e faith in it;
but, as Jesus came out of despised Nazareth, so the new world is coming
out of the multitude, amid the toil and sweat and anguish of the mills,
mines, and factories of the world. It has endured much; suffered ages
long of slavery and serfdom. From being mere animals of production, the
workers have become the "hands" of production; and they are now reaching
out to become the masters of production. And, while in other periods of
the world their intolerable misery led them again and again to strike
out in a kind of torrential anarchy that pulled down society itself,
they have in our time, for the first time in the history of the world,
patiently and persistently organized themselves into a world power.
Where shall we find in all history another instance of the organization
in less than half a century of eleven million people into a compact
force for the avowed purpose of peacefully and legally taking possession
of the world? They have refused to hurry. They have declined all short
cuts. They have spurned violence. The "bourgeois democrats," the
terrorists, and the syndicalists, each in their time, have tried to
point out a shorter, quicker path. The workers have refused to listen to
them. On the other hand, they have declined the way of compromise, of
fusions, and of alliances, that have also promised a quicker and a
shorter road to power. With the most maddening patience they have
declined to take any other path than their own--thus infuriating not
only the terrorists in their own ranks but those Greeks from the other
side who came to them bearing gifts. Nothing seems to disturb them or to
block their path. They are offered reforms and concessions, which they
take blandly, but without thanks. They simply move on and on, with the
terrible, incessant, irresistible power of some eternal, natural force.
They have been fought; yet they have never lost a single great battle.
They have been flattered and cajoled, without ever once anywhere being
appeased. They have been provoked, insulted, imprisoned, calumniated,
and repressed. They are indifferent to it all. They simply move on and
on--with the patience and the meekness of a people with the vision that
they are soon to inherit the earth.

FOOTNOTES:

[AG] The vote for Belgium is estimated. The Liberals and the Socialists
combined at the last election in opposition to the Clericals, and
together polled over 1,200,000 votes. The British Socialist Year Book,
1913