The Project Gutenberg eBook, Socialism: Positive and Negative, by Robert
Rives La Monte

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

Title: Socialism: Positive and Negative

Author: Robert Rives La Monte

Release Date: November 21, 2007 [eBook #23574]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SOCIALISM: POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE***

E-text prepared by Fritz Ohrenschall, Martin Pettit, and the Project
Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net)

Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file
which includes images of the pages of the original book.
See 23574-h.htm or 23574-h.zip:
(http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/2/3/5/7/23574/23574-h/23574-h.htm)
or
(http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/2/3/5/7/23574/23574-h.zip)

SOCIALISM: POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE

by

ROBERT RIVES LA MONTE

"I will make a man more precious than fine gold;
even a man than the golden wedge of Ophir."
--_Isaiah xiii, 12._

Chicago
Charles H. Kerr & Company
1907

Copyright 1907
by Charles H. Kerr & Company

[Illustration: logo]

Press of
John F. Higgins
Chicago

TO

M. E. M. AND L. H. M.

PREFACE

Of the papers in this little volume two have appeared in print before:
"Science and Socialism" in the International Socialist Review for
September, 1900, and "Marxism and Ethics" in Wilshire's Magazine for
November, 1905. My thanks are due to the publishers of those periodicals
for their kind permission to re-print those articles here. The other
papers appear here for the first time.

There is an obvious inconsistency between the treatment of Materialism
in "Science and Socialism" and its treatment in "The Nihilism of
Socialism." I would point out that seven years elapsed between the
composition of the former and that of the latter essay. Whether the
inconsistency be a sign of mental growth or deterioration my readers
must judge for themselves. I will merely say here that the man or woman,
whose views remain absolutely fixed and stereotyped for seven years, is
cheating the undertaker. What I conceive the true