originally designed. All the craftsmen of every craft combining
together, not one allowed to stand out, electing their own officers,
obeying rules for the general good, building halls, holding banquets,
and creating a spirit of pride in their craft. What more could be
desired? Why do we not imitate this excellent example?

Yet, when we look at the City Companies, what do we find? The old
Craft Companies, it is true, still exist; they have an income of many
thousands a year, and a livery, or list of members, in number varying
from twenty to four hundred, and not one single craftsman left among
them. What has become, then, or the Association? Well, that remains,
the shadow remains, but the substance has long since gone. Even the
craft itself, in many cases, has disappeared. There are no longer in
existence, for instance, Armourers, Bowyers, Fletchers, or Poulterers.

What has happened, then? Why did this essentially democratic
Company--in which all were subject to rules for the general good, and
none should undersell his brother, and the rate of wages and the hours
of labour were regulated--so completely fail?

For many reasons, some of which concern ourselves: it failed, because
the members themselves forgot the original reason of their
combination, and neglected to look after their own interests; it
failed, because the members were too ignorant to remember, or to know,
that the Company was founded for the interests of the Craft itself,
and not for those of the masters alone or the men alone. Now every
Association must needs, of course, have wardens or masters; it must
needs elect to those posts of dignity and responsibility such men as
could understand law and maintain their privileges if necessary before
the dread Sovereign, his Highness the King. The men they necessarily
elected were therefore those who had received some education,
master-workmen--their own employers--not their fellows. It speedily
came about, therefore, that the masters, not the men, ruled the hours
of work, the wages of work, the quantity and quality of work: the
masters, not the craftsmen, admitted members and limited their number.
Do you now understand? The officers ruled the Company of the Craftsmen
for the benefit of the masters and not the men. Nay, they did more.
Since in some trades the men showed a disposition, on dimly perceiving
the reality, to form a union within a union, the masters were strong
enough to put down all combinations for