The Conquest of Bread | Page 5

glass and hot water pipes, man renders a given space ten and
fifty times more productive than it was in its natural state.

The prodigies accomplished in industry are still more striking. With the
co-operation of those intelligent beings, modern machines--themselves
the fruit of three or four generations of inventors, mostly unknown--a
hundred men manufacture now the stuff to provide ten thousand
persons with clothing for two years. In well-managed coal mines the
labour of a hundred miners furnishes each year enough fuel to warm
ten thousand families under an inclement sky. And we have lately
witnessed the spectacle of wonderful cities springing up in a few
months for international exhibitions, without interrupting in the
slightest degree the regular work of the nations.
And if in manufactures as in agriculture, and as indeed through our
whole social system, the labour, the discoveries, and the inventions of
our ancestors profit chiefly the few, it is none the less certain that
mankind in general, aided by the creatures of steel and iron which it
already possesses, could already procure an existence of wealth and
ease for every one of its members.
Truly, we are rich--far richer than we think; rich in what we already
possess, richer still in the possibilities of production of our actual
mechanical outfit; richest of all in what we might win from our soil,
from our manufactures, from our science, from our technical
knowledge, were they but applied to bringing about the well-being of
all.
II
In our civilized societies we are rich. Why then are the many poor?
Why this painful drudgery for the masses? Why, even to the best paid
workman, this uncertainty for the morrow, in the midst of all the wealth
inherited from the past, and in spite of the powerful means of
production, which could ensure comfort to all, in return for a few hours
of daily toil?
The Socialists have said it and repeated it unwearyingly. Daily they
reiterate it, demonstrating it by arguments taken from all the sciences.
It is because all that is necessary for production--the land, the mines,
the highways, machinery, food, shelter, education, knowledge--all have

been seized by the few in the course of that long story of robbery,
enforced migration and wars, of ignorance and oppression, which has
been the life of the human race before it had learned to subdue the
forces of Nature. It is because, taking advantage of alleged rights
acquired in the past, these few appropriate to-day two-thirds of the
products of human labour, and then squander them in the most stupid
and shameful way. It is because, having reduced the masses to a point
at which they have not the means of subsistence for a month, or even
for a week in advance, the few can allow the many to work, only on the
condition of themselves receiving the lion's share. It is because these
few prevent the remainder of men from producing the things they need,
and force them to produce, not the necessaries of life for all, but
whatever offers the greatest profits to the monopolists. In this is the
substance of all Socialism.
Take, indeed, a civilized country. The forests which once covered it
have been cleared, the marshes drained, the climate improved. It has
been made habitable. The soil, which bore formerly only a coarse
vegetation, is covered to-day with rich harvests. The rock-walls in the
valleys are laid out in terraces and covered with vines. The wild plants,
which yielded nought but acrid berries, or uneatable roots, have been
transformed by generations of culture into succulent vegetables or trees
covered with delicious fruits. Thousands of highways and railroads
furrow the earth, and pierce the mountains. The shriek of the engine is
heard in the wild gorges of the Alps, the Caucasus, and the Himalayas.
The rivers have been made navigable; the coasts, carefully surveyed,
are easy of access; artificial harbours, laboriously dug out and protected
against the fury of the sea, afford shelter to the ships. Deep shafts have
been sunk in the rocks; labyrinths of underground galleries have been
dug out where coal may be raised or minerals extracted. At the
crossings of the highways great cities have sprung up, and within their
borders all the treasures of industry, science, and art have been
accumulated.
Whole generations, that lived and died in misery, oppressed and
ill-treated by their masters, and worn out by toil, have handed on this
immense inheritance to our century.

For thousands of years millions of men have laboured to clear the
forests, to drain the marshes, and to open up highways by land and
water. Every rood of soil we cultivate in Europe has been watered by
the sweat of several races of men. Every acre has its story of enforced
labour, of intolerable toil,