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desirable only when its employment can be increased at the same
time. But whenever the rate of interest is lowered it is a certain
sign that the employment of capital has proportionally diminished
as compared with the amount available; and this fall in the rate,
which is always advantageous to some people, is
disadvantageous to others—some will have to be content with
smaller incomes and others with none at all.” (Nouveaux
Principes, vol. i, p. 393.)
[420] Compare the Saint-Simonian review, Le Producteur, vol.
iv, pp. 887-888.
[421] Nouveaux Lundis, vol. vi, p. 81.
[422] Études sur l’Économie politique, vol. i, pp. 60, 61.
[423] Nouveaux Principes, vol. i, p. 341; vol. ii, p. 459.
[424] Ibid., vol. ii, pp. 415, 435. See also Études, vol. i, p. 25.
[425] Nouveaux Principes, vol. ii, pp. 365, 366.
[426] Ibid., p. 451.
[427] Ibid., p. 338.
[428] Nouveaux Principes, vol. ii, p. 661.
[429] Ibid., p. 364.
[430] See section I of present chapter.
[431] Knies, strangely enough, classes him with the socialists.
[432] A. Blanqui, in his Histoire de l’Économie politique en
Europe (1837), considers him a writer of the modern school,
which he describes as follows: “Writers of this school are no
longer willing to treat production as a pure abstraction apart from
its influence upon the workers. To produce wealth is not enough;
it must be equitably distributed.” (Introd., 3rd ed., p. xxi.)
[433] Droz (1773-1850) published in 1829 his Économie
politique, ou Principes de la Science des Richesses. It is in this
work that we find the famous phrase, “Certain economists seem
to think that products are not made for men, but that men are
made for the products.”
[434] Paris, 1841, two volumes. Buret died in 1842, when
thirty-two years of age.
[435] It was not intended that any reference should be made in
this volume to the doctrine of socialism before the opening of the
nineteenth century, but the question whether the French
Revolution of 1789 was socialist in character or simply middle-
class, as the socialists of to-day would put it, has been so
frequently discussed that we cannot ignore it altogether.
There is no doubt that the leaders of the Revolution—including
Marat even, who is wrongly regarded as a supporter of that
agrarian law which he condemned as fatal and erroneous—always
showed unfailing respect for the institution of private property.
The confiscation of the property of the Church and of the émigré
nobles was a political and not an economic measure, and in that
respect is fairly comparable with the historic confiscation of the
property of Jews, Templars, Huguenots, and Irish, which in no
case was inspired by merely socialist motives. The confiscation of
endowments—of goods belonging to legal persons—was regarded
as a means of defending individual or real property against the
encroachments of merely fictitious persons and the tyranny of the
dead hand. When it came to the abolition of feudal rights great
care was taken to distinguish the tenant’s rights of sovereignty,
which were about to be abolished, from his proprietary rights,
which deserved the respect of everyone who recognised the
legitimacy of compensation. In practice the distinction proved of
little importance. Scores of people were ruined during those
unfortunate months—some through mere misfortune, others
because of the muddle over the issue of assignats, and others,
again, because of the confiscation of rents; but the intention to
respect the rights of property remains indisputable still. It would
seem that in this matter the revolutionary leaders had come
under the influence of the Physiocrats, whose cult of property has
already engaged our attention. And how easy it would be to
imagine a Physiocrat penning Article 17 of the Declaration of the
Rights of Man when it speaks of property as an inviolable, sacred
right! But, on the other hand, it is true that Rousseau in his article
Économie politique speaks of the rights of property as the most
sacred of the citizen’s rights.
It was not only on the question of property that the
revolutionists of 1789 showed themselves anti-socialist. They
were also anti-socialist in the sense that they paid no attention to
class war and ignored the antagonism that exists between
capitalists and workers. All were to be treated as citizens and
brothers, all were equal and alike.
 However, those who claim the most intimate connection with
the spirit of the Revolution remain undismayed by such
considerations. They endeavour to show that the Revolution was
not quite so conservative nor so completely individualistic as is
generally supposed, and after diligent search they claim to have
discovered certain decrees bearing unmistakable traces of
socialism. But a much more general practice is to plead
extenuating circumstances. “Are we to demand that the social
problems which appeared fifty years afterwards, when industry
had revolutionised the relations of capital and labour, should have
been solved at the end of the eighteenth century? It would have
been worse than useless for the men of 1789 and 1793 to try to
regulate such things in advance.” (Aulard, Address to Students,
April 21, 1893. Cf. his Histoire politique de la Révolution, chap. 8,
paragraph entitled “Le Socialisme.”)
We must not lose sight of the communist plot hatched by
François Babeuf during the period of the Revolution. But in this
case, at any rate, the exception proves the rule, for, despite the
fact that Babeuf had assumed the suggestive name of Gaius
Gracchus, he found little sympathy among the men of the
Convention, even in La Montagne, and he was condemned and
executed by order of the Directory. Babeuf’s plot is interesting, if
only as an anticipatory protest of revolutionary socialism against
bourgeois revolution. Cf. Aulard, loc. cit., p. 627.
[436] Not to speak of celebrated Utopians like Plato, More, and
Campanella, a number of writers who have been minutely studied
by Lichtenberger undertook to supply such criticism in the
eighteenth century. Morelly, Mably, Brissot, and Meslier the curé
in France, and Godwin in England, attacked the institution of
property with becoming vigour. Babeuf, who in 1797 suffered
death for his attempt to establish a community of equals, has left
us a summary of their theories. But the Saint-Simonians owe
them nothing in the way of inspiration. Eighteenth-century
socialism was essentially equalitarian. What aroused the anger of
the eighteenth-century writers most of all was the inequality of
pleasure and of well-being, for which they held the institution of
private property responsible. “If men have the same needs and
the same faculties they ought to be given the same material and
the same intellectual opportunities,” says the Manifeste des
Égaux. But the Saint-Simonians recognise neither equality of
needs nor of faculties, and they are particularly anxious not to be
classed along with the Babeuvistes—the champions of the
agrarian law. Their socialism, which is founded upon the right to
the whole produce of labour and would apportion wages
according to capacity, aims neither at equality nor uniformity.
The Saint-Simonians seem to have remained in ignorance of
the socialist theories of their contemporaries, the French Fourier
and the English Thompson and Owen. Fourier’s work only became
known to Enfantin after his own economic doctrine had been
formulated. Saint-Simon and Bazard appear never to have read
him. It is probable that Enfantin only became aware of Fourier’s
writings after 1829, and when he did he interested himself merely
in those that dealt with free love and the theory of passions. As
Bourgin put it: “If Fourier did anything at all, he has rather
hastened the decomposition of Saint-Simonism.” (Henry Bourgin,
Fourier, p. 419; Paris, 1905.)
