(7) I shall next proceed to show how the pursuit of this ideal Collectivist State which is bred of Capitalism leads men acting upon a Capitalist society not towards the Collectivist State nor anything like it, but to that third utterly different thing--the _Servile State_. To this eighth section I shall add an appendix showing how the attempt to achieve Collectivism gradually by public purchase is based upon an illusion. (8) Recognising that theoretical argument of this kind, though intellectually convincing, is not sufficient to the establishment of my thesis, I shall conclude by giving examples from modern English legislation, which examples prove that the Servile State is actually upon us. Such is the scheme I design for this book. Section One Definitions Man, like every other organism, can only live by the transformation of his environment to his own use. He must transform his environment from a condition where it is less to a condition where it is more subservient to his needs. That special, conscious, and intelligent transformation of his environment which is peculiar to the peculiar intelligence and creative faculty of man we call the _Production of Wealth_. _Wealth_ is matter which has been consciously and intelligently transformed from a condition in which it is less to a condition in which it is more serviceable to a human need. Without _Wealth_ man cannot exist. The production of it is a necessity to him, and though it proceeds from the more to the less necessary, and even to those forms of production which we call luxuries, yet in any given human society there is a certain _kind_ and a certain _amount_ of wealth without which human life cannot be lived: as, for instance, in England to-day, certain forms of cooked and elaborately prepared food, clothing, warmth, and habitation. Therefore, to control the production of wealth is to control human life itself. To refuse man the opportunity for the production of wealth is to refuse him the opportunity for life; and, in general, the way in which the production of wealth is by law permitted is the only way in which the citizens can legally exist. Wealth can only be produced by the application of human energy, mental and physical, to the forces of nature around us, and to the material which those forces inform. This human energy so applicable to the material world and its forces we will call _Labour_. As for that material and those natural forces, we will call them, for the sake of shortness, by the narrow, but conventionally accepted, term _Land_. It would seem, therefore, that all problems connected with the production of wealth, and all discussion thereupon, involve but two principal original factors, to wit, _Labour_ and _Land_, But it so happens that the conscious, artificial, and intelligent action of man upon nature, corresponding to his peculiar character compared with other created beings, introduces a third factor of the utmost importance.