CONTENTS xxxiii 



PAGE 



This belief is naturally confined to men with exceptional imaginations 



and exceptional productive powers .... 365 



It only becomes general by the popularising of false theories which 



represent wealth as attainable by all, without exceptional talent 



or exceptional exertion ...... 366 



It is roused, for instance, in a man who suddenly is told that he has 



a legal right to an estate which previously he never thought of 



coveting ........ 366 



The socialistic teaching of to-day creates a spurious desire for wealth 



by its doctrines of impossible rights to it . . . . 367 



The practical craving for wealth is naturally confined to those who 



have some talent for creating it, and the pain caused by its absence 



is naturally confined to such men ..... 368 

 The socialistic theories merely cause a barren and artificial discontent, 368 

 which interferes with that harmonious progress on which the welfare 



of the many depends ...... 369 



These theories make enemies of classes who would otherwise be allies, 



and the cause of true social reform suffers incalculable injury . 370 

 The object of the present work is to show the fallacy of the theoretic 



basis of existing socialistic discontent and socialistic aspirations ; . 371 

 and to show that the many are not a self-existent power, . . 372 



but depend for all the powers they possess on the co-operation of the 



few, 373 



whose rights are as sacred, and whose power is as great, as their own . 375 

 The recognition of the fact that the relations and positions of classes 



can never be fundamentally altered .... 376 



(especially when we consider the facts of history to which Karl Marx 



drew attention) ....... 376 



shows us not only how chimerical are the hopes of the socialists, but 



what solid grounds there are for the hopes of more rational 



reformers ........ 378 