The English socialists are never as much as mentioned. The
Ricardian doctrine of labour-value, which is the basis of
Thompson’s theory and of Owen’s, and later still of that of Marx,
seems never to have become known to them. “Questions of
value, price, and production, which demand no fundamental
knowledge either of the composition or the organisation of
society,” are treated as so many details (Le Producteur, vol. iv, p.
388). Their doctrine is primarily social, containing only occasional
allusions to political economy. Enfantin is careful to distinguish
between Quesnay and his school and Smith or Say. The
Physiocrats gave a social character to their doctrine, which the
economists wrongfully neglected to develop. Aug. Comte, in the
fourth volume of the Cours de Philosophie, has criticised political
economy in almost identical terms, which affords an additional
proof of his indebtedness to Saint-Simonism.
[437] Cf. especially Dumas, Psychologie de deux Messies
positivistes, Saint-Simon et A. Comte (Paris, 1905), and for
biographical details Weill, Saint-Simon et son Œuvre (1894).
[438] Weill, Saint-Simon et son Œuvre, p. 15.
[439] In 1814 De la Réorganisation de la Société européenne,
by Saint-Simon and A. Thierry, his pupil; 1817-18, Industrie, in 4
vols. (the 3rd vol. and the first book of the 4th vol. are the work
of A. Comte); 1819, La Politique; 1821, Le Système industriel;
1823-24, Le Catéchisme des Industriels (the third book, by A.
Comte, bears the title Système de Politique positive); 1825, Le
Nouveau Christianisme. Our quotations from Saint-Simon are
taken from the Œuvres de Saint-Simon et d’Enfantin, published by
members of the committee instituted by Enfantin for carrying out
the master’s last wishes (Paris, Dentu, 1865), and from the
Œuvres choisies de Saint-Simon, published in 3 vols. by
Lemonnier of Brussels (1859).
[440] L’Organisateur, Part I, 1819, pp. 10-20. This passage was
republished by Olinde Rodrigues in 1832 under the title of Une
Parabole politique in a volume of miscellaneous writings by Saint-
Simon, with the result that Saint-Simon was prosecuted before
the Cour d’Assises. He was acquitted, however.
[441] “With the enfranchisement of the communes we shall
witness the middle classes at last in enjoyment of their liberty,
setting up as a political power. The essence of that power will
consist in freedom from being imposed upon by others without
consent. Gradually it will become richer and stronger, at the same
time growing in political importance and improving its social
position in every respect, with the result that the other classes,
which may be called the theological or feudal classes, will dwindle
in estimation as well as in their real importance. Whence I
conclude that the industrial classes must continue to gain ground,
and finally to include the whole of society. Such seems to be the
trend of things—the direction in which we are moving.” (Lettres à
un Américain, Œuvres, vol. ii, p. 166.)
[442] “Industry is the basis of liberty. Industry can only expand
and grow strong with the growth of liberty. Were this doctrine, so
old in fact but so new to many people, once fully grasped instead
of those fictitious dreams of antiquity, we should have heard the
last of such sanguinary phrases as ‘equality or death.’” (Œuvres,
vol. ii, pp. 210-211.)
[443] “Lawyers and metaphysicians are wont to take
appearance for reality, the name for the thing.” (Syst. indust.,
Œuvres, vol. v., p. 12.)
[444] “Parliamentary government must be regarded as an
indispensable step in the direction of industrialism.” (Œuvres, vol.
iii, p. 22.) “It is absolutely necessary if the transition from the
essentially arbitrary régime which has existed hitherto is to be
replaced by the ideal liberal régime which is bound to come into
being by and by.” (Ibid. p. 21.)
[445] Writing in 1803 in his Lettres d’un Habitant de Genève,
he uses the following words: “Everyone will be obliged to do
some work. The duty of employing one’s personal ability in
furthering the interests of humanity is an obligation that rests
upon the shoulders of everyone.” (Œuvres, vol. i, p. 55.)
[446] “I find it essential to give to the term ‘labour’ the widest
latitude possible. The civil servant, the scientist, the artist, the
manufacturer, and the agriculturist are all working as certainly as
the labourer who tills the ground or the porter who shoulders his
burden.” (Introduction to Travaux scientifiques, Œuvres choisies,
vol. i, p. 221.)
[447] The national or industrial party includes the following
classes:
1. All who till the land, as well as any who direct their
operations.
2. All artisans, manufacturers, and merchants, all carriers by
land or by sea, as well as everyone whose labour serves directly
or indirectly for the production or the utilisation of commodities;
all savants who have consecrated their talents to the study of the
positive sciences, all artists and liberal advocates; “the small
number of priests who preach a healthy morality; and, finally, all
citizens who willingly employ either their talents or their means in
freeing producers from the unjust supremacy exercised over them
by idle consumers.”
“In the anti-national party figure the nobles who labour for the
restoration of the old régime, all priests who make morality
consist of blind obedience to the decrees of Pope or clergy,
owners of real estates, noblemen who do nothing, judges who
exercise arbitrary jurisdiction, as well as soldiers who support
them—in a word, everyone who is opposed to the establishment
of the system that is most favourable to economy or liberty.” (Le
Parti national, in Le Politique, Œuvres, vol. iii, pp. 202-204.)
[448] Syst. indust., Œuvres, vol. vi, p. 17, note.
[449] Syst. indust., Œuvres, vol. vi, pp. 91-92.
[450] Œuvres, vol. iii, pp. 35-36.
[451] On this point see Halévy’s article in the Revue du Mois for
December 1907, Les Idées économiques de Saint-Simon, and
Allix, article mentioned supra, p. 117.
[452] In the following passage the opposition is very marked:
“One must recognise that nearly all Government measures which
have presumed to influence social prosperity have simply proved
harmful. Hence people have come to the conclusion that the best
way in which a Government can further the well-being of society
is by letting it alone. But this method of looking at the question,
however just it may seem when we consider it in relation to the
present political system, is evidently false when it is adopted as a
general principle. The impression will remain, however, until we
succeed in establishing another political order.” (L’Organisateur,
Œuvres, vol. iv, p. 201.)
Later on the Saint-Simonians abandoned this idea and
demanded Governmental control of all social relations. “Far from
admitting that the directive control of Government in social
matters ought to be restricted, we believe that it ought to be
extended until it includes every kind of social activity. Moreover,
we believe that it should always be exercised, for society to us
seems a veritable hierarchy.” (Doctrine de Saint-Simon,
Exposition, Deuxième Année, p. 108; Paris, 1830.)
[453] “Under the old régime men were considered inferior to
things,” according to a brochure entitled Des Bourbons et des
Stuarts (1822; Œuvres choisies, vol. ii, p. 447). “The object of the
new system will be to extend man’s hold over things.” (Œuvres,
vol. iv, p. 81.) “In the present state of education what the nation
wants is not more government, but more cheap administration.”
