178 Spiritual Evolution of Society 



righteousness of their cause, in the interests of them- 

 selves and their children it is only to be expected that 

 their action would be precipitate. Life is short, and 

 to men whose aspirations are infinite, action must be 

 taken and reform accomplished now or never. In the 

 last great strike, of 1912, no doubt thought should have 

 been given by the miners to the millions outside of 

 their own industry who were already in misery and 

 were only made to suffer in an increased degree. Had 

 the " sweet reasonableness " of Christian ethics operated 

 with greater potency, the interest of all workers, and 

 especially of the very poor, would have met with every 

 consideration, and the trade unions would have seen to 

 it that help was given all round and that the interests 

 of the class of workers immediately concerned were 

 not allowed to injure those of others — equally necessary 

 to the body politic but not so able to defend them- 

 selves. But the evolutionary process has not yet 

 developed sufficiently to allow of the organisation of 

 such a plan, and this imperfection in method was the 

 very reason why the strike failed to accomplish its 

 full intention. By degrees it became evident that the 

 mass of the people did not support the strikers on 

 account of the too great self-assertion of their own 

 interests to the neglect of greater sufferers outside. 

 When once Labour is so organised as to act on behalf 

 of each section without injury to others, when once it 

 is imbued with that altruism which is slowly pervading 

 the thoughts of all men, then only will it become the 

 supreme power in the State, and the greatest factor 

 in the higher evolution of the race and promoter of the 

 happiness of men. 



Notwithstanding this defect in method, by their 

 efforts and self-sacrifice in the interest of burdened 

 members of their own class, the miners secured a 

 triumph, not only for themselves, but for all workers. 



