Chapter IV: Foreword: C (2)

Capitalism is essentially competitive and therefore necessarily belligerent in character: hence a complete, an ideal moral life is an utter impossibility under it, but even the little of moral life which otherwise might be possible is lessened to one-half by official dogmas and espionage laws; if, then, the governments of churches and nations have any regard for the morality of their memberships and citizenships they will at once repeal them, and never enact others.

The democracy which means freedom to learn the laws of the physical realm of nature and to interpret them into laws for the regulation of human life (a democracy which will secure to each one the longest and happiest life which, under the most favorable of conditions, would be within the range of possibilities for him) must wait until the competitive system of capitalism for the production and distribution of the necessities has been universally and completely supplanted by the co-operative system of socialism.

The conclusion of the whole matter, as it is well put by an able contributor to the excellent Proletarian, is this:

What is needed is a complete revolution of the economic system.
Private ownership of the tools of wealth production stands in the
way of further peaceful social development and private ownership
must be eliminated. The capitalists themselves will not eliminate
it. That is certain. It remains for the working class to do so. In
order to accomplish this task it will be necessary for the workers
to take control of the institution by which the capitalists
maintain their ownership of the tools of production--the political
state. That is the historic mission of the working class. The
mission of the Socialist is to organize and train the workers for
this "conquest of political power."

Among the signs of the times which unmistakably point to the great day of the happy consummation of the movement towards the proletarian revolution, and the glorious sky is full of them, is the fact that the world has recently learned from the great war that man must work out his own salvation without the least help from the gods of the supernaturalistic interpretations of religion:

And that inverted Bowl they call the Sky,
Whereunder crawling coop'd we live and die,
Lift not your hands to It for help--for It
As impotently moves as you or I.

--Omar.

Yes, and a god moves more impotently than a man; for, whereas the god is driven hither and thither by the laws of matter and force, according to which they co-exist and co-operate through evolutionary processes to the making of the universe what it is, and the god cannot help himself by making it or conditioning himself otherwise, the man, if only he will learn those laws, may combine, guide and ride them to almost any predetermined destination, even out of the class hell of competitive capitalism to the classless heaven of co-operative socialism.

III.

The salvation of the world from its unnecessary sufferings is dependent upon such an equitable sharing of the labor involved in the making and operating of the machines of production and distribution, and upon such an equitable sharing of the products as shall issue in a classless mankind by doing away, through a revolution, with the class which lives by owning the means and machines of production and distribution.

It is this advocacy of classless levelism which constitutes the theoretical core of revolutionary socialism. Those who oppose this socialism proceed upon the assumption of the permanency of existing religious and political institutions, the most ruinous of all heresies.

What this heresy is and the fatal policy to which it gives rise has its classic expression, so far as religion is concerned, in the exhortation--"earnestly contend for the faith once for all delivered to the saints"--and, so far as politics is concerned, in the representation--"the laws of the Medes and Persians which altereth not."

There is no such faith in religion, and cannot be, for as a creed becomes stereotyped it loses the religious character and degenerates into superstition.

There are no such laws in politics, and cannot be, for as a law becomes stereotyped it loses the political character and degenerates into tyranny.

Religion, which is the ideal half, and politics, which is the practical half, of the same reality, human socialism, are like all else in the universe, constantly changing, and necessarily so, because life and progress are dependent upon change.

Orthodoxy in religion and politics is the blight of the ages, because of its assumption that the great institutions, the family, state and church with their customs, laws and doctrines, as they exist for the time being, constitute the foundation of society, without which it could not exist; that these institutions are almost if not altogether what they should be, and that, therefore, the welfare of society, if not indeed its existence, is dependent upon their continuance with but little if any change.

But the foundation of society always has been a system for the production and distribution of the necessities of life, and hence social institutions, customs, laws and creeds are what they are at any time because an economic system is what it is.

If we compare an economic system for the production of the primary necessities of life (foods, clothes and houses) to a king or bishop (we may well do so, for in all ages such systems have been the power behind every regal and episcopal throne) we shall see that states, with their rulers, codes and police, armies and jails; and churches, with their gods, revelations, heavens and hells, are but so many expediencies for the protection of the system from change.

What is true in this respect of the state and church is equally so of the family, the school, the press, the lodge, the club, the library, the theater, the chautauqua and, in short, every institution.

Why all these age-long safeguards against change? Because, so far, every economic system has divided society into two classes, a comparatively small class who own things and a large one who make things, and if the few honest owners are to hold their own as divinely favored "grab-it-alls," they must be protected at every point against the many dishonest makers who are diabolically tempted to be "keep-somes!"

These rounded out children of god have nothing in common with these caved in imps of the devil, no more than the flea and the dog, or the tapeworm and the man.

David hastily said: All men are liars. He might leisurely have said this of every representative of any religious or political orthodoxy, for they insist that their religion and politics are the permanent elements in social truth which remain unchanged from generation to generation through all ages, whereas no religion or politics continues the same during one decade, nor even a single year.

