“Why,” said I, “that is competition, which they no doubt thought better than monopoly. I can imagine that they argued that a man’s first duty was to himself and his family, that one had a right to go into any legitimate business, and that others must take care of themselves. The evil, if there was any, they probably felt was incident to the nature of business and could not be helped. I would like to ask how society could exist with any other business rules.”
As I closed it struck me that I had spoken pretty fast and without much discretion, and the impression was not removed as Thorwald answered with dignity:
“I am telling you the state of things on this planet thousands of years ago, and it is a sufficient answer to your question to say that society at the present day is not governed on any such principles; still, we seem to exist. It was a favorite saying in those days that ‘a man must live,’ and one that was used as an argument or excuse for questionable practices. The premise was wrong; it was not necessary to live: death would have been far better for the world and for the individual than a dishonorable life. So with society at large; better a change in the social structure, caused by an awakened conscience, than a state of peace founded on wrong principles. Our history proves that no particular plan of society is necessary to the world and that no order based on selfishness or injustice can long endure. But do not imagine such changes were easy or swift in accomplishment. They came, not by violence nor by the device of crafty men, but only through the universal betterment of the race, whereby a state of things that had been considered good enough, and then endured as the best attainable, became at last positively wrong and was slowly pushed aside by a growing sense of right.
“To return to your first question, as to what there was wrong in their way of doing business, I want to say with emphasis that the essence of the wrong was in an undue regard for self and an almost total disregard for the interests of others. There were exceptions to the rule, notably in the direction of charity and philanthropy and in religious work, but I am speaking of the mass of the business community. It was every man singly against all the rest of the world. No man was his brother’s keeper. If one did not look out for himself, that was the end of it; there was no one else to do it.”
“But the system itself made men selfish,” I ventured to say.
“To be sure it did,” he replied. “But why did they not then abolish the system before it had brought upon them its long train of evils? It had to go at last.”
“But,” I asked again, “was not competition a good thing for the large number of people not directly engaged in business? Did it not keep down the prices on all kinds of commodities?”
“Certainly not in the main. It increased prices, because it increased the cost of everything. But let us suppose a case where it had the effect you suggest. Could a man with a heart wear a coat, for example, with any pleasure, if he knew that rivalry between the manufacturers had forced the people who made the garment to accept starvation wages? And this was done, not from humanitarian motives, to furnish the poor with cheap clothing, but for the purpose of getting more business and so of making more money.”
I could hardly resist the temptation at this point of asking Thorwald if he had not been reading up on the current history of the earth, but I knew well enough that was not possible, for we had brought no books with us. And then I did not care to tell Thorwald just yet how near he was coming to our experience. But I could not endure having the props knocked from under our social structure without another effort to save it. So I said:
“But were not the great majority of business men honest, and were not these instances that you have cited extreme cases?”