PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS — SECTION F. 331 



<' main chance " — the salary they must receive for their labours ; 

 " not for love alone," but " because there is money with it." 



Capital may be said to be the system of dynamics which 

 rules in this world of individualism, and is an agency by means 

 of which the few are able to augment their possessions at 

 the expense of the labour of the many, in contradistinction 

 to the energy that should be begotten of the perfect or- 

 ganization of the labour of the whole community. It may 

 not be supposed that the present state of social existence 

 can at one bound leap into the improved condition sha- 

 dowed forth in this paper. We have to do %vith a period 

 of transition. "What I have undertaken is to show that one 

 portion of the machinery by which progress is to be achieved 

 is by the State taking entire control of the currency of the 

 country. With the more advanced thinkers of the age, I 

 cannot overlook the circumstance that Mr. Del Mar points 

 out — namely, that, though " reform in the institution of money 

 would remove many causes of popular discontent, it is never 

 referred to by land reformers, because the subject is one usually 

 beyond the scope of popular agitators, and who, besides, may 

 fear to risk the popularity of their own remedy by acknowledg- 

 ing the existence of another." He sums up his contention by 

 stating, what all ought to know, that " money " — i.e., the whole 

 system of the currency — "unheard, unfelt, almost unseen, has 

 the 'poivcr to so disti'ibute the burdens, gratifications, and 

 opportunities of life that each individual shall enjoy that share 

 of them to which his merits entitle him, or to dispense them 

 with so partial a hand as to violate every principle of justice, 

 and perpetuate a succession of social slaveries to the end of 

 time." 



W^hich track is our course of social life travelling upon? 

 Few persons will, I apprehend, take objection to the abstract 

 lines I have so far laid down. The self-conscious dishonesty 

 of those who possess ill-gotten booty always apologizes for 

 itself that it has by its own acts prevented greater wrong being 

 done ; and we teach om'selves to look upon the mass of moral 

 and physical human degradation, induced by the glare of what 

 we call civilisation, as a better position of affairs than that 

 which preceded it. If this progression exists, there may be 

 hope. Probably, few doubt that the present condition of 

 France is better than that which obtained under the ancien 

 regime. Then let us not talk about finality. Again I refer to 

 the history of the past to show how ready hun:ian nature is to 

 take the shadow for the reality. A block of wood has been 

 prayed to as if it were the divinity it is supposed to represent. 

 A king is treated as reverentially as if he were the '• all sorts 

 and conditions of men" whose interests he is pledged to con- 

 serve, till at length, not being unconscious like the idol, he 



