266 MY LIFE 



living heirs? And when they fully realize their position, will they not 

 choose the latter alternative if offered them? If the Bene of chang 

 here sketched out were effected, the reign of capital as the tyrant and 

 enemy of labour would be at an end. When the to. .is- with which the 

 financier and the speculator work no longer exist, the piling up of 

 great fortunes will be impossible, and much personal care and atten- 

 tion will be required in order to make capital produce a steady return. 

 Industry and commerce will be the sole means of acquiring wealth. 



and by these means alone — under flic iu-:e conditions of society— very 

 great wealth can never he accumulated by one man. For the land 

 being nationalized, and the use of some portion of it obtainable by 

 all. the minimum of wages will rise far above the starvation point 

 which now prevails, and every village or other community, however 

 small, will consist of small capitalists, who will be ever ready to unite 

 for the safe employment of their capital. Then will arise a variety of 

 industries on a scale adapted to the size and wealth of the district, 

 and calculated to utilize the surplus labour and spare time of the sur- 

 rounding population; and these small industries will compete success- 

 fully with the establishments of individual capitalists, because they 

 will have an ample and cheap supply of labour, and because most of 

 the labourers, or their relations, will be shareholders, and will be thus 

 working for themselves. The individual capitalist will then find him- 

 self paralyzed for want of labour, unless he offers great temptations 

 in the form of high wages and participation in the profits. For when 

 a large proportion of the population are settled upon the land, and are 

 able to devote their savings and their spare time to local industries, 

 they will not, as now, be forced to become parts of a huge manu- 

 facturing machine in the success of which they have little personal 

 interest. 



By the methods here sketched out the labourer will receive, as Karl 

 Marx and other social reformers maintain that he should do, the whole 

 produce of his labour, and he will obtain this general result without 

 any aid from Government, except what consists in remedying in- 

 justice, and removing the restrictions on freedom which now hamper 

 him. Without any laws against usury, usury will practically cease to 

 exist. Without any direct restrictions on wealth, those vast and 

 injurious accumulations of wealth which now prevail will be impos- 

 sible. The " stealers " and the " beggars " who now, as Mr. Girdlestone 

 has shown, are so numerous among us, will steadily give place to 

 " workers," and just in proportion as that happens, poverty will 

 diminish, and will ultimately disappear. Now, a large portion of the 

 working population are employed in the production of useless and 

 often tasteless luxuries and trifles, the direct consequence of the large 

 number of persons who have surplus money to spend after all their 

 reasonable wants and comforts are fully satisfied. It is this, much 



