This fact of poverty and its evils is patent to every one. How far it is due to individual culpability, is not considered here. That can be reduced by Socialism or economic reform, the new movement justifies its existence. The second grievance is that of economic injustice. This is the real issue in the debate. The field of political economy is the battle field in which the Socialists are willing to abide the issue.

The master spirit in the radical Socialism of the day is the Frenchman, Pierre Joseph Proudhon. No one can understand the rationale of this attempt to reconstruct society without having observed the earnestness, the intensity of this man who gave his life to the spread of its doctrines. It is necessary to understand his theories to account for the growth and the courage of the movement. To us he seems a fiery Frenchman with a sublime assurance begotten of an intense conviction. "He has been called a German-Frenchman," says Engländer; "he writes with a deep-thinking German intellect and a French power of execution. There is something of the Puritan element in his development. One sees in him the sword and the Bible, while ever and anon, the upstart, the self-educated man, is present." The Anarchism of the day is the phase of Socialism, which (the Socialistic theories of Proudhon, demanding a politico-economic revolution), was of necessity to be looked for. It is interesting to note the growth of a theory in the mind of a man; we understand it better when we know its origin. Says Proudhon, "My real masters, those who have caused fertile ideas to spring up in my mind, are three in number: first, the Bible; next, Adam Smith; and last, Hegel." It is the Hegelian Philosophy which permeates the thinking of the more intellectual Socialists. This is true of the German and French schools. Hegel with his thesis and antithesis--with his law and his antinomy-ever-recurring contradictions in the world, and the truth on the next higher plane, with its synthesis, to be sought. It is found in Socialism, the superior synthesis reconciling the thesis and antithesis. It will be seen therefore that this movement is not merely on the surface, but that the large ideas of a strong philosophy sway the minds of its thoughtful

leaders.

Property, says Proudhon, is the exploitation of the weak or the laboring classes by the strong or the capitalists. Community or Communism, the reverse, is the exploitation of the strong by the weak-the laboring classes dictating to the capitalists. Here we have the Thesis and the Antithesis. Possession is the Synthesis: each man holding and controlling his labor product. The same Hegelian idea is seen again, expecting that through this Thesis and Antithesis will result the high social condition called Liberty-or a condition of complete non-interference by capital or government with individual right. This, however, does not seem to be clearly demonstrated. This coming society known as Mutualism lays too heavy a burden on the benevolence of the average individual or community.

Proudhon was a very voluminous writer, but his book entitled "What is Property? an Inquiry into Right and Government," gives the gist of his theories. His startling definition that property is robbery, "La propriété c'est le val," has been the battle cry of his followers-misconceived by them, as it has been by many anti-socialists. He makes a very neat distinction in his definition of property, using the word out of its ordinary and accepted meaning-as he does also the word anarchy. Property as right of possession, he allows; property as right of increase through rent, interest, taxes, he unqualifiedly condemns.

Listen to him: "Suppress property while maintaining pos session, and by the simple modification of this principle, you will revolutionize law, government, economy, and institutions; you will drive evil from the face of the earth." With what ardor and confidence he speaks: "May I in this momentous struggle carry into all hearts the light with which I am filled?" Again: "Wherever this work is read and discussed there will be deposited the germ of death to property."

It is the vexed question of capital and labor on which the truth of this paradoxical statement that property is robbery hinges. Who is robbed except the laborer? How is he robbed? Briefly, through the tyranny of capital; the accumulation through interest. Without interest, rent, and profit, capital cannot increase except as it were through day's wages, in a

very limited way. Overthrow right of increase thus, you would introduce into the world an equality of condition, and corresponding happiness and freedom from crime. The middle class overflowing either way would absorb the very rich and the very poor. Why, it is asked with great earnestness, should you give to inanimate money the magic power of increasing, when it lies idle in your strong box? It does not work. It is not entitled to any increase of right. "Property engenders despotism; the government of caprice; the reign of libidinous pleasure."* It is said the non-producer produces; this is an anomaly. The capitalist works not and yet he receives wages. Who pays him? the laborer. Certainly; there is no one else. He therefore robs the laborer, giving him no equivalent for his labor. Destroy interest in every way, shape, and manner, and you establish justice thereby, and equality, and happiness. Here is a definite issue: Is the right of interest granted to property unjust? Proudhon proves that it is unjust to his satisfaction in a chapter entitled: "Property is impossible." It is hardly necessary to say that he has the political economists of the day against him. Reduced to its simplest terms the question is: Has any man a right to loan anything and receive for the loan a payment by the borrower? Admitting this the question is solved. Concerning this simple right it would seem that there could be no question. It would be a matter of no moment were it not that the spirit of Socialism, a spirit of disaffection with existing institutions, bases its opposition on the alleged injustice of the right of one man to receive interest from another for money which he has loaned. The argument finds its justification mainly in the abuse of this right, showing the evil effects of usury, the tyranny of capital, the power of corporations. Yet to argue from the abuse of a right to the non-existence of it, is absurd.

