IV
What is the character of this artisan democracy? The answer to this is summed up in one of those sayings that Andreae, in the midst of his energetic exposition, drops by the way.
“To he wise and to work are not incompatible, if there is moderation.”
So it follows that “their artisans are almost entirely educated men. For that which other people think is the proper characteristic of a few (and yet if you consider the stuffing of inexperience by learning, the characteristic of too many already) this, the inhabitants argue, should be attained by all individuals. They say that neither the substance of letters is such, nor yet the difficulty of work, that one man, if given enough time, cannot master both.”
“Their work, or as they prefer to hear it called, ‘the employment of their hands,’ is conducted in a certain prescribed way, and all things are brought into a public booth. From here every workman receives out of the stock on hand whatever is necessary for the work of the coming week. For the whole city is, as it were, one single workshop, but of all different sorts and crafts. The ones in charge of these duties are stationed in the small towers at the corners of the wall; they know ahead of time what is to be made, in what quantity, and of what form, and they inform the mechanics of these items. If the supply of material in the work booth is sufficient, the workmen are permitted to indulge and give free play to their inventive genius. No one has any money, nor is there any use for any private money; yet the republic has its own treasury. And in this respect the inhabitants are especially blessed, because no one can be superior to the other in the amount of riches owned, since the advantage is rather one of power and genius, and the highest respect that of morals and piety. They have very few working hours, yet no less is accomplished than in other places, as it is considered disgraceful by all that one should take more rest and leisure time than is allowed.”
In addition to the special trades, there are “public duties to which all citizens have obligation, such as watching, guarding, harvesting of grain and wine, working roads, erecting buildings, draining ground; also certain duties of assisting in the factories which are imposed upon all in turn according to age and sex, but not very often nor for a long time. For even though certain experienced men are put in charge of all the duties, yet when men are asked for, no one refuses the state his services and strength. For what we are in our homes, they are in their city, which they not undeservedly think a home. And for this reason it is no disgrace to perform any public function. … Hence all work, even that which is considered rather irksome, is accomplished in good time, and without much difficulty, since the promptness of the great number of workmen permits them easily to collect or distribute the great mass of things.”
In this Christianopolis, as Mr. Bertrand Russell would put it, the creative rather than the possessive impulses are uppermost. Work is the main condition of existence, and this good community faces it. It is a pretty contrast to the attitude of the leisured classes who, as Andreae says, with an entirely mistaken sense of delicacy shrink from touching earth, water, stones, coal, and things of that sort, but think it grand to have in their possession to delight them “horses, dogs, harlots and other similar creatures.”
V
The place of commerce in this scheme of life is simple. It does not exist for the sake of individual gain. Hence no one engages in commerce on his own hook, for such matters are put in the hands of “those selected to attend to them,” and the aim of commerce is not to gain money but to increase the variety of things at the disposal of the local community; so that—and again Andreae steps in for emphasis—“we may see the peculiar production of each land, and so communicate with each other that we may seem to have the advantages of the universe in one place, as it were.”
VI
The constitution of the family in Christianopolis follows pretty definitely upon the lines dictated by urban occupations; for Andreae is a city man, and since he does not despise the advantages city life can give, he does not shrink from their consequences. One of these consequences is, surely, the restriction of domesticity, or rather, the projection in the city at large of the functions that in a farmstead would be carried on within the bosom of the family.
When a lad is twenty-four and a lass is eighteen, they are permitted to marry, with the benefit of Christian rites and services, and a decorous avoidance of drunkenness and gluttony after the ceremony. Marriage is a simple matter. There are no dowries to consider, no professional anxieties to face, no housing shortage to keep one from finding a home, and above all, perhaps, no landlord to propitiate with money, since all houses are owned by the city and are granted and assigned to individuals for their use. Virtue and beauty are the only qualities that govern a marriage
