some of the money, which they have already taken from the workers, to
setting the latter toiling again! But what use would that be on the day
when our monetary system broke down--as it nearly did at the
commencement of this war? What use would it be on some critical day when
a hostile invasion called every competent man and woman to do the work
of defence absolutely necessary at the moment? What use would it be in
the hour when complete commercial dislocation caused downright famine?
Who would look at offers of money then? Could the nation Carry this vast
mass of incompetents and idlers on its back then; and can it reasonably
be expected to do so now?

A terrible and serious crisis, as I have already said, awaits us--even
when the War is over--a crisis probably worse than that which we are
passing through now. We have to remember the debts that are being piled
up. If the nations are staggering along now under the enormous load of
idlers and parasites living on interest, how will it be then? Unless we
can reorganize our Western societies on a real foundation of actual
life, of practical capacity, of honest and square living, and of mutual
help instead of mutual robbery, they will infallibly collapse, or pass
into strange and alien hands. Now is the critical moment when with the
enormous powers of production which we wield it may be possible to make
a new start, and base the social life of the future on a generous
recognition of the fellowship of all. How many times have the
civilizations of the past, ignoring this salvation, gone down into the
gulf! Can we find a better hope for our civilization to-day?

It is clear, I think, that any nation that wants to stand the shock of
events in the future, and to hold its own in the vast flux of racial and
political changes which is coming on the world, will have to found its
life, not on theories and views, or on the shifting sands of literature