Orthodox Christians say that Jesus founded their sectarian churches, though each sect insists that he had to do with only one church, theirs. I doubt that he lived. In any case, I am certain that if he did live and founded a church in the first century and were to come to earth again in this twentieth century, he could not if he would and would not if he could become a member of it, because of its changes.

Our own country is different by the width of the whole space of the heavens from what it was before the war, and it is destined to a much wider change.

So far are churches with their doctrines, and states with their laws from being changeless, that they are more or less modified by every development in the economic system to which they owe their existence and of which they are servants.

In the case of every nation its king, the economic system, has always been a robber and enslaver of the overwhelming majority of the people, and the church and state have been the hands by which he accomplished the robbing and enslaving.

Insofar as they differ, Roman orthodoxy is what it is because of its starting out as the religious product of the feudal system of economics; and Protestant orthodoxy is what it is because of its starting out as the religious product of the capitalistic system of economics.

Protestantism is preferred before Romanism by most of the leading people in the financial world, because it is the child of capitalism, their sister, so to speak, whereas its rival is only a cousin.

As to the Roman and Protestant orthodoxies they are on the same footing. I would not turn my hand over for the difference between them. If literally interpreted in the light of modern science, both are utterly antiquated and irrational.

Orthodox Romanists and Protestants have essentially the same bible and creed. In my opinion, as in that of all Marxian and Darwinian socialists, every supernaturalistic representation in both must be regarded as having either a figurative or a superstitious character, for there is not one among them which can endure a scientific and rational analysis; yet, this is an age of science and reason.

The difference between Romanism and Protestantism is not at all a question of relative supernaturalism, nor of rightness and wrongness, but wholly one of the difference between the systems of economics which gave them birth.

If you ask, is not this difference at least partly a question of the age in which they took their rise, I reply, yes; but the age itself depends upon the system.

However, it is a fact that while an economic system does constitute the foundation of every religious and political superstructure, yet below the foundation itself there is always a bed rock upon which it ultimately rests, and this is a question of machinery by which the necessities of life are produced and distributed.

The age of feudalism was essentially traditional or theoretical in its character.

The age of capitalism is essentially scientific or experimental in its character.

This difference between these ages is due to the fact that during the earlier age things were made with hand tools, and during the later one with machine tools.

Machinery in a theoretical or traditional age would be an anachronism. It must have an experimental or scientific age for its development, and, paradoxical as it may seem, this the machinery must make for itself. Every period in human history has had its determining character from the tools which brought it into being.

Supernaturalism has no place in the observations, investigations or experimentations which are necessary to the invention, construction and operation of a great machine and, hence, the machines have banished the gods from the roof of the earth and the devils from its cellar, leaving it to us to make of it what we please, a heaven or a hell without reference to them. In his brilliant work entitled "Social and Philosophical Studies", translated by Charles H. Kerr, Paul Lafargue writes:

The labour of the mechanical factory puts the wage-worker in touch
with terrible natural forces unknown to the peasant, but instead of
being mastered by them he controls them. The gigantic mechanism of
iron and steel which fills the factory, which makes him move like
an automaton, which sometimes clutches him, bruises him, mutilates
him, does not engender in him a superstitious terror as the thunder
does in the peasant, but leaves him unmoved, for he knows that the
limbs of the mechanical monster were fashioned and mounted by his
comrades, and that he has but to push a lever to set it in motion
or stop it. The machine, in spite of its miraculous power and
productiveness, has no mystery for him. The labourer in the
electrical works, who has but to turn a crank on a dial to send
miles of motive power to tramways, or light the lamps of a city,
has but to say, like the God of Genesis, "let there be light," and
there is light. Never sorcery more fantastic was imagined, yet for
him this sorcery is a simple and natural thing. He would be greatly
surprised if one were to come and tell him that a certain god
might, if he chose, stop the machines and extinguish the lights
when the electricity had been turned on; he would reply that this
anarchistic god would be simply a misplaced gearing or a broken
wire, and that it would be easy for him to seek and find this
disturbing god. The practice of the modern factory teaches
scientific determinism to the wage-worker, without it being
necessary for him to pass through the theoretic study of the
sciences.

Earth must be a hell as long as we allow the capitalist system to continue on it and to enslave the vast majority of its inhabitants. Marxian socialism will ring out the old era with its hell of human slavery and ring in the new era with its heaven of machine slavery.

One point must be grasped and held by all who would understand the changes which take place within the social realm and it is this: they are due to the differences in the instrumentalities or machines by which the necessities of life are produced.

Man has risen above the lower animals which have common ancestors with his own, because of the superiority of the hand by which he does things to the hands by which they do things. If a man's body in general and hand in particular were not a great improvement over the bodies and hands of the apes, his mind and morality would differ but little from theirs.

