1 5 8 ARISTOCRA C Y AND E VOL UTION 



Book ii be built at all, the bricklayers, masons, and other 

 workmen who built it had to perform tasks of a 

 precisely similar kind. But obedience to orders on 

 the part of the Egyptian slave was secured by the 

 knowledge on his part that disobedience would be 

 punished by some form of chastisement, and very 

 likely of torture, whilst obedience on the part of the 

 Brighton workman was secured by the knowledge 

 on his part that, unless he chose to yield it, one way, 

 at all events, of earning a livelihood would be closed 

 to him. 



It is this latter method of securing industrial 

 obedience that is made possible by the capitalistic 

 wage-system ; and it is primarily for this reason that 

 what is called capitalism is an agent of progress, and 

 has developed itself in progressive communities. As 

 for capital itself, this, as we all know, performs part 

 of its functions by assuming the form of machinery, 

 buildings, bridges, railways, and a variety of struc- 

 tures and appliances which are grouped together 

 under the general head of fixed capital by econo- 

 mists. But these structures and appliances are 

 wage-capital, themselves the result of the previous influence of 



not fixed 1-1 i r i 



capital, gives great men on the industrial actions 01 the many ; and 



- as it was by means of wage-capital that this influence 

 was secured, the primary and most essential functions 

 agent. which capital fulfils, and which really form the 



essence of the capitalistic system, are to be found by 

 considering capital as employed in the payment of 

 wages. 



Now capital as thus employed consists of an 



