“Labor, and labor alone,” I said, following in his thought.
“Something greater than agitation has done it. It’s the course of modern civilization,—machinery. It began with the first invention. To-day it is an accelerating force. Ten thousand cobblers scattered through a State are not a political force, but ten thousand workers in a shoe factory are. They live together, they think together, they become politically conscious. Davy, answer this to yourself: can you honestly believe there is anything going to prevent a class that has the power, that knows it has the power, from finally exercising that power, in the same way and for the same ends that every other social movement has acted?”
“No, not as you put it; not as I see it now.”
“Why deceive ourselves? What is the meaning of a strike? More wages, better conditions? Not fundamentally. Every strike is one step onward in the solidification of a new political force,—a skirmish before the final battle.”
“Then you, too, think that the old order is passing?”
“Passing! It started the day universal suffrage was proclaimed. I suppose now you’ll ask me if I believe in democracy?”
“I confess I am wondering.”
“Ask me if I believe in machinery! Why debate on what is an accomplished fact? Why ask if a river should move in its course? If machinery was inevitable, so democracy was inevitable. We have proclaimed universal suffrage; now we must watch it work out to its logical conclusion. We’ve been proclaiming one thing and doing another for generations. Now, we’re going to find out.”
“Socialism, then?”
“Not necessarily. The rise of a new force; a perfectly natural appetite for power, that’s all. Ideas are always translated into appetites. The Girondins were a body of idealists, and the Revolution they produced immediately devoured them. As a matter of fact, men in the mass do not want anything different from men as privileged individuals; only they want the luxury for themselves, and when they are strong enough they seize it,—to live first and then to enjoy life in a big and bigger way,—the pursuit of happiness, if you wish. Just as strong in the mass as with us.”