56 
industrial common-wealth. Schiffle was a go-between the 
orthodox political economist and the out-and-out socialism of 
Germany. He had no sympathy with violence, with an attempt 
by some State action to reconstruct Society, but hoped for a 
freer association of individuals which would ultimately take the 
place of the clumsy State. The lecturer then referred to the 
Nihilists of Russia, who aimed first, he said, at peaceful propa- 
gandism but were ruthlessly repressed, and so since 1878 with 
the merciless they have shown themselves merciless. We have 
had the times in our own country when only violence and war 
could do the work that had to be done. In America the work 
of Mr Henry George was a symptom of the surge of the move- 
ment in the west. Professor Thorold Rogers, in a criticism of 
‘«Progress and Poverty,’ had attributed the popularity of the 
book to “the American delight in clever paradoxes, and their 
interest in the speculative pessimism which well-to-do people 
like to indulge in, especially when it is illustrated from foreign 
practices.’’ The same critic had also said that in England the 
book would never have been gravely contemplated but for the 
policy of the landlords of clinging to the obnoxious privileges of 
primogeniture and the settlement of the land. It was worth 
their while, and for the study of the question absolutely neces- 
sary, that they should ask what were the factors and forces which 
were working towards and would bring about socialism. They 
were mainly three, (1) the ethical and intellectual forces, which 
were mainly the preaching of liberty, equality, and traternity ; 
(2) the political forces, the growth of the Democracy; (8) the 
industrial forces. Hegel, the giant of German philosophers was 
practically the founder of scientific socialism, and he said there 
have been two stages in modern industry, and there is yet to be 
athird. First the feudal stage with solidarity without freedom ; 
second the capitalistic stage with freedom without solidarity ; 
and thirdly and finally the permanent stage is to be socialistic 
with freedom and solidarity. The stage of freedom and solidarity 
had to come, but would that necessarily be socialistic. The 
Socialists had pictured some plausible and pleasure dreams of 
the Socialistic state, but the lecturer wanted to know how they 
were going to act to bring about the ideal State. He did not 
believe in the pessimistic outlook. Statistics all pointed to a 
wider distribution of wealth to-day than they did fifty years ago. 
He hoped to have the cost of production very much lowered by 
a reduction in the rate of transport He hoped for a redistribu- 
tion of taxation that would relieve the occupiers of the town and 
throw a much larger share upon the ground rents. He hoped 
for legislation which would better the dwellings of the poor in 
the great cities. He hoped for temperance legislation to effect 
the desirable changes largely, and he hoped for national, free 
