orking and prevent them producing the things they need. Most of these
people!' cried Owen, his usually pale face flushing red and his eyes
shining with sudden anger, 'most of these people do not deserve to be
called human beings at all! They're devils! They know that whilst
they are indulging in pleasures of every kind--all around them men and
women and little children are existing in want or dying of hunger.'

The silence which followed was at length broken by Harlow:

'You say the workers is entitled to all they produce, but you forget
there's the raw materials to pay for. They don't make them, you know.'

'Of course the workers don't create the raw materials,' replied Owen.
'But I am not aware that the capitalists or the landlords do so either.
The raw materials exist in abundance in and on the earth, but they are
of no use until labour has been applied to them.'

'But then, you see, the earth belongs to the landlords!' cried Crass,
unguardedly.

'I know that; and of course you think it's right that the whole country
should belong to a few people--'

'I must call the lecturer to horder,' interrupted Philpot. 'The land
question is not before the meeting at present.'

'You talk about the producers being robbed of most of the value of what
they produce,' said Harlow, 'but you must remember that it ain't all
produced by hand labour. What about the things what's made by
machinery?'

'The machines themselves were made by the workers,' returned Owen, 'but
of course they do not belong to the workers, who have been robbed of
them by means of the Money Trick.'

'But who invented all the machinery?' cried Crass.

'That's more than you or I or anyone else can say,' returned Owen, 'but
it certainly wasn't the wealthy loafer class, or the landlords, or the
employers. Most of the men who invented the machinery lived and died
unknown, in poverty and often in actual want. The inventors too were
robbed by the exploiter-of-labour class. There are no men living at
present who can justly claim to have invented the machinery that exists
today. The most they can truthfully say is that they have added to or
improved upon the ideas of those who lived and worked before them.
Even Watt and Stevenson merely improved upon steam engines and
locomotives already existing. Your question has really nothing to do
with the subject we are discussing: we are only trying to find out why
the majority of people have to go short of the