Part 33 (1/2)
The moment that Huxley recognizes that it is by the ”elimination of compet.i.tion,” or shall we say the ”limitation of compet.i.tion,” by subst.i.tuting human selection for natural selection, and directing selection towards an ideal that man is to progress and develop, he has recognized the scientific basis of Socialism; and when he points out that Science teaches self-restraint, human responsibility, human effort, not so much the ”survival of the fittest” as fitting as many as possible to survive, he has reconciled Science and Religion.
It is probable that one of the reasons why Huxley took a pessimistic view of the future was that he despaired of finding a solution to the economic struggle. I cannot forget the melancholy with which he said one day: ”I am informed that England keeps its control of the market of cotton goods by a difference in cost of production of a farthing per yard. How long can this last?” But Huxley only gave a part of the scientific argument for Socialism. For the other part we have to turn from the pages of Huxley to those of Karl Marx.
One of the most important services Karl Marx rendered humanity was the demonstration of the predominating influence of economics in the development of man, in the determining of our custom, character, and conduct.
The economic conception of history is described by F. Engels as follows:
”The materialist conception of history starts from the principle that production, and next to production the exchange of its products, is the basis of every social system; that in every society arising in history the allotment of products, and with it the division of society into cla.s.ses or ranks, depends upon what is produced, how it is produced, and how when produced it is exchanged. Accordingly the ultimate causes of all social changes and political revolutions are not to be looked for in the heads of men, in their growing insight into eternal truth and justice, but in changes of the methods of production and exchange; they are to be looked for not in the philosophy, but in the economy of the epoch in question.”[220]
Before elaborating this conception of history, it may be well to point out one or two elements of confusion in the terms in which it is stated. It is described as the ”materialist conception of history,”
and for this reason many people imagine that the admission of this theory means the exclusion of the ideal. This is a profound error due to a misunderstanding of the use of the word ”materialist.” This word does not necessarily imply that the only proper conception of history is a materialistic one in the sense that it excludes the operation of ideals; but only that material conditions have played a predominating role in determining ideas.
The admission, however, must be made that this explanation is by no means admitted by all Socialist writers. Indeed the very language used by Engels is inconsistent with it. He says ”they are not to be looked for in the philosophy, but in the economy of the epoch in question.”
If, however, Mr. Engels were alive to-day and were challenged as to whether in fact he meant by this phrase to exclude philosophy altogether, I think he would answer in the negative. What he meant to say, I think, was that the ultimate causes of all social changes and political revolutions are to be looked for in the economy of the epoch rather than in its philosophy. And this, I think, with some limitation is true, for the philosophy of every period is to a large extent determined by its economic conditions.
To this general statement there are, however, notable exceptions. Some men either by the adequacy of their means or the smallness of their needs, are lifted entirely above economic conditions, so that they can reason abstractly without regard to economic conditions. This probably is true of almost every philosopher that has made his mark. It is impossible to read the words of Christ, of Plato, Aristotle, St.
Thomas Aquinas, Carlyle, Emerson, and Tolstoi without being impressed by the fact that they soared far above all economic considerations.
On the other hand, economic conditions had a controlling influence on the whole philosophy of Ruskin. His first contact with life was while travelling with his father, who sold sherry to wealthy county families, and approached their mansions by way of the butler's pantry.
This impregnated Ruskin with a cult for aristocracy. It made it impossible for him to consider popular government without impatience.
Economic conditions too had put their mark so ineffaceably on the mind of Huxley that although in his criticism of Herbert Spencer he destroyed the princ.i.p.al philosophic bulwark of capitalism, he could not talk on Socialism without irritation.
Thus although men as great as Ruskin and Huxley were unable to rise above the slavery of the economic conditions in which their minds had been formed, others are so const.i.tuted as to be able to discuss ethics without any regard to economic conditions whatever. There is, however, no doubt as to the dominating influence of economic conditions in determining the average mental att.i.tude.
Man had two dominating appet.i.tes--for food and for perpetuation; and of these, because that for perpetuation is fitful whereas that for food is continuous, the latter is the more determining of the two.
There is hardly an act in a man's life which is not determined by the needs of food in the first place and the search for food in the second. This is admitted by all sociologists.
A right understanding of economics is therefore of the utmost importance to the conscious development of man. Unfortunately economists themselves have been until very lately just as narrow in their disregard of science and religion as science and religion have been narrow in their disregard of economics. Let us consider as briefly as the subject permits the inconsistencies which result from this narrowness in regard to religion and economics.
