134 
THE SOCIALISM OF TO-DAY. 
the large towns, saw, with bitter jealousy, influence and money 
passing to the large manufacturers, bankers, shareholders, pro 
moters of joint-stock companies, and all those Stock Exchange 
speculators who thenceforth, throughout “ industrialized " 
Germany, began to take the lead. The denunciation of the 
abuses of capital was much to the taste of this party of 
“ rurals,” who thus imbibed a sort of reactionary and feudal 
Socialism. According to them, not a line that Marx had 
written against capital was too violent. Of course, this 
“Agrarian” party had no idea of an Agrarian law, unless 
it could be applied exclusively to the funds of the Stock 
Exchange and to the Jews, whom they especially detested. 
The second stratum of adherents to which the Ultramontane 
Christlich-socialen penetrated was composed of the Catholic 
peasantry. The generals of the Kulturkampf, who persecuted 
the priests and the beliefs of the peasants, were Liberals and 
Economists. The Catholic country folk were therefore pleased 
to see Liberalism and Political Economy attacked. They found 
the burdens of taxation and military service overwhelming, 
and Canon Moufang had inscribed in his programme that 
they must be largely reduced. As to the “ iron law ” and 
Ricardo, they probably accepted their bishop’s teaching on 
trust. 
We shall now proceed to show that the words of Canon 
Moufang and Bishop Ketteler have not fallen upon stony 
places, but, like the seed that fell on good ground, they have 
brought forth fruit an hundred-fold. We shall principally 
follow the information collected with extreme care in a book, 
replete with facts, by Ur. Rudolf Meyer, “ The Struggle for 
the Emancipation of the Fourth Estate.” * 
The first reunion of the Ultramontane Socialist, or—as 
they used to call themselves—Christian Social (Christlich 
sociale) clubs, took place at Crefeld, in June, 1868. Only 
three clubs were represented. They adopted as their organ 
a journal edited with considerable skill by Herr Schings, a 
clergyman at Aix-la-Chapelle, Die Christlich-sociale Blaetter. 
By the next year the number of clubs had considerably 
* Der EmancipcUionskavtpf des Vierten Standes.