The Commonwealth. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1911-1914, 1912-12-27

p
ronlzingly informed me that after I
really learned what socialism is /
would abandon It.
"You Catholic young men," he be
gan, who become infected with the
virus OF socialism do not understand
the deeper significance of the move.
ment. You do not understand how
utterly materialistic and atheistic It
is. You do not see the danger to your
faith and morals.
you are playing with fire, young
man." he continued warmly. you
are playing with fire!"
As a matter of fact was playing
with my watch fob and thinking the
while, what a lofty mountain the
clergymen of my church make of the
tiny molehill known as socialism.
Socialism materialstic? OF course,
it is. 1t embraces the materialism of
bread and butter, work and wages
the materialism of life itself.
Is socialism atheistic? Some social
lists are atheistic, but socialism only
attempts to show the relation between
man and his social enyironment-not
the relation between God and man or
nature and man. Socialism can be
neither deistic nor atheistic.
The atheism of early socialists was
a survival of French free-thought of
the eighteenth century. Indeed our
own American revolutionists, in no
small measure, borrowed from the
French free-thinkers of the theories of
republican government now weayed
into the warp and wool of American
institutions. We can imagine with
what vehemence French clericals at
tackled those early theories. We know
how vigorous the Catholic church has
become in America under the consti-
tuition born of those theories.
The majority of men are secular
and live in a secular, material, prosaic
world The very material tools with
which they work have a very material
bearing on their very material lives.
This was as true of the first, rude
of production and the
first barbaric producers of wealth
as it is true of the modern automatic
machine and the later-day wage work
ers.
If early socialist writer's accentu-
ated the material and neglected the
spiritual, they did sol because they
sensibly recognized that mans physi-
cal and not his spiritual hunger has
been responsible for the creation of
human society.
Law of Social Change.
From the investigation of those
early socialists came the discovery
of an immutable law-the law of So
cial change. They discovered that
modern society is a product of all
the societies of the past They found
that the tool was mightier than the
sword or the pen and that the man.
ner in which a people made their liv
ing determined the laws, customs and
most of the institutions of that peo-
pie. This law has been christened
economic determinism.
If Marx and Engels were alive and
were asked to give a concrete mod
ern example of the operation of this
law they would probably remind us
that the reason there is no economic
independence for the mass of men in
America today is because the simple
tool of a century ago has become, by
development, complex and expensive
out of the reach of the producer.
They would also point out that the
continued development of the tools of
production will necessitate their col
lective ownership. This would be
socialism consummated through econ
omic determinism.
Marx and Engels would have also
been careful to point out the fact
that economic determinism does not
attempt to account for the origin or
desCiny of man. 1t involves neither
biology nor theology. 1t could not
have become operative as a law until
man became a tool user.
This is the head and front of social
list materialism. This is the bugbear,
the spector that is haunting the Catho-
lie hierarchy. This is the process that
will break up the home, destroy the
family establish free love, put reli-
gion on the bum and raise hell gener-
ally.
OF course, there are some socialists
who believe that economic determin-
ism is the answer to the riddle of the
universe just as there are some folks
who confidently believe that Doctor
Hartmann's Peruna will cure a ham.