ll you whether
there will be any intercommunication between the inhabitants of this
planet and of Mars; whether there will be an ambassador from Mars at
the national capital.

I do not expect that the lion will eat straw like the ox; I do not
expect that people will be perfect. I do not suppose that men and
women will have become so angelic that there will never be any crime,
suffering, anger, pain or sorrow; I do not expect disease to be
forever banished from life in the Socialist regime. Still less do I
expect that mechanical genius will have been so perfected that human
labor will be no longer necessary; that perpetual motion will have
been harnessed to great indestructible machines and work become a
thing of the past. That dream of the German dreamer, Etzler, will
never be realized, I hope.

I suppose that, under Socialism, there will be some men and women far
wiser than others. There may be a few fools left! I suppose that some
will be far juster and kinder than others. There may be some selfish
brutes left with a good deal of hoggishness in their nature! I suppose
that some will have to make great mistakes and endure the tragedies
which men and women have endured through all the ages. The love of
some men will die out, breaking the hearts of some women, I suppose,
and there will be women whose love will bring them to ruin and death.
I should not like to think of jails and brothels existing under
Socialism, Jonathan, but for all I know they may exist. Whether there
will be churches and paid ministers under Socialism, I do not know. I
do not pretend to know.

I suppose that, under Socialism, there will be some people who will be
dissatisfied. I hope so! Men and women will want to move to a higher
plane of life, I hope. What they will call that plane I do not know;
what it will be like I do not know. I suppose they will be opposed and
persecuted; that they will be mocked and derided, called "fanatics"
and "dreamers" and lots of other ugly and unpleasant names. Lots of
people will want to stay just as they are, and violently oppose the
men who say, "Let us move on." But I don't believe that any sane
person will want to go back to the old conditions--back to our
conditions of to-day.

You see, I have killed lots of your objections already, my friend!

Now let me tell you briefly what Socialists want, and what they
believe will take place--_must_ take place. In the first place, there
must be political changes to