AND SUBORDINATION. 77 



the most money, who can better afford to buy in larger quanti- 

 ties than the small trader, and who is therefore able to accom- 

 modate them with better goods at the same or a lower price. 

 It is thus that poor men refuse to stand by each other, bow their 

 necks to tyrants, arid kiss the rod of the oppressor. People are 

 attracted to the richly-furnished store ; and, for the sake of a 

 temporary advantage, they take their money to those who have 

 more than enough, and refuse to patronize the small trader. 

 Hence, inequality of condition, once engendered, is very apt to 

 go on increasing, until finally we see human forms, members of 

 the same great social family, clad in silks and rags dwelling 

 in hovels and palaces ! Now, this is all wrong ! There is no ab- 

 solute necessity for these social disfigurements. They are a 

 disgrace to Christianity. They show that our present commer- 

 cial system is not a wisely ordered one. Starveling shoots ! the 

 Social Tree is full of them. Are there not thousands of human 

 beings who toil from earliest morn to latest night, and never 

 make any headway ? Do they not continue in the same fix for 

 life, subservient to the interest of a branch which is more devel- 

 oped than themselves ; and this branch holds the same relation 

 to some other branch for which it has to work ? And what is 

 society but a Tree, an association of branches, where all 

 co-operate in building up its structure and in advancing its arts, 

 its sciences, and civilization ? You cannot deny the analogy. 

 Yes, and there are monopolizing branches which get too much 

 sap, and require pruning. For this thing has its foundation in 

 Nature, and we must look to Nature for a remedy. Are there 

 not men in every community with a superabundance of life- 

 energy, whose progress in wealth and in the extension of their 

 business relations has been rapid and unexampled ? There is 

 no end to their reckless and insatiable pursuit after wealth ! 

 Combined together, they exercise a fearful commercial power. 

 It is these merchant princes in combination who are our mas- 

 ters on the battle-ground of commerce. They are the men who 

 control the markets, who grind down the faces of the poor, who 

 exact at will from the consumer ! How beautifully is all this 

 illustrated by the branches of a tree ! How faithfully are the 

 laws of society there represented even in all their minutiae. 



