Chapter 11. Early English Socialism

¹ Spence and Ogilvie may both be found in The Pioneers of Land Reform (Bonn's Popular Library). References are to this edition.

² Spence, pp. 6–9.

³Ibid. p. 12.

⁴Ibid. p. 12.

¹ Spence, p. 15.

² Ogilvie (same edition), p. 35.

³Ibid. p. 36.

⁴Ibid. p. 38.

¹ Ogilvie (same edition), p. 41.

²Ibid. p. 42.

³Ibid. pp. 43, 44.

⁴Ibid. pp. 52–53.

¹ Ogilvie (same edition), p. 59.

²Ibid. p. 60.

³Ibid. p. 63.

⁴Ibid. pp. 67–69.

¹ Ogilvie. The complete scheme is embodied in fifteen articles, pp. 139–148.

²Ibid. pp. 82–83.

³Ibid. p. 110.

¹The Effects of Civilisation, etc., pp. iii-iv.

²Ibid. p. 1.

¹The Effects of Civilisation, etc., p. 4.

²Ibid. p. 37.

³Ibid. p. 41

⁴Ibid. pp. 40–41.

⁵Ibid. p. 43.

⁶Ibid. p. 44.

⁷Ibid. p. 72.

⁸Ibid. p. 48.

¹The Effects of Civilisation, etc., p. 49.

²Ibid. pp. 66–67.

³Ibid. p. 74.

⁴Ibid. p. 75.

⁵Ibid. p. 118.

¹The Effects of Civilisation, etc., p. 94.

²Ibid. p. 95.

³The Communist Manifesto.

⁴The Effects of Civilisation, p. 96. Hall, making use of the ‘Sic vos non vobis ‘theme, comes near to suggesting certain very familiar lines of Shelley. Shelley indeed had considerable kinship with the group now under consideration:

The seed ye sow, another reaps;
The wealth ye find, another keeps;
The robes ye weave, another wears;
The arms ye forge, another bears.

Sow seed,—but let no tyrant reap;
Find wealth,—let no impostor heap;
Weave robes,—let not the idle wear;
Forge arms,—in your defence to bear.

⁵Ibid. p. 171.

⁶Ibid. p. 172.

¹The Effects of Civilisation, p. 133.

²Ibid. p. 107.

³Ibid. pp. 68–69.

⁴Ibid. p. 83.

⁵Ibid. pp. 84–85.

⁶Ibid. p. 103.

¹ ‘Manufacturers,’ as understood in 1805, i.e. people who make things with their own hands.

²The Effects of Civilisation, p. 70.

³Ibid. p. 38.

⁴Ibid. p. 45.

⁵ Again in the eighteenth-century sense.

⁶Ibid. p. 144.

⁷Ibid. p. 261.

⁸Ibid. p. 216.

⁹Ibid. p. 218.

¹⁰Ibid. p. 277.

¹ Menger: The Right to the Whole Produce of Labour, with introduction by H. S. Foxwell (1899). It was this volume that brought belated recognition to the members of this group.

² After the manner of the age, the title was, of course, considerably longer. It should be: An Inquiry into the Principles of the Distribution of Wealth most conducive to Human Happiness; applied to the newly proposed system of the Voluntary Equality of Wealth.

¹Inquiry into the Principles of the Distribution of Wealth, pp. 1–2.

²Ibid. p. 19.

³Ibid. p. 20.

⁴Ibid. p. 21.

⁵Ibid. p. 22.

⁶Ibid. p. 19.

¹Inquiry into the Principles of the Distribution of Wealth, p. 6.

²Ibid. pp. 6–7.

³Ibid. p. 17.

¹Inquiry into the Principles of the Distribution of Wealth, pp. 35, 584.

²Ibid. pp. 145–147, 584.

³Ibid. p. 381.

⁴Ibid. p. 583.

⁵Ibid. p. 91.

⁶ Among the goods which he supposed to be thus produced without labour are hats, and in dilating on the monstrosity of some being hatless in a world where others are multiple-hatted, he uses a phrase which curiously illustrates changing valuations: ‘There are no limits to the consequential evils that may arise to the health, independent of the daily disreputableness and discomfort, of those who are compelled to do without hats’ (p. 92).

¹Inquiry into the Principles of the Distribution of Wealth, p. 94.

²Ibid. p. 99.

³Ibid. pp. 103, 143.

⁴Ibid. pp. 164–165.

⁵Ibid. p. 167.

⁶Ibid. p. 165.

⁷Ibid. p. 166.

¹Inquiry into the Principles of the Distribution of Wealth, p. 167.

²Ibid. p. 167.

³Ibid. p. 36.

⁴Ibid. pp. 168–169.

