting within earshot of a patient on the rack.

Anyhow, the first step toward the fresh new-birth of art must interfere with the privilege of private persons to destroy the beauty of the earth for their private advantage, and thereby to rob the community. The day when some company of enemies of the community are forbidden, for example, to turn the fields of Kent into another collection of cinder heaps in order that they may extract wealth, unearned by them, from a mass of half-paid labourers; the day when some hitherto all powerful "pig-skin stuffed with money" is told that he shall not pull down some ancient building in order that he may force his fellow citizens to pay him additional rack-rent for land which is not his (save as the newly acquired watch of the highwayman is) - that day will be the beginning of the fresh new-birth of art in modern times.

But that day will also be one of the memorable days of Socialism; for this very privilege, which is but the privilege of the robber by force of arms, is just the thing which it is the aim and end of our present organization to uphold; and all the formidable executive at the back of it, army, police, law courts, presided over by the judge as representing the executive, is directed towards this one end - to take care that the richest shall rule, and shall have full licence to injure the commonwealth to the full extent of his riches.

The Worker's Share of Art

William Morris

I can imagine some of our comrades smiling bitterly at the above title, and wondering what a Socialist journal can have to do with art; so I begin by saying that I understand only too thoroughly how 'unpractical' the subject is while the present system of capital and wages last. Indeed that is my text.

What, however, is art? whence does it spring? Art is man's embodied expression of interest in the life of man; it springs from man's pleasure in his life; pleasure we must call it, taking all human life together, however much it may be broken by the grief and trouble of individuals; and as it is the expression of pleasure in life generally, in the memory of the deeds of the past, and the hope of those of the future, so it is especially the expression of man's pleasure in the deeds of the present; in his work.

Yes, that may well seem strange to us at present! Men to-day may see the pleasure of unproductive energy - energy put forth in games and sports; but in productive energy - in the task which must be finished before we can eat, the task which will begin again to-morrow, and many a to-morrow without change or end till we are ended - pleasure in that?

Yet I repeat that the chief source of art is man's pleasure in his daily necessary work, which expresses itself and is embodied in that work itself; nothing else can make the common surroundings of life beautiful, and whenever they are beautiful it is a sign that men's work has pleasure in it, however they may suffer otherwise. It is the lack of this pleasure in daily work which has made our towns and habitations sordid and hideous, insults to the beauty of the earth which they disfigure, and all the accessories of life mean, trivial, ugly - in a word, vulgar. Terrible as this is to endure in the present, there is a hope in it for the future; for surely it is but just that outward ugliness and disgrace should be the result of the slavery and misery of the people; and that slavery and misery once changed, it is but reasonable to expect that external ugliness will give place to beauty, the sign of free and happy work.

Meantime, be sure that nothing else will produce even a reasonable semblance of art; for, think of it! the workers, by means of whose hands the mass of art must be made, are forced by the commercial system to live, even at the best, in places so squalid and hideous that no one could live in them and keep his sanity without losing all sense of the beauty and enjoyment of life. The advance of the industrial army under its 'captains of industry' (save the mark!) is traced, like the advance of other armies, in the ruin of the peace and loveliness of earth's surface, and nature, who will have us live at any cost, compels us to get used to our degradation at the expense of losing our manhood, and producing children doomed to live less like men than ourselves. Men living amidst such ugliness cannot conceive of beauty, and, therefore, cannot express it.

Nor is it only the workers who feel this misery (and I rejoice over that, at any rate). The higher or more intellectual arts suffer with the industrial ones. The artists, the aim of whose lives it is to produce beauty and interest, are deprived of the materials for their works in real life, since all around them is ugly and vulgar. They are driven into seeking their materials in the imaginations of past ages, or into giving the lie to their own sense of beauty and knowledge of it by sentimentalizing and falsifying the life which goes on around them; and so, in spite of all their talent, intellect and enthusiasm, produce little which is not contemptible when matched against the works of the non-commercial ages. Nor must we forget that whatever is produced that is worth anything is the work of men who are in rebellion against the corrupt society of to-day -- rebellion sometimes open, sometimes veiled under cynicism, but by which in any case lives are wasted in a struggle, often in vain, against their fellow-men, which ought to used for the exercise of special gifts for the benefit of the world.

High and low, therefore, slaveholders and slaves, we lack beauty in our lives, or, in other words, man-like pleasure. This absence of pleasure is the second gift to the world which the development of commercialism has added to its first gift of a propertyless proletariat. Nothing else but the grinding of this iron system could have reduced the civilized world to vulgarity. The theory that art is sick because people have turned their attention to science is without foundation. It is true that science is allowed to live because profit can be made of her, and men, who must find some outlet for their energies, turn to her, since she exists, though only as the slave (but now the rebellious slave) of capital; whereas when art is fairly in the clutch of profit-grinding she dies and leaves behind her but her phantom of sham art as the futile slave of the capitalist.

Strange as it may seem, therefore, to some people, it is as true as strange, that Socialism, which has been commonly supposed to tend to mere Utilitarianism, is the only hope of the arts. It may be, indeed, that till the social revolution is fully accomplished, and perhaps for a little while afterwards, men's surroundings may go on getting plainer, grimmer, and barer. I say for a little while afterwards, because it may take men some time to shake off the habits of penury on the one hand and inane luxury on the other, which have been forced upon them by commercialism. But even in that there is hope; for it is at least possible that all the old superstitions and conventionalities of art have got to be swept away before art can be born again; that before that new birth we shall have to be left bare of everything that has been called art; that we shall have nothing left us but the materials of art, that is the human race with its aspirations and passions and its home, the earth; on which materials we shall have to use these tools, leisure and desire.

Yet, though that may be, it is not likely that we shall quite recognize it; it is probable that it will come so gradually that it will not be obvious to our eyes. Maybe, indeed, art is sick to death even now, and nothing but its already half-dead body is left upon the earth; but also, may we not hope that we shall not have to wait for the new birth of art till we attain the peace of the realized New Order? Is it not at least possible, on the other hand, that what will give the death-blow to the vulgarity of life which enwraps us all now will be the great tragedy of Social Revolution, and that the worker will then once more begin to have a share in art, when he begins to see his aim clear before him -- his aim of a share of real life for all men -- and when his struggle for that aim has begun? It is not the excitement of battling for a great and worthy end which is the foe to art, but the dead weight of sordid, unrelieved anxiety, the anxiety for the daily earning of a wretched pittance by labour degrading at once to body and mind, both by its excess and by its mechanical nature.

In any case, the leisure which Socialism above all things aims at obtaining for the worker is also the very thing that breeds desire -- desire for beauty, for knowledge, for more abundant life, in short. Once more, that leisure and desire are sure to produce art, and without them nothing but sham art, void of life or reason for existence, can be produced: therefore not only the worker, but the world in general, will have no share in art until our present commercial society gives place to real society -- to Socialism. I know this subject is too serious and difficult to treat properly in one short article. I will ask our readers, therefore, to consider this as an introduction to the consideration of the relations of industrial labour to art.

TRUE AND FALSE SOCIETY

WILLIAM MORRIS

I have been asked to give you the Socialist view of the Labour Question. Now in some ways that is a difficult matter to deal with - far beyond my individual capacities - and would also be a long business; yet in another way, as a matter of principle, it is not difficult to understand or long to tell of, and does not need previous study or acquaintance with the works of specialists or philosophers. Indeed, if it did, it would not be a political subject, and I hope to show you that it is pre-eminently political in the sense in which I should use the word; that is to say, it is a matter which concerns everyone, and had to do with the practical everyday relations of his life, and that not only as an individual, but as a member of a body corporate, nay, as a member of the great corporation - humanity. Thus considered, it would be hard indeed if it could not be understood readily by a person of ordinary intelligence who can bring his mind to bear upon it without prejudice. Such a person can learn the basis of the opinion in even an hour's talk, if the matter be clearly put before him. It is my task to attempt this; and whether I fail or succeed, I can at least promise you to use no technical phrases which would require explanation; nor will I, as far as I can help, go into any speculative matter, but will be as plain and practical as I can be.

Yet I must warn you that you may be disappointed when you find that I have no elaborate plan, no details of a new society to lay before you, that to my mind to attempt this would be putting before you a mere delusion. What I ask you to consider is in the main the clearing away of obstacles that stand in the way of the due and unwasteful use of labour - a task not light indeed, nor to be accomplished without the most strenuous effort in the teeth of violent resistance, but yet not impossible for humanity as we know it, and as I firmly believe not only necessary, but, as things now are, the one thing essential to be undertaken.

Now you all know that, taking mankind as a whole, it is necessary for man to labour in order to live. Certainly not all things that we enjoy are the works of man's labour; the beauty of the earth, and the action of nature on our sensations, are always here for us to enjoy, but we can only do so on the terms of our keeping ourselves alive and in good case by means of labour, and no inventions can set aside that necessity. The merest savage has to pluck the berry from the tree, or dig up the root from the ground before he can enjoy his dog-like sleep in sun or shade; and there are no savages who have not got beyond that stage; while the progressive races of mankind have for many ages got a very long way beyond it, so that we have no record of any time when they had not formed some sort of society, whose aim was to make the struggle with Nature for subsistence less hard than it otherwise would have been, to win a more abundant livelihood from her.

We cannot deal at any length with the historical development of society; our object is simply to inquire into the constitution of that final development of society under which we live. But one may first ask a few questions: - 1st, Since the community generally must labour in order that the individuals composing it may subsist, and labour harder in order that they may attain further advantages, ought not a really successful community so to arrange that labour that each capable person should do a fair share of it and no more? 2nd, Should not a really successful community - established surely for the benefit of all its members - arrange that everyone who did his due share of labour should have his due share of the wealth earned by that labour? 3rd, If any labour were wasted, such waste would throw an additional burden on those who produced what was necessary and pleasant to existence. Should not a successful community, therefore, so organize its labour that is should not be wasted? You must surely answer Yes to each of these three questions. I will assert, then, that a successful society - a society which fulfilled its true functions - would take care that each did his due share of labour, that each had his due share of wealth resulting from that labour, and that the labour of persons generally was not wasted. I ask you to remember those three essentials of a successful society throughout all that follows; and to let me apply them now as a test of success to the society in which we live, the latest development of so many ages of the struggle with Nature, our elaborate and highly-organized civilization.

In our society, does each capable person do his fair share of labour? Is his share of the wealth produced proportionate to his labour? Is the waste of labour avoided in our society?

You may perhaps hesitate in your answer to the third question; you cannot hesitate to say No to the two first. I think, however, I shall be able to show you that much labour is wasted, and that, therefore, our society fails in the three essentials necessary for a successful society. Our civilization, therefore, though elaborate and highly organized, is a failure; that is, supposing it to be the final development of society, as some people, nay, most people, suppose it to be.

Now a few words as to the course of events which have brought us to the society of the present day. In periods almost before the dawn of continuous history the early progressive races from which we are descended were divided into clans or families, who held their wealth, such as it was, in common within the clan, while all outside the clan was hostile, and wealth not belonging to the clan was looked upon as prize of war. There was consequently continual fighting of clan with clan, and at first all enemies taken in war were slain. But after a while, as man progressed and got defter with his hands, and learned how to make more effective tools, it began to be found out that, so working, each man could do more than merely sustain himself; and then some of the prisoners of war, instead of being slain on the field, were made slaves of; they had become valuable for work, like horses. Out of the work they produced their masters or owners gave them sustenance enough to live on, and took the rest for themselves. Time passed, and the complexity of society grew; the early barbarism passed through many stages into the ancient civilizations of which Greece and Rome were the great representatives; but this civilization was still founded on slave-labour. Most of its wealth was created by men who could be sold in the market like cattle. But as the old civilizations began to decay, this slave-labour became unprofitable; the countries comprised in the Roman Empire were disturbed by constant war; the governments, both central and provincial, became mere tax-gathering machines, and grew so greedy that things became unbearable. Society became a mere pretext for tax-gathering, and fell to pieces, and chattel slavery fell with it, since under all these circumstances slaves were no longer valuable.