(Syst. indust., Œuvres, vol. v, p. 181.) Engels, in his book written
in reply to Eugen Dühring, makes use of identical terms in
speaking of the socialist régime. “When the administration of
things and the direction of the processes of production take the
place of the governing of persons the State will not merely be
abolished: it will be dead.” (Philosophie, Économie politique,
Socialisme, French translation by Laskine, p. 361; Paris, 1911.)
[454] Lettres à un Américain, Œuvres, vol. ii, p. 189.
[455] Des Bourbons et des Stuarts, Œuvres choisies, vol. ii, pp.
437-438.
[456] L’Organisateur, Œuvres choisies, vol. iv, pp. 86 and 150-
151.
[457] Lettres à un Américain, Œuvres, vol. ii, p. 188.
[458] This is not the only plan of government proposed by
Saint-Simon, although it is the one most characteristic of him. It
is to be found in L’Organisateur immediately after the Parable. We
have to remember that Saint-Simon was very hostile to a
Government of savants. Power was to be placed in the hands of
the industrial leaders—the savants were simply to advise. “Should
we ever have the misfortune to establish a political order in which
administration was entrusted to savants we should soon witness
the corruption of the scientists, who would readily adopt the vices
of the clergy and become astute, despotic quibblers.” (Syst.
indust., Œuvres, vol. v, p. 161.)
[459] Syst. indust., Œuvres, vol. vi, p. 96.
[460] F. Engels, Herrn Eugen Dührings Umwälzung der
Wissenschaft, 4th ed., p. 277. French translation, Paris, 1911, p.
334. The whole of this chapter in Engels’ book is from the pen of
Karl Marx.
[461] French translation under the title L’État socialiste, Paris,
1906.
[462] This is the full text: “The object of socialism is to set up a
new system of society based upon the workshop as a model. The
rights of the society will be the customary rights of the factory.
Not only will socialism stand to benefit by the existence of the
industrial system which has been built up by capital and science
upon the basis of technical development, but it will gain even
more from that spirit of co-operation which has long been a
feature of factory life, drawing out the best energy and the best
skill of the workman.” Earlier in the same volume he writes:
“Everything will proceed in an orderly, economical fashion, just
like a factory.” (G. Sorel, Le Syndicalisme révolutionnaire, in Le
Mouvement socialiste, November 1 and 15, 1905.)
[463] Saint-Simon often quotes Say and Smith with distinct
approval. But he charges Say with the separation of politics from
economics instead of merging the former in the latter, and with
inability to realise to the full extent what he “dimly saw, as it
were, in spite of himself, namely, that political economy is the one
true foundation of politics.” (Lettres à un Américain, Œuvres, vol.
ii, p. 185.)
[464] Saint-Simon is classed among the socialists for two
reasons: (1) the interest he takes in the condition of the poor; (2)
his opinions concerning the necessity for reforming the institution
of private property. But none of the texts that are generally
quoted seem to have the significance that is occasionally given
them. With regard to the first point, a celebrated passage from
the Nouveau Christianisme is the one usually quoted: “Society
should be organised in such a fashion as to secure the greatest
advantage for the greatest number. The object of all its labours
and activities should be the promptest, completest amelioration
possible of the moral and physical condition of the most
numerous class.” (Œuvres, vol. vii, pp. 108-109.) Already in his
Système industriel Saint-Simon had said that the direct object
which he had in view was to better the lot of that class that had
no other means of existence than the labour of its own right arm.
(Ibid., vol. vi, p. 81.) But is this not just the old Benthamite
formula—the greatest good of the greatest number? Besides, how
does Saint-Simon propose to secure all this? By giving the
workers more power? Not at all. “The problem of social
organisation must be solved for the people. The people
themselves are passive and listless and must be discounted in any
consideration of the question. The best way is to entrust public
administration to the care of the industrial chiefs, who will always
directly attempt to give the widest possible scope to their
undertakings, with the result that their efforts in this direction will
lead to the maximum expansion of the amount of work executed
by the mass of the people.” (Ibid., vol. vi, pp. 82-83.) A Liberal
economist would hardly have expressed it otherwise.
As to the question of private property, Saint-Simon certainly
regarded its transformation as at least possible. This is seen in a
number of passages. “Property should be reconstituted and
established upon a foundation that might prove more favourable
for production,” says he in L’Organisateur. (Ibid., vol. iv, p. 59.)
Elsewhere, in a letter written to the editor of the Journal général
de la France, he mentions the fact that he is occupied with the
development of the following ideas: (1) That the law establishing
the right of private property is the most important of all, seeing
that it is the basis of our social edifice; (2) the institution of
private property ought to be constituted in such a fashion that the
possessors may be stimulated to make the best possible use of it.
(Ibid., vol. iii, pp. 43-44.) In his Lettres à un Américain he gives
the following résumé of the principles which underlie the work of
J. B. Say (an incidental proof of his attachment to the Liberal
economists): “The production of useful objects is the only
positive, reasonable aim which political societies can propose for
themselves, and consequently the principle of respect for
production and producers is a much more fruitful one than the
other principle of respect for property and proprietors.” (Œuvres,
vol. ii, pp. 186-187.) But all that this seems to us to imply is that
the utility of property constitutes its legality and that it should be
organised with a view to social utility. Admitting that he did
conceive of the necessity of a reform of property, it does not
appear that he intended this to mean anything beyond a reform
of landed property. We have already seen how he regarded
capital as a kind of social outlay which demanded remuneration.
The following passage bears eloquent testimony to his respect for
movable property: “Wealth, generally speaking, affords a proof of
the manufacturers’ ability even where that wealth is derived from
inherited fortune, whereas in the other classes of society it is
apparently true to say that the richer are inferior in capacity to
those who have received less education but have a smaller
fortune. This is a truth that must play an important part in
positive politics.” (Syst. indust., Œuvres, vol. v, p. 49, note.)
[465] The exact title is Doctrine de Saint-Simon, Exposition,
Première Année, 1829. Our quotations are taken from the second
edition (Paris, 1830). One ought to mention, in addition to these,
the articles contributed by Enfantin to Le Globe and republished
under the title of Économie politique et Politique, in one volume
(2nd ed., 1832). But none of these articles is as interesting as the
Doctrine, and they only reproduce the ideas already discussed by
Enfantin in his articles in Le Producteur.
[466] Despite the fact that the oral exposition of the doctrine
was the work of Bazard and was prepared for the press by his
disciples—Hippolyte Carnot among others—most of the economic
ideas contained in it must be attributed to Enfantin. Enfantin also
was responsible for the majority of the economic articles that
appeared in Le Producteur. But the doctrine set forth in Le
Producteur differs considerably from that expounded in the
Exposition. Interest and rent are subjected to severe criticism as
tributes paid to idleness by industry. Inheritance, on the other
hand, though treated with scant sympathy, is not condemned. A
lowering of the rate of interest would, Enfantin thinks, help to
enfranchise the workers, and a sound credit system would solve
the greatest of modern problems—that is, it would reconcile
workers and idlers, “whose interests will never again be confused
with the general interest, inasmuch as the possession of the fruits
of past labour will no longer constitute a claim to the enjoyment
of the benefits of labour in the present or future.” (Le Producteur,
vol. ii, p. 124.) These ideas are more fully developed in the
Exposition.