¹ The influence of the early English socialists on Marx has been so much discussed that the reproduction of an unusually Marxian paragraph from Thompson may be enlightening:

‘If, on the contrary, the measure of the capitalists prevails, what is the consequence? Whetted by the stimulus of the gratification of unbounded desires, of superiority without assignable limit to the destitution around him, the desire of accumulation supersedes with the capitalist even the love of enjoyment. To inequality of wealth there is no bound: it becomes the ruling passion: the distinction which it confers, the envy which it excites, urge men on to acquire it by any means: talents, virtue are sacrificed to it. Every expedient which force and cunning can use to appropriate the fruits of other men's labor, and with this view to turn the mass of mankind into ignorant contented drudges, is erected into a custom or a law. A universal and always vigilant conspiracy of capitalists, of necessity the most intelligent, exists everywhere, because founded on a universally existing interest, to cause the laborers to toil for the lowest possible, and to wrest as much as possible of the products of their labor to swell the accumulations and expenditure of capitalists. Yet such is the rage of these men for distinction, for expenditure as an instrument of distinction rather than of any direct enjoyment, that the products of the labor of thousands are swallowed up for no other end than to gratify such unsubstantial desires. What accumulated wealth there is in such a community, is gathered into the hands of a few; and as well from its bulk as from its contrast with the surrounding poverty, it strikes every eye. The productive laborers stript of all capital, of tools, houses, and materials to make their labor productive, toil from want, from the necessity of existence, their remuneration being kept at the lowest compatible with the existence of industrious habits.... The extremes of luxury and magnificence prevail. The evils of inequality are pushed to the utmost. The desire of accumulation reigns unbounded: production is stimulated chiefly by want’ (pp. 170–171).

² The full title is: Labor Rewarded. The Claims of Labor and Capital Conciliated: or, How to Secure to Labor the Whole Products of its Exertions. By One of the Idle Classes.

¹Labor Rewarded, p. 13.

²Ibid. p. 2.

³Ibid. p. 3.

⁴Ibid. p. 6.

⁶Ibid. p. 16.

⁶Ibid. p. 17.

¹Distribution of Wealth, p. 371.

¹ Elie Halévy: Thomas Hodgskin (1903), p. 142. It is rather extraordinary, and not wholly creditable to us, that we should be indebted to a Frenchman for the only biography of Hodgskin; it is even more extraordinary that we should have to rely for our knowledge of a large part of Hodgskin on such extracts from his unpublished papers as M. Halévy has elected to translate into French.

²Travels in the North of Germany, vol. 1, p. 210.

³Ibid, vol 1, p. 292.

⁴Ibid. vol. 1, p. 417.

¹Travels in the North of Germany, vol. 1, p. 467.

²Ibid. vol. 2, p. 180.

³Ibid. vol. 2, p. 205.

⁴Popular Political Economy, p. 150.

⁵Ibid. pp. 168–170.

⁶Ibid. p. 149.

⁷Ibid. p. 206.

¹Popular Political Economy, p. 218.

²Ibid. p. 235.

³Ibid. p. 16.

⁴Ibid. p. 19.

⁵ Halévy: Thomas Hodgskin, pp. 54–72.

⁶Ibid. pp. 59–60.

⁷ References are to the 1922 reissue by the Labour Publishing Company.

¹Labour Defended, p. 38.

²Ibid. p. 44.

³Ibid. p. 51.

⁴Ibid. p. 53.

⁵Ibid. p. 55.

⁶Ibid. p. 60.

⁷Ibid. p. 81.

⁸Popular Political Economy, pp. 120–121.

¹E.g.: ‘From this fact we may learn that men are only improvident in proportion as their wants are supplied by other persons, and that the simple means of making the race frugal, is to supply the wants of no man, and to leave every man the produce of his own labour (Travels in the North of Germany, vol. 2, p. 86).

‘The object in labouring is to supply the individual's wants. Nature gave him his faculties and powers for this purpose; for this purpose only, and not for the purpose of supplying the wants of other men whom she equally endowed’ (Popular Political Economy, p. 51).

²Labour Defended, p. 85.

³Ibid. p. 87.

⁴Ibid. pp. 90–91.

⁵Ibid. p. 89.

⁶Ibid. p. 90.

¹Labour Defended, pp. 104–105.

²Popular Political Economy, p. 237.

³Travels in the North of Germany, vol. 1, p. 302.

¹Labour's Wrongs and Labour's Remedy (London School of Economics Reprint), p. 10.

²Ibid. p. 40.

³Ibid. p. 113.

⁴Ibid. p. 115.

⁵Ibid. p. 123.

⁶Ibid. p. 17.

⁷Ibid. p. 34.

⁸Ibid. pp. 19–22.

