st-known member, have given to the world a volume
called _Fabian Essays_. This volume was republished in America, and to
the American edition a special preface was prefixed with a view to
emphasising the essentials of a socialistic conception of society, and
bringing the details of the socialistic theory up to date. In this
preface it is stated, with regard to the apportionment of material
wealth generally, that "the only truly socialistic scheme" is one which
"will absolutely abolish all economic distinctions, and prevent the
possibility of their ever again arising." And how would it accomplish
this end? "By making," says the writer, "an equal provision for all an
indefeasible condition of citizenship, without any regard whatever to
the relative specific services of the different citizens. The rendering
of such services on the other hand," the writer goes on, "instead of
being left to the option of the citizen, with the alternative of
starvation (as is the case under the wage-system) would be secured
under one uniform law of civic duty, precisely like other forms of
taxation or military service."

Such, then, is the system which is put forward by educated socialists
to-day as the only means of escape from the existing system of wages.
And an escape from the wage-system--and one not theoretically
impracticable--it no doubt is; but an escape into what? It is an escape
into one of those systems which I have just now mentioned. That is to
say, it is an escape into economic slavery. For the very essence of the
position of the slave, as contrasted with the wage-paid labourer, is, so
far as the direction of his industrial actions is concerned, that he has
not to work as he is bidden in order to gain a livelihood, but that, his
livelihood being assured him no matter how he behaves himself, he is
obliged to work as he is bidden in order to avoid the lash, or some
other form of equally effective punishment.[8]

Now, I am not attempting here to find any fault with socialism on the
ground that it would, on the admission of some of its most thoughtful
exponents, be obliged to re-establish slavery as the price of
emancipation from "wagedom." I have commented on this fact solely with
the view to showing that the nature of the alternative to the
wage-system thus proposed indicates a full recognition, on the part of
those proposing it, of the nature and necessity of the functions which
the wage-system performs at present--namely, that