-- 2. CONFLICT BETWEEN ECONOMICS AND RELIGION
It is said that by the side of every poison in Nature there grows its antidote; that for every bean of St. Ignatius there is a bean of Calabar; and that a man poisoned by the one has only to stretch his hand out to the other.
So also in our social system may the two influences be at work, at odds with each other; whereas, did we but know enough, they might not only serve to counteract one another, but even become a priceless boon to humanity, as indeed the beans of St. Ignatius and Calabar have been made to yield up drugs as useful as nux vomica and eserine.
Religion and economics start by a.s.sumptions that are glaringly inconsistent.
Religion proceeds upon the a.s.sumption that man has morality in him and will, sometimes, act morally even contrary to his material interests.
Economics proceed upon the a.s.sumption that man has no morality in him and will never act morally if morality be contrary to his material interests.
Modern economists have somewhat modified this last view, but I am not criticising modern Political Economy, which is already lowering its flag to new doctrine; I am criticising the doctrine of _laissez faire_, which still const.i.tutes the backbone of our existing economics and will continue to deform our economic ideas until that backbone is relegated to museums by the side of the Ichthyosaurus and the Iguanodon.
Is the a.s.sumption that economic science is uninfluenced by morality true or false? Undoubtedly an economic science can be and has been constructed which does ignore morality and, dealing with man not as he really is but stripped of his morality, or as he is termed by some economic writers, ”economic man,” and still more navely by others the ”average sensual man,” has laid down the laws which _for such a man_ govern the production, distribution, and acc.u.mulation of wealth. In the development of this science it has been found necessary to define wealth, and here we come upon the first hard substance against which economists have broken their heads. For obviously wealth is to the ”economic” or ”average sensual” man a totally different thing to what it is to a Diogenes, a Cato, or to a Sister of Charity. To the latter wealth or well-being as opposed to illth or ill-being, consists mainly in the opportunity to be helpful to our fellow-creatures, whereas to the average sensual man wealth means money or the things that represent money, produce, bonds, and shares of stock. Now all economists are not ”average sensual” men; it is doubtful whether to those who know the Dean of Modern Economists, Mr. Alfred Marshall, he can be described as a sensual man at all; and so there are few subjects upon which economists have differed so much as upon the definition of wealth. The extremists confine wealth to material things that have an exchange value; but the absurdity of such a definition is slowly making itself recognized; thus it has been forced upon some that skill is wealth; and upon others that honesty too is wealth; for the money value of honesty is now put into dollars and cents by surety companies. And so very slowly but surely economists are beginning to recognize that man is a moral as well as a sensual animal, and that his morality cannot be disregarded even by economics.
Then, too, what is wealth in one country is not wealth in another; thus we are told that the food of John the Baptist was ”locusts and wild honey,” and in certain parts of Africa locusts are still a marketable article of food; so snails are wealth in France though not in England; and human flesh which is not wealth in Europe is still wealth in some parts of Africa. Wealth then depends upon two factors: intrinsic and extrinsic; the first including qualities of the thing itself, the second depending upon human demand; so that a painting by Tintoretto is wealth to a community that loves art, but an enc.u.mbrance to one that does not love it; and absinthe, that is regarded as a valuable a.s.set in France, is excluded by Belgium as poison.
Here again we come up against the morality of man; will he continue to poison himself with absinthe or will he abstain? Upon this ethical decision will depend the question whether the immense stock of absinthe now on the French market is wealth or not. And so we are led insensibly to a question of still wider importance: Is wealth money or is it happiness? If it is money then economists are right; if it is happiness then they are wrong. And yet it is as clear as the sun on a cloudless day that what man wants is happiness, and that if he has been set all these centuries on seeking money it is because money is believed by him to be practically the only medium through which he can attain happiness. Here is repeated the old story of the captive beaver in the attic gathering sticks to make a dam when the water pitcher was upset. The object for making dams had disappeared, but the dam-building instinct survived. We have grown so accustomed to labor for money that we have lost sight of the real object of our efforts; and we have to think a long time before we recognize that money in itself is of no importance to us whatever; and that the only thing of real importance is that for which money is sought--happiness. Now what happiness consists of depends upon the mentality of any given community. The tree-dwelling savage's idea of happiness is plenty of nuts and fine weather; the Englishman's idea is plenty of land and a seat in Parliament; the American's idea is millions of money; and the tree-dwelling savage is probably as near the truth as either of the other two.