[467] Doctrine de Saint-Simon, p. 182.
[468] Ibid., p. 190.
 [469] Ibid., p. 93.
[470] Sismondi’s term was rather “spoliation.” See supra, p.
185.
[471] “The mass of workers are to-day exploited by those
people whose property they use. Captains of industry in their
dealings with proprietors have to submit to a similar kind of
treatment, only to a much less degree. But they occasionally
share in the privilege of the exploiters, for the full burden of
exploitation falls upon the working classes—that is, upon the vast
majority of mankind.” (Doctrine de Saint-Simon, p. 176.)
[472] “It is our belief that profits diminish while wages
increase; but the term ‘wages’ as we use it includes the profits
that accrue to the entrepreneur, whose earnings we regard as the
price of his labour.” (Le Producteur, vol. i, p. 245. The article is by
Enfantin.)
[473] We might sum up the different senses of the word
“exploitation” as used by Sismondi, the Saint-Simonians, and
Marx respectively as follows:
(1) Sismondi thinks that the worker is exploited whenever he is
not paid a wage sufficient to enable him to lead a decent
existence. Unearned income seems quite legitimate, however.
(2) Exploitation exists, in the opinion of the Saint-Simonians,
whenever a part of the material produce raised by labour is
devoted to the remuneration of proprietors through the operation
of ordinary social factors.
(3) Marx speaks of exploitation whenever a portion of the
produce of labour is devoted to the remuneration of capital either
through the existence of social institutions or the operation of the
laws of exchange.
[474] See p. 25.
[475] Doctrine, p. 191.
[476] See p. 79, note.
[477] Doctrine, pp. 191-192.
[478] The Saint-Simonians never make use of the term, but
they describe the doctrine admirably.
[479] “We may provisionally speak of this system as a general
system of banking, ignoring for the time being the somewhat
narrow interpretation usually placed upon that word. In the first
place, the system would comprise a central bank, which would
directly represent the Government. This bank would be the
depository for every kind of wealth, of all funds for productive
purposes and all instruments of labour—in a word, it would
include everything that is to-day comprised within the term
‘private property.’ Depending upon this central bank would be
other banks of a secondary character, which would be, as it were,
a prolongation of the former and would supply it with the means
of coming into touch with the principal localities, informing the
central institution as to their particular needs and their productive
ability. Within the area circumscribed for these banks would be
other banks of a more specialised character still, covering a less
extensive field and including within their ambit the tenderer
branches of the industrial tree. All wants would be finally focused
in the central bank and all effort would radiate from it.” (Doctrine,
pp. 206-207.) The idea is probably Enfantin’s, for there is an
exposition of the same idea in Le Producteur, vol. iii, p. 385.
[480] Doctrine, p. 210, note. Elsewhere (p. 330): “We are
weary of every political principle that does not aim directly at
putting the destiny of the people in the hands of the most able
and devoted among them.”
 [481] “We come back with real joy to this great virtue, so
frequently misconceived, not to say misrepresented, at the
present time—that virtue which is so easy and so delightful in
persons who have a common aim which they want to attain, but
which is so painful and revolting when combined with egoism.
This virtue of obedience is one to which our thoughts return ever
with love,” (Ibid., p. 330.)
[482] The formula in the third edition of the Doctrine is a little
different. “Each one,” it runs there, “ought to be endowed
according to his merits and rewarded according to his work.” We
know that the first part of the formula refers to the distribution of
capital, i.e. to the instruments of labour, while the second refers
to individual incomes. The word “classed” was substituted for
“endowed” in the second edition.
[483] Published as an appendix to the second edition of the
Doctrine de Saint-Simon, Exposition, Première Année, 1829.
[484] In his small volume Le Collectivisme (Paris, 1900).
[485] Littré has disputed Comte’s indebtedness to Saint-Simon
in his Auguste Comte et le Positivisme. Saint-Simon, however, in
his preface to Système industriel remarks that in political matters
the jurists form a connecting link between feudal government on
the one hand and industrial government on the other, just as the
metaphysicians are intermediate between the theological and the
scientific régimes. In a note which he adds he states his position
still more clearly (Œuvres, vol. v, p. 9). It is true that the Système
industriel dates from 1821, and is consequently subsequent to the
beginning of the friendly relations between Comte and Saint-
Simon. But textual evidence, however precise, cannot decide the
question of the reciprocal influence which these two Messiahs
exercised upon one another. A similar idea had already found
expression in Turgot’s work.
[486] P. 179.
[487] “Another mistake that is also very general is to speak of
property as if it were an institution with a fixed, unchangeable
form, while as a matter of fact it has assumed various aspects
and is still capable of further modification as yet undreamt of.”
(Laveleye, De la Propriété et de ses Formes primitives, 1st ed.,
1874, p. 381.) Stuart Mill, in a letter addressed to Laveleye on
November 17, 1872, congratulated him on the demonstration he
had given of this. (Ibid., preface, p. xiii.)
[488] Note this argument, which has so frequently been
employed by Liberal economists, and which we shall come across
in Bastiat’s work. The Saint-Simonians are constantly running with
the hare as well as hunting with the hounds.
[489] Doctrine, p. 182. The historical argument of which we
have just given a short summary is developed in the Doctrine, pp.
179-193. It is open to a still more fundamental criticism,
inasmuch as it does not seem to be historically accurate.
[490] Saint-Simon, Mémoire introductif sur sa Contestation
avec M. de Redern (1812) (Œuvres, vol. i, p. 122).
[491] Doctrine, p. 144.
[492] The philosophy of history might be said to consist of
attempts to show that history is made up of alternating periods of
organic growth and destructive criticism. The former periods are
marked by unity of thought and aim, of feeling and action in
society; the latter by a conflict of ideas and sentiments, by
political and social instability. The former periods are essentially
religious, the latter selfish. Reform and revolution are the modern
manifestations of the critical nature of the period in which we live.
Saint-Simonism would lead us into a definitely organic epoch.
Historical evolution seems to point to a religious and universal
association.
[493] Doctrine, p. 119.
[494] Ibid., p. 121. “Man is not without some intuitive
knowledge of his destiny, but when science has proved the
correctness of his surmises and demonstrated the accuracy of his
forecasts, when it has assured him of the legitimacy of his
desires, he will move on with all the greater assurance and
calmness towards a future that is no longer unknown to him.
