els that were
imagined by the writers of fairy tales and Eastern stories--a power so
vast--so marvellous, that it is difficult to find words to convey
anything like an adequate conception of it.

'We all remember the story, in The Arabian Nights, of Aladdin, who in
his poverty became possessed of the Wonderful Lamp and--he was poor no
longer. He merely had to rub the Lamp--the Genie appeared, and at
Aladdin's command he produced an abundance of everything that the youth
could ask or dream of. With the discovery of steam machinery, mankind
became possessed of a similar power to that imagined by the Eastern
writer. At the command of its masters the Wonderful Lamp of Machinery
produces an enormous, overwhelming, stupendous abundance and
superfluity of every material thing necessary for human existence and
happiness. With less labour than was formerly required to cultivate
acres, we can now cultivate miles of land. In response to human
industry, aided by science and machinery, the fruitful earth teems with
such lavish abundance as was never known or deemed possible before. If
you go into the different factories and workshops you will see
prodigious quantities of commodities of every kind pouring out of the
wonderful machinery, literally like water from a tap.

'One would naturally and reasonably suppose that the discovery or
invention of such an aid to human industry would result in increased
happiness and comfort for every one; but as you all know, the reverse
is the case; and the reason of that extraordinary result, is the reason
of all the poverty and unhappiness that we see around us and endure
today--it is simply because--the machinery became the property of a
comparatively few individuals and private companies, who use it not for
the benefit of the community but to create profits for themselves.

'As this labour-saving machinery became more extensively used, the
prosperous class of skilled workers gradually disappeared. Some of the
wealthier of them became distributers instead of producers of wealth;
that is to say, they became shopkeepers, retailing the commodities that
were produced for the most part by machinery. But the majority of them
in course of time degenerated into a class of mere wage earners, having
no property in the machines they used, and no property in the things
they made.

'They sold their labour for so much per hour, and when they could not
find any employer to buy it from them, they wer