252 SOCIAL AND INDIVIDUAL 



to it may serve to illustrate the principle I have tried to 

 expound. It is not infrequently held that one of the most 

 characteristic and significant of modern tendencies is to 

 restrict the right of the individual to external goods and 

 subordinate his use of them to considerations of public 

 utility. What is the ultimate meaning of the factory and 

 other acts which limit the right of so-called ' ' free bar- 

 gaining," except that they imply the denial of the boasted 

 "right" of the individual "to do as he likes with his 

 own" ? And looking to the future, it will be asked 

 whether there is any legislative tendency more probable 

 than that of the further limitation of individual liberty on 

 behalf of the interests of society as a whole. Are we not 

 on the way to a condition of matters in which the state 

 shall be the only capitalist and employer and the individual 

 be deprived of all rights of property other than those which 

 would belong to him in the capacity of a civil servant ? 



I would answer these questions in a way radically 

 different from that of the militant socialists. I would 

 distinguish between the definition and regulation of rights 

 on the one hand and their restriction or abolition on the 

 other. It is at least possible that to define and to regulate 

 a right is to render it more secure. The so-called invasion 

 of private rights to property I regard as a symbol that the 

 social consciousness of the sacredness of property is deepen- 

 ing. The state, as a matter of fact, instead of depriving 

 all alike of the power of saying, "This is mine and not 

 yours," is endeavouring to indicate more accurately what 

 is a man's own, and to protect it more completely. An 

 illustration may help to bring out this important point 

 more clearly. There was a time when the " rights of 

 property " extended over persons ; when a man might sell 



