is not bound to provide medical aid or medicines for a sick servant, though he is for an apprentice. If he sends for medical assistance for a servant whilst under his roof, he is liable.
In the same encyclical of Leo XIII a general rule is laid down for deciding what a fair wage is: " Let it, then, be taken for granted that workman and employer should, as a rule, make free agreements, and in particular should agree freely as to the wages; nevertheless, there underlies a dictate of nature more imperious and more ancient than any bargain between man and man namely, that the remuneration must be sufficient to support the wage- earner in reasonable and frugal comfort. If through necessity or fear of a worse evil, the workman accept harder conditions, because an employer or contractor will afford him no better, he is made the victim of force and injustice."
The workman, then, has a right to a living wage, and the employer who grows rich by sweating his work-people commits a sin against justice and is bound to make restitution of his ill-gotten wealth. If, however, the employer gives as good wages as he can afford, or as good as the labour is worth, he will be excused from any sin against justice; occasionally in bad times he may be bound out of charity to give employment without profit to himself or even at a personal loss.
4. It is sometimes the duty of the State to interpose its authority in order to settle labour questions. As Leo XIII says: " If by a strike, or other combination of workmen, there should be imminent danger of disturbance to the public peace; or if circumstances were such that among the labouring population the ties of family life were relaxed; if religion were found to suffer through the operatives not having time and opportunity afforded them to practise its duties; if in workshops and factories there were dangers to morals through the mixing of the sexes or from other harmful occasions of evil; or if employers laid burdens upon their workmen which were unjust, or degraded them with conditions repugnant to their dignity as human beings; finally, if health were endangered by excessive labour or by work unsuited to sex or age in such cases there can be no question but that, within certain limits, it would be right to invoke the aid and authority of the law." A little further on Pope Leo again refers to strikes: " When work-people have recourse to a strike, it is frequently because the hours of labour are too long, or the work too hard, or because they consider their wages insufficient. The grave
