58 EVOLUTION, SOCIAL AND ORGANIC 



Socialism may be defined as the application 

 of the theory of evolution to the phenomena of 

 society. This is precisely what Marx and 

 Engels accomplished, and this why their work 

 is so fundamentally opposed to the con- 

 ventional theories and theological superstitious 

 current in their time, and so fully in harmony 

 with all the latest achievements in the scientific 

 world. History ceases to be a meaningless 

 mass of war and famine, bloodshed and cruelty. 

 It becomes a panorama presenting the develop- 

 ment of society according to laws which may 

 be understood and with a future that may be 

 measurably predicted. 



It develops by the operation of forces that 

 no man or class can wholly stay or hinder. The 

 power of those forces and the direction in 

 which they are now making has been well set 

 forth by Victor Hugo by a very striking 

 simile in the following passage: 



"We are in Russia. The Neva is frozen. 

 Heavy carriages roll upon its surface. They 

 improvise a city. They lay out streets. They 

 build houses. They buy. They sell. They 

 laugh. They dance. They permit themselves 

 anything. They even light fires on this water 

 become granite. There is winter, there is ice 

 and they shall last forever. A gleam pale and 

 wan spreads over the sky and one would say 