Thus will he become a free, intelligent agent working out his own
destiny, which he himself cannot change, but which he may
considerably expedite by his own efforts.”
[495] This is developed at great length in the seventh lecture,
Doctrine, pp. 211 et seq.
[496] “Politics,” says Saint-Simon, “have their roots in morality,
and a people’s institutions are just the expression of their
thoughts.” (Œuvres, vol. iii, p. 31.) “Philosophy,” he remarks
elsewhere, “is responsible for the creation of all the more
important political institutions. No other power would have the
strength necessary to check the action of those that have already
become antiquated or to set up others more in conformity with a
new doctrine.” (Syst. indust., Œuvres, vol. v, p. 167.) He further
insists upon the part which philanthropists may play in the
creation of a new society. “One truth,” he writes, “that has been
established in the course of human progress is this: a
disinterested desire for the general well-being of the community
is a more effective instrument of political improvement than the
conscious self-regarding action of the classes for which these
changes will prove most beneficial. In a word, experience seems
to show that those who should naturally be most interested in the
establishment of a new order of things are not those who show
the greatest desire to bring it about.” (Œuvres, vol. vi, p. 120.) It
would be difficult to imagine a neater refutation of Marxian ideas,
especially the contention that the emancipation of the workers
can only come from the workers themselves.
[497] Cf. on these points Weill, L’École Saint-Simonienne
(1896), and Charléty, Histoire du Saint-Simonisme (1896).
[498] “The object of credit,” says Enfantin (Économie politique
et Politique, p. 53), “in a society where one set of people possess
the instruments of production but lack capacity or desire to
employ them, and where another have the desire to work but are
without the means, is to help the passage of these instruments
from the former’s possession into the hands of the latter.” No
better definition was ever given.
[499] Doctrine, p. 226. Cf. p. 223 for an eloquent passage
denouncing Ricardo and Malthus, who, as the result of their
“profound researches into the question of rent,” undertake to
defend the institution of private property.
[500] The article is entitled De la Classe ouvrière, and may be
found in vol. iv of Le Producteur. See particularly pp. 308 et seq.
[501] Engels, Herrn Eugen Dührings Umwälzung der
Wissenschaft, p. 277.
[502] “The majority of economists, and especially Say, whose
work we have just reviewed, regard property as a fixed factor
whose origin and progress is no concern of theirs, but whose
social utility alone concerns them. The conception of a
distinctively social order is more foreign still to the English
writers.” (Doctrine, pp. 221 and 223.) No exception is made in
favour of Sismondi or Turgot.
[503] Le Producteur, vol. iii, p. 385.
[504] In the preface to Économie politique et Politique, Enfantin
again writes: “All questions of political economy should be linked
together by a common principle, and in order to judge of the
social utility of a measure or idea in economics it is absolutely
necessary to consider whether this idea or measure is directly
advantageous to the workers or whether it indirectly contributes
to the amelioration of their lot by discrediting idleness.” It is a
pleasure to be able to concur in the opinion expressed by M.
Halévy in his article on Saint-Simon (Revue du Mois for December
1907), in which he maintains that this idea is the distinctive trait
of Saint-Simon’s socialism. We have already called attention to
another feature that seems to us equally important, namely, the
suggested substitution of industrial administration for political
government.
[505] It is impossible not to make a special mention of Anton
Menger’s excellent little book. Das Recht auf den vollen
Arbeitsertrag (1886) (the English translation, with an excellent
introduction by Professor Foxwell, is unfortunately out of print). It
is indispensable in any history of socialism. We must also
mention, with deep acknowledgments, Pareto’s Les Systèmes
socialistes (Paris, 1902, 2 vols.)—the most originally critical work
yet published on this subject, though not always the most
impartial—and Bourguin’s Les Systèmes socialistes et l’Évolution
économique (Paris, 1906), as containing the most scientific
criticism of the economic theories of socialism.
[506] “Association, which is destined to put an end to
antagonism, has not yet found its true form. Hitherto it has
consisted of separate groups which have been at war with one
another. Accordingly antagonism has not yet become extinct, but
it certainly will as soon as association has become universal.”
(Doctrine de Saint-Simon, Exposition, Première Année, p. 177.)
[507] In Owen’s paper, the Economist, for August 11, 1821, we
meet with the following words: “The secret is out!… The object
sought to be obtained is not equality in rank or possessions, is
not community of goods, but full, complete, unrestrained co-
operation on the part of all the members for every purpose of
social life.” Fourier writes in a similar strain: “Association holds the
secret of the union of interests.” (Assoc. domestique, vol. i, p.
133.) Elsewhere he writes: “To-day, Good Friday, I discovered the
secret of association.”
[508] On the relations of socialism to the French Revolution see
the preceding chapter on Saint-Simon (p. 199, note).
[509] The Declaration of the Rights of Man speaks of liberty,
property, resistance to oppression, but there is not a word about
the right of association. Trade association, one of the oldest and
most democratic forms of association, was proscribed by the
famous decree of Le Chapelier (1791), and severe penalties were
imposed upon associations of more than twenty persons by the
Penal Code of 1810. These prohibitions were gradually removed
in the course of the nineteenth century. Friendly societies were
the first to be set free, then followed trade unions, but these laws
were not definitely repealed until July 1, 1901.
[510] “It is obvious that the present régime of free competition
which is supposed to be necessary in the interests of our stupid
political economy, and which is further intended to keep
monopoly in check, must result in the growth of monopoly in
almost every branch of industry.” (Victor Considérant, Principes de
Socialisme.)
[511] Fourier’s first book, Les Quatre Mouvements, was
published in 1808, and his last, La Fausse Industrie, in 1836.
Owen’s earliest work, A New View of Society; or Essays on the
Formation of Human Character, was published in 1813, and his
last work, The Human Race governed without Punishment, in
1858.
[512] “According to details supplied by journalists, Owen’s
establishments seem to have at least three serious drawbacks
which must inevitably destroy the whole enterprise—the numbers
are excessive, equality is one of his ideals, and there is no
reference to agriculture.” (Unité universelle, vol ii, p. 35)
[513] Despite the fact that Chartism was essentially a working-
class movement, controlled by the Working Men’s Association, its
demands were exclusively political, the chief of them being
universal suffrage.
[514] It is quite possible that Owen regarded the term as his
own invention, but we now know that it had been previously
employed by Pierre Leroux, the French socialist. The publication
of Owen’s What is Socialism? in 1841, however, is the earliest
instance of the term being employed as the title of a book.
 Owen lived an extremely active life, and died in 1857 at the
advanced age of eighty-seven. Of Welsh artisan descent, he
began life as an apprentice in a cotton factory, setting up as a
master spinner on his own account with a capital of £100, which
he had borrowed from his father. His rise was very rapid, and at
the age of thirty he found himself co-proprietor and director of
the New Lanark Mills. It was then that he first made a name for
himself by his technical improvements and his model dwellings for
his workmen. It was at this period that his ideas on education
also took shape. By and by it became the fashion to make a
pilgrimage to view the factory at New Lanark, and among the
visitors were several very distinguished people. His
correspondents also included more than one royal personage.
