effected any change in the face of society, I must say, I do not know. I can only say that I did not measure my hope, nor the joy that it brought me at the time. For the rest, when I took that step I was blankly ignorant of economics; I had never so much as opened Adam Smith, or heard of Ricardo, or of Karl Marx.3 Oddly enough, I had read some of Mill,4 to wit, those posthumous papers of his (published, was it in the Westminster Review or the Fortnightly?) in which he attacks Socialism in its Fourierist'5 guise. In those papers he put the arguments, as far as they go, clearly and honestly, and the result, so far as I was concerned, was to convince me that Socialism was a necessary change, and that it was possible to bring it about in our own days. Those papers put the finishing touch to my conversion to Socialism. Well, having joined a Socialist body (for the Federation soon became definitely Socialist), I put some conscience into trying to learn the economical side of Socialism, and even tackled Marx, though I must confess that, whereas I thoroughly enjoyed the historical part of 'Capital,' I suffered agonies of confusion of the brain over reading the pure economics of that great work. Anyhow, I read what I could, and will hope that some information stuck to me from my reading; but more, I must think, from continuous conversation with such friends as Bax and Hyndman and Scheu,6 and the brisk course of propaganda meetings which were going on at the time, and in which I took my share. Such finish to what of education in practical Socialism as I am capable of I received afterwards from some of my Anarchist friends, from whom I learned, quite against their intention, that Anarchism was impossible, much as I learned from Mill against his intention
that Socialism was necessary. But in this telling how I fell into practical Socialism I have begun, as I perceive, in the middle, for in my position of a well-to-do man, not suffering
from the disabilities which oppress a working-man at every step, I feel that I might never have been drawn into the practical side of the question if an ideal had not forced me to seek towards it. For politics as politics, i.e., not regarded as a necessary if cumbersome and disgustful means to an end, would never have attracted me, nor when I had become conscious of the wrongs of society as it now is, and the oppression of poor people, could I have ever believed in the possibility of a partial setting right of those wrongs. In other words, I could never have been such a fool as to believe in the happy and 'respectable' poor. If, therefore, my ideal forced me to look for practical Socialism, what was it that forced me to conceive of an ideal? Now, here comes in what I said (in
this paper) of my being a type of a certain group of mind.
Before the uprising of modern Socialism almost all intelligent people either
were, or professed themselves to be, quite contented with the civilization of
this century. Again, almost all of these really were thus contented, and saw
nothing to do but to perfect the said civilization by getting rid of a few ridic
ulous survivals of the barbarous ages. To be short, this was the Whig7 frame
3. German political philosopher (1818?1883), Stuart Mill. who developed the concept of communism; his 5. Characteristic of a political philosophy, devel- Capital (1867?94) is an analysis of capitalism. oped by Charles Fourier (1772?1837), that advo- Smith (1723?1790), Scottish economist who cated a social reorganization to equalize wealth. argued that natural laws of production and 6. Ernest Belfort Bax (1854-1926), H. M. Hyndexchange govern economies and produce wealth. man (1842-1921), and Andreas Scheu (1844Smith's work was an important justification of cap-1927), leaders in the early English socialist moveitalism and laissez-faire (noninterventionist) eco-ment. nomics. David Ricardo (1772?1823), English 7. From the monarchical crisis of 1678-81 economist whose labor theory of value influenced onward, the term Whig (from whiggamore, a Scot- Marx. tish name for a cattle driver) designated a member 4. James Mill (1773-1836), philosopher, political of one of the two major parliamentary alliances economist, and historian, and the father of John (the Tories being the opposing group). Originally
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Ho w I BECAME A SOCIALIST / 1493
of mind, natural to the modern prosperous middle-class men, who, in fact, as
far as mechanical progress is concerned, have nothing to ask for, if only Social
ism would leave them alone to enjoy their plentiful style. But besides these contented ones there were others who were not really
contented, but had a vague sentiment of repulsion to the triumph of civiliza
tion, but were coerced into silence by the measureless power of Whiggery.
Lastly, there were a few who were in open rebellion against the said Whig
gery?a few, say two, Carlyle and Ruskin. The latter, before my days of prac
tical Socialism, was my master towards the ideal aforesaid, and, looking
backward, I cannot help saying, by the way, how deadly dull the world would
have been twenty years ago but for Ruskin! It was through him that I learned
to give form to my discontent, which I must say was not by any means vague.
Apart from the desire to produce beautiful things, the leading passion of my
life has been and is hatred of modern civilization. What shall I say of it now,
when the words are put into my mouth, my hope of its destruction?what shall
I say of its supplanting by Socialism? What shall I say concerning its mastery of and its waste of mechanical
power, its commonwealth so poor, its enemies of the commonwealth so rich,
its stupendous organization?for the misery of life! Its contempt of simple
pleasures which everyone could enjoy but for its folly? Its eyeless vulgarity
which has destroyed art, the one certain solace of labour? All this I felt then
as now, but I did not know why it was so. The hope of the past times was gone,
the struggles of mankind for many ages had produced nothing but this sordid,
