When
wealth and poverty meet each other face to face, the one the
master and the other the dependent, the one exalted and the other
debased, it is perhaps hardly matter for surprise that the
dependent and debased and powerless faction, in envy of their
opponents' supremacy, should demand, not simple reform, but
absolute community and equality of wealth. That cry for
communism is no new one in the history of mankind. Thousands of
years ago it was heard and acted on; and, in the lapse of
centuries, its reverberations have but swelled in volume. Again
and again, the altruist has arisen in politics, has bidden us
share with others the product of our toil, and has proclaimed the
communistic dogma as the panacea for our social ills. So today,
amid the buried hopes and buried projects of the past, the
doctrine of communism still lives in the minds of men. Under
stress of misfortune, or in dread of tyranny, it is still
preached in modern times as Plato preached it in the world of the
Greeks.
Yet it is indeed doubtful whether, in the history of mankind, a
doctrine was ever taught more impracticable or more false to the
principles it professes than this very doctrine of communism.
Pages:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17