Then came another change. A new society was formed, partly out of the tribes of barbarians who had invaded the Roman Empire, and partly out of the fragments of that empire itself; the feudal system arose, bearing with it new ideas, which I have not time to deal with here and now. Suffice it to say that in its early days mere chattel slavery gave place to serfdom. Powerful men, privileged men, had not forgotten that men can produce more by a day's labour than will keep them alive for a day; so now they settled their labourers on certain portions of land, stocked their land with them, in fact, and on these lands they had leave to live as well as they might on the condition that they should work a certain part of their time on the land which belonged to their lords. The average condition of these serfs was better than that of the chattel slaves. They could not be bought and sold personally, they were a part of the manor on which they lived, and they had as a class a tendency to become tenants by various processes. In one way or another these serfs got gradually emancipated, and during a transitional period, lasting through the two last centuries of the Middle Ages, the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the labour classes were in a far better position than they had been before, and in some ways than they have been since; suffering more from spasmodic arbitrary violence than from chronic legal oppression. The transition from this period to our own days is one of the most interesting chapters of history; but it is impossible for me to touch on it here. All I can say is that the emancipated serfs formed one of the elements that went to make up our present middle class, and that a new class of workers grew up beneath them: men who were not owned by anyone, who were bound by no legal ties to such and such a manor, who might earn what livelihood they could for themselves under certain conditions, which I will presently try to lay before you, and which are most important to be considered; for this new class of so-called free labourers has become our modern working class.

Now it will be clear to you, surely, how much and how grievously both the classical period, with its chattel slavery, and the feudal system, with its serfdom, fell short of the society which we have set before us as reasonably successful. In each of them there was a class obviously freed from the necessity of labour by means of the degradation of another class which laboured excessively and reaped but a small reward for its excessive labour. Surely there was something radically wrong in these two societies. From the fact that labour is necessary for man's life on earth, and that Nature yields her abundance to labour only, one would be inclined to deduce the probability that he who worked most would be the best off. But in these slave and serf societies the reverse was the case: the man of leisureless toil lived miserably, the man who did nothing useful lived abundantly. Then, again, as to our third test, was there no waste of labour? Yes, indeed, there was waste most grievous. I have said that the slave-owner or the lord of the manor did nothing useful, and yet he did something; he was bound to do something, for he was often energetic, gifted, full of character; he made war ceaselessly, consuming thereby the wealth which his slaves or his serfs created, and forcing them to work the more grievously. Here was waste enough, and lack of organization of labour.

Well, all this people find no great difficulty in seeing, and few would like, publicly at least, to confess a regret for these conditions of labour, although in private some men, less hypocritical of more logical than the bulk of reactionists, admit that they consider the society of cultivated men and chattel slaves the best possible for weak human nature. Yet though we can see what has been, we cannot so easily see what is; and I admit that it is especially hard for people in our civilization, with its general freedom from the ruder forms of violence, its orderly routine life, and, in short, all that tremendous organization whose very perfection of continuity prevents us from noticing it - I say it is hard for people under the quiet order and external stability of modern society to note that much the same thing is going on in the relations of employers to the employed as went on under the slave society of Athens or under the self-sustained baronage of the thirteenth century.

For I assert that with us, as with the older societies, those who work hardest fare the worst; those who produce the least get the most; while as to the waste of labour that goes on, the waste of times past is as nothing compared with what is wasted to-day.

I must now justify this view of mine, and, if possible, get you to agree with it by pointing out to you how society at the present day is constituted.

Now, as always, there are only two things essential to the production of wealth - labour, and raw material: everyone can labour who is not sick or in nonage, therefore everyone except those, if he can get at raw material, can produce wealth; but without that raw material he cannot produce anything - anything, that is, that man can live upon; and if he does not labour he must live at the cost of those that do; unless, therefore, everyone can get at the raw material and instruments of production, the community in general will be burdened by the expense of so many useless mouths, and the sum of its wealth will be less than it ought to be. But in our civilized society to-day the raw material and the instruments of production are monopolized by a comparatively small number of persons, who will not allow the general population to use them for production of wealth unless they pay them tribute for doing so; and since they are able to exact this tribute, they themselves are able to live without producing, and consequently are a burden on society. Nor are these monopolists content with exacting a bare livelihood from the producers, as mere vagabonds and petty thieves do; they are able to get from the producers in all cases an abundant livelihood, including most of the enjoyments and advantages of civilization, and in many cases a position of such power that they are practically independent of the community and almost out of reach of its laws, although, indeed, the greater part of those laws were made for the purpose of upholding this monopoly; and wherever necessary they do now use the physical force which, by one means or another, they have under their control, for such upholding.

These monopolists, or capitalists, as one may call them broadly (for I will not at present distinguish the land capitalists from the money capitalists), are in much the same position as the slave-owners of ancient Greece and Rome, or the serf-masters of the thirteenth century; but they have this advantage over them, that though really they sustain their position by mere compulsion, just as the earlier masters did, that compulsion is not visible as the compulsion of the earlier times was; and it is very much their business to prevent it becoming visible, as may well be imagined. But as I am against monopoly and in favour of freedom, I must try to get you to see it, since seeing it is the first step towards feeling it, which, in its turn, is sure to lead to your refusing to bear it.

I have spoken of the tribute which the capitalists exact as the price of the use of those means of production which should be as free to all as the air we breathe is, since they are as necessary to our existence as it is: how do they exact the tribute? They are, to start with, in a good position, you see, because even without anyone's help they could use the labour-power in their own bodies on the raw material they have, and so earn their livelihood; but they are not contented with that, as I hinted above - they are not likely to be, because their position, legalized and supported by the whole physical force of the State, enables them "to do better for themselves," as the phrase goes; they can use the labour-power of the disinherited, and force them to keep them without working for production. Those disinherited, however, they must keep alive to labour, and they must allow them also opportunity for breeding - these are necessities that pressed equally on the ancient slave-owner or the medieval lord of the manor, or, indeed, that press on the owner of draught cattle; they must at least do for the workers as much as for a machine - supply them with fuel to enable them to work. Nor need they do more if they are dealing with men who have no power of resistance. But these machines are human ones, instinct with desires and passions, and therefore, they cannot help trying to better themselves; and they cannot better themselves except at the expense of the masters, because whatever they produce more than the bare necessaries of life the masters will at once take from them if they can; therefore they have always resisted the full exercise of the privilege of the masters, and have tried to raise their standard of livelihood above the mere subsistence limit. Their resistance has taken various forms, from peaceful strikes to open war, but it has always been going on, and the masters, when not driven into a corner, have often yielded to it, although unwillingly enough; but it must be said that mostly the workers have claimed little more than mere slaves would, who might mutiny for a bigger ration. For, in fact, this wage paid by our modern master is nothing more than the ration of the slave in another form; and when the masters have paid it, they are free to use all the rest that the workers produce, just as the slave-owner takes all that the slave produces. Remember at this point, therefore, that everything more than bare subsistence which the workers gain to-day they gain by carrying on constant war with their masters. I must add that their success in this war is often more apparent than real; that too often it means little more than shifting the burden of extreme poverty from one group of workers to another; the unskilled labourers, of whom the supply is unlimited, do not gain by it, and their numbers have a tendency to increase, as the masters, driven to their shifts, use more elaborate machines in order to dispense with skilled labour, and also use the auxiliary labour of women and children, to whom they do not pay subsistence wages, thereby keeping down the wages of the head of the family, and depriving him and them of the mutual help and comfort in the household which would otherwise be gained from them.

Thus, then, the capitalists, by means of their monopoly of the means of production, compel the worker to work for less than his due share of the wealth which he produces - that is, for less than he produces. He must work, he will die else; and as they are in possession of the raw material, he must agree to the terms they enforce upon him. This is the "free contract" of which we hear so much, and which, to speak plainly, is a capitalist lie. There is no way out of this "freedom" save rebellion of some kind or other: strike-rebellion, which impoverishes the workers for the time, whether they win the strike or lose it; or the rebellion of open revolt, which will be put down always until it is organized for a complete change in the basis of society.

Now to show you another link or two of the chain which binds the workers. There is one thing which hampers this constant struggle of the workers towards bettering their condition at the expense of their masters, and that is competition for livelihood amongst them. I have told you that unskilled labour is practically unlimited; and machines, the employment of women and children, long hours of work, and all that cheapening of production so much bepraised now, bring about this state of things, that even in ordinary years there are more hands than there is work to give them. This is the great instrument of compulsion of modern monopoly; people undersell one another in our modern slave-market, so that the employers have no need to use any visible instrument of compulsion in driving them towards work; and the invisibility of this whip, the fear of death by starvation, has so muddled people's brains that you can hear men, otherwise intelligent, e.g., answering objections to the uselessness of some occupation by saying, "But you see it gives people employment," although they would see that if three of them had to dig a piece of ground, and one of them knocked off, and was "employed" in throwing chuckie stones into the water, the other two would have to do his share of the work as well as their own.

Another invisible link of the chain is this, that the workman does not really know his own master; the individual employer may be and often is on good terms with his men, and really unconscious of the war between them, although he cannot fail to know that if he pays more wages to his men than other employers in the same line of business as himself do, he will be beaten by them. But the workman's real master is not his immediate employer but his class, which will not allow even the best intentioned employer to treat his men otherwise than as profit-grinding machines. By his profit, made out of the unpaid labour of his men, the manufacturer must live, unless he gives up his position and learns to work like one of his own men, which indeed, as a rule, he could not do, as he has usually not been taught to do any useful work; therefore, as I have said, he must reduce his wages to the lowest point he can, since it is on the margin between his men's production and their wages that his profit depends; his class, therefore, compel his workmen to accept as little as possible. But further, the workman is a consumer as well as a producer, and in that character he has not only to pay rent to a landlord (and far heavier proportionately than rich people have to pay), and also a tribute to the middle-man who lives without producing, and without doing service to the community, by passing money from one pocket to another; but he also has to pay (as consumer) the profits of the other manufacturers who superintend the production of the goods he used. Again, as a mere member of society, a should-be citizen, has had to pay taxes, and a great deal more than he thinks; he has to pay for wars, past, present, and future, that were and are never meant to benefit him, but to force markets for his masters, nay, to keep him from rebellion, from taking his own at some date; he has also to pay for the thousand and one idiocies of parliamentary government, and ridiculous monarchical and official state; for the mountain of precedent, nonsense, and chicanery with its set of officials, whose business it is under the name of law to prevent justice being done to any one. In short, in one way or another, when he has by dint of constant labour got his wages into his pocket, he has them taken away from him again by various occult methods, till it comes to this at last, that he really works an hour for one-third of an hour's pay, while the two-thirds go to those who have not produced the wealth which they consume.

Here, then, as to the first and second conditions of a reasonable society. 1st, That the labour should be duly apportioned. 2nd, That the wealth should be duly apportioned. Our society does not merely fail in them, but positively inverts them; with us those who consume most produce least; those who produce most consume least.

There yet remains something to be said on the third condition of a fair state of society, that it should look to it that labour be not wasted. How does civilization fare in that respect? I have told you that war was the occupation of the ancient slaveholders, set free by slave-labour from the necessity of producing; similarly, the medieval baron, set free from the necessity of producing by the labour of the serfs, who tilled his lands for him, occupied himself with fighting for more serf-tilled land either for himself or his suzerain. In our own days we see that there is a class freed from the necessity of producing by the tribute paid by the wage-earners; what does our free class do, how does it occupy the life-long leisure which it forces toil to yield to it?

Well, it chiefly occupies itself in war like those earlier non-producing classes, and very busy it is over it. I know indeed that there is a certain position of the dominant class that does not pretend to do anything at all, except perhaps a little amateur reactionary legislation; yet even of that group I have heard that some of them are very busy in their estate offices trying to make the most of their special privilege, the monopoly of the land; and taking them altogether they are not a very large class. Of the rest some are busy in taxing us and repressing our liberties directly, as officers in the army and navy, magistrates, judges, barristers, and lawyers; they are the salaried officers on the part of the masters in the great class struggle. Other groups there are, as artists and literary men, doctors, schoolmasters, etc., who occupy a middle position between the producers and non-producers; they are doing useful service, and ought to be doing it for the community at large, but practically they are only working for a class, and in their present position are little better than hangers-on of the non-producing class, from whom they receive a share of their privilege, together with a kind of contemptuous recognition of their position as gentlemen - heaven save the mark! But the great mass of the non-producing classes are certainly not idle in the ordinary sense of the word; they could not be, for they include men of great energy and force of character, who would, as all reasonable men do, insist on some serious or exciting occupation; and I say once again their occupation is war, though it is "writ large," and called competition. They are, it is true, called organizers of labour; and sometimes they do organize it, but when they do they expect an extra reward for so doing outside their special privilege. A great many of them, though they are engaged in the war, sit at home at ease and let their generals - their salaried managers, to wit - wage it for them. I am meaning here shareholders or sleeping partners; but whenever they are active in business they are really engaged in organizing the war with their competitors, the capitalists in the same line of business as themselves; and if they are to be successful in that war, they must not be sparing of destruction, either of their own or other people's goods; nay, they not unseldom are prepared to further the war of sudden, as opposed to that of lingering death, and of late years they have involved pretty nearly the whole of Europe in attacks on barbarian or savage peoples, which are only distinguishable from sheer piracy by their being carried on by nations instead of individuals. But all that is only by the way; it is the ordinary and necessary outcome of their operations that there should be periodical slackness of trade following on times of inflation, from the fact that everyone tries to get as much as he can of the market to himself at the expense of everyone else, so that sooner or later the market is sure to be overstocked, so that wares are sold sometimes at less than the cost of production, which means that so much labour has been wasted on them by misdirection. Nor is that all; for they are obliged to keep an army of clerks and such like people, who are not necessary either for the production of goods or their distribution, but are employed in safe-guarding their masters' interests against their masters' competitors. The waste is further increased by the necessity of these organizers of the commercial war for playing on the ignorance and gullibility of the consumers by two processes, which in their perfection are specialities of the present century, and even, it may be said, of this latter half of it - to wit, adulteration and puffery. It would be hard to say how much ingenuity and painstaking have been wasted on these incidents in the war of commerce, and I am wholly unable to get any statistics of them: but we all know that an enormous amount of labour is spent on them, which is at the very best as much wasted as if those engaged on them were employed in digging a hole and filling it up again.

