62 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



of anomalies and extravagancies, yet plainly visible to the observ- 

 ant eye, stamps the beginning of the labor movement in Ger- 

 many." 



If confined to such lofty aims, the mission of socialism would 

 be worthy of, and would command the sympathy and hearty co- 

 operation of all enlightened people ; but Mr. Gohre shows that it 

 is necessary first to unmask the hypocrisy of social-democratic 

 literature, to oppose the true to the false, the impartial to the 

 partisan; he tells us that "German Social Democracy is to-day 

 not merely a political party, not merely the promoter of a new 

 system of economics, or even both of these and nothing more ; it 

 is also the embodiment of a philosophy, a logical, anti-Christian, 

 materialistic conception of the universe. Upon this materialistic 

 system it founds its economic and political system. This principle, 

 the caricature of a so-called science, worshiped by its followers, is 

 the corner stone of the party, gives it authority and ideals, and 

 exercises the most fatal and lasting influence, not so much on the 

 social and political tendencies as on the intellectual and ethical 

 character of the whole German laboring class." This new gospel 

 of socialism ran like wildfire among the hundreds of thousands 

 of German workingmen. Herr Liebknecht tells us that " nearly 

 two millions of men voted for the socialistic programme on the 15th 

 of June, 1893, to whom must be added nearly a million of voteless 

 young men between the ages of twenty and twenty-five years." 



The spread of socialism in Germany has now reached the de- 

 gree which is popularly termed with us a " craze." Its earliest con- 

 verts became its new prophets, its inspired preachers; from inner 

 conviction they gave their whole strength, their utmost capacity, 

 to the cause. " Wherever two or three met together men set forth 

 and discussed the thoughts they had imbibed from one book or 

 half a dozen books .of the new literature; sometimes fairly 

 grasped, sometimes only half comprehended and more than half 

 forgotten, but always brought afresh to their minds by the arti- 

 cles in their social-democratic paper. . . . The effect of this agita- 

 tion was the one desired. Under its pressure all the old youthful 

 training of the workman gave way and is still giving way in 

 every individual who brings such training with him to a factory 

 where the spirit of social democracy prevails." 



If, now, we cull out these true and noble yearnings of the work- 

 ingmen, discarding the sophistries of their self-elected leaders, we 

 find that their aims are those which have already been largely 

 attained by the wage-earning class in America through educa- 

 tion ; and while we may reasonably sympathize with the German 

 " party of the discontented," we have nothing to gain by the dis- 

 semination of their socialistic literature, though they have much 

 to learn from us. 



