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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xliv INTRODUCTION. established among men ; but social transformations are not to be accomplished by violence. Attempts at assassination and insurrections can have but one result : that of provoking a desperate repression, and restoring despotism. What an amount of harm have the German regicides, Hcedel and Nobiling, not done to the cause of which they professed them selves the champions ! If Socialists would set forth their ideas persistently but moderately, using those powerful arguments which economic science has placed in their hands, as was done by J. S. Mill, and the former Austrian minister, Albert Schæffle, the governing classes would listen to them, for they cannot divest themselves of the sentiments of even-handed justice planted in their hearts by the Gospel. The Irish Land Laws wrested by Mr. Gladstone even from the House of Lords, show what decisive victories Socialism may obtain by peaceable means. It is probable that it may be gradually introduced into our laws by the increasing influence of what we call State Socialism. Its weakness results from the fact that, being chiefly confined to the labouring classes, it seldom finds exponents among enlightened men such as Lassalle and Marx undoubtedly were. If, as formerly in Israel, there should arise prophets burning with a righteous thirst for justice, Christian Socialism, taking possession of men’s minds, may bring about profound changes in the economic world. But the enduring triumph of a violent Socialist revolution is impossible. Nevertheless, as Nihilism, like burning lava, seethes throughout the underground strata of society, and there keeps up a sort of diabolic destroy ing rage, it is possible that in some crisis, when authority is powerless and repressive force paralyzed, the predictions of the poet Hegesippe Moreau and M. Maxime du Camp may be realized, and we may see our capitals ravaged by dynamite and petroleum in a more ruthless and a more systematic manner than even that which Paris experienced at the hands of the Commune.

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