Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 1.djvu/78

 66 But this conception of personality insists above all upon the truth that labor is not a commodity: labor is a service, not only of individual to individual but of individual to society also Labor is thus regarded as a social function and should be so estimated. This is the conception which the trite phrase, "the dignity of labor," endeavors to express, though this perception is a very vague one. Man is not only estimated as a man—the dignity of man,—but is also estimated as a functionary of society,—the dignity of labor. Hence the incongruity of the wage system in the present form at least, and the impossibility of constructing a stable society upon the industrial principle of competition without a counterbalancing principle of human valuation. The iron law of wages must be nullified by a change in the conditions which put it into operation. Property is considered no less "sacred," but its sacredness is found to exist only in the sacredness of the personality back of the property.

ECONOMIC VERSUS SOCIAL MOTIVES. A third element of ideal is found in the denial of the paramount importance of economic ends and the insistence upon a juster valuation of various social ends. The economic motive is essentially individualistic. No other ruling motive depends so little upon social relations for its satisfaction. It has been necessary for socialism in general, in defending the various forms of an ideal status, to demonstrate the sufficiency of these other motives. Whether this has been done beyond question may be doubted; but it is certain that a juster relative estimate has been reached. Whether this or that motive will actually produce this or that result under certain unrealized conditions is speculation. But such discussions have brought to light much concerning human motive forces that has long remained unnoticed or undervalued. Whether motives in abeyance can be stimulated to a given intensity may not be determinable, but we no longer deal with the equation of societary relations upon the assumption that the only significant term is economic.

If the medical profession can have guarded for so many