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