semination, and to have attempted interpretations of them in terms of current social life. This is peculiarly the function of the Christian socialist of today, and it is a function whose value is not likely to be overestimated, though the value of any one attempted interpretation may be and is likely to be rated above its actual worth.
SOLIDARITY OF THE RACE.
The first of these postulates,—the ethical basis of modern social movements,—is the solidarity of the race. It is no new thing to teach that "we are members one of another;" but any general working acceptance of this principle is still reserved for the future. Man is made by and for association with fellow man. Both the family and the nation are means to this fellowship; and though the solidarity of the race is a higher conception, yet both the family and the nation must be preserved in their integrity as means. So an integral family has been made by many the unit of society. This is one of the incidental though not unimportant, differences between socialism and Christian socialism. Upon this conception of solidarity was based the Christian socialists' advocacy of co-operation. If society is recognized as possessing an organic unity, it should work as such. Men are not merely individuals; they are parts of society. The whole influences the part more than the part influences the whole. This does not stifle individuality; it is a means to individualization. The organic cell possesses greater individuality than the inorganic atom. In this solidarity of the race is found the reconciliation of egoism and altruism. This is an application of the paradox, "He that findeth his life shall lose it, and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it."
This conception has stimulated a correlated idea,—the dignity of man as man. Even individualism, with so much to its credit, failed to achieve this dignifying of personality except within limited areas. The Reformation secured a measure of it in religious affairs, the eighteenth century evolutions conquered a place for it in political affairs; socialism,—or rather this concep-
