472 HEREDITY AND SELECTION IN SOCIOLOGY 



of purely ethical forces. And the Socialism of Karl Marx is not 

 by any means the Socialism of Mr. Kidd ; for whereas the former 

 means by Socialism a condition of afEairs in which the action 

 of those developmental forces which have given rise to all progress 

 — the forces of conflict — ^will be suspended, Mr. Kidd aspires to 

 a state in which these forces shall reach their maximum ; although 

 it is hard to understand how this is to come about a^ - '•"suit of 

 the growth of the softening ethical influences of Christianity. 

 But Mr. Kidd's ideal is also a vague Socialism, and this Socialism 

 is, in the eyes of that distinguished sociologist, as much a 

 necessity as the Socialism of Karl Marx is for him, even if the 

 nature of the determining forces be difEerent. Karl Marx 

 foretold many years ago that the SociaHst regime would be 

 the inevitable outcome of that system of economic contradictions 

 created by capitalism. 



" In the measure that the number of potentates of capitalism, who 

 usurp and monopoHse all the advantages of this present phase of social 

 evolution, diminishes, the misery, oppression, slavery, degradation, and 

 exploitation, but also the power of resistance, of the labouring classes 

 increase concurrently. These classes are always augmenting their numbers, 

 and tend to become more and more disciplined, united, and organised by 

 the very mechanism of capitalist production. The monopoly of capitalism 

 becomes an obstacle to the very mode of production which has developed 

 and prospered with it and through it. The socialisation of work and the 

 centralisation of its material resources both reach a point at which they 

 are unable any longer to be contained ia their capitahst envelope. This 

 envelope will burst. The death -knell of capitalist property has sounded. 

 The expropriators will be expropriated in their turn." ^ 



One of the most authorised exponents of Marxism at the 

 present day, Karl Kautsky, in a recent work, has prophesied the 

 same thing. Kautsky recognises the imperative necessity of 

 expansion inherent in the capitahst mode of production, as in 

 every other form of life, and he writes : 



" La necessite de 1' extension constante du marche a encore pour con- 

 sequence un autre fait important : U est clair que le mode de production 



1 Karl Marx, Das Kapital, Zweite Auflage, 1872, vol. i., p. 793. 