Among these we may specially mention the King of Prussia, who
sought his advice on the question of education, and the King of
Holland, who consulted him on the question of charity.
The crisis of 1815 revealed to Owen the serious defects in the
economic order, and this marks the beginning of the second
period of his life, when he dabbled in communal experiments. In
1825 he founded the colony of New Harmony in Indiana, and the
same year witnessed the establishment of another colony at
Orbiston, in Scotland. But these lasted only for a few years. In
1832 we have the National Equitable Labour Exchange, which
was not much more successful.
Owen, sixty-three years of age, and thoroughly disappointed
with his experiments, but as convinced as ever of the truth of his
doctrines, entered now upon the third period of his life, which, as
it happened, was to be a fairly long one. This period was to be
devoted wholly to propagating the gospel of the New Moral World
—The New Moral World being the title of his chief work and of
the newspaper which he first published towards the end of 1834.
He took an active part in the Trade Union movement, but does
not seem to have been much interested in the co-operative
experiments which were started by the Rochdale Pioneers in
1844, although curiously enough this is his chief claim to fame.
Owen was in no sense a littérateur, being essentially a man of
affairs, and we are not surprised to find that the number of books
which he has left behind him is small. But he was an indefatigable
lecturer, and wrote a good deal for the press. We must confess,
however, that it is not easy, as we read his addresses and articles
to-day, to account for the wonderful contemporary success which
they had.
There is an excellent French work by Dolléans dealing with his
life and doctrines (1907). The best English life, that of Podmore,
is unfortunately out of print.
[515] To his fellow-employers who complained of his almost
revolutionary proposals Owen made reply as follows—and his
words are quite as true now as they were then: “Experience must
have taught you the difference between an efficiently equipped
factory with its machinery always clean and in good working
order and one in which the machinery is filthy and out of repair
and working only with the greatest amount of friction. Now if the
care which you bestow upon machinery can give you such
excellent results, may you not expect equally good results from
care spent upon human beings, with their infinitely superior
structure? Is it not quite natural to conclude that these infinitely
more delicate and complex mechanisms will also increase in force
and efficiency and will be really much more economical if they are
kept in good working condition and treated with a certain
measure of kindness? Such kindness would do much to remove
the mental friction and irritation which always results whenever
the nourishment is insufficient to keep the body in full productive
efficiency, as well as to arrest deterioration and to prevent
premature death.”
[516] Education is given a very prominent place in Owen’s
system, and once we accept his philosophy we realise what an
important place it was really bound to have. Education was to
make men, just as boots and caps are made. Were it not
altogether foreign to our purpose it would be interesting to
compare his educational ideals with those of Rousseau as
outlined in Émile.
[517] “The idea of responsibility is one of the absurdest, and
has done a great deal of harm.” (Catechism of the New Moral
World, 1838.)
[518] On the other hand, Owen had great influence with the
working classes, and this he attributed to the fact that, “freed
from all religious prejudice, he was able to look upon men and
human nature in general with infinite charity, and in that light
men no longer seemed responsible for their actions.” (Quoted by
Dolléans.)
 [519] Like most of the economists and socialists of that time,
Owen was very much impressed with the crisis of 1815.
[520] On the other hand, there is this objection:
Whenever profit forms a part of cost of production it is
impossible to distinguish it from interest. In that case it is true
that even perfect competition would not do away with profit,
since it will only reduce the price to the level of cost of
production. In that case profit cannot be said to be either unjust
or parasitic, for the product is sold exactly for what it cost.
When profit does not enter into cost of production there is no
possibility of confusing it with interest. It is simply the difference
between the sale price and the cost of replacing the article. In
this it is certainly parasitic, and would disappear under a régime
of perfect competition, which must to some extent destroy the
monopoly upon which such profit rests.
But the distinction between profit and interest was not known
in Owen’s time, and Owen would have said that they are both
one, and that if profit occasionally claims a share in the cost of
production with a view to defying competition it has no right to
any such refuge, for cost of production should consist of nothing
but the value of labour and the wear and tear of capital.
Accordingly it ought to be got rid of altogether.
[521] “Metallic money is the cause of a great deal of crime,
injustice, and want, and it is one of the contributory causes which
tend to destroy character and to make life into a pandemonium.
“The secret of profit is to buy cheap and to sell dear in the
name of an artificial conception of wealth which neither expands
as wealth grows nor contracts as it diminishes.”
[522] This contradiction did not escape Owen. But we must not
forget that he regarded this merely as a compromise, and that he
looked forward to a time when the establishment of a
communistic association with a new environment would lead to a
complete solution of the problem. He began in the New Harmony
colony by making pro rata payment for the work done, but the
object was to arrive gradually at a state of complete equality
where no distinction was to be made between the service
rendered or the labour given—with the result that the colony was
extinct in six months.
 [523] The Labour Exchange, which was opened in September
1832, at first enjoyed a slight measure of success. There were
840 members, and they even went the length of establishing a
few branches. Among the chief causes of the failure of the
scheme the following may be enumerated:
(a) The associates, being themselves allowed to state the value
of their products, naturally exaggerated, and it became necessary
to relieve them of a task which depended entirely upon their
honour, and to place the valuation in the hands of experts. But
these experts, who were not at all versed in Owen’s philosophy,
valued the goods in money in the ordinary way, and then
expressed those values in labour notes at the rate of 6d. for every
hour’s work. It could hardly have been done on any other plan.
But it was none the less true that Owen’s system was in this way
inverted, for instead of the labour standard determining the
selling value of the product, the money value of the product
determined the value of the labour.
(b) As soon as the society began to attract members who were
not quite as conscientious as those who first joined it, the
Exchange was flooded with goods that were really unsaleable.
But for the notes received in exchange for these the authorities
would be forced to give goods which possessed a real value, that
is, goods which had been honestly marked, and which
commanded a good price, with the result that in the long run
there would be nothing left in the depot except worthless
products. In short, the Exchange would be reduced to buying
goods which cost more than they were worth, and selling goods
that really cost less than they were worth.
Since the notes were not in any way registered, any one,
whether a member of the society or not, could buy and sell them
in the ordinary way and make a handsome profit out of the
transaction. Three hundred London tradesmen did this by offering
to take labour notes in payment for merchandise. They soon
emptied the Exchange, and when they saw that nothing valuable
was left they stopped taking the notes, and the trick was done.
M. Denis very aptly points out that the Exchange was really of
not much use to the wage-earner, who was not even allowed to
own what he had produced. There is some doubt after all as to
whether the system would prove quite successful in abolishing
the wage-earners.
