"The plausible and the easy again arise in this age. Let no one mistake a mirage for a real image. Disaster will attend any attempt at social reform, if the marriage relation is even suspected to be rendered less happy. The family is a rock against which all objects not only will dash in vain, but they will fall shivered at its base.
"N.C.M."
But even marriage and family, rocks though they are, have to yield to earthquakes: and Fourierism, in which Meeker delighted, was one of the upheavals that have unsettled them. They will have to be reconstructed.
The latest visitor to the remains of the North American whose observations have fallen under our notice, is Mr. E.H. Hamilton, a leading member of the Oneida Community. His letter in the Circular of April 13, 1868, will be a fitting conclusion to this account; as well for the new peep it gives us into the causes of failure, as for its appropriate reflections.
Why the North American Phalanx failed.
"New York, March 31, 1868.
"Business called me a short time ago to visit the domain once occupied by the North American Phalanx. The gentleman whom I wished to see, resided in a part of the old mansion, once warm and lively with the daily activities and bright anticipations of enthusiastic Associationists. The closed windows and silent halls told of failure and disappointment. When individuals or a Community push out of the common channel, and with great self-sacrifice seek after a better life, their failure is as disheartening as their success would have been cheering. Why did they fail?
"The following story from an old member and eye-witness whom I chanced to meet in the neighboring village, impressed me, and was so suggestive that I entered it in my note-book. After inquiring about the Oneida Community, he told his tale almost word for word, as follows:
C.—My interest in Association turns entirely on its relations to industry. In our attempt, a number of persons came together possessed of small means and limited ideas. After such a company has struggled on a few years as we did, resolutely contending with difficulties, a vista will open, light will break in upon them, and they will see a pathway opening. So it was with us. We prospered in finances. Our main business grew better; but the mill with which it was connected grew poorer, till the need of a new building was fairly before us. One of our members offered to advance the money to erect a new mill. A stream was surveyed, a site selected. One of our neighbors whose land we wanted to flow, held off for a bonus. This provoked us and we dropped the project for the time. At this juncture it occurred to some of us to put up a steam-mill at Red Bank. This was the vista that opened to us. Here we would be in water-communication with New York city. Some $2,000 a year would be saved in teaming. This steam-mill would furnish power for other industries. Our mechanics would follow, and the mansion at Red Bank become the center of the Association, and finally the center of the town. Our secretary was absent during this discussion. I was fearful he would not approve of the project, and told some of our members so. On his return we laid the plan before him, and he said no. This killed the Phalanx. A number of us were dissatisfied with this decision, and thirty left in a body to start another movement, which broke the back of the Association. The secretary was one of our most enthusiastic members and a man of good judgment; but he let his fears govern him in this matter. I believe he sees his mistake now. The organization lingered along two years, when the old mill took fire and burned down; and it became necessary to close up affairs.
E.H.H.—Would it not have been better if your company of thirty had been patient, and gone on quietly till the others were converted to your views? If truth were on your side, it would in time have prevailed over their objections.