g something that our
fellows want us to do, and so co-operating in the work of supplying
man's need. (That many of man's needs are stupid and vulgar is most
true, but the only way to cure that is to teach him to want something
better.) The Guildsmen seem to think that this necessity to make or do
something that is wanted implies slavery, and ought to be abolished.
They are fond of quoting Rousseau's remark that "man is born free and
is everywhere in chains." But is man born free to work as and on what
he likes? In a state of Nature man is born--in most climates--under
the sternest necessity to work hard to catch or grow his food, to make
himself clothes and build himself shelter. And If he ignores this
necessity the penalty is death. The notion that man is born with a
"right to live" is totally belied by the facts of natural existence.
It is encouraged by humanitarian sentiment which, rightly makes
society responsible for the subsistence of all those born under its
wing; but it is not part of the scheme of the universe.

Such are a few of the weaknesses involved by the theoretical basis
on which Guild Socialism is built. When we come to its practical
application we find the creed still more unsatisfactory. Even if
we grant--an enormous and quite unjustified assumption--that the
Guildsman, if he is to be paid merely for being alive, will work hard
enough to pay the community for paying him, we have then to ask how
and whether he will achieve greater freedom under the Guilds than
he has now. Now, freedom is only to be got by work of a kind that
somebody wants, and wants enough to pay for it. And so the consumer
ultimately decides what work shall be done. The Guildsman says that
the producer ought to decide what he shall produce and what is to be
done with it when he has produced it. "Under Guild Socialism," says
Mr Cole,[1] "as under Syndicalism, the State stands apart from
production, and the worker is placed in control." Very well, but what
one wants to know is what will happen if the Guilds choose to produce
things that nobody wants. Will they and their members be paid all the
same? Presumably, since they are to be paid "as human beings" and not
because there is a demand for their work. But if so, what will happen
to the Guildsman as consumer? There will be no freedom about his
choice of things that he would like to enjoy. And what about admission
to membership of a Guild, the price at which the Guilds will exchange
p