But further; there is yet another source of waste involved in our present society. The grossly unequal distribution of wealth forces the rich to get rid of their surplus money by means of various forms of folly and luxury, which means further waste of labour. Do not think I am advocating asceticism. I wish us all to make the utmost of what we can obtain from Nature to make us happier and more contented while we live; but apart from reasonable comfort and real refinement, there is, as I am sure no one can deny, a vast amount of sham wealth and sham service created by our miserable system of rich and poor, which makes no human being the happier, on the one hand, while on the other it withdraws vast numbers of workers from the production of real utilities, and so casts a heavy additional burden of labour on those who are producing them. I have been speaking hitherto of a producing and a non-producing class, but I have been quite conscious all the time that though the first class produces whatever wealth is created, a very great portion of it is prevented from producing wealth at all, and being set to nothing better than turning a wheel that grinds nothing - save the workers' lives. Nay, worse than nothing. I hold that this sham wealth is not merely a negative evil (I mean in itself), but a positive one. It seems to me that the refined society of to-day is distinguished from all others by a kind of gloomy cowardice - a stolid but timorous incapacity of enjoyment. He who runs may read the record of the unhappy rich not less than that of the unhappy poor in the futility of their amusements, and the degradation of their art and literature.

Well, then, the third condition of a reasonable society is violated by our present so called society; the tremendous activity, energy, and invention of modern times is to a great extent wasted; the monopolists force the workers to waste a great part of their labour-power, while they waste almost all of theirs. Our society, therefore, does not fulfil the true functions of society. Now, the constitution of all society requires that each individual member of it should yield up a part of his liberty in return for the advantages of mutual help and defence; yet at bottom that surrender should be part of the liberty itself; it should be voluntary in essence. But if society does not fulfil its duties towards the individual, it wrongs him, and no man voluntarily submits to wrong - nay, no man ought to. The society, therefore, that has violated the essential conditions of its existence must be sustained by mere brute force, and that is the case with our modern society no less than that of the ancient slave-holding and the medieval serf-holding societies. As a practical deduction, I ask you to agree with me that such a society should be changed from its base up, if it be possible. And further, I must ask how, by what, and by whom, such a revolution can be accomplished? But before I set myself to deal with these questions, I will ask you to believe that though I have tried to argue the matter on first principles, I do not approach the subject from a pedantic point of view. If I could believe that, however wrong it may be in theory, our present system works well in practice, I should be silenced. If I thought that its wrongs and anomalies were so capable of palliation that people generally were not only contented, but were capable of developing their human faculties duly under it, and that we were on the road to progress without a great change, I for one would not ask anyone to meddle with it. But I do not believe that, nor do I know of any thoughtful person that does. In thoughtful persons I can see but two attitudes; on the one hand, the despair of pessimism, which I admit is common, and on the other a desire and hope of change. Indeed, in years like these few last, when one hears on all sides and from all classes of what people call depression of trade, which, as we too well know, means misery at least as great as that which a big war bears with it, and when on all sides there is ominous grumbling of the coming storm, the workers unable to bear the extra burden laid upon them by the "bad times," - in such years there is, I do not say no hope, but at least no hope except in those changes, the tokens of which are all around us.

Therefore, again I ask how, or by what, or by whom, the necessary revolution can be brought about? What I have been saying hitherto has been intended to show you that there has always been a great class struggle going on which is still sustained by our class of monopoly and our class of disinheritance. It is true that in former times no sooner was one form of that class struggle over than another took its place; but in our days it has become much simplified, and has cleared itself by progress through its various stages of mere accidental circumstances. The struggle for political equality has come to an end, or nearly so; all men are (by a fiction it is true) declared to be equal before the law, and compulsion to labour for another's benefit has taken the simple form of the power of the possessor of money, who is all powerful; therefore, if, as we Socialists believe, it is certain that the class struggle must one day come to an end, we are so much nearer to that end by the passing through of some of its necessary stages; history never returns on itself.

Now, you must not suppose, therefore, that the revolutionary struggle of to-day, though it may be accompanied (and necessarily) by violent insurrection, is paralleled by the insurrections of past times. A rising of the slaves of the ancient period, or of the serfs of medieval times, could not have been permanently successful, because the time was not ripe for such success, since the growth of the new order of things was not sufficiently developed. It is indeed a terrible thought that, although the burden of injustice and suffering was almost too heavy to be borne in such insurrectionary times, and although all popular uprisings have right on their side, they could not be successful at the time, because there was nothing to put in the place of the unjust system against which men were revolting. And yet it is true, and it explains the fact that the class antagonism is generally more felt when the oppressed class is bettering its condition than when it is at its worst. The consciousness of oppression then takes the form of hope, and leads to action, and is indeed the token of the gradual formation of a new order of things underneath the old decaying order.

I told you that I was not prepared to give you any details of the arrangement of a new state of society; but I am prepared to state the principles on which it would be founded, and the recognition of which would make it easy for serious men to deal with the details of arrangement. Socialism asserts that everyone should have free access to the means of production of wealth - the raw material and the stored-up force produced by labour; in other words, the land, plant, and stock of the community, which are now monopolized by certain privileged persons, who force others to pay for their use. This claim is founded on the principle which lies at the bottom of Socialism, that the right to the possession of wealth is conferred by the possessor having worked towards its production, and being able to use it for the satisfaction of his personal needs. The recognition of this right will be enough to guard against mere confusion and violence. The claim to property on any other grounds must lead to what is in plain terms robbery; which will be no less robbery because it is organized by a sham society, and must no less be supported by violence because it is carried on under the sanction of the law.

Let me put this with somewhat more of detail. No man has made the land of the country, nor can he use more than a small portion of it for his personal needs; no man has made more than a small portion of its fertility, nor can use personally more than a small part of the results of the labour of countless persons, living and dead, which has gone to produce that fertility. No man can build a factory with his own hands, or make the machinery in it, nor can he use it, except in combination with others. He may call it his, but he cannot make any use of it as his alone, unless he is able to compel other people to use it for his benefit; this he does not do personally, but our sham society has so organized itself that by its means he can compel this unpaid service from others. The magistrate, the judge, the policeman, and the soldier are the sword and pistol of this modern highwayman, and I may add that he is also furnished with what he can use as a mask under the name of morals and religion.

Now if these means of production, the land, plant, and stock, were really used for their primary uses, and not as means for extracting unpaid labour from others, they would be used by men working in combination with each other, each of whom would receive his due share of the results of that combined labour; the only difficulty would then be what would be his due share, because it must be admitted on all hands that it is impossible to know how much each individual has contributed towards the production of a piece of co-operative labour. But the principle once granted that each man should have his due share of what he has created by his labour, the solution of the difficulty would be attempted, nay, is now hypothetically attempted, in various ways - in two ways mainly. One view is that the State - that is, society organized for the production and distribution of wealth - would hold all the means of the production and distribution of wealth in its hands, allowing the use of them to whomsoever it thought could use them, charging rent, perhaps, for their use, but which rent would be used again only for the benefit of the whole community, and therefore would return to the worker in another form. It would also take on itself the organization of labour in detail, arranging the how, when, and where for the benefit of the public; doing all this, one must hope, with as little centralization as possible; in short, the State, according to this view, would be the only employer of labour. No individual would be able to employ a workman to work for him at a profit, i.e., to work for less than the value of his labour (roughly estimated), because the State would pay him the full value of it; nor could any man let land or machinery at a profit, because the State would let it without profit. It is clear that, if this could be carried out, no one could live without working. When a man had spent the wealth he had earned personally, he would have to work for more, as there would be no tribute coming to him from the labour of past generations. On those terms he could not accumulate wealth, nor would he desire to; for he could do nothing with it except satisfy his personal needs with it, whereas at present he can turn the superfluity of his wealth into capital, i.e., wealth used for the extraction of profit. Thus society would be changed. Everyone would have to work for his livelihood, and everybody would be able to do so, whereas at present there are people who refuse to work for their livelihood and forbid others to do so. Labour would not be wasted, as there would be no competing employers gambling in the market and using the real producer and the consumer as their milch cows. The limit of price would be the cost of production, so that buying and selling would be simply the exchange of equivalent values, and there would be no loss on either side in the transaction Thus there would be a society in which everyone would have an equal chance for well-doing, for, as a matter of course, arrangements would be made for the sustaining of people in their nonage, for keeping them in comfort if they were physically incapacitated from working, and also for educating everyone according to his capacities. This would at the least be a society which would try to perform those functions of seeing that everyone did his due share of work and no more, and had his due share of wealth and no less, and that no labour was wasted, which I have said were the real functions of a true society.

But there is another view of the solution of the difficulty as to what constitutes the due share of the wealth created by labour. Those who take it say, since it is not really possible to find out what proportion of combined labour each man contributes, why profess to try to do so? In a properly ordered community, all work that is done is necessary on the one hand, and on the other there would be plenty of wealth in such a community to satisfy all reasonable needs. The community holds all wealth in common, but has the same right to holding wealth that the individual has, namely, the fact that it has created it and uses it; but as a community it can only use wealth by satisfying with it the needs of every one of its members - it is not a true community if it does less than this - but their needs are not necessarily determined by the kind or amount of work which each man does, though of course, when they are, that must be taken into account. To say the least of it, men's needs are much more equal than their mental or bodily capacities are: their ordinary needs, granting similar conditions of climate and the like, are pretty much the same, and could, as above said, be easily satisfied. As for special needs for wealth of a more special kind, reasonable men would be contented to sacrifice the thing which they needed less for that which they needed more; and for the rest the varieties of temperament would get over the difficulties of this sort. As to the incentives to work, it must be remembered that even in our sham society most men are not disinclined to work, so only that their work is not that which they are compelled to do; and the higher and more intellectual the work is, the more men are resolved to do it, even in spite of obstacles. In fact, the ideas on the subject of the reward of labour in the future are founded on its position in the present. Life is such a terrible struggle for the majority that we are all apt to think that a specially gifted person should be endowed with more of that which we are all compelled to struggle for - money, to wit - and to value his services simply by that standard. But in a state of society in which all were well-to-do, how could you reward extra services to the community? Give your good worker immunity from work? The question carries with it the condemnation of the idea, and, moreover, that will be the last thing he will thank you for. Provide for his children? The fact that they are human beings with a capacity for work is enough; they are provided for in being members of a community which will see that they neither lack work nor wealth. Give him more wealth? Nay, what for? What can he do with more than he can use? He cannot eat three dinners a day, or sleep in four beds. Give him domination over other men? Nay, if he be more excellent than they are in any art, he must influence them for his good and theirs if they are worth anything; but if you make him their arbitrary master, he will govern them, but he will not influence them; he and they will be enemies, and harm each other mutually. One reward you can give him, that is, opportunity for developing his special capacity; but that you will do for everybody, and not the excellent only. Indeed, I suppose he will not, if he be excellent, lack the admiration, or perhaps it is better to say the affection, of his fellow men, and he will be all the more likely to get that when the relations between him and them are no longer clouded by the fatal gift of mastership.

Moreover, those who see this view of the new society believe that decentralization in it would have to be complete. The political unit with them is not a Nation, but a Commune; the whole of reasonable society would be a great federation of such communes, federated for definite purposes of the organization of livelihood and exchange. For a mere nation is the historical deduction from the ancient tribal family in which there was peace between the individuals composing it and war with the rest of the world. A nation is a body of people kept together for the purposes of rivalry and war with other similar bodies, and when competition shall have given place to combination, the function of the nation will be gone.

