Page:Masterpieces of German literature volume 10.djvu/573

 kind of association exists. Their help can therefore reach only the artisan producers.

But, even in this respect, please notice and impress upon your minds two essential circumstances:

In the first place the inevitable tendency of our industrialism is to put factory production more and more from day to day in place of artisan production, and, in consequence, to drive the workmen of a constantly increasing number of trades into the laboring class proper, which finds work in the factories. England and France, which are ahead of us in economic development, show this in a still greater degree than Germany, which is, however, taking tremendous strides in the same direction. Your own experience will confirm this sufficiently.

It follows from this that the Schulze-Delitzsch credit and raw material associations, even if they could help the artisans, could be of advantage only to a very small number of people, a number which is constantly decreasing and tends to disappear, through the inevitable development of our manufacturing system—people who through the progress of our culture are, in constantly increasing numbers, forced into the class of workingmen who are not affected by this aid. That is, nevertheless, only the first conclusion. A second, of still greater importance, is the following: In competition with factory production, which is in constantly increasing scope taking the place of small artisan production, even the artisans who remain in the latter are in no way certain of being protected by the credit and raw material associations. I will again cite Professor Huber as a witness on this point. "Unfortunately," says he, after speaking in praise, as I have done, of the Schulze-Delitzsch credit and raw material associations, "unfortunately, however, the assumption that the competition of production on a small scale with factory production would be made possible seems by no means sufficiently established."