are by far the more important.

The end of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th centuries were the
culminating days of the industrial revolution, when the old organization
of domestic industry had given way before the factory system, and the
population of the factory districts was suffering a martyrdom, with ruin
of body and degradation of character, from unbridled competition, long
hours, women's and children's labour, pauper apprenticeship, great
fluctuations of trade and employment, dearness and adulteration of
provisions, the truck system and insanitary homes. Owen, having himself
become a great employer of labour, after starting as a draper's
assistant, saw that this was in every sense waste, and that as it paid
the manufacturer to have the best machinery and not to overdrive it, but
to tend it well and keep it in the best repair, so it would pay him, and
abundantly pay the nation, to have the human machines well cared for,
not overworked, and kept in the best condition. The popular
individualistic philosophy of that day taught that the good of society
would be achieved by each individual seeking in his business relations
the interest of himself and his family; but Owen maintained that the
well-being of the social body could only be served if each individual
made that his conscious aim. For this reason he and his disciples were
called Socialists. He taught further that a man's character depended
mainly upon the circumstances which influenced his life; he emphasized
environment, and all but denied heredity. At New Lanark, from 1799, he
carried out these ideas among the workers in the cotton mills of which
he was managing partner.[1] "For twenty-nine years," he wrote, "we did
without the necessity for magistrates or lawyers; without a single legal
punishment; without any known poors' rate; without intemperance or
religious animosities. We reduced the hours of labour, well educated all
the children from infancy, greatly improved the condition of the adults,
diminished their daily labour, paid interest on capital, and cleared
upwards of L300,000 of profit." So wonderful were the results upon the
population, that New Lanark became a show-place of world-wide renown,
and was visited by many of the greatest and most exalted people of the
period.

While thus using his own power Owen not only advocated legislation to
limit the hours of factory labour, but appealed to the public
authorities to establish industrial communit