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 CHAPTER VII

THE ETHICS OF THE PRODUCERS

I

years ago Proudhon pointed out the necessity of giving the people a morality which would fit new needs. The first chapter of the preliminary discourses placed at the beginning of Justice in the Revolution and in the Church is entitled "The State of Morals in the Nineteenth Century. Invasion of moral scepticism; society in danger. What is the remedy?" There one reads these noteworthy sentences: "France has lost its morals. Not that, as a matter of fact, the men of our generation are worse than their fathers. … When I say that France has lost its morals I mean that it has ceased to