_Socialistic tendencies._—Socialistic theories gain adherence under the provocation of certain tendencies in society. First, they appear whenever by oppression or fraud of any kind a community is made up of one class possessing wealth directly opposed to another class without wealth, with no extended middle class, and therefore with no ready means of transition from one class to another. As long as the doors are open for real progress in power of accomplishment, all the way from poverty to wealth, society has a unity in its variety that is better than any communism promises. At present in our own country, with the great multitude of farmers’ families furnishing not only the necessities of life, but the larger part of human energy that goes into every calling and every rank, socialism does not appeal to any large number. An earnest, thriving farmer’s family will never believe advantage to come either to themselves or to the race by making them all practically mere wage-earners. Second, a common cause of socialistic views is separation, under extreme division of labor and opposing organizations sustained by it, of the workers in very distinct fields of labor. The jealousies arising between these classes, or guilds, or between employers and employed, foster the revolutionary spirit which jumps at any promise of relief from unsatisfactory conditions. In the third place, a political revolution, if it has destroyed landmarks of the past and any natural sentiments growing out of social relations, leaves a mass of people at sea with reference to the nature of rights. Under such circumstances socialism offers an apparent solution of difficulties unprovided for. Though any practical effort to apply these theories under such circumstances usually results in despotic assumption of authority by a few, the people are moved by the pleasant-sounding phrases. If, in the settling of social affairs after a revolution, an earnest effort is made to agree upon set phrases embodying principles of constitutional liberty, the chances are in favor of some sweeping statements, too general to control action, but over-emphasizing individual rights in comparison with individual duties. Action under these declarations usually conforms to the necessities of the case, accepting the immediate welfare of the society as a guide to more complete welfare.