democratize the distributive agencies, and the workers will have many
allies in this, driven by the increased cost of living to search out the
most economical agencies of purchase. If the proletarians are not in a
majority in Ireland--a nation where the farmers are the most numerous
single class--they certainly form the majority in the cities; and the
co-operative store, while admitting to membership all who will apply,
ought to be and would be sympathetic with the efforts of labor to
emancipate itself, and would be a powerful lever in its hands. As the
stores increase in number, an analysis of their trade will reveal year
by year in what directions co-operative production of particular
articles may safely be attempted. More and more by this means the
producing power and the capital at the disposal of the worker will be
placed at the service of democracy. The first steps are the most
difficult. In due time the workers will have educated a number of their
members, and will have attached to themselves men of proved capacity to
be the leaders in fresh enterprises, manufactures of one kind or
another, democratic banking institutions, all supporting each other and
leaning on each other and playing into each other's hands.

The extent to which this may be carried, and the opportunities for
making Ireland a co-operative democracy, I shall presently explain. I
do not regard any of these forms of co-operative organization as ideal
or permanent. The co-operative movement must be regarded rather as a
great turning movement on the part of humanity towards the ideal. The
co-operative organizations now being formed in Ireland and over the
world will, I am certain, persist and outlast this generation and the
next, and will grow into vaster things than we dream of; but the really
important change they will bring about in the minds of men will be
psychological. Men will become habituated to the thought of common
action for the common good. To get so far in civil life is a great