erty being theft, capitalists as well as landowners are thieves
who possess no claim whatever to consideration or even to mercy. "To
talk about 'the respective claims of capital and labour' is as
inaccurate as to talk about the 'respective claims' of coals and
colliers, or of ploughs and ploughmen. Capital has no claims. This is
not a quibble. The distinction between capital and the capitalists is
one of vital importance. Capital is a necessary thing. The capitalist
is as unnecessary as any other kind of thief or interloper. The
capitalist, though as loud as greedy in his 'claims,' has no rights at
all."[434]

"Do you mean to say, then, that the capitalist does not perform a
useful function in running a risk for the profit he receives?--No. In
so far as he exercises the function of management and receives
remuneration for this, his remuneration is not profit at all, but
wages of superintendence, and the functions of management would be
undertaken by the organised society of the future through its
appointed representatives. As to any necessary risks, all individuals
would be relieved from this under Socialism, as it would be borne by
the whole of society."[435] "If capitalists attempt to justify their
way of making profit by saying that they have to run risks sometimes,
that a part of their property might occasionally be lost, we answer
that labour has nothing to do with that."[436]

Capital large and small is the result of thrift. If capital is theft,
then thrift also is theft. The thrifty investor, being an immoral
person, has no right to protest against the confiscation of his
property. "By capitalist I mean the investor who puts his money into a
concern and draws profits therefrom without participating in the
organisation or management of the business. Were all these to
disappear in the night, leaving no trace behind, nothing would be
changed."[437] Nothing would be changed for the Socialist agitator,
the loafer, and the tramp. On the contrary, they would profit from the
ruin of the industrious and the thrifty. The fact that honest and
hardworking men who do their duty to their family and who wish to
leave their children provided for should have the result of the
economy of a lifetime confiscated matters little to the Socialist
leaders. According to the Socialist doctrines the industrious and the
thrifty are thieves and exploiters of those workers who have never
saved a penny. On the other hand, those men who live