dom is of the essence of contract, and the end of contract is the furtherance of the good of the community, any attempt to check or suppress the free exercise of this right is hostile not merely to the interests of the workman but to the community as well. For that reason there seems no justification for the action of Trade-Unions in frustrating contracts made by non-unionists on the one hand, or for preventing the operation of piece-work contract on the other. Their attempt to control the output of work and their hostility to machinery stand condemned by what has already been said of the ethical meaning of labour, and the significance of machinery.
I am aware that all this is a general statement of principles and not a concrete statement of details, but perhaps the former may be more useful at the present time than the latter. For a grasp of principle is often more important for the student of social problems than a mass of detail.
In conclusion, labour, we have said, is a form of social activity in the interests of the common good; and all its questions are ultimately not economic but moral, and must find ethical solutions. But labour is no more than a form of man's general activity in the community. To regard it as the whole, or as the primary form, is to distort the position of labour itself. It is never an end in itself; and that is in a large measure the source of the irksomeness and wearisomeness of labour. But man as a whole is an end in himself, and must therefore have other ends than those of labour to make up the complete sum of human good. If, therefore, opposition of classes in a community is hostile to the general good and unjustifiable for the reason shown, the attempt to erect the labour class into the whole state is not merely foolishness, it is a degradation of mankind. And if that be true, all attempts to establish a labour-state, all forms of socialism on a purely labour basis, are seen to be the dreams of extravagant enthusiasts, and the outcome of a very one-sided conception of human good.
| J. B. Baillie |
| Aberdeen University.. |