The superiority of the civilization of this age over its predecessors is a question of instrumentalities by which the efficiency of the hand is increased.

If all the modern machinery were taken from this generation and replaced by the implements of the stone age the civilization of the next generation would begin to sink, and within a century it would reach the ancient level.

Strong expression is also given to the great truth upon which we are here dwelling by the Socialist Party of Great Britain in its noteworthy Manifesto:

Obviously, in order that there may be ideas and human history, two
material things must first be present: human beings, and food and
shelter for them. And the fundamental fact that is so seldom
realized is, that where, by what means, and how much, food and
shelter can be obtained, determines if, where, and how, man shall
live, and the forms his social institutions and ideas shall take.

It is, indeed, the very basis of Socialist philosophy that, in the
words of Frederick Engels:

"In every historical epoch the prevailing mode of economic
production and exchange, and the social organization necessarily
following from it, form the basis upon which is built up, and from
which, alone can be explained, the political and intellectual
history of that epoch."

This materialist concept is the Socialist key to history. It is the
first principle of a science of society, and, being directly
antagonistic to all religious philosophy, it is destined to drive
this "philosophy" and all its superstitions from their last ditch.

Civilization will not die with the death of the capitalist system of production any more than it did with the feudal system. It improved under capitalism, because of the improvement in the machinery of production, and it is destined to continue its progress so long as new and better machines are made and this will be to the end.

Marxian socialism is a machine optimism. Under this socialism the number and efficiency of machines would increase more rapidly than they have under capitalism and feudalism, because its aim will be the production of commodities for use within the shortest time by the least exertion at the slightest risk of injury.

Up to the point of over production, that is, of glutting the markets, it is to the interest of capitalism to encourage improvements in machinery, but the ability to do this has been reached, as is evident from what we hear at increasingly frequent intervals about an over production of commodities.

What machinery we now have renders it possible to produce more commodities than can be sold without employing all the labor power. But the idle, starving slave is a danger to the idle, surfeiting master. Hence, under capitalism there can be no further development of machinery, at least not on a large scale.

An industrial government would have for its aim to produce enough of everything for all with the least expenditure of energy and time. Hence, the greatest benefactors and heroes under socialism would be the inventors of labor saving, leisure giving machinery.

We hear much about the mental superiority of the representatives of the master class over those of the slave class, but there is little or no truth in it.

On the contrary, it can be shown that the invention of a great labor saving, rapid-producing machine is, upon the whole, the greatest triumph of the human mind and that nearly all among such machines are invented, made, operated, kept in order and improved by the laborer.

Masters may be more cunning than slaves, but cunningness is not an evidence of a high order of intellectual power. Many of the lower animals are quite the equals, if not indeed the superiors, of capitalists in this quality, but no animal is the equal of any man, not to speak of the exceptionally skilled laborer, in the power to produce efficient machines for the production and distribution of the necessities of life.

Romanism began its career as a child of the feudal system for the production and distribution of commodities for the profit of the owners of the land and the means for its cultivation. The mission to which it was born was the assistance of its father, feudalism, in robbing and enslaving the workers who tilled the soil, and never did a servant more faithfully or efficiently perform a task during a longer period.

Protestantism began its career as a child of the capitalistic system for the production and distribution of commodities for the profit of the owners of the means and machines for their manufacturing. The mission to which it was born was the assistance of its father, capitalism, in robbing and enslaving the workers, who make and operate the machines, and never did a servant more faithfully and efficiently perform a task in a larger or more fruitful field.

Hitherto all systems of economics have had the same soul, competition; and, because of it, every one among them has been a diabolical trinity of which lying is the father; robbing is the son, who proceeds from the father; and murder is the spirit, who proceeds from the father and the son.

Labor, "the certain man" of every nation, is half dead lying in the ditch by the wayside, despoiled and wounded, the victim of capitalism, the greatest liar, robber and murderer of all the ages.

The church is the archangel or prime minister through which this Beelzebub, capitalism, has done most of his lying, though within the last hundred years the business has become so great that the office of coadjutor to this archangel was created, and the press appointed to it.

The state is the archangel or prime minister through which this prince of devils, capitalism, has done most of his robbing and killing, though the church has often taken a helpful hand in these departments of the devil's work, the great work of converting earth into a hell.

Nearly all of the backwardness of the world and more than half of its unnecessary sufferings have been due to efforts to prevent changes in religion and politics. Our nation is passing through the darkest period of its history because of such efforts on the part of the powers which be in the state, and they are supported by those in the church.

Speaking of the change with which we are here especially concerned, the one involved in the supplanting of an old economic system by a new, there have been several revolutions due to such changes, and another is inevitable and imminent.

When an economic system fails, as the capitalistic one is failing, to feed, clothe and house the workers of the world who produce all foods, clothes and houses, the time when it must give place to another is manifestly near at hand.

