ime a retrogression in the condition of the oppressed class,
that is of the great majority. Every benefit for one class is
necessarily an evil for the other, every new emancipation of one class a
new oppression for the other. The most drastic proof of this is
furnished by the introduction of machinery, the effects of which are
well known to-day. And while there is hardly any distinction between
rights and duties among barbarians, as we have seen, civilization makes
the difference between these two plain even to the dullest mind. For now
one class has nearly all the rights, the other class nearly all the
duties.

But this is not admitted. What is good for the ruling class, is alleged
to be good for the whole of society with which the ruling class
identifies itself. The more civilization advances, the more it is found
to cover with the cloak of charity the evils necessarily created by it,
to excuse them or to deny their existence, in short to introduce a
conventional hypocrisy that culminates in the declaration: The
exploitation of the oppressed class is carried on by the exploiting
class solely in the interest of the exploited class itself. And if the
latter does not recognize this, but even becomes rebellious, it is
simply the worst ingratitude to its benefactors, the exploiters.[46]

And now, in conclusion, let me add Morgan's judgment of civilization
(Ancient Society, page 552):

"Since the advent of civilization, the outgrowth of property has been so
immense, its forms so diversified, its uses so expanding and its
management so intelligent in the interest of its owners that it has
become, on the part of the people, an unmanageable power. The human mind
stands bewildered in the presence of its own creation. The time will
come, nevertheless, when human intelligence will rise to the mastery
over property, and define the relations of the state to the property it
protects, as well as the obligations and the limits of the rights of its
owners. The interests of society are paramount to individual interests,
and the two must be brought into just and harmonious relations. A mere
property career is not the final destiny of mankind, if progress is to
be the law of the future as it has been of the past. The time which has
passed away since civilization began is but a fragment of the past
duration of man's existence; and but a fragment of the ages yet to come.
The dissolution of society bids fair to become the termination of a