invest part of their large incomes in other
concerns and draw enormous profits from the labors of other toilers,
sometimes even in other lands. They are capitalists and their whole
influence is on the side of the capitalists against the workers.

I want you to think over these things, friend Jonathan. Don't be
afraid to do your own thinking! If you have time, go to the library
and get some good books on the subject and read them carefully, doing
your own thinking no matter what the authors of the books may say. I
suggest that you get W.J. Ghent's _Mass and Class_ to begin with.
Then, when you have read that, I shall be glad to have you read
Chapter VI of a book called _Socialism: A Summary and Interpretation
of Socialist Principles_. It is not very hard reading, for I wrote the
book myself to meet the needs of just such earnest, hard-working men
as yourself.

I think both books will be found in the public library. At any rate,
they ought to be. But if not, it would be worth your while to save the
price of a few whiskies and to buy them for yourself. You see,
Jonathan, I want you to study.

IV

HOW WEALTH IS PRODUCED AND HOW IT IS DISTRIBUTED

It is easy to persuade the masses that the good things of this
world are unjustly divided--especially when it happens to be
the exact truth.--_J.A. Froude._

The growth of wealth and of luxury, wicked, wasteful and
wanton, as before God I declare that luxury to be, has been
matched step by step by a deepening and deadening poverty,
which has left whole neighborhoods of people practically
without hope and without aspiration.--_Bishop Potter._

At present, all the wealth of Society goes first into the
possession of the Capitalist.... He pays the landowner his
rent, the labourer his wages, the tax and tithe-gatherer their
claims, and keeps a large, indeed, the largest, and a
constantly augmenting share of the annual produce of labour
for himself. The Capitalist may now be said to be the first
owner of all the wealth of the community, though no law has
conferred on him the right of this property.... This change
has been effected by the taking of interest on Capital ... and
it is not a little curious that all the lawgivers of Europe
endeavoured to prevent this by Statutes--viz., Statutes
against usury.--_Rights of Natural and Artificial Property
Contrasted_ (_An Anonymous work, published