Capitalism is failing in this, the only legitimate mission of an economic system. It has indeed over-supplied the needs of about one in ten, but in doing this it has shown partiality, for the remaining nine are left more or less foodless, clotheless and houseless, and this notwithstanding they have done all the feeding, clothing and housing. Those favored by the system will not be able to prevent its overthrow by those who are wronged.

With our materials, factories, railroads and skill, all should have enough and to spare of every necessity, but so far is this from being the case that millions are insufficiently fed, clothed, housed and warmed, and are doomed to a perpetual and exhaustive drudgery which leaves neither leisure nor energy for the cultivation of their soul life.

The economical and statistical experts of our government's Department of Labor represent that the bare necessities of a comfortable and efficient life for a family of five require an annual income of $1,500, and that the simple luxuries, which are next to being indispensable, require an additional $1,000, in all $2,500, per year.

How many American families of five have even the smaller of these sums at their disposal? The overwhelming majority have less than $1,000. Let us be honest with the peoples of other nations by ceasing to speak of our country as "the land of plenty and the home of the free," until there is a great change for the better.

Wage slavery may be prolonged by a military coercion but it cannot have a successor in any other form of human slavery. Military coercion prolonged chattel slavery, and by so doing brought what is known as the dark ages upon the world. If wage slavery is to be prolonged by military coercion the world must pass through a second dark age. The league of nations is fixing for this; but let us hope that this coalition will not stand and that wage slavery will soon be followed by machine slavery, the form of slavery which will end human slavery; not until then shall we have peace on earth and good will among men.

Then they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.

Do you not now see with me that the christ of the world is not a conscious, personal god, but an unconscious, impersonal machine? It is the machine of man, not a lamb of god, to which we may hopefully look for the taking away of the sins of the world.

Ignorance is the great misfortune of the world, its devil, and slavery is his hell. The machine is the redeemer who shall save man from this devil and hell.

Yes, strange, even blasphemous, as the representation may seem, it is nevertheless true, the machine is the only name given under heaven whereby the world can be saved.

Civilization is salvation. The civilization which is salvation depends on leisure and it on slavery, but so long as leisure is dependent upon the slavery of man, civilization must be limited to a diminishing few.

Marxian socialism is a movement towards the equalization and universalization of leisure by doing away with the master and slave classes, through transference of slavery from man to machine.

If there is any truth in my naturalistic representation about the dependence of morality upon a system for the production of the necessities of life, there is none in the supernaturalistic one, which makes it dependent on any among the gods; and, what is true of the realm of morality is equally so of the realm of history, and this whether it be the history of the universe in general or man in particular.

Lavoisier and Mayer showed that no god (Jesus, Jehovah, Allah, Buddha) created the universe out of nothing, for the matter and force which enter into its constitution are eternalities and universalities.

Kant and Laplace showed that the earth and the heavenly bodies were not created by any god at all, but evolved from gaseous nebulae.

Kepler and Newton showed that these bodies were not governed in their motions by a god but by the law of gravitation.

Darwin and Wallace showed that the species of animal and vegetable life were not created by any among the gods, but evolved from a common protoplasm.

Marx and Engels showed that man's career has not been determined by any among the gods, but by his systems for producing and distributing the necessities of life.

These ten men are the greatest teachers the world has had, and this is the sum of all their great teachings: The universe is self-existing, self-sustaining and self-governing, having all the potentialities of its own life within itself, and what is true of it in general is equally so of all the phenomena which enter into its constitution, including man; who, though he is the highest among them, is only a phenomenon, on a level with all the rest, not excepting the lowest. A microbe and a man are on the same footing, both as to their origin and destiny, and as to their having within themselves all power which is available for making the most of their respective lives.

"We are part
Of every rock and bird and beast and hill,
One with the things that prey on us,
And one with what we kill."

Darwinism and Marxism constitute one gospel, the only true, comprehensive and sufficient gospel which the world has ever had or can have, and there is no hope for the future of mankind except in it. If it fails the world is lost, but it shall not and indeed cannot fail, for its words are so many acts or facts of nature.

There is no fact which is not such an act, and every such fact is a part of the one only law upon the knowing and doing of which terrestrial life and its happiness are wholly and solely dependent.

Yes, life, long life, happy life, all there is of such human life, or divine life, (if there be any), depends entirely upon a knowledge of and conformity to this law which is the doing of nature, and not at all upon any law which is the willing of a god, if indeed there is such a law.

Neither the religion nor the politics which enters into the constitution of Marxian or proletarian socialism is at all concerned about the heaven above or the hell below the earth, if there are such places: but the concern of both is wholly to ring out a hell from the earth and to ring in a heaven upon it.

Nor have the religion and politics which constitute this socialism the least concern about the service of a celestial divinity (Jesus, Jehovah, Allah, Buddha or any other) by doing his will; but both are much concerned with the service of humanity, which consists in rightly learning, interpreting and using the laws of nature, wholly for the purpose of making the terrestrial lives of men, women and children as long and happy as possible, and with absolutely no reference to any celestial life which may be either above or below the earth.