I will recapitulate, then, the two views taken among Socialists as to the future of society. According to the first, the State - that is, the nation organized for unwasteful production and exchange of wealth - will be the sole possessor of the national plant and stock, the sole employer of labour, which she will so regulate in the general interest that no man will ever need to fear lack of employment and due earnings therefrom. Everybody will have an equal chance of livelihood, and, except as a rare disease, there would be no hoarding of money or other wealth. This view points to an attempt to give everybody the full worth of the productive work done by him, after have ensured the necessary preliminary that he shall always be free to work.

According to the other view, the centralized nation would give place to a federation of communities who would hold all wealth in common, and would use that wealth for satisfying the needs of each member, only exacting from each that he should do his best according to his capacity towards the production of the common wealth. Of course, it is to be understood that each member is absolutely free to use his share of wealth as he pleases, without interference from any, so long as he really uses it, that is, does not turn it into an instrument for the oppression of others. This view intends complete equality of condition for everyone, though life would be, as always, varied by the differences of capacity and disposition; and emulation in working for the common good would supply the place of competition as an incentive.

These two views of the future of society are sometimes opposed to each other as Socialism and Communism, but to my mind the latter is simply the necessary development of the former, which implies a transition period, during which people would be getting rid of the habits of mind bred by the long ages of tyranny and commercial competition, and be learning that it is to the interest of each that all should thrive.

When men had lost the fear of each other engendered by our system of artificial famine, they would feel that the best way of avoiding the waste of labour would be to allow every man to take what he needed from the common store, since he would have no temptation or opportunity of doing anything with a greater portion that he really needed for his personal use. Thus would be minimized the danger of the community falling into bureaucracy, the multiplication of boards and offices, and all the paraphernalia of official authority, which is, after all, a burden, even when it is exercised by the delegation of the whole people and in accordance with their wishes.

Thus have I laid before you, necessarily briefly, a Socialist's view of the present condition of labour and its hopes for the future. If the indictment against the present society seem to you to be of undue proportions compared with the view of that which is to come, I must again remind you that we Socialists never dream of building up by our own efforts in one generation a society altogether anew. All I have been attacking has been the exercise of arbitrary authority for the supposed benefit of a privileged class. When we have got rid of that authority and are free once more, we ourselves shall do whatever may be necessary in organizing the real society which even now exists under the authority which usurps that title. That true society of loved and lover, parent and child, friend and friend, the society of well-wishers, of reasonable people conscious of the aspirations of humanity and of the duties we owe to it through one another - this society, I say, is held together and exists by its own inherent right and reason, in spite of what is usually thought to be the cement of society, arbitrary authority to wit, that is to say, the expression of brute force under the influence of unreasoning habit. Unhappily though society exists, it is in an enslaved and miserable condition, because that same arbitrary authority says to us practically: "You may be happy if you can afford it, but, unless you have a certain amount of money you shall not be allowed the exercise of the social virtues: sentiment, affection, good manners, intelligence even, to you shall be mere words; you shall be less than men, because you are needed as machines to grind on in a system which has come upon us we scarce know how, and which compels us as well as you." This is the real, continuously-repeated proclamation of law and order to the most part of men who are under the burden of that hierarchy of compulsion which governs us under the usurped and false title of society, and which all true Socialists or supporters of real society are bound to do their best to get rid of, so as to leave us free to realize to the full that true society which means well-being and well-doing for one and all.

WHAT SOCIALISTS WANT

WILLIAM MORRIS

Socialists no more than other people believe that persons are naturally equal: there are amongst men all varieties of disposition, and desires, and degrees of capacity; nevertheless these differences are inequalities are very much increased by the circumstances amongst which a man lives and by those that surrounded the lives of his parents: and these circumstances are more or less under the control of society, that is of the ordered arrangement of persons among which we live. So I say first that granted that men are born with certain tendencies those tendencies can be developed for good and evil by the conditions of our lives, and those conditions are in our own hands to deal with, taking us nation by nation as a whole. If we are careful to be prudent and wise for ourselves and just towards other people those inequalities which are natural can be used for making life pleasanter and more varied: but if we act stupidly and unjustly they become a source of misery to many, and of degradation to all.

I have admitted that men are not naturally equal, yet all persons must admit that there are certain things which we all need; in that respect we are equal: we all need food, clothes, and shelter, and clearly if we need these things we need them in sufficiency, and of good quality, or else we have not really got them. Since then these needs are common to all, it follows that if anyone is not able to satisfy his needs in these respects there is something wrong somewhere, either with nature, or the man himself, or with the society of which he forms a part and which therefore dictates to him how he shall live.

But these things, food, clothes, and shelter, but these are our needs as animals only; as men and women we have other needs: however much we may vary we all of us need leisure and amusement and education of some sort or other for all men have the power of thinking, and that power may be repressed and may be developed, just as a plant may be starved or made fruitful by the quality of the soil it is planted in and cultivation it has. Again then I say that if a person has not leisure, pleasure, and education they fall short of human necessaries and there is something wrong somewhere.

So you see whatever inequality I admit among people, I claim this equality that everybody should have full enough food, clothes, and housing, and full enough leisure, pleasure, and education; and that everybody should have a certainty of these necessaries: in this case we should be equal as Socialists use the work: if we are not so equal, I assert that something is wrong either with nature, the individual man or the Society which tells him how to live.

Now does this reasonable equality exist amongst us? There can be but one answer to that: it does not: this is the richest country in the world; there are numbers of clever and capable people in it, and numbers of hard-working people: nevertheless every year there are persons who are starved to death in it, and there are vast numbers of persons who have not enough food and enough clothing or good enough housing and who have no hope of obtaining these things: still more who have no leisure, except the dreadful leisure which lack of employment, that is starvation, gives them, no pleasure worthy of a man, nay far less than the beasts have, no education in the true sense of the word, no chance of developing the innate power of thought that lies in them, in a word in this the richest country that ever has been there are many poor.

Now consider, what is a rich person and what is a poor one? It is worth while asking you to consider that, because people sometimes tell us that poverty is no evil and that a poor person can be as happy as a rich one, and so forth: whether they expect the poor to believe them I do not know: they want to make the best of things I suppose which as they are well-to-do they don't find a difficult matter. Well let us see what is a rich and what a poor person: a rich man is sure of all those necessities I spoke of bodily and mental, and other natural objects of desire he can reasonably hope to obtain: a poor man is scantily supplied with the bodily necessaries, has not got the mental ones, and risks losing even what he has, so that he lives in perpetual anxiety; as to the desire for superfluities, he has the desire indeed, but no hope of ever satisfying it: and I must say that all this seems to me as to all thoughtful persons a dreadful thing.

If therefore there are rich and poor in a rich country I am sure there must be something wrong: either with nature, or the individual persons, or with the system of Society under which such things happen.

Now I know that there are many people who say it is the fault of nature, and usually the same persons think it is also the fault of the poor people: in other words they think that certain persons are naturally incapable of earning their own livelihood, and that these people form the great mass whom we call the poor. I shall be able I hope to show you how greatly they are mistaken in this view.

There are others who think that it is the fault of the system of Society, and who try in various ways to alter that system, and all such people may fairly be called Socialists, though they don't all call themselves so, because they think it possible that a condition of things could be brought about in which these wrongs could be redressed and these gross inequalities made an end of: and it is cheering to think that the number of those who think this are increasing fast, and that many people are Socialists without knowing it; when they come to know it Socialism will be in a fair way to be realized.

Now then, let us look at that opinion which holds that it [is] necessary and natural that the poor should exist, that it is people's own fault that they are poor, and that nature has made them so.

It is a law of nature that mankind must labour in order to live, and men by means of their ever-increasing intelligence have striven to turn this law to their advantage by associating their labour and organizing it till in civilized countries they have brought it about that an ordinary average man can produce by his labour more than enough to keep himself (and his family) alive: that has been the case for a very long time; but in modern civilization the power of producing wealth has very much increased by the means of ever-improving organization of labour, and the invention of machinery: to give you an instance; it has been computed that in the great wheat-growing plains of Dakota the labour of one average man produces in a year 5500 bushels of wheat. However there is no need to go into elaborate figures and calculations on this point, because the very fact that there are rich and poor in the same community proves that the existence of the poor is not caused by natural laws but by artificial arrangements: for the poor do certainly labour, and by their labour produce the things on which men live and the luxuries which they enjoy, whereas on the other hand the rich either do not work at all, or if they do work do not produce wealth by their work: therefore the poor by their labour keep the rich: rich men are pensioners of poor ones, and if the poor were to withdraw their pensions the rich would either starve or have to work for their living. Do you doubt this by any chance? Then let us have an example. A man who owns a factory, and money which he does not need to spend on his own keep employs, say, a thousand men to work in that factory and by their labour they produce so much goods: why does he employ them? Clearly in order that he may get a certain advantage from them: what is that advantage? Well, he must pay these men something from out of that extra money he has, because if he didn't as they have nothing of their own except their bodies and minds and the power of labour in them they would starve to death; what does he pay them then? Does he let them have what they have produced by means of his factory after having made a fair deduction for the wear and tear of machinery, the expenses of bringing the goods to market, the risks incidental to manufacturer and trade and due payment for his superintendence, supposing him to be capable of superintendence? If he did so he would have an advantage in employing them because he would be able to help them in their work by means of it, and so he would earn his livelihood along with them. Now that I think would be a fair bargain the details of which could be easily arranged among honest and reasonable men, and which would gradually tend to the perfecting of fairness between the associated workers. A fair bargain but if any workman ventures to propose it to his employer, he had better have another situation in the background lest he should get the sack for being a Socialist. For this fair bargain is, so far as the faction in question is concerned, a Socialistic one. As a matter of fact the advantages he proposes to gain from so employing men is very different from that: what he does is to pay wages to his men, that is to give them as little as they will take without revolting or striking, and to keep for himself, and make the most of, all that they produce over and above those wages. And if [he] does not get by this means more than will cover the wear and tear of machinery, the risks of business, the expenses of marketing, and payment for his superintendence if he superintends, he has failed in his object: he says he has made no profit and sooner or later he withdraws his capital, i.e. his extra money from the concern and embarks it in another which will produce him a profit. It will make this matter clearer to you if you think of the employer not as one man, who might take a part in the work done in the factory, but as a joint-stock-company, the members of which could not do so: you will then see that the employers of labour are engaged in amusing themselves or in working or making a show of work elsewhere, while they are living on the labour of the men in the factory: from each one of those men they take a portion of what he produces and thereby make[s] his life the poorer: thus they are the pensioners of the workers and evade the law of nature which bids men work in order to thrive; but since it is a law of nature they can only do so at other people's expense: unless all help to produce some will not thrive; that is certain: what we Socialists say, is let those who will not work be the ones who do not thrive: can anybody say that is unfair? Yet many and many a man has suffered poverty, imprisonment, loss of friends, the reproach of the public, yes and death on the gallows-tree for persisting in preaching that simple piece of justice.

Now before I ask you to think if there is any good reason why all this should be, why strong, healthy, and capable people should be pensioners on others, let us try to see how it is; what the machinery is which enables such a joint-stock-company to live without producing: and let me say in passing that all that I have said about a factory and its machinery and capital applies equally to land: the land is also a factory, and its machinery is the fertility of it won by the labour of many generations of workers: the landlord is the pensioner of workmen past and present.

Now then this pension, this rent, this profit, which the landlord or the factory-owner live[s] on is clearly not paid to the pensioners voluntarily or indeed consciously by the workers: they are compelled to pay it, and so cunningly that they do not understand the compulsion, though they feel it, and in an unconscious manner struggle against it. What enables the pensioners to force unwilling people to pay them a pension? This, that they are the owners of the raw material and instruments of labour: they have a privilege to compel people to pay for the use of these things, a privilege which is supported by the whole power of the law; and indeed the maintenance [of this privilege] is the chief business of all law and government in this and all civilized countries.

