er pursuit happens to attract them. No doubt the great majority
of those who chose this course would spend their time in mere
amusement, as most of the rich do at present. But it could not be
said, in such a society, that they were parasites upon the labor of
others. And there would be a minority who would give their hours of
nominal idleness to science or art or literature, or some other
pursuit out of which fundamental progress may come. In all such
matters, organization and system can only do harm. The one thing that
can be done is to provide opportunity, without repining at the waste
that results from most men failing to make good use of the
opportunity.

But except in cases of unusual laziness or eccentric ambition, most
men would elect to do a full day's work for a full day's pay. For
these, who would form the immense majority, the important thing is
that ordinary work should, as far as possible, afford interest and
independence and scope for initiative. These things are more
important than income, as soon as a certain minimum has been reached.
They can be secured by gild socialism, by industrial self-government
subject to state control as regards the relations of a trade to the
rest of the community. So far as I know, they cannot be secured in
any other way.

Guild socialism, as advocated by Mr. Orage and the "New Age," is
associated with a polemic against "political" action, and in favor of
direct economic action by trade-unions. It shares this with
syndicalism, from which most of what is new in it is derived. But I
see no reason for this attitude; political and economic action seem to
me equally necessary, each in its own time and place. I think there
is danger in the attempt to use the machinery of the present
capitalist state for socialistic purposes. But there is need of
political action to transform the machinery of the state, side by side
with the transformation which we hope to see in economic institutions.
In this country, neither transformation is likely to be brought about
by a sudden revolution; we must expect each to come step by step, if
at all, and I doubt if either could or should advance very far without
the other.

The economic system we should ultimately wish to see would be one in
which the state would be the sole recipient of economic rent, while
private capitalistic enterprises should be replaced by self-governing
combinations of those who actually do the work. It ought to b