Socialism is the philosophy of a pure, wholesome, progressive industrial life, to be initiated and maintained by human effort—nay more, it is a veritable Gospel of Peace. And I use the word Gospel advisedly, for the finest religious quality of human nature is not in those beings who calmly pursue a course of spiritual development for themselves, unmindful that the physical part of their fellows craves the food and rest without which the latent soul within cannot manifest itself.
We have seen that in the domain of feeling the stirrings of socialism have for years been agitating the bosom of society, and although the outcome in philanthropic action issues usually in failure, none the less does it spring from the highest and holiest motives of man. But while philanthropy chiefly represents love’s labour lost, there are other and more virile forces in action that are indicative of a coming organic democracy. Observe, for instance, the constant efforts of the people to alter the political and economic strain by State interference. This agitation is a very significant fact. It betrays a hunger for social justice which will certainly increase with the growth of knowledge, public spirit and sensitiveness to personal rights. This hunger can never be fully appeased under any system that permits wealth to flow to the lucky, the clever, the cunning, the greedy, and be handed down by inheritance and bequest from generation to generation. No modification of individualism and not even socialism will banish all popular agitation. Communism is the far-distant goal to which it points, for communism alone sets forth as attainable a satisfying equality in all the comforts of life, and since evolution must eventuate in social justice, whatever falls short of this will inevitably contain some conditions of discontent.
But whilst a craving for justice among the masses cries out for State interference, from whence comes the modern view of what justice means? Among the classes it has been considered that the man who is clever, i.e. mentally strong, has a right to a greater reward for labour than the man who is stupid. The origin of this notion is simply the fact that in a competitive system he is able to obtain that superior reward. Power, and not any ethical idea, is the foundation of the notion. The notions of justice prevailing throughout society have all arisen naturally in the past amid the strong and privileged few, and readily have they been accepted by the docile and oppressed many. The clever, not the stupid, have formed public opinion, and that under a purely egoistic impulse. Nevertheless, as evolution passes from the unconscious to the self-conscious stage, reason unites with altruistic feeling to give birth to new conceptions that are moulding public opinion to a higher and truer form, and working out on the plane of practical action. The conception of justice involved in socialism is naturally unpalatable to the privileged few, but it goes far to prove the truth of socialism, that the conception is the fruit of the most advanced study of our social organism as a whole, while it coincides precisely with the blindly instinctive pulsations of the central mass of the people.
Turning now from the moral and emotional to the economic and practical side of the question, we are bound to inquire by what methods transition from the present competitive commercial system of industry to the socialism of the future will take effect. For, be it observed, supporters of the latter system not only assert its ethical superiority, but further assert that it is both practicable and economically inevitable.
There are two, and only two, general directions of popular reform: first, the revolutionary—the driving straight at established institutions with the intention of overthrowing them; second, the legislative—the aiming to improve the existing system by co-operative methods and the modification and gradual destruction of its worst features, i.e. its extremes of injustice and inequality. I have to point out how retrograde and futile for the promotion of happiness is sudden revolution. It is the spontaneous method of human passion where intellect is unenlightened on natural evolution and causation. It seeks to overturn what, for the time being, is the highest product of evolution, and it would blindly substitute that, which although ethically superior, the society of the time is unable to support. The method of legislative reform, national and municipal, is the rational one; and no other, we may confidently hope, will be tried in the civilized countries of Europe so long as socialists are not harassed and persecuted for their opinion beyond the point of endurance.
Already, as regards legislation in this country, the power of the Demos—the mass of the people—is acutely felt. Step by step our rulers have been compelled to lower the political franchise in order to quell revolutionary tendency and maintain their position. Fear-forces within the social organism have changed direction unnoted at the surface. The classes are secretly more afraid of the people than the people are of the classes; yet the actual burdens borne by the people are in no way lightened. And why is this so? Because the people generally are ignorant of their political power, and still more ignorant of how to wield it favourably to their own interests. As has truly been said: “The difficulty in England is not to secure more political power for the people, but to persuade them to make any sensible use of the power they already have.”
But social forces of persuasion and enlightenment are ready prepared for their guidance. In the upper and lower sections of the middle class, men and women whose culture is scientific and whose moral sentiment is advanced, are ranging themselves in the van of the world’s progress, and chiefly through their efforts there is pouring into and penetrating the darkness of the masses a flood of intellectual enlightenment. This process begun has its definite bearings. A growing intelligence in the people will cause the displacement of all authority that is irresponsible. A better selection of legislators will be made, and these, constrained by judicious criticism, will study the principles of social science and learn how best to attain the clear ends of government.
As our masses rise to the full exercise of their political power and the democratic trend of the nation goes forward, no higher motive force than that of self-seeking is required to secure better social conditions. Not only does the ignorant self-seeking of the masses carry weight commanding attention, but the intelligent self-seeking of rulers is a force set in similar direction. To please the majority of constituents is their highest policy; and since food and leisure and education are the essential needs of that majority, such available intellect as the legislative body possesses will be honestly applied to promoting the increase and better distribution of these various necessaries of a civilized life; in short, to promoting the general well-being in so far as the exigencies of the times permit.
I do not deny that self-seeking in rulers has hitherto mainly led to the clever hoodwinking of ignorant constituents. I merely assert that we have rounded the point of Cape Danger in that regard. Every step we take on democratic lines, every advance we make in educating the people, removes us further from that danger point. Moreover, I assert that extending the Parliamentary franchise to women of every social class will equally work for good. The new altruistic or philanthropic spirit of the age has laid firm hold of the so-called educated women of to-day. When public responsibility presses these women to self-education in politics, the myriad injustices revealed will cause them to turn from futile individualist charities and concentrate their energies on works of real and lasting social reform. We may confidently anticipate that the British Parliament will become an excellent instrument of Democratic Government when certain reforms—that are already widely agitated—have been carried out. These reforms are that: “The House of Commons should be freed from the veto of the House of Lords, and should be thrown open to candidates from all classes by a system of payment of representatives and a more rational method of election.” (See Fabian Tract No. 70.)
There are two lines of action certain to be pursued by a Parliament growing yearly more democratic. One is the line of protection of labour, the other is that of an active service of the people. Now State interference with trade—in the interests of workers—is condemned by the laissez-faire school of economists. Such action is scoffingly termed “grandmotherly legislation.” It is deprecated as injurious to society as a whole, as an outrage on the liberty of the British subject, and an impious desecration of the capitalistic fetish, “Freedom of Contract.” But when the knowledge of facts proves that on one side this so-called freedom signifies freedom of choice between dire starvation and the distasteful terms of an absolute master, surprise is not felt that intelligent men prefer what the ignorant may regard as a species of State bondage. This preference is a feature of the times clearly visible. No doubt, where social equality reigns, individual liberty is a noble attainment; but with inequality in the means of life and the fundamental conditions of social happiness, a State that is honestly striving to restore the balance is a very fount of justice. The quest of the workers is not that of individual liberty, but of a collective liberty, embracing every man, woman and child within the ranks of their own order.