no EMPLOYERS AND WORKMEN 



pre-eminence in the world-wide conflict. Some- 

 times the men of a particular colliery lay down 

 their tools, sometimes all the pits in a whole 

 district are idle. Sometimes it is the cotton- 

 spinners who strike, sometimes the boiler-makers, 

 sometimes the bakers. It may be the electric 

 lights of Paris that are put out, it may be the 

 dockyard hands that refuse to work, it may be 

 a whole railway system that is disorganised, it 

 may be the vineyards that are deserted. It is 

 impossible to predict with certainty where the 

 next heavy blow is likeliest to fall. 



Now, a small strike here and there occasionally, 

 soon ending in an adjustment of differences, 

 might not indicate anything seriously wrong 

 with the system of work pursued. But strikes 

 are very far from being small and occasional, 

 and differences are very far from being rapidly 

 and easily adjusted. It is becoming more and 

 more difficult to control strikes in such a way 

 that their apparent causes are quietly removed, 

 and their recurrence rendered unlikely for some 

 time to come. For which there are two reasons : 

 that the apparent causes are seldom the real 

 causes, and that the desire for peace is seldom 

 a general and genuine feeling. It is this that 

 makes strikes an index of the relations, bad 

 and not improving, between employers and 

 workmen. 



It is believed that this state of affairs may be 

 traced to two causes originating very far back 

 in the history of mankind. 



A true history of morals has yet to be written. 