The justice of interest lies in two considerations: a negative one, the individual right of abstinence from use and also a positive, the individual right for payment for service rendered. In this twofold relation lies the justice of interest. The right of abstinence from use is a main right of property, second only to right of possession. This abstinence is entitled to recom

* Pr., p. 279.

pense, as in rent when property is used, or in interest when money is loaned and there is an additional risk of loss.

Property or money: convertible terms, is merely stored production. It has potential power-call it magic, if you will, to purchase, to create, for an individual. Looked at in one way interest is a kind of wage paid by the borrower to the lender. Through the lender's capital the machine and the workman are brought into activity by the borrower. The amount of money loaned is, for the time being, equivalent to the machine and workman-they are convertible terms-the interest is a part of the product earned; for the lender's money is an efficient factor with the machine and the workman, in the total product, and therefore justly paid. Interest is also payment for service rendered. The objection is made: if the workman labors he is entitled to all he earns, his full product. If he pays interest he must take it from his product. This he is obliged to give to the capitalist; so he is virtually robbed. The capitalist, it is true takes it, but rightfully, for the capital for which interest is paid is the overplus of energy, beyond that which the laborer alone represents, with his machine; it works with him and he is entitled to his product less the efficiency of capital entering into and being a component part of the combined labor; that subtracted from the total product is the interest which the capitalist receives. It is a difficult question to explain, running back as it does to the ultimate and original questions of land and its distribution and the unearned increment. Perhaps, in a word, the justice is best placed in the sovereignty of the individual privilege to do what he will with his own, from the economic standpoint.

From the standpoint then of Political Economy as a matter of simple right, the objection to interest is seemingly ill-founded. But there is another phase of the question lying alongside of this, concerning which the way is not quite so clear. It is this: whether the world would not be better off if all right of increase pertaining to property were forever done away with? Soon, then, amassing of wealth would be impossible, tyranny of corporations, vices of luxury, and idleness. This is the Socialistic claim, which they assert is rapidly growing and winning favor in the minds of men.

In answer to this it may be said in general, the world would be better off if general benevolence prevailed, and if men unselfishly abandoned the right of accumulating vast sums of money, and using it to the detriment of others; the right thus to accumulate being an individual right, inalienable. To promote general benevolence, unselfish individuality, would seem to be the first and necessary step in the Socialistic programme, but of this we hear but little.

Let us endeavor to see what would be the condition of affairs were the Socialistic paradise to be established, yet it is dangerous to prophesy. Mutual societies, like so many circles: these would be various; like seeking like. Professions, trades, occupations; in each of these individuals of superior ability acknowledged leaders. A senate to arrange difficulties between these circles. In corporations made up of employer, and workmen, superintendents. Interest and rent and profit being abolished-a supposed uniformity of comfort and expense, the vices of the rich being removed from the body. politic. The evils of competition disappearing. Leisure for individual improvement would be possible. In order to facilitate business, a bank to be established to loan money in peculiar conditions, at a rate sufficient only to cover expenses. This is the future society of the radical Socialists of the Proudhon school. It may be mentioned also that every one being well fed, housed, clothed, educated, crimes against society would disappear. It is not wholly Utopian, as one might think. Practically in New England there has been a condition of affairs not unlike this. Each man with land; each man with a voice in government; a few selectmen; farms worked on shares; the church mutual societies; equally dif fused comforts, and crime reduced to a minimum.

It must be remembered that Communism is a grosser form of Socialism, for which many of the Socialists of the day have ridicule and bitter words.

The difficulties in the way of this reform are apparent. Competition between mutual societies; the combination of these societies to control others; the difficulty of obtaining best men to superintend. As in political life, says Mr. Mill, "they will hold back from managerial responsibility." That