282 THE SOCIALISM OF TO-DAY. 
Schmoller advocates a system of corporations of working 
men that many of the others attack. Two points, however, are 
to be found in the programmes of all : first, the increased inter 
vention of the law or of the State in the economic world ; 
secondly, the intellectual and material elevation of the labour 
ing classes. “When men of science,” Held truly remarks, 
“ concern themselves warmly and in an entirely disinterested 
way with the good of the labourers, ought not their action to be 
taken in good part, especially in the face of the indifference or 
even hostility of public opinion? It is too common for the 
privileged classes to consider the labourers as born to serve 
them, and to nourish in their hearts the sentiments of the 
Brahmin towards the Pariah. From want of thought and from 
never trying to look at the matter from the labourer’s stand 
point, employers are apt to be hard and unjust. Have we not 
done a useful thing in showing that there is nothing immoral 
nor revolutionary in the desire of the labourers to get an increase 
of wages and a diminution of the working hours ? ” 
At the opening of the session of October, 1882, Professor 
Nasse, an Economist whose learning and moderation are 
recognized throughout the scientific world, sums up the work 
of the new school in the following terms :—“ Ten years have 
passed away since the ‘Association for Social Politics’ assembled 
for the first time at Eisenach, in order to devote itself to the 
study of the social question. Its object was to oppose the 
tendencies which had theretofore prevailed, in the press and in 
public opinion, on economic subjects. The formation of our 
Association was a protest against that narrow individualism 
which thinks that the most difficult problems of economic 
legislation may be solved by simply invoking the most complete 
freedom of action to individual interests, and which ignores the 
mission of moral culture incumbent on the State in the region 
of Political Economy. The Association was specially directed 
against that optimism which shuts its eyes to the urgent necessity 
of examining this formidable problem known as the social ques 
tion. It was an appeal and a warning which issued from the 
juridical and moral conscience of almost all Germany, and which, 
I think I may safely assert, has completely modified the ten-