 [524] This does not imply that consumers’ associations, when
they are better organised and federated, with large central depots
at their command, will not take up this project once again—that
is, will not try to dispense with money in their commercial
transactions. They will certainly keep an eye on that problem.
[525] That was Holyoake’s view (History of Co-operation, vol. i,
p. 215). But, according to a passage quoted by Dolléans, Owen
contemplated making an appeal to the co-operative societies to
come to the rescue of his National Labour Exchange.
[526] To the workers he wrote: “Would you like to enjoy
yourselves the whole products of your labour? You have nothing
more to do than simply to alter the direction of your labour.
Instead of working for you know not whom, work for each other.”
(Quoted by Foxwell in his introduction to Anton Menger’s The
Right to the Whole Produce of Labour.)
[527] See the lecture on Les Prophéties de Fourier in Gide’s Co-
opération.
[528] It is hardly necessary, however, to credit him with a
greater amount of eccentricity than he actually possessed, and I
seize this opportunity of refuting once more a story told by more
than one eminent economist, attributing to him the statement
that the members of the Phalanstère would all be endowed with a
tail with an eye at the end of it. The caricaturists of the period
—“Cham,” for example—represent them in that fashion. The
legend doubtless grew out of the following passage from his
works, which is fantastic enough, as everybody will admit. After
pointing out that the inhabitants of other planets have several
limbs which we do not possess, he proceeds: “There is one limb
especially which we have not, and which possesses the following
very useful characteristics. It acts as a support against falling, it is
a powerful means of defence, a superb ornament of gigantic
force and wonderful dexterity, and gives a finish as well as
lending support to every bodily movement.” (Fausse Industrie,
vol. ii, p. 5.)
[529] Nouveau Monde industriel, p. 473.
[530] Letter dated January 23, 1831, quoted by Pellarin, Vie de
Fourier (Paris, 1850).
[531] Nouveau Monde industriel, p. 26. For further details see
Œuvres choisies de Fourier, with introduction by Charles Gide,
and Hubert Bourgin’s big volume on Fourier.
 [532] It is necessary to point out that Fourier’s suggestions for
a solution of the domestic servant problem are really not quite so
definite as we have given the reader to understand in the text.
They are mixed up with a number of other ideas of a more or less
fantastic description, but very suggestive nevertheless. This is
especially true of the suggestion to transform domestic service by
making it mutually gratuitous—an idea that is worth thinking
about.
[533] We were thinking especially of associations like that of
the painters under the leadership of M. Buisson, where
distribution is as follows: labour, 50 per cent., capital 27 per cent.,
administration 12 per cent.
[534] Association domestique, vol. i, p. 466.
[535] Ibid., p. 466. Note that Fourier says that this only applies
to civilised societies. For those who live in the future Harmony
city there will be other and more powerful motives.
[536] Unité universelle, vol. iii, p. 517.
[537] Ibid., p. 457.
[538] The system of integral association proposed by Fourier,
including both co-operative production and co-operative
distribution, will be better understood if we look at the facts of
the present situation.
On the one hand we have co-operative associations of
producers who are not particularly anxious that their products
should be distributed among themselves; they simply produce the
goods with a view to selling them and making a profit out of the
transaction. On the other hand, the distributing societies simply
aim at giving their members certain advantages, such as cheaper
goods, but they make no attempt to produce the goods which
they need.
In countries where co-operative societies are properly
organised, as they are in England, for example, many of these
societies have undertaken to produce at least a part of what they
consume, and some of them have even acquired small estates for
the purpose; but only a small proportion of the employees are
members of the societies, with the result that their position is not
very different from that of other working men. One understands
the difficulty of grouping people in this way. But if the
associations are to live it is absolutely necessary that they should
produce what they require under conditions that are more
favourable than those of ordinary producers; in a word, that they
should be able to create a kind of new economic environment.
Even in the colonies one does not find many instances of
vigorous associations of this kind.
[539] Co-partnership as outlined by M. Briand is to-day an item
in the programme of the Radical Democratic party. See Les
Actions du Travail, by M. Antonelli.
[540] M. Faguet, Revue des Deux Mondes, August 1, 1896.
[541] “Industrialism is the latest scientific illusion.” (Quatre
Mouvements, p. 28.) We must also draw attention to his
suggestion for co-operative banks, where agriculturists could
bring their harvest and obtain money in exchange for it—a rough
model of the agricultural credit banks. But he only regarded this
as a step towards the Phalanstère.
[542] The kinds of labour which Fourier selects as examples are
always connected with fruit-growing—cherry orchards, pear
orchards, etc. Fruit and flowers have a very important place in his
writings. He seems to have anticipated the fruit-growing rancher
of California.
Without stopping to examine some of the more solid reasons—
which unfortunately are buried beneath a great deal of rubbish—
why fruit-growing should take the place of agriculture, we must
just recall the curious fact that he was always emphasising the
superiority of sugar and preserves over bread, and pointed to the
“divine instinct” by which children are enabled to discover this.
The suggestion was ridiculed at the time, but is to-day confirmed
by some of the most eminent doctors and teachers of hygiene.
[543] It is interesting to contrast this view with Bücher’s, who
thinks that the evolution of industry simply increases its
irksomeness. A conception of regressive or spiral evolution might
reconcile the two views.
[544] Let us not forget his Petites Hordes, which consisted of
groups of boys who undertook the sweeping of public paths, the
surveillance of public gardens, and the protection of animals. The
idea was very much ridiculed at the time, but a number of similar
organisations, each with its badge and banner, were recently
instituted by Colonel Waring in the city of New York.
 [545] “My theory is that every passion given by nature should
be allowed the fullest scope. That is the key to my whole system.
Society requires the full exercise of all the faculties given us by
God.”
[546] Quatre Mouvements, p. 194.
[547] See, for example, such works as Zola’s Travail, and
Barrè’s L’Ennemi des Lois; and as an example of the general
change in the tone of the economists we may refer to Paul Leroy-
Beaulieu’s latest writings, in which he speaks of Fourier as a
“genial thinker.”
[548] It is no part of our task to relate the story of the several
colonies founded either by disciples of Fourier or of Owen.
Experiments of this kind were fairly general in the United States
between 1841 and 1844, when no less than forty colonies were
founded. Brook Farm, which is the best known of these, included
among its members some of the most eminent Americans—
Channing and Hawthorne, for example—but none of the
settlements lasted very long.
Similar attempts have been made in France at a still more
recent period. The one at Condé-sur-Vesgres, near Rambouillet,
where a few faithful disciples of Fourier have come together, is
still flourishing.
[549] Founded in 1859, it only became a co-partnership in
1888, the year of Godin’s death.
[550] As a matter of fact it first appeared as an article in the
Revue du Progrès in 1839.
