Work [Travail]

by Émile Zola

'Just think of it, my friend!' Jordan resumed. 'For so many years past whilst we have been pursuing parallel tasks, our lives have been mingled. I should have gone off full of remorse if I had not again excused myself for having placed such little faith in your work when you first came to me and asked my help to build the future city of Justice. I was at that time convinced that you would encounter defeat.'

Luc began to laugh: 'Yes, yes, as you said, my friend, political, economical, and social struggles were not your business. No doubt there has been much futile agitation among men. But was one to abstain on that account from taking part in what went on, was one to allow evolution to take place as it listed, and refrain from hastening the hour of deliverance? All the compromises—often necessary ones—all the base devices to which the leaders of men have stooped, have had their excuse in the double march which they have at times helped mankind to effect.'

Jordan hastily interrupted him: 'You were right, my friend,' said he, 'and you have proved it magnificently. Your battle here has created, hastened the advent of a new world. Perhaps you have snatched a hundred years from human wretchedness. At all events this new town of Beauclair, where more justice and happiness now flower, proclaims the excellence of your mission, the beneficent glory of your achievement. I am with you entirely, you see, in mind and in heart, and I do not wish to quit you without telling you once more how thoroughly you won me over to your work, and with what growing affection I watched you whilst you were realising so many great things. You were often an example for me.'

But Luc protested: 'Oh! do not let us speak of any example of mine, my friend. It was you who ever gave me one, the loftiest, the most magnificent! Remember my lassitude, my occasional attacks of weakness, whereas I always found you erect, endowed with more courage, more and more faith in your work, even on the days when everything seemed to be crumbling around you. That which made you invincible was that you believed solely in work, in which, alone, you set health and the one reason for living and doing. And your own work became your very heart and brain, the blood pulsing in your veins, the thought ever on the alert in the depths of your mind. Your work alone existed for you, building itself up with all the life that you bestowed on it, hour by hour. And what an imperishable monument, what a gift of splendour and happiness you will leave to mankind! I might never have been able to carry out my own work, as a builder of towns, and leader of men, and at all events it would as yet be as nothing, had it not been for yours.'

Silence fell, and some birds flew by, whilst through the bare branches of the lime-tree the autumn sunshine streamed more gently as evening advanced. Sœurette, in her motherly fashion, became anxious, and drew Jordan's rug over his knees, whilst Josine and Suzanne bent over Luc, fearing lest he should tire himself.

But the latter replied to Jordan: 'Science remains the great revolutionary. You told me so at the outset, and every forward step in our long lives has shown me how right you were. Would our town of Beauclair, now all comfort and solidarity, have been possible as yet if you had not placed at its disposal that electrical power which has become the necessary agent of all work, all social life? Science, truth, will alone emancipate man, make him master of his destiny, and give him sovereignty over the world by reducing the natural forces to the status of obedient servants. Whilst I was building, my friend, you gave me what was needed to infuse life into my stones and mortar.'

'It is true, no doubt, that science will free man,' Jordan quietly replied in his weak little voice, 'for at bottom truth is the one powerful artisan of fraternity and justice. And I'm going off, feeling well pleased with myself, for I've just paid my last visit to our factory, and it is working now as I desired it to work, for the relief and felicity of all.'

He went on giving explanations and instructions respecting the working of the new appliances, the employment of those reservoirs of force, as if indeed he were dictating his last will and testament to his friend. Electricity already cost nothing, and was so abundant that it might be given to the inhabitants of Beauclair in whatever measure they desired, like the streams whose flood was inexhaustible; like the air which came freely from the four corners of the heavens. And given in this wise electricity was life.

In every public edifice and private house, even the most modest, light, heat, and motive power were distributed without counting. It was only necessary to turn on a few switches and the house was illumined and warmed, food was cooked, and various trade and household appliances were set working. All sorts of ingenious little mechanisms were being invented for household requirements, relieving women of the work which they had formerly done, substituting mechanical action for manual toil. In a word, from the housewife to the factory-worker, the ancient human beast of burden had been altogether relieved of physical exertion and useless suffering; a subjugated and domesticated natural force now replacing the old-time toilers and performing all the work allotted to it, in silence and cleanliness, with merely an attendant to check its action. And this also meant relief and freedom for the mind, a moral and intellectual rise for every brain, hitherto weighed down by excessive work, badly apportioned and fraught with savage iniquity for the greater number of the disinherited, whom it had plunged in ignorance, baseness and crime. And it was not slothful idleness that now reigned in the place of excessive toil, but work into which more freedom and conscience entered; man really becoming the king of work, devoting himself to the occupations he preferred, and creating more truth and beauty according to his tastes, after the few hours of general work which he gave to the community. And meantime also the unhappy domestic animals, the sad-looking horses, all the beasts used for draught, burden, and servitude were freed from the carts they had been compelled to drag, the millstones they had turned, the loads they had carried, and were restored to happy life in the fields and the woods.

But the purposes for which the electric force could be used were innumerable, and each day brought with it some fresh benefit. Jordan had invented some lamps of such great power that two or three sufficed to illumine an avenue. Thus the dream of lighting another sun above Beauclair at night-time would assuredly be fulfilled. Some huge and splendid glass houses had also been erected, in which by means of an improved system of heating, flowers, vegetables, and fruits could be easily grown at all seasons. The town was full of them, they were distributed broadcast, and winter, like night, ceased to exist. Moreover, transport and locomotion were facilitated more and more, thanks to the free motive power which was applied to an infinity of vehicles, bicycles, carriages, carts, and trains of several coaches.