126 PRESIDENTS ADDRESS—SECTION F. 
It is fortunate for Esau that he had the power of effecting an 
exchange, and that, notwithstanding the exorbitancy of the 
seller’s terms, he had no hesitancy in exchanging (or despising, 
as it is stated) the less needful satisfactions for the more pressing 
or primary ; for in the trial of Job’s integrity and fortitude it is 
affirmed, with truth, that skin for skin, all that a man hath will 
he give for his life. 
Unfortunately for the working-class breadwinner, his only 
birthright is physical power and manual skill, and although 
these are all he can offer for his life needs, he cannot always as a 
competitor effect the necessary exchange ; and too often he, and 
those depending upon him, travel the swift road to beggary and 
death. 
Thus there are still defects, whether remediable or otherwise, 
in the present civilisation, so long as these fundamental neces- 
sities of a power to exchange with primary satisfactions are 
imperfect, ¢.g., certain divisions of human kind are not directly 
engaged in producing primary needs for themselves. They are 
mostly engaged merely in rendering more or less skilled services, 
in return for tokens (money or other medium) understood to 
have at least the power of effecting corresponding definite supplies 
of primary wants. But this division has another difficulty. 
The actual owner of the power (rich capitalist) to effect the 
production of things which may be exchanged for a corresponding 
quantity of primary needs, may in all likelihood be able to effect 
such exchanges ; but the poor capitalist, the possessor of the 
power of mere services, such as the navvy, the house servant, the 
blacksmith, may often be unable to exchange his services towards 
the production of these very things; and under such conditions, 
as the needful exchange cannot be effected, the unemployed 
wage-earner in the division of human labour must be supported 
by drawing upon a more or less limited surplus previously 
earned ; failing that, he must either borrow, take the risk of 
violent means to secure primary wants, be fed by private or 
public charity, or die of starvation. 
This, then, is the problem of problems of the present day. 
References to current high rates of wages, the low prices of 
provisions, or the increasing aggregate value of wealth in 
exchange, do not always disclose this skeleton in the social 
cupboard. When the ship of society is barred into many more 
or less water-tight compartments, the ship itself may not founder, 
although one or two minor chambers be damaged and water- 
logged, and their contents destroyed. If the larger and more 
important chambers, however, be destroyed, the whole ship may 
founder, and those who may effect escape may be small indeed. 
This allegorical picture must not be pressed too hard. It may be 
sufficient, however, to draw attention to a dangerous side of the 
division of labour composition of modern society. 