Religion and politics are the complementary and inseparable halves of the social sphere, religion being its idealism and politics its practicalism.

Religious idealism is a social soul of which the church should be the embodiment.

Political practicalism is a social soul of which the state should be the embodiment.

Contrary to the representations of orthodox Christianism it is impossible for any soul to exist without an embodiment.

In truth the body produces the soul, not the soul the body. We must have the church and state in order that we may have their souls, idealism and practicalism.

Why, if the Soul can fling the Dust aside
And naked on the Air of Heaven ride,
Were't not a Shame--were't not a Shame for him
In this clay carcass crippled to abide?

--Omar.

IV.

The church and the state are on the same level as to their origin and importance. Both are human institutions and each is indispensable to the other. It is not at all desirable or possible to rid the world of either, but it is absolutely necessary that both should be revolutionized, the church by having its bible and creed rewritten or at least reinterpreted, on the basis of truth as it is revealed by nature, and the state by having its institutions reorganized on the basis of service to all instead of only to those of a small class, the owner or master class.

All the idealistic aims of churches and all the practical undertakings of states should be directly concerned with the answer to three questions: (1) the question as to how to reach the goal where terrestrial life shall in the case of each man, woman and child be as long and happy as it is within the range of possibilities to make it, by the fullest of attainable knowledge concerning the laws of nature; (2) the question as to how to make the most successful endeavor universally to disseminate such knowledge, and (3) the question as to how resistlessly to persuade to the living of it.

These are the only concerns and aims of Marxian socialism and they cannot be promoted or even avowed by Christian socialists.

The great crime of the ages is the robbing of the producer of the basic necessities of human life by the non-producer.

Capitalism is the robber, and the politics and religion of the old states and churches are the right and left hands by which he has been and is doing the robbing.

Marxian socialism is an undertaking which has for its task the overthrow of the system which makes it possible for those who produce nothing to live surfeitingly, and renders it necessary for those who produce everything to live starvingly.

Poverty is a disease caused by the unjust wage system of competitive capitalism for producing and distributing the necessities of life (food, clothing and shelter) for the profit of capitalists, the few who live by owning the materials and machines of production and distribution; and this blighting malady cannot be cured by charity, but it will spread until this system is supplanted by the just one of co-operative industrialism, a system by which these necessities shall be produced and distributed for the use of laborers, those who live by making and operating the machines.

Every gift to charity by a rich man is a robbery of a poor man. You will not see this at once, if ever, and I shall not blame you for the failure to do so. It was not seen by me until I was much older than you; but I am now seeing it as clearly as I ever saw the sun on a cloudless noonday, and this is true of rapidly growing millions who are resolutely resolved to do away with the prevailing conception of charity, according to which capitalists may rob laborers of the fruit of their toil, giving them of it barely enough to keep body and soul together and to raise up children who are doomed to follow in their footsteps; and then, when the strength of their victim fails, to make amends for the robberies, by giving the most highly favored among them beds in hospitals, poor-houses in which to die prematurely, and nameless graves in potter's fields in which to await hopefully a resurrection and ascension to an inheritance of happiness in a sky, which was denied them on the earth.

The time is at hand when everywhere the unemployed and the underpaid shall begin a resistless march towards the goal of economic levelism under a banner containing this slogan: We want no charity but the right to work and the fruits of our labors that we and our helpless dependents may have every necessity to the fullest life for body and soul.

During more than a whole generation Mrs. Brown and I have not produced a spoonful of any food, a thread of any garment or a shingle of any house; and yet we have had foods, garments and houses in abundance with some to spare, while their producers have had them in scarcity with much to want.

While the world war was on, an ill wind for the producers blew a thousand dollars to us and an ill wind for us blew it into the hands of a committee, ostensibly for investment on behalf of a hospital of which we approved, but really for the purchase of a bond in the interest of a war of which we disapproved.

The fathers of the present generation of producers and distributors of the necessities of life were robbed in order that we might inherit the property from which our income is derived; the sons and daughters are being robbed over and over again and again, year after year, in order that the property may continue to yield this income to us.

We therefore paid nothing of our own for this bond. What we gave for it was of the spoils which the great robber, capitalism, has bestowed upon us, its favorite children, from what it has taken from its unfortunate victims.

The same persons or their children and successors were or shall be robbed first to create our property, then to pay the income of it, next to buy the bond, and now they are being robbed to meet the interest on it and finally they will be robbed to pay its face value. If capitalism stands, of course the victims of the last of these robberies will belong, probably, to a remote generation; but this delay is a misfortune in store for many of all intervening generations.

