Page:James Ramsay MacDonald - The Socialist Movement.pdf/141

 Rh lems which this conflict will create will belong to the Socialist state itself, which will certainly not be a stagnant state, and they need not be discussed in detail now. All that has to be done at present is to emphasise the fact that the impulses which have driven men so far on the road in search of liberty will cross the Socialist boundary and remain in full operation after that.

And we must also insist that laws and regulations are not only not antagonistic to liberty, but are the very conditions of liberty. They are the expressions of the social life; they are the signs of warning, the directing finger posts which the experience of the past has set up for the guidance of the future; they are the wisdom which men have picked up onthe way. They are, so to speak, the hard bony structure of conduct which supports—and which alone can support—the mobile activities through which the free will finds play. Moreover, they are what may be called the economies of liberty. For liberty is like wealth, in that it should be carefully used if it is to fulfil its purpose. Laws and regulations prevent its misuse, and make easy its proper use. Where two persons use the road, they have to devise some rule of the road; where two persons do business, they have to agree to the conditions of contract; where two persons form a community, they have to provide for common liberty as well as for individual freedom. Liberty is an adjustment of opposites. When Liberty is sovereign, Control is her chief adviser.