met by the actual change of
habits. The wave of temperance which two generations ago reformed the
habits of the well-to-do in England is rapidly spreading through all
classes in our own time. The drink bill is still excessive, the
proportion of his weekly wages spent on drink by the average workman is
still too great, but it is a diminishing quantity, and the fear which
might have been legitimately expressed in old days that to add to wages
was to add to the drink bill could no longer be felt as a valid
objection to any improvement in the material condition of the working
population in our own time. We no longer find the drink bill heavily
increasing in years of commercial prosperity as of old. The second
argument has experienced an even more decisive fate. Down to my own time
it was forcibly contended that any improvement in the material condition
of the mass of the people would result in an increase of the birth rate
which, by extending the supply of labour, would bring down wages by an
automatic process to the old level. There would be more people and they
would all be as miserable as before. The actual decline of the birth
rate, whatever its other consequences may be, has driven this argument
from the field. The birth rate does not increase with prosperity, but
diminishes. There is no fear of over-population; if there is any
present danger, it is upon the other side. The fate of these two
arguments must be reckoned as a very important factor in the changes of
opinion which we have noted.

Nevertheless, it may be thought that the system that I have outlined is
no better than a vast organization of State charity, and that as such it
must carry the consequences associated with charity on a large scale. It
must dry up the sources of energy and undermine the independence of the
individual. On the first point, I have already referred to certain
cogent arguments for a contrary view. What the State is doing, what it
would be doing if the whole series of contemplated changes were carried
through to the end, would by no means suffice to meet the needs of the
normal man. He would still have to labour to earn his own living. But he
would have a basis to go upon, a sub-structure on which it would be
possible for him to rear the fabric of a real sufficiency. He would have
greater security, a brighter outlook, a more confident hope of being
able to keep his head above water. The experience of life suggests that
hope is a better s