If the robbery connected with this bond were limited to its original cost, one thousand dollars, and to its accruing interest, which is likely in time to aggregate several thousand dollars, it would indeed be bad enough, yet not nearly as much so as it is under the melancholy circumstances; for the money paid on account of the bond goes towards killing or wrecking its producers, if not those who produced this particular thousand dollars, yet others of their class to whom the world owes all of its wealth; therefore the thousand dollars which went into this bond has been devoted to the robbery of those who were robbed of it and of the most precious of all things: life and limb.

You will ask: how can you and Mrs Brown, in the face of your theory, according to which all who live by owning are robbers of those who live by working, consistently receive and expend the income of your inheritance?

The answer was given to a friend who asked us why we did not follow the heroic example of a young American who had recently renounced what had been inherited by him, and this is, in effect, what we said:

As we look at the question, our course is more rational than his, because the wealth which he renounces may go to some one who is without his sympathy for the proletariat. We prefer to receive our inheritance and use it to overthrow the economic system which makes it possible for us to do nothing and have everything, and for those who do everything to have nothing.

Capitalists, as such, people who live by the owning of the machines of production and distribution, instead of by the making and operating of them, have much to say against the alleged anarchism of socialists and yet they are necessarily what they accuse anarchism of being, robbers and murderers. Every cent of profit, interest and rent is so much robbing, and all wars are so many conflicts between the capitalistic bandits or robbers in the countries involved, and the peace conferences, which follow them, are so many attempts of the bandits on the successful side to have the spoils as large as possible, and to satisfactorily divide them.

It is Holy Week 1921. The week in which during all the years of many and long ages benighted people sacrificed their Christs to Shylock gods. If Jesus lived and was a Christ, unhappily He was neither the first nor the last, for there were many both before and after Him. Were they who superstitiously led these victims to their Golgothas greater sinners against humanity than those who did avariciously during the war drive large armies of young men to the terrible trenches, a wholesale sacrifice of the lords of power and wealth and who do now drive the vast majority of the nations involved in that war to a terrible body and soul destroying poverty and slavery? No. The modern robbers even more than the ancient ones are in need of the prayer: Forgive them for they know not what they do.

Communism and Christianism have, indeed, this in common, that their object is to promote life, long life, and happy life, both lives in a large and full measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over.

Yet, with this sameness in the gospels of Communism and Christianism there is this difference in the aims of the christs who preached them, which separate them as widely as the east is from the west, leaving a great and impassable gulf between them.

Marx, the christ of the Communist gospel, said: I am come that the world might have terrestrial life for body, mind and soul, and have it for each in the fullest of possible measures by co-operation with each other in the discovery of the laws of nature and in making them serve men, women and children by securing for them food, clothing, shelter, health and comfort for the body, and leisure for the mind to think and for the soul to grow.

Jesus, the christ of the Christian gospel, according to orthodoxy, said: I am come that ye might have celestial life for mind, body and soul and have it for each in the largest and fullest possible measure by co-operation in persuading each other in particular and the world in general to receive a revelation of the will of a conscious, personal God, made through prophets, preserved in the bible and interpreted by the church.

With me it is a melancholy but resistless and deepening conviction, that, if orthodox Christianism should become associated with Marxian socialism, as Kingsley and you would associate them, we should soon have a glaring illustration of the truth of two proverbs: a house divided against itself cannot stand; and no man can serve two masters.

Moreover, I believe that if Christian socialism were to become a door to Marxian socialism, through which orthodox Christianism could enter and make itself at home, the revolutionary aims of the slave class would be thwarted and the world would enter upon a new dark age, as it did when Constantine was converted to Christianity and Christians became the most loyal citizens and valiant soldiers of the Empire.

At that time chattel slavery had run its course as wage slavery has now; and, if it had not been prolonged by a military despotism, as I fear this may be, the world would have had something of the feudal slavery, but nothing of the dark age. This age was the baneful fruit of Christianism. Christianity has held the world back from civilization instead of advancing it towards civilization.

The Christianization of Marxian communism, in accordance with the program of Kingsley and our Church Socialist League, would spell another military despotism for the prolongation of a second system of slavery, which has run its course and is in a fair way of being overthrown; but if the revolutionists fail, as the result of being trampled under the iron heel, we are at the threshold of a second dark age and shall soon be passing through all the miseries of it.

My interest in the movement within our church looking towards a Christian socialism of a more radical and revolutionary type would be great, if only I could feel as I should so much like, that the Christian socialism to which you have consecrated the whole prime of your life, and the Marxian socialism, to which I have consecrated all of the little that remains of mine, the fag-end, are not utter incompatibilities, so much so that it is absolutely impossible that they can co-exist and co-operate to any good purpose.

The irreconcilable incompatibility of Christian socialism and Marxian socialism is due to the fact that, whereas the Christian is essentially imperialistic in its character, the Marxian is as essentially democratic. The reason for this fundamental and ineradicable difference, and the consequent incompatibleness, is the fact that orthodoxism, whether Christian, Jewish, Mohammedan or Buddhistic, is nothing unless it is supernaturalistic and traditional; and Marxism is nothing unless it is naturalistic and scientific, as much so as is Darwinism.

