The Socialism of to-day

Bibliographic data

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

Usage license:: Get license information via the feedback formular.

INTRODUCTION. let them go on as they are doing.) In free competition the most able succeed, and this should be our desire. Nothing could be more absurd than to endeavour, by misdirec e charity, to preserve those whom nature has condemned to disappear, and thus place obstacles in the way of progress. Yield place to the strong, for might makes right. Christianity and Socialism hold quite another language. They declare war against the strong, that is to say, the rich, and aspire to raise up the poor and the down-trodden, d rey subordinate these so-called natural laws to the law of Justice. Let there be full liberty, but only under the guidance of right. In the words of the Sermon on the Mount, “ Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled.” It is impossible to understand by what strange blindness Socialists adopt Darwinian theories, which condemn their claims of equality, while at the same time they reject Christianity, whence those claims have issued and whence their justification may be found. At all events, we may conclude that the religion which has shaped us all, advocates as well as adversaries, has formulated in the clearest terms the principles of Socialism, and that it is precisely in Christian countries that socialistic doctrines have taken deepest root Let us now consider the way in which religious Socialism has become the political Socialism of our day. When the Declaration of Independence in the United States, and t e French Revolution, proclaimed the sovereignty of the people, and inscribed the equality of men among the articles of the constitution, the principle of the brotherhood of man descended from the heights of the ideal and from the dreams of Utopia to become thenceforth the watchword of the radical party in every country to which the ideas that triumphed in America and Paris have spread. Equality of political rights leads inevitably to the demand for equality of conditions, that is to say, the apportionment of well-being according to work accomplished. Universal suffrage demands as its complement universal well-being ; for it is a paradox that the people should be at once wretched and sovereign. As Aristotle and Montes quieu so continually insist, democratic institutions presuppose

Access restriction

Copyright

fullscreen: The Socialism of to-day

Monograph

Table of contents

Download

Monograph

This page

Image fragment

Citation links

Citation recommendation