The Socialism of to-day

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 835096955

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-28834

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Laveleye, Émile de

Title:: The Socialism of to-day

Place of publication:: London

Publisher:: Field & Tuer

Year of publication:: 1884

Scope:: 1 Online-Ressource (XLIV, 331 S.)

Collection:: Economics Books

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CONSERVATIVE SOCIALISTS. 95 it was necessary, he thinks, that the forced labour of the greater number should afford leisure to the free men. At that period the quantity of produce was always in proportion to the means of production, as this consisted solely of the hands of the slaves. If the number of these was increased, consumption increased in proportion, and thus the surplus which maintained leisure remained at a minimum. To-day work is done by iron workmen, consuming coal and not wheat ; their power is unlimited, and they will never call upon the rights of man to demand their enfranchisement. When the water-wheel, coming from the East, was introduced for the first time into the Western world, towards the end of the Roman Republic, a Greek poet, named Antiparos, com posed some verses which the Anthology has preserved for us, and which recount, in a most charming manner, the cause of the economic progress accomplished in the last two thousand \ years : “ Slaves who turn the millstone, spare your hands and sleep in peace. In vain the shrill voice of the cock shall announce the daylight ; sleep on. By order of Demeter, the labour of young girls is performed by the Naiads, and now they | leap, shining and light, upon the wheel as it revolves. They i drag around the axle with its spokes, and put in motion the ! great stone which turns round and round. Let us live the happy life of our fathers, and enjoy, without labour, the bless ings the goddess showers upon us.” Thus machinery creates leisure; but who shall enjoy it? That is the point Three cases might occur. Either this leisure will liberate from all work a larger and larger number of persons, the working day of those who continue to labour remaining the same • or no one will have increased leisure, as the idle hours will be em ployed in making objects of luxury ; or, once more, as Antiparos fancied, machinery will benefit the labourers by lessening their task, and an increase of leisure will accrue to all, even to the workers. In the interest, not of the increase of production, but of the progress of civilization, it was to be hoped that this latter hypothesis would be realized. But in reality it is usually either the first or second case which happens. The Conservative, like the Catholic Socialists, develop

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