In order that you may see the reason, as I understand it, for this wide, deep and bridgeless difference, I draw the following contrasts between the essential beliefs of Marxian socialists and orthodox Christians:

1. Marxian socialism is essentially naturalistic. Orthodox Christianism is essentially supernaturalistic. The consistent socialist says: I have all the potentialities of my own life within myself. The consistent Christian says: My strength is from God.

2. Marxian socialism is essentially classless. Orthodox Christianism is essentially a class system by which the world is divided into two classes, saints and sinners. The consistent socialist says: Every man is my brother. The consistent Christian (like the theist of every name--Jew, Mohammedan, Buddhist and the rest) says: Every true believer is my brother, but those who are not are only potential brethren.

3. Marxian socialism is essentially terrestrial. Orthodox Christianism is essentially celestial. The consistent socialist says: Earth is my home. The consistent Christian says: Heaven is my home.

4. Marxian socialism is essentially materialistic. Orthodox Christianism is essentially spiritualistic. The consistent socialist says: The basic necessities of life, and therefore its first concern, are foods, raiments, shelters, comfort and leisure. The consistent Christian says: Take no primary thought for these, but only for faith in and obedience to God, regarding all else of secondary importance.

5. Marxian socialism is essentially proletarian. Orthodox Christianism is essentially bourgeois. The consistent socialist says: I am, by reason of my antecedents, a man, a woman, a child of nature on an essential level as to my origin and destiny with every other representative of humanity and indeed animality. The consistent Christian, like the theist of every name, says: I am (by reason of my faith, baptism or conversion) a prince or princess, the son or daughter of a king, God.

6. Marxian socialism is essentially democratic. Orthodox Christianism is essentially imperialistic. The consistent socialist says: I live with reference to the will of the majority. The consistent Christian says: I live with reference to the will of a God.

7. Marxian socialism is essentially pacific.[F] Orthodox Christianism is essentially belligerent. The consistent socialist says: Since you are a man, I co-operate with you. The consistent Christian says: Since you are not a believer, I contend with you.

8. Marxian socialism is essentially non-sectarian. The consistent socialist says: All the world is my home and the desire and effort to render service to men, women and children is my religion. The consistent Christian says: Only Christendom is my home and the desire and effort to serve a God is my religion.

9. Marxian socialism is, as to the source of knowledge and the means of attaining it, essentially scientific. Orthodox Christianism is essentially traditional. The consistent socialist says: The salvation of the world is dependent upon what is learned by natural experience, observation and investigation about the doings of a matter-force-law, nature. The consistent Christian says: This salvation depends upon what is learned by revelation, tradition and inspiration about the willings of a father-son-spirit, God.

10. Marxian socialism explains the history of mankind on the naturalistic theory that it has been determined during every period by the existing system for supplying the materialistic necessities of life. Orthodox Christianism explains this history on the supernaturalistic theory that it is determined by the providential directions of a triune divinity. The consistent socialist says: If you will tell me of the economic system by which a people have fed, clothed and housed themselves, I will tell you, at least in general outline, what has been their history. The consistent Christian says: If you will tell me what the providences of my God have been towards a people, I will tell you their history.

11. Marxian socialism has inscribed on one of its banners: Liberty. Orthodox Christianism has this inscription on its corresponding banner: Obedience. The consistent socialist says: This Liberty-banner is the symbol of my freedom as a son of man to be progressively learning, living and teaching the unfolding revelations of nature--to know and to live which is to have life, terrestrial life in an ever increasing measure, all the life there is here and now or elsewhere and elsewhen, if there is to be a conscious, personal life anywhere or anywhen else. The consistent Christian says: This Obedience-banner is a symbol of my slavery as a son of God by which I am bound to receive, live and teach the faith once for all delivered to the saints in the Old and New Testaments or else lose the permanent life in the sky which is to follow this temporary one on the earth.

12. Marxian socialism has inscribed on another of its banners: Justice to Man. Orthodox Christianism has on its corresponding banner: Love to God. The consistent socialist says: It is my aim to do unto others as I would have them do unto me if our circumstances were reversed. The consistent Christian says: It is my aim to love God with all my heart, mind and soul.

And if there be any further contrast between this Christianism and Socialism, it is briefly comprehended in these three statements,--in themselves sufficient to show how absolutely impossible it is for a consistent Jesuine Christian to be a consistent Marxian Socialist:

1. Marx seeks to save by doing away with both the master and slave classes--Jesus by exalting the slave class above the master class.

2. Marx exhorts the slave class to look to itself for deliverance--Jesus taught it to look to a God for this.

3. Marx promises salvation for this world here and now, a world about which everybody knows much--Jesus promised it for another world elsewhere and elsewhen, a world about which nobody knows anything.