[551] Buonarotti was the author of La Conspiration pour
l’Égalité, dite de Babeuf, published in 1828. Little notice was
taken of the volume by the public, but it was much discussed in
democratic circles.
[552] Organisation du Travail, 5th ed. (1848). p. 77.
[553] We refer to it as the commonest type because in the
previous section we have shown that other co-operative societies
exist, such as Le Travail, for example, which claims to be
modelled upon Fourier’s scheme, especially in the matter of
borrowed capital. But the usual type is affiliated to the Chambre
consultative des Associations de Production. Article II of its
regulations reads as follows: “No one will be allowed to become a
subscriber who is not a worker in some branch of production or
other.” See the volume published by the Office du Travail in 1898,
Les Associations Ouvrières de Production.
[554] In the Journal des Sciences morales et politiques,
December 17, 1831. Only one association—the goldsmiths’, in
1834—was founded as the result of this article.
[555] Quoted by Festy, Le Mouvement ouvrier au Début de la
Monarchie de Juillet, p. 88 (Paris, 1908).
[556] Buchez’s proposals for the reform of the “great industry”
were of an entirely different character.
[557] François Vidal, De la Répartition des Richesses (1846).
[558] “The emancipation of the working classes is a very
complicated business. It is bound up with so many other
questions and involves such profound changes of habit. So
numerous are the various interests upon which an apparent
though perhaps not a real attack is contemplated, that it would
be sheer folly to imagine that it could ever be accomplished by a
series of efforts tentatively undertaken and partially isolated. The
whole power of the State will be required if it is to succeed. What
the proletarian lacks is capital, and the duty of the State is to see
that he gets it. Were I to define the State I should prefer to think
of it as the poor man’s bank.” (Organisation du Travail, p. 14.)
[559] “The illusive conception of an abstract right has had a
great hold upon the public ever since 1789. But it is nothing
better than a metaphysical abstraction, which can afford but little
consolation to a people who have been robbed of a definite
security that was really theirs. The ‘rights of man,’ proclaimed
with pomp and defined with minuteness in many a charter, has
simply served as a cloak to hide the injustice of individualism and
the barbarous treatment meted out to the poor under its ægis.
Because of this practice of defining liberty as a right, men have
got into the habit of calling people free even though they are the
slaves of hunger and of ignorance and the sport of every chance.
Let us say once for all that liberty consists, not in the abstract
right given to a man, but in the power given him to exercise and
develop his faculties.” (Organisation du Travail, p. 19.)
[560] Cf. pp. 186 et seq.
[561] “Your want of faith in association,” he wrote to the
National Assembly of 1848, “will force you to expose civilisation to
a terribly agonising death.”
 [562] L’Humanité (1840). It would be wrong to conclude,
however, that this desire for secularising charity meant that
Leroux was anti-religious. On the contrary, he admits his
indebtedness for the conception of solidarity to the dictum of St.
Paul, “We are all members of one body.”
[563] “I was the first to employ the term ‘socialism.’ It was a
neologism then, but a very necessary term. I invented the word
as an antithesis to ‘individualism.’” (Grève de Samarez, p. 288.)
As a matter of fact, as far back as 1834 he had contributed an
article entitled De l’Individualisme et du Socialisme to the Revue
encyclopédique. The same word occurs in the same review in an
article entitled Discours sur la Situation actuelle de l’Esprit
humain, written two years before. See his complete works, vol. i,
pp. 121, 161, 378. For a further account of Leroux see M. F.
Thomas’s Pierre Leroux (1905), a somewhat dull but highly
imaginative production.
[564] For Cabet’s life and the story of Icaria see
Prudhommeaux’s two volumes, Étienne Cabet and Histoire de la
Communauté icarienne.
[565] “The communists will never gain much success until they
have learned to reform themselves. Let them preach by example
and by the exercise of social virtues, and they will soon convert
their adversaries.”
[566] Protection was attacked by Sismondi in Nouv. Princ.,
Book IV, chap. 11. He considered it a fruitful source of over-
production, and uttered his condemnation of the absurd desire of
nations for self-sufficiency. Saint-Simon considered Protection to
be the outcome of international hatred (Œuvres, vol. iii, p. 36),
and commended the economists who had shown that “mankind
had but one aim and that its interests were common, and
consequently that each individual in his social connection must be
viewed as one of a company of workers” (Lettres à un
Americaine, Œuvres, vol. ii, pp. 186-187). The Saint-Simonians
never touched upon the question directly, but it is quite clear that
Protective rights were to have no place in the universal
association of which they dreamt. According to Fourier, there was
to be the completest liberty in the circulation of goods among the
Phalanstères all the world over. (Cf. Bourgin, Fourier, pp. 326-
329; Paris, 1905.)
[567] We refer to two of them only: Augustin Cournot and
Louis Say of Nantes. The former, in his Recherches sur les
Principes mathématiques de la Théorie des Richesses (1838), a
work that is celebrated to-day but which passed unnoticed at the
time of its publication, has criticised the theory of Free Trade. But
the reputation which he subsequently achieved was not based
upon this part of the book. Louis Say (1774-1840) was a brother
of J. B. Say. He published a number of works, now quite
forgotten, in which he criticised several doctrines upheld by his
brother, whose displeasure he thus incurred. We refer to his last
work, Études sur la Richesse des Nations et Réfutation des
principales Erreurs en Économie politique (1836), for this is the
work to which List alludes. It is probable that Louis Say’s name
would have remained in oblivion but for List. Richelot, in his
translation of List (second edition, p. 477), quotes some of the
more important passages of Say’s book.
[568] The union of England and Scotland dates from 1707.
Compare the passage in Adam Smith, Book V, chap. 2, part ii, art.
4; Cannan’s edition, vol. ii, p. 384.
[569] List, Werke, ed. Häusser, vol. ii, p. 17. The seventh
edition of the National System, which was published in 1883 by
M. Eheberg, contains an excellent historical and critical
introduction. Our quotations are from the English translation by
Lloyd, published in 1885, republished, with introduction by
Professor Shield Nicholson, in 1909.
[570] Petition presented to a meeting of the German princes at
Vienna in 1820 (Werke, vol. ii, p. 27).
[571] Baden, Nassau, and Frankfort joined in 1835 and 1836.
But there still remained outside Mecklenburg and the Free Towns
of the Hanse, Hanover, Brunswick, and Oldenburg.
[572] List’s expression “exchangeable value” merely signifies
the mass of present advantages—the material profit existing at
the moment. It is not a very happy phrase, and it would be a
great mistake to take it literally or to attach great importance to
it. In his Letters to Ingersoll, p. 186, he gives expression to the
same idea by saying that Smith’s school had in view “the
exchange of one material good for another,” and that its concern
was chiefly with “such exchanged goods rather than with
productive forces.” We note that List never speaks of Ricardo, but
only of Smith and Say, whose works alone he seems to have
read.
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