Workmen's advocate. (New Haven, Conn.) 1883-1891, 1891-03-14

OF the human race.
The power Of man over man, the right
of the strong and the oppression of the
weak, that is the characteristic feature,
the scarlet thread that is woven into the
history of antiquity and of the Middle
Ages And is it otherwise now;
Does not the order of society to-day
rest, in spite of the much,praiSed pro-
gress of Civilization, upon the same prin-
cipIe of human subservienCe? Has the
Present a right to look back to the con.
dtions of heather antiquity and of The
Christian Middle Ages with pride and
satisfaction?
With afrankness which leaves nothing
to be desired "A statesman Of the Nine
teenth Century, Count Joseph de
Maistre, has expressed himself, literally,
thus
"The human race was created for the
benefit of few men. 1t Is the business
of the clergy, the aristocracy, and the
higher officers of the State 10 teach the
people what is good or bad true or false
in the worlds of morals and intellect
Other persons have no right to dispute
about such matters, they must endure
without murmuring."
If this is rather highly colOred, the
picture is none the less drawn from ma
ture. So long as the shepherds of the
nations 90 to war without saying "by
your leave" to the people, so long as
ecclesiastics come together in council
and synod "to judge false human
science under the auspices of the Holy
Ghost" so long we have no right TO
accuse de Maistre of faleehood. But
wrong and incompreh. nsibe it is that de
Mastre approves this state of things,
that he dreams such conditions can and
will endure for all time
Let me produce another witness:
Robert Owen, the founder of the CO.
operative system in England, once met
in the house of a Frankfort banker
Friedrich Won Cent?, the well-known
statesman. Owen set forth the excellence
of his sociaistic system and observed
IF only unity could replace disunlon
upon
THAT may be true" replied Won
Cent?, ''but we do not wish the masses
to be prosperous and independent of us,
for how could we then continue to gov
ern ?"
There we have the whole Social Cues
ton of the present in nutshell. fOwen
speaks the word of deliverance, the
Untg of Mankind, Cent? proclaims the
fundamental evil that stands in the way
of redemption, the Lore Of po1cer Of the
more fuuored classes. Aristotle also
divided mankind, it will be remembered,
into two classes, such as are destined
to command and such as are born to
serve. But it was difference of nationall-
ty, as between Greeks and Barbarians,
which lay at the foundation of his dis
tinction. Cent? and de Mastre on the
contrary draw dividing line within the
same race, between the upper ten thou
sand who are ordained to rule and pros
per, and the remaining masses destined
to be governed and to languish.
Whether we examine the state of the
Church, the state or Society every
where-we cannot ignore tive meet
with the class rule of the Middle Ages.
the medieval system of guardianship
In one point only does the Present differ
from the Past, namely that, thanks to
the German Reformation and the French
Revolution, the conviction gains ground
from day to day IN overwhelming circles
down to the lowest strain, that it cannot
90 on so forever, that men are not Gre
ated to be ruled and governed, held IN
leading strings and oppressed by their
fellow-men For thousands Of years
love of ones neighbor and the fellow.
ship of man have been preached to the
people. The present demands that in
every deed, in daily he, in the State and
Society this teaching be applied in
earnest.
There was time-the older men
among you remember it-when everyone
who doubted the right of absolute gov
eminent was branded rebel. To day a
similar fate is the lot of everyone who
ventures to lay hands upon the "Chain
of economic phenomena" Do but ven
ture to attack the privilege of the pos
sessing class, the abuse of power by Cap
ital, the prevailing credit and loan sys
TEN, or even to bruach more equal dis
tribution of material goods and you are
in certain circles branded forthwith as
the en- my of all social order, social
hereto. a Communist. But this shall
not deter me from recognizing freely
and publicly that allindivIduaI property,
material not less than intellectual, is the
common good of society. Like man him
elf, every form of the property of man
possesses, besides its special character
which makes it the private possession OF
an individual a universal side which
gives the community we'll grounded
claim to a right to 1t. That the State
and the municipality appropriate part
of the pronprty of every citizen as taxes