6o 
THE SOCIALISM OF TO-DAY. 
lodging with innocent amusement for a half or a third of wha 
they earn per day. It follows that they would enjoy greater ease 
and comfort than their comrades in the same category, that 
they would acquire better habits, would lay up a small capital, 
and thus would not be in such haste to throw themselves into 
the miseries of a too early marriage. In drawing nearer to 
the middle classes, they would acquire their instincts of order 
and prudence. 
As those Economists have seen who have best analyzed 
this difficult problem. Mill in England and Joseph Gamier in 
France, it all comes back to the question whether it is want 
or plenty which urges on the increase of population. If 
greater comfort leads necessarily to a corresponding increase 
in the number of labourers, then there is no salvation. The 
“ iron law ” will act in all its rigour. The minimum of sub 
sistence will be the eternal destiny of the greater number. 
For, as Mill puts it, you may adopt institutions, the most 
favourable to the labourer; you may devise whatever division 
you please of wealth and products, the time will come when 
the earth will be no longer able to support all those upon it. 
If, on the contrary, the acquisition of property, and the greater 
degree of comfort resulting therefrom, retard marriages and 
diminish the number of births, then it may be affirmed that 
the measures taken in favour of the labouring classes will end 
in the permanent improvement of their condition, and will 
the good results of which I can closely observe, obtained the medal of 
honour at the Universal Exhibition of Vienna in 1873. For i fr. 50 c. 
a day, the labourer can have two breakfasts, a dinner, and a supper ; he 
gets his lodging, heating, and lighting, and has his washing done for him. 
In the hotel he has a café, a reading-room, and a casino where there is 
music, and where the evenings may be spent. He can take whatever 
meal he likes at a separate table, there being no common board. The 
labourer thus preserves a complete independence, and is in no wise treated 
as if in barracks. The collier gets from four to five francs for a day of eight 
hours, even more if trade is brisk. Thus he has two-thirds of his wages at 
his disposal for his accessory needs. He is consequently not reduced to 
the minimum necessary for existence. See Philanthropie sociale à I Expo 
sition de Vienne, hy Léon d’Andrimont. [As to “the Familistère at 
Guise,” see a lecture by M. Godin, translated into English by Mr. E. V. 
Neale, and issued as a pamphlet by the Central Co-operative Board, 
M anchester.—Tr.]