The Industrial Review, Social and Political. — 1878-06-15 (London, England)

ENGLISH SOCIALISM.  So much is said about Socialism just now, and so much apprehension is felt in observing its rapid extension among the people df foreign countries, that the following statement respecting what may he called English Socialism will be useful to reassure those who imagine that in England it is something to be contemplated mith alarm.  The working classes of this and other countries have become so strongly exasperated by the glaring inconsistencies and the gross injustice of the present state of things, that in some localities the aid of the police and the military is now necessary to restrain them from excesses which would be productive of fearful consequences to the rich, and of no less fearful consequences to themselves, if not prevented. But brute force will never satisfy the growing discontent of the people with a system which grinds them to the earth to gratify the selfish desires of the possessors of wealth and power, in the midst of the means to provide abundantly, and with pleasure for all, the reasonable wants of every individual. And it has become the urgent duty of the possessors of wealth and power, for their own protection, as well as from considerations •of humanity, to make themselves acquainted with the means by which alone the reasonable dissatisfaction of the industrious classes can be pacified.  These- means have been very much misunderstood, in consequence of the false notions which have been associated with th.em. But these notions have now been corrected, and the required knowledge may now be obtained, unassociated with the errors by which it has hitherto been made repulsive and unintelligible. These means have been called "Socialism," and Socialism while it has not been understood, has been supposed to be, and has been in some respects, a very absurd and a very odious system. When it shall be understood it will assume a very different aspect.  It is a system to effect, in the most beneficial manner for all, the following most desirable improvements in the general arrangements and proceedings of societies. 1. To place those who ate dissatisfied with their present position in the midst of New Surroundings in the highest degree favourable to their well-being, well-doing, and happiness. 2. To employ and educate them within those New Surroundings in the most beneficial manner possible for all. • 3. To enable them to produce the most useful wealth so abundantly, and to distribute it so equitably and honestly, that all their reasonable material wants will be plentifully supplied. 4. To enable them to acquire the most useful knowledge and the most beneficial habits of thought and feeling, and thus to provide most beneficially for all theirintellectual and moral wants, and to unite all sects—Christian, Jew, Mahomedan, Hindoo, &c., &c., and men of all theological opinions, in mutual good feeling, and in the religious observance of their Social Duty to do to others in all things as they would have others to do to them." 5. To enable the recipients of those advantages to obtain them as the results of their own united and well-directed industry, and to enable them to pay a reasonable moderate interest for the capital employed in forming the new arrangements. 6. To effect these reforms in the spirit of good will towards all, of every class and position in life; with the willing consent of all who enter into the new arrangements, and without interfering with those who do not wish to do so. •  7. To begin with those who are the most in need of improvement in their condition, and to extend the improvement to those who are less so, as they become desirous to partake of it. All this may be done with the greatest facility when men know how to do it—far more easily than men can be drilled to become warriors, and to go into foteign countries to murder, and plunder, and mutilate their fellow-creatures, and to destroy their property, without compunction or consciousness of the atrocity of their pro-. ceedings ; and far more easily than men can be induced to act as constables or policemen, to keep in subjection the justly-exas-. perated working classes. And the knowledge by which men will. be enabled to effect these most salutary moral and material reforms is prepared for them, and is very easy to be acquired with a little willing attention to the facts of the subject.