Impossible to tell definitely how the change will be brought about--Possible only to point out tendencies making for Socialism, and to show how the change _can_ be brought about--Marx's "catastrophe theory" a lapse into Utopian methods of thought--His deeper thought--Testimony of Liebknecht--Socialism not to be reached through a _coup de force_--The political changes necessary for Socialism--Tendencies making for socialization of industry--Monopolies, cooeperative societies, the vast extension of collectivism within the capitalist system--Confiscation or compensation?--Change to Socialism to be legal and gradual--Engels and Marx favored compensation--The widow's savings--Elimination of unearned incomes--Violence not necessary 323 INDEX 339 SOCIALISM A SUMMARY AND INTERPRETATION OF SOCIALIST PRINCIPLES SOCIALISM CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION I It is not a long time since the kindest estimate of Socialism by the average man was that expressed by Ebenezer Elliott, "the Corn-Law Rhymer," in the once familiar cynical doggerel:-- "What is a Socialist? One who is willing To give up his penny and pocket your shilling." There was another view, brutally unjust and unkind, expressed in blood-curdling cartoons representing the Socialist as a bomb-throwing assassin. According to the one view, Socialists were all sordid, envious creatures, yearning for the "Equal division of unequal earnings," while the other view represented them as ready to enforce this selfish demand by means of the cowardly weapons of the assassin. Both these views are now, happily, well-nigh extinct. There is still a great deal of misconception of the meaning of Socialism; the ignorance concerning it which is manifested upon every hand is often disheartening, but neither of these puerile misrepresentations is commonly encountered in serious discussion. It is true that the average newspaper editorial confounds Socialism with Anarchism, often enlisting the prejudice which exists against the most violent forms of Anarchism in attacking Socialism, though the two systems of thought are fundamentally opposed to each other; it is likewise true that Socialists are not infrequently asked to explain their supposed intention to have a great general "dividing-up day" for the equal distribution of all the wealth of the nation. The Chancellor of a great American university returns from a sojourn in Norway, and naively hastens to inform the world that he has "refuted" Socialism by asking the members of some poor, struggling sect of Communists what would happen to their scheme of equality if babies should be born after midnight of the day of the equal division of wealth!