674 '^^E POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



stimulant to labor. I admit, with John Stuart Mill, that it may be 

 well to give new wants to still savage people, so that their energy and 

 ingenuity may be stimulated and they be lifted out of a condition of 

 indolence by the exertion necessary to satisfy those wants ; but the 

 taste for consuming is not the one that needs to be stimulated among 

 European peoi)les. The greater number of men, even in a country as 

 rich as France, have not such homes, or furniture, or clothing, or food 

 as hygiene requires, nor such as they all certainly would desire to 

 have. Is not this want of necessaries sufficient to urge them to labor ? 

 It is the only incentive of those who labor with their hands ; and it 

 is only those who are at ease that seek for the superfluous. "But 

 what," says M. Baudrillart, "will you do with those thousands of 

 artists, those hundreds of thousands of workmen, who are working in 

 metals, in cloths, ivory, woods, gems, with infinite taste?" The emi- 

 nent economist himself answers the question a few pages further 

 on, in replying to those who say that France " produces too much." 

 " What does this fortunate France produce too much of ? It is not of 

 the things useful or agreeable in life when there are so many poor. 

 Let some one point out what it is that is produced in superabundance. 

 Is it wool, when so many are cold ? Is it grain, when so many are in 

 want of bread?" Let the men who are working at ivory and gems 

 produce the wool and the grain which you say are lacking, and the 

 question will be answered. 



M. Baudrillart regards a small number of wants as a sign of inferi- 

 ority, and supposes that the development of material wants corre- 

 sponds with that of the moral faculties. This is true in the earlier 

 stages of civilization, but ceases to be so in the later stages, when the 

 development of wants is so little a sign of progress that they have 

 been most multiplied and refined in times of laxity, corruption, and 

 decadence. This is exemplified and proved in the case of the Roman 

 Empire, where the impossible was pursued, and extravagance sought 

 the height of enjoyment in the indulgence of perverted fancies. 



Economists are accustomed to measure the degree of civilization 

 of a country by its productive power. In a certain country the rich 

 lay the world under contribution for the adornment of their mansions 

 and the supply of their tables, while a million poor people may be 

 living on public charity, a third of the population may be illiterate, 

 another third may be without necessaries, and the prisons may have 

 to be enlarged and martial law proclaimed. No matter ; that coun- 

 try is called the most civilized in the world. In another country, we 

 find brawny rustics, owning their houses and lands, procuring by their 

 labor all that is indispensable to them. No one among them falls 

 short of a certain degree of ease and education, but no luxury can be 

 seen anywhere. That country is considered very backward. Such 

 are the habitual judgments of the day. I believe them to be super- 

 ficial and false. 