Let me explain further: for the production of good two things are necessary, the labour of men on the one hand, raw material together with the tools of labour on the other: the best workman in the world is useless without the wherewithal to work on, and in these days of the elaborate organization of labour if [he] is not also furnished with the most improved machinery he will fall far short of the workmen that are so furnished; the workmen of any country therefore must be able to have the use of the land of it, of the factories, machinery, railways, and lastly of the capital, i.e. the stored-up labour-power of past generations: if they cannot have these things they cannot work at all. Now the privileged classes, men like the joint-stock-company I have been speaking of, are quite willing that the workmen should work, that is necessary for the exercise of their privilege, if the workmen did not work, the idlers could not live idle: therefore they are allowed to use the raw material and tools of labour that the privileged own, but only on their paying a price for the use of them: now as for this price it cannot be more than would enable the workman to live and breed, and it cannot be less than would enable the property-owner to live on the labour of the workman; it varies between those two extremes; but the great mass of the workmen have to pay a price to leave to work little less than the highest price, or in other words their wages are little above what is necessary for them to live, work and breed on: because they are what is called unskilled workmen, that is they do work which requires no special aptitude or long training, and of this kind of labour the supply exceeds the demand, there are more workmen that is than the employers can employ at a profit to themselves.

So you see this is the reason why the manufacturer is not satisfied with that fair bargain of working amongst his workmen: the law gives him the power to force them to pay him for leave to work if by any means not illegal he has managed to acquire more wealth than he needs for his own use. Money as you well know can buy immunity from labour, but once again this means nothing more nor less than that the owner of it can force other people to work for him gratis after they have fed, clothed, and housed themselves poorly. So you see unless a man is well enough off to have at his command land at least if not machinery and capital he cannot work wholly for himself; some part of his time at least he must pay as a poll-tax for leave to work that is for leave to live; and as the owners of land and capital are comparatively few it follows that the smaller part of the population forces the larger part to pay this poll-tax. And what is this tax? It is no slight money charge which one man might easily pay to another and feel little the worse for it; we have seen already what it is: the price which the workers pay to the idlers for leave to live is the renunciation of all the comforts of life: in order that he may live the working man has to consent to live as an inferior being to the non-worker, and this he is forced to agree to, because certain persons are allowed to live not by producing wealth as the worker does but by owning it: by owning what is necessary for the worker to use, but which they the non-workers can only use as an instrument of compulsion to force the workers to work without being paid for a portion of their working.

Now then we can see surely that it is nonsense saying that [it] is natural for the great mass of people to be poor; it is unnatural: if nature bids us to work in order to live, and refuses to yield her treasure to anyone who does not work, it ought to follow on that, that those who work most should have the most, and those who do not work at all should get nothing: whereas under our present system exactly the contrary is the case: the great landowner, the rich shareholder, men who do not even pretend to do anything are at the one end of the scale and are most wealthy; the unskilled workman, the field labourer working day-in day-out their lives long, and ending with the workhouse are at the other end of it; and betwixt and between are various groups of whom in the main it is true that the harder and the usefuller their work is the less they get.

Now I say that this is a lamentable flying in the face of Nature, and the result must be the impoverishment of the larger part of mankind. I have said that this is a rich country, and yet perhaps that is a misuse of words; can a country be called rich that has so many poor in it?

So we see it is absurd to put down the inequalities of modern Society to the nature or necessity of the case. But the defenders of our present system, say it is the fault of the poor themselves that they are poor: that is quite as absurd; we have seen that the greater part of the workers are poor: is it possible that it can be their faults: its being their faults would mean that they do not work, that they are idle; but they do all the work that is done at any rate, and they do so much of it that they are not only enabled to live to work but they also have the honour (I won't call it a pleasure) of keeping those who do not work: so that is preposterous nonsense saying of the whole of this working class that they are poor through their idleness.

No we must I feel sure come to the conclusion that it is the system under which we live that brings about those terrible inequalities which most thoughtful men lament: and we ought to be very glad that we are driven to that conclusion: because if it were the work of nature we could not seriously amend it: or if [it] could be true that all useful people were idle, i.e. useless, what could we do then? But since it is the fault of a system, which has grown up to what it is by the carelessness and thoughtlessness of men, it both can be altered, and it will be, since it is of the very nature of all human systems to change into something else and to change in the direction of men's desires: and men's desires do now, and have for a long time tended towards equality, towards the extinction of classes, in a word towards the general happiness of the whole population. Ah my friends, it is a mournful thing to consider how hard and cruel men are to one another, not from malice or ill-nature but from ignorance and thoughtlessness when with a little courage, a little forethought, a little wisdom we could make such a different world of it, that we could make all the poor, rich or wealthy rather, without really injuring the rich one iota. Is it not worth while trying to do that? Well that is what Socialists want to do. And I say again that can be done, and will be done; but if people delay too long trying to do it the natural break-up of the system will bring about much misery and probably war and violence before the times [get] better: which we might avoid by being wise in time, and thinking about what is to be done, trying our own selves to make the change from the bad old system to the better new come about with the consent of all thoughtful and well-wishing people: this is why I am speaking to you tonight trying to get you to agree with me that the position of working men can and should be altered and that altogether, not a little bettered merely; but quite changed; put on a new foundation.

I have shown you that the real reason for the poverty of the working-classes lay in the fact that some men wishing to live without working had managed to get into their hands those things which are necessary to the workmen to work with, and thus could compel them to keep them in idleness. Now this is the thing we Socialists want to alter: we say with St. Paul, that no one who can work has a right to live unless he works; and we also say as I began by telling you that since every ordinary healthy and capable man can produce more than he needs to keep himself every man who does a fair share of work ought to have a good livelihood.

I fear to some of you that may appear impossible; but you must remember what work now is, and what work should be: there is only a certain amount of labour-power in the country, and clearly if a great part of this labour-power in allowed to run to waste, the wealth of the country must be less than it should be. Now not only do a great many people refuse to work, but a great many others are set to do quite useless work by these idle rich men: if all the men who are doing nothing and all who are simply wasting their workers to work at making things which we want, which the whole community wants, and at distributing them in an unwasteful manner, we should as a community be abundantly wealthy: and if this wealth were shared justly we should be every one of us both healthy and wealthy: healthy I say without hesitation, because I am sure that all disease comes either from excess or from poverty.

Well then how are [we] to set to work about it? Perhaps you may have been told that the Socialists want to share up all wealth, and that the result of this would be that in the shorter or longer time things would come back to the old condition of inequality. Well of course they would if things remained otherwise as they are now. But then the Socialists do not want to share up all wealth: they want all persons to enjoy what they have fairly earned by their labour and what they can fairly use; and I don't think that on consideration you can think that wrong. What a man has and can use is his own; but what sense is there in his calling a thing his own which he cannot use? Suppose you give a child a sugar-plum and say that it is his but he mustn't eat it: what will he do? Why he will be coming to you every hour of the day and be saying "please may I eat that jumble now?" or else he will show you practically what he thinks about property by eating it without asking you. So you see you do not injure a man by taking away from him what he cannot use. But supposing he abuses this property of his which he cannot use for doing a wrong to someone else: are you injuring him by taking it away from him then? for instance - if you see a man levelling a gun at another man, are you injuring him by taking the gun away from him? Certainly not; you are preventing him from committing a crime. Well that is what we Socialists want to do: but further than that: we would take from people that part of their property which they cannot use and which they now abuse by wronging other people by means of it; but we would not take it away to do nothing with it, we would use it and by using it would benefit the very people from whom we had taken it as well as other people. We fully admit the right of people to use property, we deny their right to abuse it: and I must tell you plainly that in doing so we are in direct opposition to the present laws of Society, the laws that keep you poor: their maxim is that a man has a right to use and abuse the wealth which he has legally acquired. This abuse of property we would put an end to at once.

You will of course ask me what we propose in this matter, how we propose to destroy the abuse of property: I cannot give you the details of such an arrangement; no man can at this stage of the question: but I think I can make the principles clear on which those details would be founded. In order to do that let me go back to that owner of a factory that I have been speaking to you about before, and who would be content to be paid by the workmen who use if for the wear and tear and risk involved in working it, and just consideration for his own personal work in it: I think such a man would only wish to call such a factory his own because if he gave it up he would be thrown out of work. I think he would be perfectly willing to surrender it to a body of men whom he could trust to use it duly and ensure him work in it at a fair remuneration; I think he would be quite contented if he could say not this factory is mine, but this factory is ours: whose? Why the men's who work in it including himself. That is cooperation you will say: yes so it is: and it is also Socialism, if (and the if is a great one) that is the condition of all factories throughout the country. But it can only be the condition of all factories if those factories cease to be owned by private persons and are owned by the people in general in some way or other. Therefore you see the only body to which our factory owner could surrender the property which is useless to himself unless the people ensure the proper use of it is the people at large: they are the only body which can own it without wronging someone. Well, when the people, the nation if you please, owned this property what would they do with it? They would allow the workmen who could use it for producing goods to use it on condition that they paid to the whole people for the wear and tear of their property, that they paid in short what was necessary to keep it a going concern, and that they dealt fairly in dividing amongst themselves what they earned by their work. This is what is called the Nationalization of the means of production, and I have dealt with the case of the factory first because if you will agree to that you will the more readily agree to the opinion that the land should be nationalized; although for my part I can see no serious difference between the position of the land and the other means of production. The land should be owned by no private person but by the people at large to be used by those who can use it: they will indeed have to pay rent to the people, because if they did not, the man who got hold of a piece of extra-productive land would have an unfair advantage over his neighbour: but this rent would [be] so apportioned that it would not begin till the cultivator had made a fair living out of the soil; and he then would not be paying a tax on his labour, but would be handing over to the people what he had not worked for, a fertility which was the work of accident and the labour of past generations. And of this which he would pay to the people he would have his share again as one of the people. The capital of the country i.e. the stored-up wealth to be used for further production would also be owned by the people; no one would be allowed to take interest on money in order to live idly without labour; the people would lend to those that needed it on the security of the labour-power of the borrower under due regulations: the railways and other means of transit like all machinery would be owned by the people to be used by everybody according to his convenience. Of course we should between us have to pay for the maintenance and renewal of these things, but we should find it more convenient to pay for them in the lump, and everybody to use them freely just as we do for our bridges and highways and our postal service.

Now this would mean a very great change: it would put Society on a new basis: everyone would have to work and everyone would be able to work according to his capacity: there would be no need for overwork, since everyone was working: labour would be free; workmen would not need to beg to be employed by a master, because they would be able to employ themselves, and the results of their labour would be all their own. Moreover the people would see that education was the same for everyone according to their capacity, and that the old, the infirm, and all who for natural reasons could not work should be properly taken care of; and since the standard of life for the worker would have been raised so much the standard of comfort for such people would you may be sure be of the same kind: the people also would undertake great works for public utility and pleasure as they might well do in a country where no labour was wasted; and probably having satisfied their ordinary wants on a generous scale, it would be to these public advantages that people would turn for whatever of luxury or splendour they desired.

You may have noticed that I have [been] saying `the people' would take over such and such things, would do so and so: I have used this word as including all forms of administration bodies by which these changes would be carried out and the new Society maintained: I do not want to prejudice the question as to the exact form that such a Society would take. But in my opinion there would be far less centralization than there is at present, a board of officials, a parliament, or any such-like body should not attempt to administer the affairs of people living a long way off, whose conditions and surroundings they cannot thoroughly understand: surely it is always and everywhere good that people should do their own business, and in order that they may do it well, every citizen should have some share of it, and take on his own shoulders some part of the responsibility: true it is that this can only be done by free men, slaves can have no responsibility, and as long as the workers are the slaves of capital and have to work and live as it bids them, they must submit to what I should call professional officials, and have all public work ill-done at a huge cost.

Therefore to my mind in the new Society, we should form bodies like municipalities, county-boards and parishes, and almost all practical public work would be done by these bodies, the members of whom would be working at and living by their ordinary work, and, as aforesaid everybody who had any capacity for such work would have to do his share of it: and you must remember that this is no new idea after all, but is the ancient constitution of the land, which [was] gradually corrupted and overlaid by officialism of one sort or other: of course these bodies would have to federate for national or international purposes: but no set of delegates would venture to consider itself the master of the public, it would be its servant rather.

To recapitulate. In the Society which we Socialists wish to see realized labour will be free: no man will have to find a master before he sets to work to produce wealth, a master who will not employ him unless he can take from him a portion of what he has produced: every man will be able to keep himself by his labour, and the combination of all these workers will supply those things which can only be used by the public, such as baths, libraries, schools, great public buildings, railways, roads, bridges, and the like. There will be no political parties squabbling incessantly as to who shall govern the country and doing nothing else; for the country will govern itself, and the village, municipal, and county councils will send delegates to meetings for dealing with matters common to all. The trades also will have councils which will organize each the labour which they understand and these again will meet when necessary to discuss matters common to all the trades: in short life and labour [will be organized] in the least wasteful manner, and the ordinary citizen will learn to understand at least some part of this organization.

