little nothings, without
which the most fertile idea would remain fruitless. More than that:
every new invention is a synthesis, the resultant of innumerable
inventions which have preceded it in the vast field of mechanics and
industry.

Science and industry, knowledge and application, discovery and practical
realization leading to new discoveries, cunning of brain and of hand,
toil of mind and muscle--all work together. Each discovery, each
advance, each increase in the sum of human riches, owes its being to
the physical and mental travail of the past and the present.

By what right then can any one whatever appropriate the least morsel of
this immense whole and say--This is mine, not yours?

III

It has come about, however, in the course of the ages traversed by the
human race, that all that enables man to produce and to increase his
power of production has been seized by the few. Some time, perhaps, we
will relate how this came to pass. For the present let it suffice to
state the fact and analyze its consequences.

To-day the soil, which actually owes its value to the needs of an
ever-increasing population, belongs to a minority who prevent the people
from cultivating it--or do not allow them to cultivate it according to
modern methods.

The mines, though they represent the labour of several generations, and
derive their sole value from the requirements of the industry of a
nation and the density of the population--the mines also belong to the
few; and these few restrict the output of coal, or prevent it entirely,
if they find more profitable investments for their capital. Machinery,
too, has become the exclusive property of the few, and even when a
machine incontestably represents the improvements added to the original
rough invention by three or four generations of workers, it none the
less belongs to a few owners. And if the descendants of the very
inventor who constructed the first machine for lace-making, a century
ago, were to present themselves to-day in a lace factory at Bale or
Nottingham, and claim their rights, they would be told: "Hands off! this
machine is not yours," and they would be shot down if they attempted to
take possession of it.

The railways, which would be useless as so much old iron without the
teeming population of Europe, its industry, its commerce, and its marts,
belong to a few shareholders, ignorant perhaps of the whereabouts of
the lines of rails which yield them revenues gr