director, for industry under Socialism will be carried on by the same differentiation of function as is the case now. Therefore we can safely conclude that there will be ability; that its monopoly will be broken down, and that there will be plenty of opportunity for its exercise under Socialism. The precise method of rewarding it can be safely left to experience in the calm assurance that if special monetary payment is necessary, Socialism will adapt itself to that necessity.
But, again our critic objects, experience has shown that "public opinion" has been against mechanical invention, and as "public opinion" will control the production of wealth under Socialism, the ability produced in the way described will be as ruthlessly sacrificed as certain primitive peoples sacrificed their female offspring. There will be just enough of it preserved to keep things going. And here they remind us of the wild Luddites, of the tribulations of Arkwright with the crowd, and so on, and defy us to get our necks out of that noose.
I must, however, point out a distinction between the present state and Socialism which robs these historical instances of any value for the purpose of this argument. The immediate and local effect of the introduction of machinery to-day is to displace labour. Labour saving machinery under the operations of our present system is labour substituting. That was the first effect of the Arkwright inventions. It must not be forgotten that the years when the new machines were being introduced lay
