TO THE POOE. 283 



neither being easy for workmen to do. For this reason 

 alone the progress of co-operative labour must be slow ; 

 but there are more formidable obstacles. There are 

 deeper reasons, founded on the nature of man and things, 

 why the instances of successful united production must 

 be limited for a long time to come, if not for ever. For 

 the cases to which the principle of co-operative labour 

 applies are limited. There would be many more, indeed, 

 if men's natures were changed and improved, if love for 

 others and mutual confidence the qualities requisite 

 for success were really as common as the advocates of 

 co-operation assume them to be. Ever we come to the 

 same check imperfect human nature, which has not 

 much progressed in this direction since Christianity first 

 preached to men the love of one another ; the same old r 

 unimproved human nature, which still bars the way 

 alike of general progress and of co-operative production. 



For a business can no njore be carried on successfully 

 without a single directing and controlling head, than a 

 bridge can be built, a campaign conducted, a ship sailed, 

 or an epic poem created. There must be in co-operative 

 production, as in all other kinds of production, a single 

 brain interested and responsible, which guides and 

 governs the whole, over and above the instrumental 

 hands which perform the mechanical processes and 

 manual dexterities. There must be a head to guide 

 and govern the whole course of labour from start to- 

 finish, to appoint to each one his suitable part in the 

 division of labour, to buy and sell and watch the market, 

 to know when to contract or extend operations. There 

 must be such a president and directing intelligence, or 

 the whole concern will speedily collapse in the presence 

 of the competing production possessed of this advantage. 

 For here, as everywhere, the law of Darwin holds, that 



