THE FARMER AND SOCIALISM. 431 



at severe labor, there is still ample time for such "improve 

 ment" as we are capable of absorbing, and such recreation as 

 is healthful and really enjoyable. The normal man gets his 

 best recreation in forwarding bu.siness for his individual wel 

 fare within the limits of his strength. It is not in the line of 

 progress, but of retrogression, to reduce the hours of work 

 beyond reason, and thereby the aggregate of divisible satis- 

 factions, nor will it promote happiness to apply work to the 

 general rather than individual welfare. 



At any rate, the farmer can not so live, because unalterable 

 natural conditions compel him to live otherwise. What 

 Socialists term ca|)italistic methods do not lend themselves 

 readily to the cultivation of land. They are now seldom 

 protitable, and only under exceptional conditions, which, even 

 where they exist, can not be lasting. The use of machinery 

 quickly finds its limit in the inequalities of land, the cost of 

 powder, and the expense of wear and tear. So long as there 

 is surplus power in self-repairing human beings, who must in 

 any case be fed, and so long as plants and animals have indi- 

 vidual peculiarities, which must be considered, but of which 

 machinery takes no account, it will not be economical to 

 dispense with human and animal labor for the majority of 

 agricultural operations, even if inventive genius could devise 

 the machines. Those who write most glibly about machine 

 cultivation of farms seem unfamiliar with the operation of the 

 economic law of diminishing returns, and do not realize that 

 most land is rough, and that power costs money, and its use 

 requires mechanical skill and convenient repair shops. That 

 the aggregate of the use of machinery in agricultural opera- 

 tions will increase, there can be no doubt, but, relatively, it 

 must decrease with the increase of population. So long as 

 land shall be cultivated, its economic use will require work 

 days of long hours, and economic rent will tend to be absorl)ed 

 by the requirements of labor until it is no longer a factor 

 in the farmer's income — a condition which it has long since 

 reached in many lands — and in this way all value that has 

 temporarily and unjustly been appropriated by individuals 

 will gradually be reappropriated by society, and that not by 



