“THE FUTURE OF SOCIETY.
“An American, visiting Europe, notices how completely there the various functions of the social body are performed. He finds a servant, an officer, a skilled workman, at every place. From the position of the stone-breaker on the highway, up to that of the highest Government official, every post is filled; every personal want of the traveller or the citizen is attended to. Policemen guard him in the streets, lackeys watch for his bidding at the hotels, railroad officials with almost superfluous care forward him on his way. As compared with American railroad management, the great English roads probably have four employés to our one. This plentitude of service results from three things—viz., density of population, which gives an abundant working class; cheapness of labour; and the aristocratic formation of society that tends to fix persons in the caste to which they were born. The effect is to produce a smoothness in the social movement—an absence of jar and friction, and a release in many cases from anxious, personal outlook, that are very agreeable. The difference between English and American life in respect to the supply of service is like that between riding on a highly-finished macadamized way, where every rut is filled and every stone is removed, and picking one’s way over our common country roads.
“Another thing that the traveller observes in Europe is the abundance everywhere of works of art. One’s sense of beauty is continually gratified; now with a finished landscape, now with a noble building, now with statues, monuments, and paintings. This immense accumulation of art springs in part of course from the age of the nations where it is found; but it is also due in a very great degree to the employment given to artists by [[373]]persons of wealth and leisure. Painting, sculpture, and architecture have always had constant, and sometimes munificent, patrons in the nobility and the Established Church.
“Observing these things abroad, the American asks himself whether the institutions of this country are likely to produce in time any similar result here. Shall we have the finished organization, the mutual service, and the wealth of art that characterize European society? Before answering this, let us first ask ourselves whether it is desirable that we should have them in the same manner that they exist abroad? Certainly not. No American would be willing to pay the price which England pays for her system of service. The most painful thing which one sees abroad is the utter absence of ambition in the class of household servants. Men who in this country would be looking to a seat in the legislature,[9] and who would qualify themselves for it, there dawdle away life in the livery of some noble, in smiling, aimless, do-nothing content, and beget children to follow in their steps. On seeing these servile figures, the American thanks heaven that the ocean rolls between his country and such a system. Rather rudeness, discomfort, self-service, and poverty, with freedom and the fire of aspiration, than luxury purchased by the enervation of man!
“Still, cannot we have the good without the bad? Cannot we match Europe in culture and polish without sacrificing for it our manhood? And if so, what are the influences in this country that are working in that direction? In answering this question, we have to say frankly that we see nothing in democracy alone that promises to produce the result under consideration. In a country where every one is taught to disdain a situation [[374]]of dependence, where the hostler and the chambermaid see the way opened for them to stand even with the best in the land, if they will but exercise their privilege of ‘getting on,’ there will be no permanent or perfect service. And so long as every man’s possessions are divided and scattered at his death, there will be no class having the secured leisure and the inducement to form galleries of art. Why should John Smith take pains to decorate his house with works of art, when he knows that within a year after his death it will be administered upon by the Probate Court, and sold with its furniture for the benefit of his ten children?” (Well put,—republican sage.)
“In a word, looking at the æsthetic side of things, our American system must be confessed to be not yet quite perfect.” (You don’t say so!) “Invaluable as it is for schooling men to independence and aspiration, it requires, to complete its usefulness, another element. The Republic has a sequel. That completing element, that sequel, is Communism. Communism supplies exactly the conditions that are wanting in the social life of America, and which it must have if it would compete with foreign lands in the development of those things which give ease and grace to existence.
“For instance, in respect to service: Communism, by extinguishing caste and honouring labour, makes every man at once a servant and lord. It fills up, by its capacity of minute organization, all the social functions as completely as the European system does; while, unlike that, it provides for each individual sufficient leisure, and frequent and improving changes of occupation. The person who serves in the kitchen this hour may be experimenting with a microscope or giving lessons on the piano the next. Applying its combined ingenuity to social needs, Communism will find means to consign all repulsive and injurious labour to machinery. It is continually interested to promote labour-saving improvements. The service that is performed [[375]]by brothers and equals from motives of love will be more perfect than that of hired lackeys, while the constantly varying round of occupation granted to all will form the most perfect school for breadth of culture and true politeness. Thus Communism achieves through friendship and freedom that which the Old World secures only through a system little better than slavery.
“In the interest of art and the cultivation of the beautiful, Communism again supplies the place of a hereditary aristocracy and a wealthy church. A Community family, unlike the ephemeral households of ordinary society, is a permanent thing. Its edifice is not liable to be sold at the end of every generation, but like a cathedral descends by unbroken inheritance. Whatever is committed to it remains, and is the care of the society from century to century. With a home thus established, all the members of a Community are at once interested to gather about it objects of art. It becomes a picture-gallery and a museum, by the natural accretion of time, and by the zeal of persons who know that every embellishment added to their home will not only be a pleasure to them personally, but will remain to associate them with the pleasure of future beholders in all time to come.
“Thus in Communism we have the conditions that are necessary to carry this country to the summit of artistic and social culture. By this route, we may at one bound outstrip the laboured attainments of the aristocracies of the Old World. The New York Central Park shows what can be achieved by combination on the democratic plan, for a public pleasure-ground. No other park is equal to it. Let this principle of combination be extended to the formation of homes as well as to municipal affairs, and we shall simply dot this country over with establishments[10] as much [[376]]better than those of the nobles of England as they are better than those of a day-labourer. We say better, for they will make art and luxury minister to universal education, and they will replace menial service with downright brotherhood. Such must be the future of American society.”
“To the Editor of the ‘American Socialist.’