Thus we shall learn to live reasonably. My own belief is that when we are once bound together by ties of honesty and mutual self-respect all this will tend to get simpler and simpler, until our business becomes very easy to transact. For instance I have been speaking as if there would still be some social inequalities, as if one man would earn more money than another, though none would earn less than enough to keep him comfortably: but I do not think that this would last long: we should find that when we ceased to fight with each other for livelihood and to rob each other that all ordinary necessaries and comforts would be so abundant and so cheap that they would be free for everybody to take as he needed: of course we should pay for them, but in the lump: let me give you an illustration: when a family that is comfortably-off sit down to a leg of mutton how do they act? do they bring in a pair of scales and weigh out to each one his share of the victuals? No that is done in a prison, but not in a family: in a family everybody has what he needs and no one grudges it: Mary has one slice, Jack has two, and Bill has four: but Mary and Jack don't feel wronged, since they have had as much as they wanted: and the reason for this is that enough has been provided, and that the members of the family trust one another.

My friends it is for you to choose whether you will live in a prison or a family: we Socialists beg you to choose the latter. But in order that you may do so you must understand and make others understand that the world can only be happy if [it] is honest, and it can only be honest by not allowing persons to live by making other men poor: all rich people do now live in that way and consequently the world is dishonest. Now you may think it is too difficult a task to convince rich people of this, or to convince poor people that it is their duty to compel the rich to be honest - i.e. to be rich no longer. It is a difficult task; but we Socialists do not despair of it because on the one hand the rich are not over-happy in their riches, and many of them are beginning to learn one thing, viz. that they have nothing to fear from a system which will destroy poverty as well as riches. And on the other hand the poor are not so ignorant as they used to be, and they are beginning to learn that not only is it [in] their interest not to allow themselves to be robbed, but that it is a necessity for them, or else ruin will overtake their masters along with themselves: everywhere employers make less and less profits; the big men are swallowing the small, the bigger the big, and the biggest the bigger: employment becomes yearly harder to get and harder to give. The old system is tumbling to pieces, and the workers must now come forward and show the way to the new, by claiming to be allowed to work for themselves, and thus form a Society where all will be workers: if they do not do this, consciously and speedily too, there will be a terrible state of things before the new system is born: we now living may yet see people dying by the dozen of starvation in our streets before full shops and crowded warehouses: or indeed people in their agony of necessity breaking through all restraints and sacking such shops and warehouses and destroying everything right and left in mad and ignorant riot: because they will not understand and cannot unless they are taught that it is not the day's stock of bread and beef or the year's stock of cloth that they need, but the raw material and instruments for making the bread, beef, and cloth, and the organization for employing these matters. This lesson is what we have to teach them, I am sure that if we who have learned it will but do our duty they will not be long in learning it; and when they have learned it they will claim their rights; their right to live free, and to use what they can use though others may abuse it, the raw material and instruments of labour. That claim cannot be resisted if [it] is made by the combined workers of the country. The question is will they combine? I answer they must combine or starve.

But in order to combine in the best manner and to bring about the freedom of labour with least possible violence and misery, after they have learned what their position is and what it should be, they must cast aside all jealousy of one another, must understand thoroughly that they are not enemies to one another but all soldiers in one great army: they must be forebearing and slow to quarrel... [section deleted] and when they really feel this it will give them a courage which people can never have when they [are] acting in a selfish way each one for his own interests, a courage which will make them good men and true in all senses of the phrase: and then I repeat they will be irresistible: they will attract to them all that there is of intelligence in the working-classes, they will convince all those of the wealthy classes who are worthy and well-meaning, and the rest they will push aside to let them find out by experience that the life of a free man is better than that of either a slave or a slave-owner.

WHERE ARE WE NOW?

WILLIAM MORRIS

It is good from time to time for those who are engaged in a serious movement to look back and review the progress of the past few years; which involves looking around them and noting the way the movement is affecting other people. It is good to do so for this reason amongst others, that men absorbed in such a movement are apt to surround themselves with a kind of artificial atmosphere which distorts the proportions of things outside, and prevents them from seeing what is really going on, and consequently from taking due council as to what is best to do.

It is now some seven years since Socialism came to life again in this country. To some the time will seem long, so many hopes and disappointments as have been crowded into them. Yet in the history of a serious movement seven years is a short time enough; and few movements surely have made so much progress during this short time in one way or another as Socialism has done.

For what was it which we set out to accomplish? To change the system of society on which the stupendous fabric of civilisation is founded, and which has been built up by centuries of conflict with older and dying systems, and crowned by the victory of modern civilisation over the material surroundings of life.

Could seven years make any visible impression on such a tremendous undertaking as this?

Consider, too, the quality of those who began and carried on this business of reversing the basis of modern society! Who were the statesmen who took up the momentous questions laid before England of the nineteenth century by the English Socialists! Who were the great divines who preached this new gospel of happiness from their pulpits? Who were the natural philosophers who proclaimed their hope and joy at the advent of a society which should at last use their marvellous discoveries for the good of mankind?

There is no need to take a pen in hand to write their names. The traveller (i.e., the toiler) has fallen among thieves, and the priest and the Levite went by on the other side; or perhaps in this case threw a stone or two at the wounded man: it was but a Samaritain (sic), an outcast, an unrespectable person, who helped him.

Those who set out "to make the revolution" - that is, as afore said, to put society on a new basis, contradictory to the existing one - were a few working-men, less successful even in the wretched life of labour than their fellows; a sprinkling of the intellectual proletariat, whose keen pushing of Socialism must have seemed pretty certain to extinguish their limited chances of prosperity; one or two outsiders in the game political; a few refugees from the bureaucratic tyranny of foreign governments; and here and there an unpractical, half-cracked artist or author.

Yet such as they were, they were enough to do something. Through them, though not by them, the seven years of the new movement toward freedom have, contrary to all that might have been expected, impressed the idea of Socialism deeply on the epoch. It is true that the toilers have not begun to reap benefit from that impression; but it was impossible that they should. No permanent material benefit can accrue to them until Socialism has ceased to be militant, and is merged in the new society. But as I said the other week, the movement has at least accomplished this, that no one who thinks is otherwise than discontented with things as they are. The shouts of triumph over the glories of civilisation which once drowned the moans of the miserable (and that but a dozen years ago at most) have now sunk into quavering apologies for the existence of the horrors and fatuities of our system; a system which is only defended as a thing to be endured for lack of a better, and until we can find some means of packing it off into limbo: and the workers, who in the period of "leap and bound prosperity" were thought to have reached the end of their tether, and to be fixed in a kind of subordinate heaven on earth, are now showing that they are not going to stop there, at any rate, and whatever happens. And the principles of Socialism are beginning to be understood, so that to some of ourselves, who are always hearing of them, they seem now mere commonplaces which need not be insisted on. Though with that view I can, as I shall show presently, by no means agree.

All this has come to pass. How and why? Was it by virtue of the qualities of those who have furthered it? That little band of oddities who fell in with Socialism during these last few years, did it turn out after all that they were so much better than they seemed? Well, they were (and are), most of them, human at least; but otherwise it cannot be said that great unexpected talent for administration and conduct of affairs has been developed amongst us, nor any vast amount of foresight either. We have been what we seemed to be (to our friends I hope) - and that was no great things. We have between us made about as many mistakes as any other party in a similar space of time. Quarrels more than enough we have had; and sometimes also weak assent for fear of quarrels to what we did not agree with.

There has been self-seeking amongst us, and vainglory, and sloth, and rashness; though there has been at least courage and devotion also. When I first joined the movement I hoped that some working-man leader, or rather leaders, would turn up, who would push aside all middle-class help, and become great historical figures. I might still hope for that, if it seemed likely to happen, for indeed I long for it enough; but to speak plainly it does not so seem at present.

Yet, I repeat, in spite of all drawbacks the impression has been made, and why? The reason for it has been given in words said before, but which I must needs say again: because that seemingly inexpugnable fabric of modern society is verging towards its fall; it has done its work, and is going to change into something else. That is the reason why, with all our faults, we have been able to do something; nor do I believe that there will ever be lacking instruments for bringing about the great change, exactly in proportion to the readiness of the solid elements in society - the workers, to wit - to receive that change, and carry on the new order to which it will give birth.

So much at least we have to encourage us. But are not some of us disappointed in spite of the change in the way in which Socialism is looked on generally? It is but natural that we should be. When we first began to work together, there was little said about anything save the great ideals of Socialism; and so far off did we seem from the realisation of these, that we could hardly think of any means for their realisation, save great dramatic events which would make our lives tragic indeed, but would take us out of the sordidness of the so-called "peace" of civilisation. With the great extension of Socialism, this also is changed. Our very success has dimmed the great ideals that first led us on; for the hope of the partial and, so to say, vulgarised realisation of Socialism is now pressing on us. I think that we are all confident that Socialism will be realised: it is not wonderful, then, that we should long to see - to feel - its realisation in our own life-time. Methods of realisation, therefore, are now more before our eyes than ideals: but it is of no use talking about methods which are not, in part at least, immediately feasible, and it is of the nature of such partial methods to be sordid and discouraging, though they may be necessary.

There are two tendencies in this matter of methods: on the one hand is our old acquaintance palliation, elevated now into vastly greater importance than it used to have, because of the growing discontent, and the obvious advance of Socialism; on the other is the method of partial, necessarily futile, inconsequent revolt, or riot rather, against the authorities, who are our absolute masters, and can easily put it down.

With both of these methods I disagree; and that the more because the palliatives have to be clamoured for, and the riots carried out by men who do not know what Socialism is, and have no idea what their next step is to be, if contrary to all calculation they should happen to be successful. Therefore, at the best our masters would be our masters still, because there would be nothing to take their place. We are not ready for such a change as that! The authorities might be a little shaken perhaps, a little more inclined to yield something to the clamours of their slaves, but there would be slaves still, as all men must be who are not prepared to manage their own business themselves. Nay, as to the partial violent means, I believe that the occurrence of these would not shake the authorities at all, but would strengthen them rather, because they would draw to them the timid of all classes, i.e., all men but a very few.

I have mentioned the two lines on which what I should [consider] the methods of impatience profess to work. Before I write a very few words on the only line of method on which some of us can work, I will give my views about the present state of the movement as briefly as I can.

The whole set opinion amongst those more or less touched by Socialism, who are not definite Socialists, is towards the New Trades' Unionism and palliation. Men believe that they can wrest from the capitalists some portion of their privileged profits, and the masters, to judge by the recent threats of combination on their side, believe also that this can be done. That it could only very partially be done, and that the men could not rest there if it were done, we Socialists know very well; but others do not. Let that pass for the present. The Parliamentary side of things seems in abeyance, at present; it has given place to the Trade Union side. But, of course, it will come up again; and in time, if there is nothing to cut across the logical sequence of events, it will achieve the legal Eight Hours' Day - with next to no results either to men or masters.

For the rest, I neither believe in State Socialism as desirable in itself, or, indeed, as a complete scheme do I think it possible. Nevertheless, some approach to it is sure to be tried, and to my mind this will precede any complete enlightenment on the new order of things. The success of Mr. Bellamy's utopian book, deadly dull as it is, is a straw to show which way the wind blows. The general attention paid to our clever friends, the Fabian lecturers and pamphleteers, is not altogether due to their literary ability; people have really got their heads turned more or less in their direction.

Now it seems to me that at such a time, when people are not only discontented, but have really conceived a hope of bettering the condition of labour, while at the same time the means towards their end are doubtful; or, rather, when they take the very beginning of the means as an end in itself, - that this time when people are excited about Socialism, and when many who know nothing about it think themselves Socialists, is the time of all others to put forward the simple principles of Socialism regardless of the policy of the passing hour.

My readers will understand that in saying this I am speaking for those who are complete Socialists - or let us call them Communists. I say for us to make Socialists is the business at present, and at present I do not think we can have any other useful business. Those who are not really Socialists - who are Trades' Unionists, disturbance-breeders, or what not - will do what they are impelled to do, and we cannot help it. At the worst there will be some good in what they do; but we need not and cannot heartily work with them, when we know that their methods are beside the right way.

Our business, I repeat, is the making of Socialists, i.e., convincing people that Socialism is good for them and is possible. When we have enough people of that way of thinking, they will find out what action is necessary for putting their principles in practice. Until we have that mass of opinion, action for a general change that will benefit the whole people is impossible. Have we that body of opinion of any thing like it? Surely not. If we look outside that glamour, that charmed atmosphere of party warfare in which we necessarily move, we shall see this clearly: that though there are a great many who believe it possible to compel their masters by some means or another to behave better to them, and though they are prepared to compel them (by so-called peaceful means, strikes and the like), all but a very small minority are not prepared to do without masters. They do not believe in their own capacity to undertake the management of affairs, and to be responsible for their life in this world. When they are so prepared, then Socialism will be realised; but nothing can push it on a day in advance of that time.

