tual import. Derived
from the Latin word, _socius_, meaning a comrade, it is, like the word
"mother," for instance, one of those great universal speech symbols
which find their way into every language.

Signifying as it does faith in the comradeship of man as the basis of
social existence, prefiguring a social state in which there shall be no
strife of man against man, or nation against nation, it is a verbal
expression of a great ideal, man's loftiest aspirations crystallized
into a single word. The old Hebrew prophet's dream of a
world-righteousness that shall give peace, when nations "shall beat
their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks,"[4]
and the Angel-song of Peace and Goodwill in the legend of the Nativity,
mean no more than the word "Socialism" in its best usage means. Plato,
spiritual son of the Socrates who for truth's sake drained the hemlock
cup to its dregs, dreamed of such social peace and unity, and the line
of those who have seen the same vision of a love-welded world has never
been broken: More and Campanella, Saint-Simon and Owen, Marx and Engels,
Morris and Bellamy--and the end of the prophetic line is not yet.

But if the dream, the hope itself, is old, the word is comparatively
new. It is hard to realize that the word which means so much to
countless millions of human beings, and which plays such a part in the
vital discussions of the world, in every civilized country, is no older
than many of those whose lips speak it with reverence and hope. Yet such
is the fact. Because it will help us to a clearer understanding of
modern Socialism, and because, too, it is little known, notwithstanding
its intensely interesting character, let us linger awhile over that page
of history which records the origin of this noble word.

Some years ago, anxious to settle, if possible, the vexed question of
the origin and first use of the word "Socialism," the present writer
devoted a good deal of time to an investigation of the subject, spending
much of it in a careful survey of all the early nineteenth-century
radical literature. It soon appeared that the generally accepted account
of its introduction, by the French writer, L. Reybaud, in 1840, was
wrong. Indeed, when once fairly started on the investigation, it seemed
rather surprising that the account should have been accepted,
practically without challenge, for so long. Finally the conclusion was
reached that an anonymous writer in an Engli