IX.

Before I leave the subject of Collectivism tested by experiment, I desire to say a word on the general question, and for that purpose will resume some portion of what I have written elsewhere on the subject (i.e. in The Liberal Unionist in 1891). I admit as fully as any Socialist can that the ideal is to get a better, fairer and more equal distribution of the world's goods. Two solutions are offered of this problem—one by the Socialists, the other by those who follow in the footsteps of Mr. Cobden and Mr. Bright. The Socialists in effect say, 'Make the State the universal proprietor and the universal employer of labour, and you will have solved the problem and produced a community where misery shall have ceased to exist.' On the other hand, the advocates of Free Exchange, not less zealous nor less religious in their own faith, say, 'Free trade and labour from all shackles, put an end to the ruin and waste of war, and of the armaments maintained for the purpose of war, stop all unnecessary absorption by the State of wealth which should belong to the individual, and you will make human labour so valuable that every man willing and able to work will be able to command material comfort.' I have no hesitation in saying Edition: current; Page: [99] that I believe the solution offered by the advocates of Free Exchange is the true solution. Socialism, which has existed as an aspiration since the world began, has in bygone times been carried into practice, but always with one result—the enslavement and misery of people. When the Spaniards tore down the veil behind which the Peruvian State had developed secluded from all intercourse with the outside world, they found a community arranged on the most approved Socialistic model. The State owned the land, the flocks and herds, the houses, and finally, the bodies of the inhabitants. What was the result? The Peruvians were a nation of slaves, living a life which was little better than that of well-kept, well-fed animals. Again in Paraguay the Jesuits produced a Socialistic state. The infantes barbati, or bearded children of their Reductions—the name given to the communities in which the Indians were collected—were ideal Socialist citizens. They possessed no property. No family was richer or more esteemed than another, and all individual effort was suppressed. Yet who will venture to assert that Paraguay under the Jesuits is a model which ought to be copied in the regulation of human society? The case against Socialism is, indeed, conclusive in every particular. Socialism can be proved unsound both economically and historically; and, further, it can be shown to be in conflict with the strongest impulses and instincts of human nature. It may be said, perhaps, that if Socialism can be shown to have failed it cannot be shown that any system based on Free Exchange has ever succeeded. No doubt no State has yet been civilized enough to adopt the principle of Free Exchange in its entirety. It can, however, be proved that those States which have approached most nearly to that ideal are the most prosperous, and their inhabitants least miserable. England has gone further than any other country in the direction of Free Exchange, and unquestionably the people of England are better off than those of any country whose conditions as to debt and geographical position make the comparison a fair one. Wages are better, prices lower, and the standard of comfort higher in England than in any Edition: current; Page: [100] country of the Continent. That this is due to the partial adoption of the principle of Free Exchange, I do not doubt for a moment.