Therefore, I say, make Socialists. We Socialists can do nothing else that is useful, and preaching and teaching is not out of date for that purpose; but rather for those who, like myself, do not believe in State Socialism, it is the only rational means of attaining to the New Order of Things.

WHIGS, DEMOCRATS, & SOCIALISTS *

WILLIAM MORRIS

What is the state of parties in England to-day? How shall we enumerate them? The Whigs, who stand first on the list in my title, are considered generally to be the survival of an old historical party once looked on as having democratic tendencies, but now the hope of all who would stand soberly on the ancient ways. Besides these, there are Tories also, the descendants of the stout defenders of Church and State and the divine right of kings.

Now, I don't mean to say but that at the back of this ancient name of Tory there lies a great mass of genuine Conservative feeling, held by people who, if they had their own way, would play some rather fantastic tricks, I fancy; nay, even might in the course of time be somewhat rough with such people as are in this hall at present. ** But this feeling, after all, is only a sentiment now; all practical hope has died out of it, and these worthy people cannot have their own way. It is true that they elect members of Parliament, who talk very big to please them, and sometimes even they manage to get a Government into power that nominally represents their sentiment, but when that happens the said Government is forced, even when its party has a majority in the House of Commons, to take a much lower standpoint than the high Tory ideal; the utmost that the real Tory party can de, even when backed by the Primrose League and its sham hierarchy, is to delude the electors to return Tories to Parliament to pass measures more akin to Radicalism than the Whigs durst attempt, so that, though there are Tories, there is no Tory party in England.

On the other hand, there is a party, which I can call for the present by no other name than Whig, which is both numerous and very powerful, and which does, in fact, govern England, and to my mind will always do so as long as the present constitutional Parliament lasts. Of course, like all parties it includes men of various shades of opinion, from the Tory-tinted Whiggery of Lord Salisbury to the Radical-tinted Whiggery of Mr. Chamberlain's present tail. Neither do I mean to say that they are conscious of being a united party; on the contrary, the groups will sometimes oppose each other furiously at elections, and perhaps the more simple-minded of them really think that it is a matter of importance to the nation which section of them may be in power; but they may always be reckoned upon to be in their places and vote against any measure which carries with it a real attack on our constitutional system; surely very naturally, since they are there for no other purpose than to do so. They are, and always must be, conscious defenders of the present system, political and economical, as long as they have any cohesion as Tories, Whigs, Liberals, or even Radicals. Not one of them probably would go such a very short journey towards revolution as the abolition of the House of Lords. A one-chamber Parliament would seem to them an impious horror, and the abolition of the monarchy they would consider a serious inconvenience to the London tradesman.

Now this is the real Parliamentary Party, at present divided into jarring sections under the influence of the survival of the party warfare of the last few generations, but which already shows signs of sinking its differences so as to offer a solid front of resistance to the growing instinct which on its side will before long result in a party claiming full economical as well as political freedom for the whole people.

But is there nothing in Parliament, or seeking entrance to it, except this variously tinted Whiggery, this Harlequin of Reaction? Well, inside Parliament, setting aside the Irish party, which is, we may now well hope, merely temporarily there, there is not much. It is not among people of "wealth and local influence," who I see are supposed to be the only available candidates for Parliament of a recognized party, that you will find the elements of revolution. We will grant that there are some few genuine Democrats there, and let them pass. But outside there are undoubtedly many who are genuine Democrats, and who have it in their heads that it is both possible and desirable to capture the constitutional Parliament and turn it into a real popular assembly, which, with the people behind it, might lead us peaceably and constitutionally into the great Revolution which all thoughtful men desire to bring about; all thoughtful men, that is, who do not belong to the consciously cynical Tories, i.e., men determined, whether it be just or unjust, good for humanity or bad for it, to keep the people down as long as they can, which they hope, very naturally, will be as long as they live.

To capture Parliament and turn it into a popular but constitutional assembly is, I must conclude, the aspiration of the genuine Democrats wherever they may be found; that is their idea of the first step of the Democratic policy. The questions to be asked of this, as of all other policies, are first, What is the end proposed by it? and secondly, Are they likely to succeed? As to the end proposed, I think there is much difference of opinion. Some Democrats would answer from the merely political point of view, and say: Universal suffrage, payment of members, annual Parliaments, abolition of the House of Lords, abolition of the monarchy, and so forth. I would answer this by saying: After all, these are not ends, but means to an end; and passing by the fact that the last two are not constitutional measures, and so could not be brought about without actual rebellion, I would say if you had gained all these things, and more, all you would have done would have been to establish the ascendancy of the Democratic party; having so established it, you would then have to find out by the usual party means what that Democratic party meant, and you would find that your triumph in mere politics would lead you back again exactly to the place you started from. You would be Whigs under a different name. Monarchy, House of Lords, pensions, standing army, and the rest of it, are only supports to the present social system - the privilege based on the wages and capital system of production - and are worth nothing except as supports to it. If you are determined to support that system, therefore, you had better leave these things alone. The real masters of Society, the real tyrants of the people, are the Landlords and the Capitalists, whom your political triumph would not interfere with.

Then, as now, there would be a proletariat and a moneyed class. Then, as now, it would be possible sometimes for a diligent, energetic man, with his mind set wholly on such success, to climb out of the proletariat into the moneyed class, there to sweat as he once was sweated; which, my friends, is, if you will excuse the word, your ridiculous idea of freedom of contract.

The sole and utmost success of your policy would be that it might raise up a strong opposition to the condition of things which it would be your function to uphold; but most probably such opposition would still be outside Parliament, and not in it; you would have made a revolution, probably not without bloodshed, only to show people the necessity for another revolution the very next day.

Will you think the example of America too trite? Anyhow, consider it! A country with universal suffrage, no king, no House of Lords, no privilege as you fondly think; only a little standing army, chiefly used for the murder of red-skins; a democracy after your model; and with all that, a society corrupt to the core, and at this moment engaged in suppressing freedom with just the same reckless brutality and blind ignorance as the Czar of all the Russias uses. ***

But it will be said, and certainly with much truth, that not all the Democrats are for mere political reform. I say that I believe that this is true, and it is a very important truth too. I will go farther, and will say that all those Democrats who can be distinguished from Whigs do intend social reforms which they hope will somewhat alter the relations of the classes towards each other; and there is, generally speaking, amongst Democrats a leaning towards a kind of limited State Socialism, and it is through that that they hope to bring about a peaceful revolution, which, if it does not introduce a condition of equality, will at least make the workers better off and contented with their lot.

They hope to get a body of representatives elected to Parliament, and by them to get measure after measure passed which will tend towards this gaol; nor would some of them, perhaps most of them, be discontented if by this means we could glide into complete State Socialism. I think that the present Democrats are widely tinged with this idea, and to me it is a matter of hope that it is so; whatever of error there is in it, it means advance beyond the complete barrenness of the mere political programme.

Yet I must point out to these semi-Socialist Democrats that in the first place they will be made the cat's-paw of some of the wilier of the Whigs. There are several of these measures which look to some Socialistic, as, for instance, the allotments scheme, and other schemes tending toward peasant proprietorship, co-operation, and the like, but which after all, in spite of their benevolent appearance, are really weapons in the hands of reactionaries, having for their real object the creation of a new middle-class made out of the working-class and at their expense; the raising, in short, of a new army against the attack of the disinherited.

There is no end to this kind of dodge, nor will be apparently till there is an end of the class which tries it on; and a great many of the Democrats will be amused and absorbed by it from time to time. They call this sort of nonsense "practical"; it seems like doing something, while the steady propaganda of a principle which must prevail in the end is, according to them, doing nothing, and is unpractical. For the rest, it is not likely to become dangerous, further than as it clogs the wheels of the real movement somewhat, because it is sometimes a mere piece of reaction, as when, for instance, it takes the form of peasant proprietorship, flying right in the face of the commercial development of the day, which tends ever more and more towards the aggregation of capital, thereby smoothing the way for the organized possession of the means of production by the workers when the true revolution shall come: while, on the other hand, when this attempt to manufacture a new middle-class takes the form of co-operation and the like, it is not dangerous, because it means nothing more than a slightly altered form of joint-stockery, and everybody almost is beginning to see this. The greed of men stimulated by the spectacle of profit-making all around them, and also by the burden of the interest on the money which they have been obliged to borrow, will not allow them even to approach a true system of co-operation. Those benefitted by the transaction presently become eager shareholders in a commercial speculation, and if they are working-men, as they often are, they are also capitalists. The enormous commercial success of the great co-operative societies, and the absolute no-effect of that success on the social conditions of the workers, are sufficient tokens of what this non-political co-operation must come to: "Nothing - it shall not be less."

But again, it may be said, some of the Democrats go farther than this; they take up actual pieces of Socialism, and are more than inclined to support them. Nationalization of the land, or of railways, or cumulative taxation on incomes, or limiting the right of inheritance, or new factory laws, or the restriction by law of the day's labour - one of these, or more than one sometimes, the Democrats will support, and see absolute salvation in these one or two planks of the platform. All this I admit, and once again say it is a hopeful sign, and yet once again I say there is a snare in it - a snake lies lurking in the grass.

Those who think that they can deal with our present system in this piecemeal way very much underrate the strength of the tremendous organization under which we live, and which appoints to each of us his place, and if we do not chance to fit it, grinds us down till we do. Nothing but a tremendous force can deal with this force; it will not suffer itself to be dismembered, nor to lose anything which really is its essence without putting forth all its force in resistance; rather than lose anything which it considers of importance, it will pull the roof of the world down upon its head. For, indeed, I grant these semi-Socialist Democrats that there is one hope for their tampering piecemeal with our Society; if by chance they can excite people into seriously, however blindly, claiming one or other of these things in question, and could be successful in Parliament in driving it through, they would certainly draw on a great civil war, and such a war once let loose would not end but either with the full triumph of Socialism or its extinction for the present; it would be impossible to limit the aim of the struggle; nor can we even guess at the course which it would take, except that it could not be a matter of compromise. But suppose the Democratic party peaceably successful on this new basis of semi-State Socialism, what would it all mean? Attempts to balance the two classes whose interests are opposed to each other, a mere ignoring of this antagonism which has led us through so many centuries to where we are now, and then, after a period of disappointment and disaster, the naked conflict once more; a revolution made, and another immediately necessary on its morrow!

Yet, indeed, it will not come to that; for, whatever may be the aims of the Democrats, they will not succeed in getting themselves into a position from whence they could make the attempt to realize them. I have said there are Tories and yet no real Tory party; so also it seems to me that there are Democrats but no Democratic party; at present they are used by the leaders of the parliamentary factions, and also kept at a distance by them from any real power. If they by hook or crook managed to get a number of members into Parliament, they would find out their differences very speedily under the influence of party rule; in point of fact, the Democrats are not a party; because they have no principles other than the old Whig-Radical ones, extended in some cases so as to take in a little semi-Socialism which the march of events has forced on them - that is, they gravitate on one side to the Whigs and on the other to the Socialists. Whenever, if ever, they begin to be a power in the elections and get members in the House, the temptation to be members of a real live party which may have the government of the country in its hands, the temptation to what is (facetiously, I suppose) called practical politics, will be too much for many, even of those who gravitate towards Socialism: a quasi-Democratic parliamentary party, therefore, would probably be merely a recruiting ground, a nursery for the left wing of the Whigs; though it would indeed leave behind some small nucleus of opposition, the principles of which, however, would be vague and floating, so that it would be but a powerless group after all.

The future of the constitutional Parliament, therefore, it seems to me, is a perpetual Whig Rump, which will yield to pressure when mere political reforms are attempted to be got out of it, but will be quite immovable towards any real change in social and economical matters; that is to say, so far as it may be conscious of the attack; for I grant that it may be betrayed into passing semi-State-Socialistic measures, which will do this amount of good, that they will help to entangle commerce in difficulties, and so add to discontent by creating suffering; suffering of which the people will not understand the causes definitely, but which their instinct will tell them truly is brought about by government, and that, too, the only kind of government which they can have so long as the constitutional Parliament lasts.

