Page:Karl Marx - The Poverty of Philosophy - (tr. Harry Quelch) - 1913.djvu/83

 and such ideas will never be eradicated, nor the institutions founded upon them be subverted, so long as this inequality is maintained. Men have hitherto blindly hoped to remedy the present unnatural state of things, and to institute equality of rights and laws by removing one rich tyrant and setting up another—by destroying existing inequality and leaving untouched the cause of the inequality; but it will shortly be seen that it is not in the nature of any mere governmental change to afford permanent relief—that misgovernment is not a cause but a consequence—that it is not the creator, but the created—that it is the offspring of inequality of possessions; and that inequality of possessions is inseparably connected with our present social system." (J. F. Bray, pp. 33, 36 and 37.)

"Not only are the greatest advantages, but strict justice also, on the side of a system of equality. Every man is a link, and an indispensable link, in the chain of effects—the beginning of which is but an idea, and the end, perhaps, the production of a piece of cloth. Thus, although we may entertain different feelings towards the several parties, it does not follow that one should be better paid for his labor than another. The inventor will ever receive, in addition to his just pecuniary reward, that which genius only can obtain from us—the tribute of our admiration."

"From the very nature of labor and exchange, strict justice not only requires that all exchangers should be mutually, but that they should likewise be equally benefited. Men have only two things which they can exchange with each other, namely, labor, and the produce of labor; therefore, let them exchange as they will, they merely give, as it were, labor for labor. If a just system of exchanges were acted upon, the value