HUMAN JUSTICE FOR THOSE AT THE BOTTOM:* Is there any
large number of persons "at the top" who require to be reminded that the world is full of inequality and misery ? If so, this volume may be of some use to them. It is written with evident sincerity and much amiability, but except in so far as kindness and honesty of purpose are qualities needed in every enterprise, its practical value is, we fear, very slight. The author makes his appeal "in further- ance of the first of the three constituents of Socialism," a word which he tells us is " more loosely used and misapplied " than any other. With the laudable object, therefore, of being definite, he proceeds to define Socialism as " Justice, Kind- ness, Love." From this fair start we swim away into the empyrean, and the subject seems one of extraordinary simplicity. His method may be illustrated by what he calls " one example only. In our actual treatment of domestic animals our standard of human justice, of humanity, is higher in some respects than it is in our actual treatment of this particular section of human beings—the bottom section of society " (p. 35). But the whole difficulty surely consists in the fact that human kind are not domesticated animals, but self-conscious beings, claiming their right of initiative, needing therefore their experience of discipline if they are to be free and responsible agents successfully surmounting the problems of associated life. Of course, it the lower stratum of society were domesticated animals, it would necessarily follow that their existence should be regulated for them by " those at the top." Particularly our author is anxious that the old age of those at the bottom should cease to be their own responsibility, and he supports the proposal with the usual arguments. He has apparently no glimmering of the obvious argument that, if it is politic to deprive a section of the community of responsibility for this most universal risk of life, it must be politic also to deprive them of responsibility for all other risks. And what is the future of a race to be which abjures for the undisciplined section of its members the exercise-ground on which personal responsibility is discharged and economic character and habit acquired ?
There is of course a practical difficulty in deciding at what point the State should interfere in the interest of a class that is momentarily depressed, but to ignore the arguments which are usually adduced to show that the line. must be drawn somewhere is to indulge in a feeble and useless sentimentalism, —and from this fault we cannot acquit the author of this well- intentioned but inconclusive little book.
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