Now, if you think I have exaggerated the power of the Whigs, that is, of solid, dead, unmoving resistance to progress, I must call your attention to the events of the last few weeks. Here has been a measure of pacification proposed; at the least and worst an attempt to enter upon a pacification of a weary and miserable quarrel many centuries old. The British people, in spite of their hereditary prejudice against the Irish, were not averse to the measure; the Tories were, as usual, powerless against it; yet so strong has been the vis inertiæ of Whiggery that it has won a notable victory over common-sense and sentiment combined, and has drawn over to it a section of those hitherto known as Radicals, and probably would have drawn all Radicals over but for the personal ascendancy of Mr. Gladstone. The Whigs, seeing, if but dimly, that this Irish Independence meant an attack on property, have been successful in snatching the promised peace out of the people's hands, and in preparing all kinds of entanglement and confusion for us for a long while in their steady resistance to even the beginnings of revolution.

This, therefore, is what Parliament looks to me: a solid central party, with mere nebulous opposition on the right hand and on the left. The people governed; that is to say, fair play amongst themselves for the money-privileged classes to make the most of their privilege, and to fight sturdily with each other in doing so; but the government concealed as much as possible, and also as long as possible; that is to say, the government resting on an assumed necessary eternity of privilege to monopolize the means of the fructification of labour.

For so long as that assumption is accepted by the ignorance of the people, the Great Whig Rump will remain inexpugnable, but as soon as the people's eyes are opened, even partially - and they begin to understand the meaning of the words, the Emancipation of Labour - we shall begin to have an assured hope of throwing off the basest and most sordid tyranny which the world has yet seen, the tyranny of so-called Constitutionalism.

How, then, are the people's eyes to be opened? By the force evolved from the final triumph and consequent corruption of Commercial Whiggery, which force will include in it a recognition of its constructive activity by intelligent people on the one hand, and on the other half-blind instinctive struggles to use its destructive activity on the part of those who suffer and have not been allowed to think; and, to boot, a great deal that goes between those two extremes.

In this turmoil, all those who can be truly called Socialists will be involved. The modern development of the great class-struggle has forced us to think, our thoughts force us to speak, and our hopes force us to try to get a hearing from the people. Nor can one tell how far our words will carry, so to say. The most moderate exposition of our principles will bear with it the seeds of disruption; nor can we tell what form that disruption will take.

One and all, then, we are responsible for the enunciation of Socialist principles and of the consequences which may flow from their general acceptance, whatever that may be. This responsibility no Socialist can shake off by declarations against physical force and in favour of constitutional methods of agitation; we are attacking the Constitution with the very beginnings, the mere lispings, of Socialism.

Whiggery, therefore, in its various forms, is the representative of Constitutionalism - is the outward expression of monopoly and consequent artificial restraints on labour and life; and there is only one expression of the force which will destroy Whiggery, and that is Socialism; and on the right hand and on the left Toryism and Radicalism will melt into Whiggery - are doing so now - and Socialism has got to absorb all that is not Whig in Radicalism.

Then comes the question, What is the policy of Socialism? If Toryism and Democracy are only nebulous masses of opposition to the solid centre of Whiggery, what can we call Socialism?

Well, at present, in England at least, Socialism is not a party, but a sect. That is sometimes brought against it as a taunt; but I am not dismayed by it; for I can conceive of a sect - nay, I have heard of one - becoming a very formidable power, and becoming so by dint of its long remaining a sect. So I think it is quite possible that Socialism will remain a sect till the very eve of the last stroke that completes the revolution, after which it will melt into the new Society. And is it not sects, bodies of definite, uncompromising principles, that lead us into revolutions? Was it not so in the Cromwellian times? Nay, have not the Fenian sect, even in our own days, made Home Rule possible? They may give birth to parties, though not parties themselves. And what should a sect like we are have to do in the parliamentary struggle - we who have an ideal to keep always before ourselves and others, and who cannot accept compromise; who can see nothing that can give us rest for a minute save the emancipation of labour, which will be brought about by the workers gaining possession of all the means of the fructification of labour; and who, even when that is gained, shall have pure Communism ahead to strive for?

What are we to do, then? Stand by and look on? Not exactly. Yet we may look on other people doing their work while we do ours. They are already beginning, as I have said, to stumble about with attempts at State Socialism. Let them make their experiments and blunders, and prepare the way for us by so doing. And our own business? Well, we - sect or party, or group of self-seekers, madmen, and poets, which you will - are at least the only set of people who have been able to see that there is and has been a great class-struggle going on. Further, we can see that this class-struggle cannot come to an end till the classes themselves do: one class must absorb the other. Which, then? Surely the useful one, the one that the world lives by, and on. The business of the people at present is to make it impossible for the useless, non-producing class to live; while the business of Constitutionalism is, on the contrary, to make it possible for them to live. And our business is to help to make the people conscious of this great antagonism between the people and Constitutionalism; and meantime to let Constitutionalism go on with its government unhelped by us at least, until it at last becomes conscious of its burden of the people's hate, of the people's knowledge that it is disinherited, which we shall have done our best to further by any means that we could.

As to Socialists in Parliament, there are two words about that. If they go there to take a part in carrying on Constitutionalism by palliating the evils of the system, and so helping our rulers to bear their burden of government, I for one, and so far as their action therein goes, cannot call them Socialists at all. But if they go there with the intention of doing what they can towards the disruption of Parliament, that is a matter of tactics for the time being; but even here I cannot help seeing the danger of their being seduced from their true errand, and I fear that they might become, on the terms above mentioned, simply supporters of the very thing they set out to undo.

I say that our work lies quite outside Parliament, and it is to help to educate the people by every and any means that may be effective; and the knowledge we have to help them to is threefold - to know their own, to know how to take their own, and to know how to use their own.

* Read at the Conference convened by the Fabian Society at South Place Institute, June 11, 1886. back

** They have been "rather rough," you may say, and have done more than merely hold their sentimental position. Well, I still say (February 1888) that the present open tyranny which sends political opponents to prison, both in England and Ireland, and breaks Radical heads in the street for attempting to attend political meetings, is not Tory, but Whig; not the old Tory "divine right of kings," but the new Tory, i.e., Tory-tinted Whig, "divine right of property," made Bloody Sunday possible. I admit that I did not expect in 1886 that we should in 1887 and 1888 be having such a brilliant example of the tyranny of a parliamentary majority; in fact, I did not reckon on the force of the inpenetrable stupidity of the Prigs in alliance with the Whigs marching under the rather ragged banner of sham Toryism. back

*** As true now (Feb. 1888) as then: the murder of the Chicago Anarchists, to wit. back

William Morris : Works

1870

Review of Dante Gabriel Rossetti's Poems *

1877

Manifesto of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings (SPAB) *

Tewkesbury Minster *

Restoration of Tewkesbury Minster *

Canterbury Cathedral I *

Canterbury Cathedral II *

Canterbury Cathedral III *

1878

Report of the First Annual Meeting - SPAB *

Destruction of City Churches *

St Albans Cathedral I *

St Albans Cathedral II *

Southwell Minster I *

Southwell Minster II *

1879

Report of the Second Annual Meeting - SPAB *

Speech Seconding a Resolution Against Restoration *

Aims of SPAB *

St Mark's, Venice I *

St Mark's, Venice II *

St Mark's, Venice III *

1880

Annual Report of The SPAB III *

The Baptistry, Ravenna *

1881

Magdalen Bridge *

Ashburnham House *

High Wycombe Grammar School *

1882

Annual Report of The SPAB -V. *

Answer to Query About Blytheborough Church *

Speech Seconding a Vote of Thanks to the Hon. James Bryce MP. *

Vandalism in Italy *

1883

Annual Report of The SPAB - VI. *

Blundell's School, Tiverton *

1884

Architecture and History *

Art and Socialism

At a Picture Show, 1884 *

How We Live and How We Might Live

1885

The Manifesto of The Socialist League, First Edition *

The Manifesto of The Socialist League, Second Edition *

Speech Moving the Adoption of the Annual Report at the Eighth Annual Meeting of SPAB *

Useful Work versus Useless Toil *

The Vulgarisation of Oxford *

1886

May Day *

Socialism from the Root Up

1 - Ancient Society

2 - Mediæval Society

3 - The Break-up of Feudalism

4 - Modern Society: Early Stages

5 - Preparing for Revolution - England

6 - Preparing for Revolution - France

7 - The French Revolution: Constitutional Stage

8 - The French Revolution: The Proletarian Stage

9 - The Industrial Revolution in England

10 - Political Movements in England

11 - Reaction and Revolution on the Continent

12 - The Paris Commune of 1871, and the Continental Movement Following It

13 - The Utopists: Owen, Saint Simon, and Fourier

Speech Seconding a Resolution to Establish a Fund for the Repair of Ancient Buildings *

1887

Socialism from the Root Up

14 - The Transition from Utopists to Modern Socialism

15 - Scientific Socialism - Karl Marx

16 - Scientific Socialism - Karl Marx II Money

17 - Scientific Socialism - Conversion of Capital into Money

18 - Scientific Socialism - The Production of Surplus Value - That is, of Rent, Interest, and Profit

19 - Scientific Socialism - Constant and Variable Capital

20 - Marx's Deduction of the Historical Evolution of Modern Industry

21 - Scientific Socialism: Conclusion

Speech Proposing the Adoption of the Annual Report *

1888

The Revival of Architecture *

The Revival of Handicraft *

Socialism from the Root Up

22 - Socialism Militant [Part 1]

22 - Socialism Militant [Part 2]

23 - Socialism Triumphant [Part 1]

23 - Socialism Triumphant [Part 2]

True and False Society *

Ugly London *

1889

Address at the Twelfth Annual Meeting - SPAB *

Response to Vote of Thanks *

Mr. Shaw Lefevre's Monumental Chapel *

Monuments in Westminster Abbey *

Peterborough Cathedral I *

Peterborough Cathedral II *

Socialism and Anarchism

1890

Vandalism in Oxford *

Stratford-on-Avon Church *

Monopoly; or, How Labour is Robbed *

News from Nowhere

Statement of Principles of the Hammersmith Socialist Society *

1891

The Proposed Addition to Westminster Abbey *

Restoration of Westminster Abbey *

The Socialist Ideal: Art *

1892

Preface to The Nature of Gothic by John Ruskin *

1893

On the Artistic Qualities of the Woodcut Books of Ulm and Augsburg in the Fifteenth Century *

Preface to Medieval Lore by Robert Steele *

Printing *

Textiles *

Foreword to Thomas More's Utopia *

Westminster Abbey *

1894

The Mortuary Chapel, Westminster Abbey *

How I Became a Socialist

Introductory Note to Good King Wenceslas, by Dr Neale

Some Notes on the Illuminated Books of the Middle Ages

1895

Peterborough Cathedral III *

Gossip about an Old House on the Upper Thames *

The Royal Tombs in Westminster Abbey *

The Restoration of Rouen Cathedral *

The Trinity Almshouses *

Peterborough Cathedral IV *

Peterborough Cathedral V *

Chichester Cathedral *

1896

The Present Outlook of Socialism in England *

Unknown

How we Live & How we Might Live

Lecture on Bellamy's Looking Backward *

An address delivered at the distribution of prizes to students of the Birmingham Municipal School of Art *

Communism *

Socialism up-to-date [portions] *

The Art of Dyeing *

Address on the Collection of Paintings of the English Pre-Raphaelite School *

Equality [portions] *

Textile Fabrics *

What we have to look for [portions] *

Makeshift *

Socialism: The Ends and the Means *

Our Policy *

The Political Outlook [portions] *

Art Under Plutocracy *

Art and its Producers *

Communism, - i.e. Property [portions] *

Speech on W. T. Stead's Exposé of London Prostitution *

The Arts and Crafts of To-day *

Commercial War [portion] *

What is: What should be: What will be: What may be [portions] *

Where are we now? *

The Woodcuts of Gothic Books *

Speech Against the Abuses of Public Advertising *

The Aims of Art *

Art and Labour *

The Influence of Building Materials on Architecture *

Art and the Beauty of the Earth *

Dawn of a New Epoch *

Gothic Architecture *

Some Hints on Pattern-Designing *

Architecture and History *

The Early Literature of the North - Iceland *

The Ideal Book *

The Lesser Arts of Life *

Of the Origins of Ornamental Art *

The Present Outlook in Politics *

The History of Pattern-Designing *

The Policy of Abstention *

Art, Wealth, and Riches *

Testimony on the Restoration of Westminster Hall *

Address at the Twelfth Annual Meeting of SPAB [pages 146-147 missing] *

Report at the Second Annual Meeting of SPAB *

Town and Country [portions] *

The Depression of Trade *

What Socialists Want *

Whigs, Democrats, & Socialists *