Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. III.djvu/443

Rh the fruits of the labour of all, and all enjoy the fruits of God's rich and beautiful earth. It enforces that object in individual activity at which it aims publicly in the great community. It is a forerunner and a prophet. The prophets of old were stoned, and are dead. They were, however, found to be right at last. And their voices sound even now upon earth. The community of the Phalanstery, as I beheld it here, with its sound kernel of pious and earnestly working members, with its surrounding garland of intellectual devoted lookers-on, is a product of Christ's doctrine of love, and it aims at making this a vital principle of social life. It is an upright and a noble endeavour.

And the kingdom of God is extended by such endeavours. May one and all be faithful in their part. And should the Phalanstery, even in this its contracted form, become one of the earth's “enfans perdus,” yet it will not be so in the history of the new community, neither in that of the house of God.

For my part, I feel convinced that these small socialist communities will not sustain themselves longer than they are sustained by the noble spirits who infuse into them their energetic life of love. Then probably their work will fall to pieces. But if they, during a short successful period, exhibit that which social humanity may become when all shall be influenced by a noble and beneficent spirit, and when possessed of all those material advantages which associated life affords,—then they will not have flourished, will not have lived in vain.

And it cannot be denied that the moral element which they adopt as the principle of association, and which constitutes their characteristic and recognisable feature, is also beginning to be current in the great commercial, industrial, and scientific associations of North America. People are acknowledging more and more that man is more than meat, and “levelling upwards,” is the universal watchword in all associated life. Associations in all professions, and for