Page:Philosophical Review Volume 20.djvu/264

250 operations; in the commercial type, the cultivation of the arts of peace, which is part of the function of labour, is the predominant feature, and for this only defensive military operations are required, and to this they are made to minister.

But while the position of labour in a society thus varies with the type and tendency of society, at all times it presents a special problem to the political or moral guide of the destinies of a state. At no time has this been more true than the present. In some of the societies of Western Europe at the present moment, the problem of labour has become the prime factor to be reckoned with in determining the conditions of social equilibrium. All the more important is it therefore that we should try to understand the nature of labour and the place it holds in the social order.

It must be borne in mind that while labour has always existed as a fact in human society, the fact has not always been interpreted in the same way. Its significance has varied from time to time. It is the conception by which we interpret the place of labour in society that guides explicitly or implicitly all considerations of its worth or importance in the plan of social life. This conception, unlike the fact of labour, has not always been the same. Different conceptions of its nature have been formed by different societies, and each, as we shall see, throws some light on its real meaning.

But first it is necessary, in order to clear the ground for discussion, to state the limits within which we wish here to confine the use of the term labour. There is clearly no specific problem regarding labour if we take this term to apply to all forms and kinds of activity, still less to all forms and kinds of work. In a social whole, everyone is active in the production of social ends in some way or other; the child at school or even at play, the student, the sculptor, the saint, the statesman, the salesman, the sweep, the ship-builder. Some of these activities we would call ' work ' ; but certainly not in the ordinary usage of language would many of them be called 'labour.' All 'work' involves efficient action with a view to realising the ends which constitute the permanent good of man in society, of a man living with his