¹Labour's Wrongs and Labour's Remedy, pp. 28–30.

²Ibid. pp. 34–36.

³Ibid. p. 41.

⁴Ibid. p. 42.

⁵Ibid, pp. 42–45.

¹Labour's Wrongs and Labour's Remedy, pp. 46–47.

²Ibid. p. 47.

³Ibid. p. 47.

⁴Ibid. p. 48.

⁵Ibid. p. 56.

⁶Ibid. pp. 49–50.

¹Labour's Wrongs and Labour's Remedy, p. 57.

² Ibid. pp. 60–61.

³Ibid. p. 74.

⁴Ibid. p. 98.

⁵Ibid. p. 100.

⁶Ibid. p. 133.

⁷Ibid. p. 130.

⁸Ibid. p. 133.

¹Labour's Wrongs and Labour's Remedy, p. 134.

²Ibid. p. 194.

³Ibid. p. 155.

⁴Ibid.p. 161.

⁶Ibid. pp. 170–172.

⁶Ibid. pp. 165–166.

¹Lecture on Human Happiness (London School of Economics Reprint), p. 5.

²Ibid. p. 13.

³Ibid. p. 13.

¹Lecture on Human Happiness, p. 15.

²Ibid. p. 69.

³Ibid. p. 28.

⁴ The title of Patrick Colquhoun's book is A Treatise on the Wealth, Power and Resources of the British Empire, and it is the fourth chapter of this quite impressive work that flits through early English Socialist literature. This chapter makes a quite laudable attempt to estimate the income of various classes, and there is attached to it a Table (No. 4) which is called An Attempt to Exhibit a General View of Society (pp. 124–125). Needless to say, the discussion and the table alike are somewhat amateurish, giving at best very approximate guesses in respect of ill-defined categories. The contemporary references to Colquhoun, in Gray and elsewhere, may, however, give a wrong impression to a reader who is unable to unearth and carry to a place of security Colquhoun's massive treatise.

It is not, as might be inferred from Gray, a remote ancestor of Fabian Tract No. 5, Facts for Socialists. Colquhoun is beset by Adam Smith's definition of productive labour, and thinks in terms of ‘vendible commodities.’ His own estimate (p. 109) is that on this definition one-fifth part of the whole community are unproductive labourers, and that they secure one-third of the new property created annually. But he hastens to warn his readers that the unproductive labourer, on Adam Smith's definition, may be a very useful person: ‘with a few exceptions... they eminently tend to promote, invigorate, and render more productive the labour of the creating classes.’ Indeed (p. 105), he somewhat too zealously goes out of his way to prove (with few exceptions) the great usefulness of everybody. Gray, taking Colquhoun's table and adding to it, makes his own estimate of the useless and the useful, on a purely arbitrary basis which reflects his own prejudices. It is a significant testimony to his prudence that while temporal and spiritual peers and all other ‘gentry’ are 100 per cent, useless, no impious voice of criticism is raised against even the remoter branches of the Royal Family, who are classed as 100 per cent, useful. Eminent clergymen are 100 per cent, useless; lesser clergymen are 100 per cent, useful. The whole profession of law, from judges down to ‘clerks, etc.,’ are useless. The theatrical profession (rather oddly) leaves the inquisition without a stain on its honour, being found 100 per cent, useful. Again, rather oddly, the class of lunatics produces none who are useless. In most cases, there is merely an arbitrary cutting down to a half or a third, the residue (with their families) being ‘useless.’

Where Colquhoun may quite legitimately irritate—if, after reading Owen, one is so weak as to feel irritation against anyone—is in his doctrine of the usefulness of Poverty in a State, resting on the distinction between poverty and indigence. Every State, he says, is supported by the poverty of the community (p. 110); and the reasoning is almost grotesquely simple. Riches are the offspring of labour; and labour can result only from a state of poverty! But below poverty lies indigence, and by ‘well-timed props,’ the poor must be prevented from lapsing into indigence, at which point they become a burden to others. They must (in a very fine phrase) ‘be again restored to their former rank of independent poverty’ (p. 113).

¹Lecture on Human Happiness, p. 20.

²Ibid. p. 22.

⁸Ibid. p. 24.

⁴Ibid. pp. 26–27.

¹Lecture on Human Happiness, p. 43.

²Ibid. p. 34.

³Ibid. p. 34.

⁴Ibid. p. 36.

¹Lecture on Human Happiness, p. 38.

²Ibid. p. 57.

³Ibid. p. 60.

¹Lecture on Human Happiness, pp. 60–61.

²Ibid. p. 62.

³Ibid. p. 62.

⁴Ibid. p. 63.

⁵Ibid. p. 65.

¹Lecture on Human Happiness, p. 66.

²Ibid. Appendix, p. 10.