SECTION 22. OBSERVATION. 287 



munity, because wealth and labour, as is frequently alleged, are 

 interchangeable terms. 



Finally, weigh the pregnancy of an expression such as "the 

 family is the nation's unit". As a slogan it signifies substan- 

 tially nothing ; but allowing the imagination to pursue the con- 

 sequences, we arrive at a comprehensive theory of the State 

 and of economics. The object of wealth, according Jp this view, 

 is primarily to secure the welfare of families, meaning by family 

 mainly the two parents and the children, with their home. 

 Wealth as such has, then, no value, and the wealth produced 

 does not appertain to the individual producer, nor can it be 

 legitimately disbursed save for promoting family welfare. The 

 State similarly is not concerned with glory, power, honour, or 

 wealth as such ; but its policy should be shaped first and fore- 

 most by the requirements of the families constituting the nation. 

 The home, then, is the true centre of national concern, and 

 the production of wealth and the regulations of the State 

 must subserve it. Domestic and child hygiene, home educa- 

 tion, home work simplification, family concord and concord 

 in the family of nations, become consequently all-important. 

 The young should be trained for the life of marriage, and the 

 husband should know much of the home as the wife should 

 know much of the world, both being educated to appreciate 

 the value of co-operation and the need for mutual respect. 

 A male-directed world proves therefore an abortion, due to the 

 men having come to confound the means (wealth) for the end 

 (family welfare). Rightly considered, legislators and wealth 

 producers should have for their principal object the creation and 

 maintenance of well-provided and morally and aBsthetically 

 beautiful homes. The woman's work in the home assumes 

 thereby a transfigured value, and she is also required to join 

 the councils of the State, since she is best informed regarding 

 that which most concerns the State. Erratic anti-family theories 

 are hence discountenanced; old maids and old bachelors virtu- 

 ally cease to be as a voluntary class, whilst everything is done 

 to maintain the numerical equality of the sexes; the man's 

 ideal companion is his wife, and vice versa; home education 

 and home management become matters of science; wealth 

 production is directed to serve primarily this new conception 

 of society; Utopias are converted into eutopias; etc., etc. 



Again, a more virile use of the imagination would cast doubt 

 on some aspects of the theory of "genius" or inherited psychi- 

 cal capacity. That one man should be born with a perceptibly 

 stronger or more delicate physical constitution than another, 

 is easily understood; but how are we to picture to ourselves 

 a "born" baker, cook, accountant, merchant, manufacturer, 

 airman, lawyer, pianist, painter, musician, poet, saint, and the 

 thousands of other "somebodies" who are said to be "born, not 

 made", especially since, through the changes and developments 



