n infinite variety of other factories
_must_ spring up around, so that, mutually supporting and stimulating
one another by their inventions, they increase their productivity.

III

It is foolish indeed to export wheat and to import flour, to export wool
and import cloth, to export iron and import machinery; not only because
transportation is a waste of time and money, but, above all, because a
country with no developed industry inevitably remains behind the times
in agriculture; because a country with no large factories to bring steel
to a finished condition is doomed to be backward in all other
industries; and lastly, because the industrial and technical capacities
of the nation remain undeveloped, if they are not exercised in a variety
of industries.

Nowadays everything holds together in the world of production.
Cultivation of the soil is no longer possible without machinery, without
great irrigation works, without railways, without manure factories. And
to adapt this machinery, these railways, these irrigation engines, etc.,
to local conditions, a certain spirit of invention, and a certain amount
of technical skill must be developed, while they necessarily lie dormant
so long as spades and ploughshares are the only implements of
cultivation.

If fields are to be properly cultivated, if they are to yield the
abundant harvests that man has the right to expect, it is essential that
workshops, foundries, and factories develop within the reach of the
fields. A variety of occupations, and a variety of skill arising
therefrom, both working together for a common aim--these are the true
forces of progress.

And now let us imagine the inhabitants of a city or a territory--whether
vast or small--stepping for the first time on to the path of the Social
Revolution.

We are sometimes told that "nothing will have changed": that the mines,
the factories, etc., will be expropriated, and proclaimed national or
communal property, that every man will go back to his usual work, and
that the Revolution will then be accomplished.

But this is a mere dream: the Social Revolution cannot take place so
simply.

We have already mentioned that should the Revolution break out to-morrow
in Paris, Lyons, or any other city--should the workers lay hands on
factories, houses, and banks, present production would be completely
revolutionized by this simple fact.

International commerce will come to a standstill; so also will the
importat