The world has never had a gospel which is at all comparable in its excellency to that of Marxian Socialism. The gospel of Jesuine Christianism, according to the orthodox interpretation of it, is no exception; for, granting it to be superior to the Mosaic, Buddhistic, Mohammedan and other gospels, it is, nevertheless, almost infinitely inferior to the Marxian gospel. Gospels are for the purpose of saving the world from its suffering. The Jesuine and Marxian gospels are alike in having for their object the salvation of the proletarian world.

V.

About three years ago I discovered that I had spent a long, strenuous and open-handed ministry in preaching lies to the permanent ruin of my health and the temporary embarrassment of my purse; therefore I had the unhappy experience of being forced to see that all this part of my life, its prime, had been mostly, if not wholly wasted and worse. What was to be done?

My friends told me as plainly as they could, and some succeeded in making it brutally plain, that in losing my faith in the supernaturalistic dogmas of traditional Christianism, as they are literally interpreted in the doctrinal standards of the orthodox churches, I had lost the pearl of great price.

My soul told me that I had never possessed this jewel, but that, even with the little time and enfeebled strength that remained to me, I might yet find it, if only I should cease looking for it in the field of supernaturalism, under the direction of divine authority, and begin looking for it in the field of naturalism, under the direction of human reason.

Happily, where faith went out courage came in, and it increased with my desperation until (though standing on the shore of death where the deep and unknown stream lies darkly between the present and future) I could and I did undertake the supreme task of my life--the breaking of the chains by which I was bound as a slave to the degrading superstition that I was, both by an inherited and cultivated disposition, a doomed man, and by an inherent weakness, a helpless one with no power to emancipate myself.

Of such enslaving chains I mention three among the strongest, the severed parts of which, with those of all the rest, now lie scattered about me: (1) the chain of the fear of God; (2) the chain of the fear of the devil, and (3) the chain of the fear of man.

Hitherto I had been a child, thinking as a child, understanding as a child and speaking as a child.

Henceforth I was to be a man, the greatest, conscious, personal being who has anything to do with this world; and as a man, I put away the things of a child, especially the most childish of all things, fear, the fear of God, the fear of devil and the fear of man.

Preachers of the supernaturalistic interpretations of religion say that the fear of God is salvation. It is damnation. No one who has fear of any conscious, personal master whomsoever or wheresoever, God in heaven, devil in hell or man on earth, is free or other than a slave. Nor has any such attained to the full stature of manhood.

There is only one fear which saves and that is the fear of ignorance. The world's destroyer-god is ignorance. There is no other devil on earth or in hell below it, and this one lives, moves and has his being in the fear of knowledge.

The world's saviour-god is knowledge. There is no other Christ on earth or in any heaven above it, and this one lives, moves and has his being in the fear of ignorance.

Happily, I listened to my soul and I have found the pearl of great price, yes, a whole bed of them, so that I am now in position to substitute in my preaching a truth for every lie I used to preach, and thus save myself; but woe unto me unless I make the substitution by ringing out the lie and ringing in the truth.

Within the last three years I have learned that, as I have not been, since the beginning of my Christian ministry, more than a generation ago, a producer, I have nothing of my own to give to charity, and what is true of me is true of Mrs. Brown.

No one is a producer who does not grow things on the farm, make things in a shop, discover things in a laboratory or render some necessary or helpful service to those who do such things. I have done nothing of the kind. If I had been preaching truths I might have rendered such service, but I preached lies.

Every possession rightfully belongs to the productive worker and nothing to the unproductive idler. This is one of the two greatest and most salutary among all the truths known to mankind. Recently I made acknowledgment of it on the pledges to a good cause, that of the Red Cross, by writing on their upper left hand corners: "The gift of Unknown Laborers through Bishop and Mrs. Brown, whose possessions are the fruits of their enforced toil and sacrifices."

By this acknowledgment I rang out a great lie--the lie which makes the salvation of the world depend upon the capitalists with their servants, the preachers on the right and the politicians on the left hand.

Salvation or, what is the same reality, civilization, always has been and always will be dependent upon the producer. It will never be attained until the laboring class has done away with the capitalist class. The ideal civilization (which is the salvation of the world from its unnecessary sufferings, especially the overwhelming ones due to the great trinity of evils, war, poverty and slavery) is in the very nature of things an impossibility on the basis of class sectarianism, such as we have even in our Anglo-American Christianity, the best interpretation of traditional religion, and in our American democracy, the best interpretation of traditional politics.

Among the pathetic things about war, there is this, the laboring class makes by far the greater sacrifices, not only of life and limb, but also of money.

Quite contrary to the general impression, capitalists, as such, pay no part of the enormous and ruinous pecuniary cost of war. When Mr. Rockefeller pays out three million dollars in war taxes he is disposing of what rightfully belongs to laborers, because they, not he, earned it. Capitalists, as such, neither earn nor pay anything, in time of either war or peace.