254 THE FUTURE OF OUR AGRICULTURE. 



increase the well-being of its members, not merely by en- 

 abling them to engage in profitable productive enterprises, 

 but also to raise funds themselves by thrift. Borrowing 

 to lend without providing funds of its own would make 

 of the banks institutions from which no permanent good 

 could be expected. " It is self-help which makes the man," 

 so Mr. Gladstone has written ; " and man- making is the 

 aim which the Almighty has everywhere impressed upon 

 Creation. It is Thrift by which self-help for the masses 

 is principally made effective. In them Thrift is the S3^mbol 

 and instrument of independence and liberty, indispensable 

 conditions of permanent good." 



Thrift must therefore be the groundwork of the institu- 

 tion. But the encouragement of Thrift should be carried 

 beyond the narrow limits of the society itself. The society 

 cannot lend to others besides its own members, because 

 others have not the same security to offer. But it can 

 collect money from any one. And in Schulze Delitzsch's 

 words, the co-operative bank, being strongly localised, ought 

 to make it its endeavour to collect every spare shilling to 

 be met with in its district. 



The stability and strength of each bank will be greatly 

 added to by union with other banks governed by the same 

 principles, and combination with them for the formation 

 of a central bank, which will, however, have to be formed 

 with scrupulous care taken, not to entangle liabilities. Each 

 bank must remain answerable only for itself, though giving 

 support to, and receiving support from, sister banks, by 

 means of a central institution which alone can make sure 

 of obtaining money, when wanted, from outside sources. 

 The principle which M. Luzzatti has laid down for co- 

 operative banks is a good one : independenti senipre, isolati 

 mat. 



It will be seen that the societies here spoken of, " the 

 humbleness of which," wrote the late Eugene Rostand, a 

 leading organiser of co-operative credit in France, " con- 

 stitutes their beauty " — are institutions of a quite peculiar 

 kind, designed for humble members, down to the very 

 humblest, who are otherwise debarred access to cheap 



