ture. But I must not be led away from
my theme by the bitter reflections which arise in one who lives in the
Iron Age and knows it is Iron, who feels at times like the lost wanderer
on trackless fields of ice, which never melt and will not until earth
turns from its axis.

I wish to see society organized so that it shall be malleable to the
general will. But political and economic progress are obstructed because
existing political and economic organizations are almost entirely
unmalleable by the general will. Public opinion does not control the
press. The press, capitalistically controlled, creates public opinion.
Our legislators have grown so secure that they confess openly they have
passed measures which they knew would be hateful to the majority of
citizens, and which, if they had been voted on, would never have been
passed. The theory of representative government has broken down. To tell
the truth, the life of the nation is so complicated that it is difficult
for the private citizen to have any intelligent opinion about national
policies, and we can hardly blame the politician for despising the
judgment of the private citizen. Government departments are still less
malleable by public opinion than the legislature. For an individual to
attack the policy of a Government department is almost as hopeless a
proceeding as if a laborer were to take pickaxe and shovel and
determine to level a mountain which obstructed his view. Yet Government
departments are supposed to be under popular control. The Castle in
Ireland, theoretically, was under popular control, but it was adamantine
in policy. If the cant about popular control of legislation and
Government departments is obviously untrue, how much more is it
in regard to public services like railways, gas works, mines, the
distribution of goods, manufacture, purchase and sale, which are almost
entirely under private control and where public interference is bitterly
resented and effectively opposed. What chance has the individual who is
aggrieved against the great carrying companies? To come lower down,
let us take the farmer in the fairs. What way has he of influencing the
jobbers and dealers to act honestly by him--they who have formed rings
to keep down the prices of cattle? Are they malleable to public opinion?
The farmers who have waited all day through a fair know they are not.

When we consider the agencies through which people buy we find the same
thing. The increase o