Courses of lectures on the arts by members of the society accompanied our earlier exhibitions, and these have since been published, and by such means our propaganda was greatly extended.
If we cannot claim to have solved the Labour question, which, of course, nothing short of a Socialist system can do, we have asserted the claims of decorative and industrial art and of the craftsman, and we have enabled a body of artistic craftsmen to appeal direct to the public, while many of our members through teaching bodies, such as the Board of Education and the County Councils have been the means of inculcating sound traditions of workmanship among large numbers of young students and apprentices from various trades who go to study in the evening schools, and so carry back into their ordinary work fresh ideas and enhanced skill and taste.
The influence of the Arts and Crafts movement has certainly been socialistic in increasing the respect for workmanship, and in awakening the sense of the public to the need of humane and healthful conditions for the workers, over and above the inculcation of the desire for beauty in common things, and harmonious surroundings of a refined if simple life.
Its quiet methods still serve indirectly the propaganda of the Socialist Ideal.
Only recently, for instance, an exhibition was organized in London of the work of various Guilds of Handicraft, by a lady on the staff of a well-known Socialist weekly journal, which demonstrated on the one hand the joy in art and handicraft under happy and fair conditions for the worker, and on the other showed the conditions of "sweated" labour by living examples working at their miserably paid trades.
A river gathers volume by the contributions of the small streams which flow into it, and so with the great movement of Socialism, which, comprehending as it does, the whole range of human effort and aspiration, is continually widening and increasing in depth and force, not only by the direct action of its leaders, and the support of its conscious followers, but in many indirect ways. The sum of which it would be difficult to estimate though every influence counts, and even the very opposition of enemies often has the contrary effect to that intended by them, and not only so, but as we may observe in the political arena these are sometimes driven to defend their position by borrowing palliative weapons from the armoury of those they profess bitterly to oppose.
The forms which art will take when Socialism is actually established will probably be very different from those which herald its advent. The consideration of such a large subject involves much speculation, but from the analogy of the inspiring influence of the ancient religions which have held sway over mankind, and which, controlling the whole of human life, focussed the most beautiful art upon its mysteries and beatitudes, and drew both the senses and the intellect of man into their service, we cannot but believe that the feeling of the solidarity of humanity, and all that it implies, which would dominate all social thought and conduct in a collective socialized community, would become a religion, when its full significance and its bearing on every department of life was fully realized; but a religion free from the shadow of degrading superstitions, and from the taint of asceticism, and under which there would be no shirking of either the work or the enjoyment of the earth—a religion whose highest sanction would be human happiness, and in which its votaries would discover not only a sound rule of conduct for every-day life, but an inspiring ideal to lead the spirit ever onwards.
Human history would acquire a new significance in the mind of the poet and the artist, as they beheld, in the long course of evolution, the race in a vast procession emerging from the mists of primaeval time; from its early struggles with wild nature; from the gens and the tribal state, finding safety in primitive communism, and in that state beholding the invention of the essential fundamental necessities and appliances, such as the spade, the plough, and the wheel, the spinning and weaving of cloth, pottery, and the birth of song and art.
From the tragic vicissitudes of history, of race-conflict, of conquest and domination of warlike tribes and the institution of slavery, the foundation and influence of the great ancient states and empires, and their inevitable decay and fall, and the new order springing from their ruins; the tragic tale of wars and pestilence and famine, of flood and of fire and of earthquake, and yet onward still through all these perils and disasters we may see humanity marching beneath the banner of social justice to fulfil its destiny; the hero spirits still passing the torch of enlightenment and freedom from hand to hand, and as one sinks into the silence another advances towards the full flush of the new morning.