It is not likely that the American public, once it understands the situation, will refuse to adopt the only practical method of ridding itself of a wasteful system and a corrupt government just because the few who profit by it for very obvious reasons do not want them to. All the public needs is a clear understanding of what Socialism really is; how it is certain to come eventually; and how it is best that it should come.

Many Socialists make the mistake of asking us to look too far ahead. We are not all equally far-sighted. Some are very near-sighted. In fact the habit of looking closely at our ledgers and at our looms tends to make us near-sighted. Socialists too may be wrong in their forecast centuries ahead. This book therefore makes a distinction between those things that can be demonstrated and those which, on the contrary, are still matter for mere speculation.

It can be demonstrated that a partial substitution of coöperation for competition in definite doses will put an end to pauperism, prostitution and in great part to crime. Whether a wholesale substitution of coöperation for competition will still further promote human development and happiness is a matter of speculation—as to which men can legitimately differ.

The contention made in this book is that a substitution of coöperation for competition in the dose herein prescribed must put an end to the three gigantic evils above mentioned, and incidentally confer upon us a larger and truer measure of liberty and happiness than the world has ever yet known.

One word about the language of this book. As it is addressed to persons not familiar with the Socialist vocabulary, I am going to abstain to the utmost possible from using this vocabulary. I am not going to use the words "surplus value" when the more familiar word "profit" can be used with practically the same advantage. I am going to avoid the expression "materialist interpretation of history" when the words "economic interpretation of history" are equally correct and less likely to mislead. And I am above all going to avoid, wherever I can, the use of the words "individualism" and "individualists," because these words have been already used by capitalists to beg the whole question. Capitalists have quietly appropriated this word to themselves and Socialists have been foolish enough to permit them to do it. Capitalism does indeed promote a certain kind of individualism; but we shall have to discuss later just what is the nature of the individualism promoted by existing conditions and compare it with the individualism that will be promoted by Socialism. I think it will become clear that it is the peculiar province of Socialism to rescue the vast majority of men from conditions which make the development of the individual impossible, and to put opportunities of individual development at the disposal of all; that, indeed, the highest type of individualism can be realized only in a coöperative commonwealth that will give to every man not only opportunity for developing his individual talents, but leisure for doing so—the very leisure of which the vast majority are deprived under the present system and of which the few who have it profit little.

It is not easy to find words to substitute for individualist and individualism. The word that best describes the individualist is "egotist." But the use of the word "egotist," for the very reason that it is the truest word for describing the individualist, would arouse such protest in the minds of those so designated as perhaps to prevent this book from being read by the very persons to whom it is chiefly addressed.

The word "capitalist" cannot be used for this purpose either, because by no means all who have capitalistic ideas are capitalists, and some capitalists are free from capitalistic ideas.

So instead of the words "individualist," "egotist" and "capitalist," I am going to use the French word "bourgeois." It seems to convey what it is intended to convey with least error and most consideration for capitalistic susceptibilities. It is true that "bourgeois" is a French word and should be avoided in consequence, but it has been now so acclimated to our language that many editors print it without quotation marks. The word "bourgeois" roughly includes all those who have property or employ labor, or who can be psychologically classed with these. It includes the small shop-keeper who keeps a clerk, or perhaps only a servant, and the millionaire who keeps thousands of men at work in his factories, mines, railroads or other industries. It includes the large farmer who employs help, but not the small farmer who employs no help; it includes the lawyer, the broker and the agent who depend upon the capitalist but are lifted above the hunger line.

Instead of the word "individualism," I shall use another French expression which has also become acclimated—that is to say, laissez faire; for laissez faire are words adopted by the bourgeois to describe the system for which he generally stands. This expression is peculiarly appropriate to-day, when we hear our business men clamoring to be "let alone." Indeed were it not for the awkwardness of the expression "let-alone-ism," this literal translation of laissez faire would just suit my purpose.

It is true that the laissez faire of to-day differs from that of the last century. For there is at present a very wide belief in the possibility of controlling corporations, and whereas the laissez faire of the last century went so far as to deny the necessity of government control, that of to-day very largely admits it. By laissez faire, therefore, I mean the controlled laissez faire that now prevails as well as the uncontrolled laissez faire of a century ago, the essential difference between laissez faire and Socialism being that the former implies leaving the production and distribution of everything to private capital whether controlled or uncontrolled by government; whereas Socialism implies putting production and distribution of at least the necessaries of life into the hands of those who actually produce and distribute them without any intervention or control of private capital whatever.

I have been careful to take my facts and figures not from Socialist publications, but from government publications or economists of admitted authority. I have, too, in every case where it seems necessary quoted my authority so that there may be no doubt as to the source from which my facts are drawn.

In conclusion it must be stated that there are four very different standpoints from which Socialists start—the economic, the political, the scientific and the ethical.

Ethical writers began by disregarding the economic side of Socialism altogether, and some economic Socialists are therefore disposed to despise ethical and so-called Christian Socialism; whereas the ethical view is not only useful, but essential to a complete understanding of the subject.

The scientific view of Socialism has been comparatively little treated, but it is not for that reason the least important. On the contrary, Herbert Spencer and his school have built a formidable opposition to Socialism based upon pseudo-scientific grounds. It becomes, therefore, important to point out the extent to which Herbert Spencer was wrong and Huxley right in the application of science to this question.

My own conviction is that the highest Socialism is that which reconciles all four views—the economic, the political, the scientific and the ethical. But as this is a work of exposition rather than of controversy, I have abstained from insisting upon this view and have, on the contrary, endeavored to give a fair account of all four arguments, in the hope that those who are inclined to the economic view may