Let us turn to Robert Owen, who was at an early age the most successful cotton spinner in England. He adapted an old philosophy to a new humanitarianism. He saw that a "gradual increase in the number of our paupers has accompanied our increasing wealth."[6] He began the series of experiments which made his name familiar in England and America and made him known in history as the greatest experimental communist. His experiments have failed. But his hopefulness persists. In his address delivered at the dedication of New Lanark, 1816, he said that he had found plenty of unhappiness and plenty of misery. "But from this day a change must take place; a new era must commence; the human intellect, through the whole extent of the earth, hitherto enveloped by the grossest ignorance and superstition, must begin to be released from its state of darkness; nor shall nourishment henceforth be given to the seeds of disunion and division among men. For the time has come when the means may be prepared to train all the nations of the world in that knowledge which shall _impel them not only to love but to be actively kind to each other in the whole of their conduct, without a single exception_." Here is an all-inclusive hopefulness. Its significance is not diminished by the fact that it was spoken of his own peculiar remedy by education and environment. This faith and hope runs through all their books like a golden song. Excepting Marx, he was the great gloomy one. Even those who condemn modern society with the most scathing adjectives link with their denunciations the most sanguine sentences of hope. The Christian Socialism of Kingsley is filled with optimism. "Look up, my brother Christians, open your eyes, the hour of a new crusade has struck."[7] The song of the new crusade was sung by Robert Morris: "Come, shoulder to shoulder ere the world grows older! Help lies in naught but thee and me; Hope is before us, the long years that bore us, Bore leaders more than men may be. "Let dead hearts tarry and trade and marry, And trembling nurse their dreams of mirth, While we, the living, our lives are giving To bring the bright new world to birth." This song of hope is sung to-day by thousands of marching Socialists. Their bitter experiences in parliaments and in strikes, and all the warfare of politics and trade, have not blighted their rosy hope. They are still looking forward to "the bright new world," in which a new social order shall reign. Linked with this optimism is a certain prophetic tone, an elevation of spirit that lifts some of their books out of the commonplace. The sincerity of these prophets of Socialism contributes this quality more than does their originality of mind.