xxv RALAHINE AND ITS TEACHINGS 477 



improvement of the workers were concerned. They were all 

 alike broken up by the misconduct or greed of the 

 capitalistic owners the self-styled " superior classes." 

 But we do not therefore jump to the conclusion that these 

 classes are worse than the workers, and that it is their 

 " human nature " that wants altering. On the contrary we 

 believe, as does Herbert Spencer, that on the average, both 

 classes are equal in moral worth as well as in intellectual 

 power, and that, when the wealthy and educated classes are 

 once freed from the debasing influence of cut-throat competi- 

 tion and the worship of wealth, they will be amenable to the 

 influences of a more elevating environment, arid will be quite 

 as well able to make the co-operative commonwealth a 

 success, as were the humble Irish labourers and the 

 enthusiastic young Englishman at Ralahine. 



