Source: The Cambridge Independent Press, Saturday 2 October 1886, page 4
Note: This is a delivery of the lecture Socialism, given on September 27 to the Manchester SL. It is listed by LeMire as a delivery of Socialism: the ends and the means
Transcription: by Graham Seaman for MIA, November 2022
In a lecture on socialism at Manchester, by Mr. W. Morris, Mr. Morris said it seemed to him that most people whom one addressed did not put to themselves the momentous questions of why they were in the position in which they were, of why the working man, the beggar, the pauper, the criminal was in his position, and of why the rich man was in his. Most people did not doubt the necessity of the existence of the classes into which society was divided, nor did they suppose that it was possible that this arrangement might not go on for ever. Socialists on the contrary believed that they knew why these class distinctions existed, and how they had grown into what they were. That growth, they admitted, bad been inevitable in the past, hut, so far from it being an eternal thing they believed that this arrangement would in itself destroy itself, giving place to something else, and that would be a society in which there would ba no rich, because there would he no poor; for there could be no rich men unless there were poor ones. Proceeding to sketch the present composition of society, Mr. Morris remarked that it was to-day still the rule of our society that those who worked should fare the hardest, and that the reward of idleness should generally be abundant wealth (applause). The question thereupon arose as to which was right—the moral rules, the religious, which we were supposed to guided by, or the practice which went on underneath that morality and religion. One of the two things must ba wrong, and if they adhered to the practice let them at all events give up the religion. In society as at present composed there were two great classes, the rich and the poor, the first monopolising all means of the production of wealth save one, viz., the power of labour, which was possessed by the second. The rich could compel the poor to sell their power of labour to them on terms which insured the continuance of the rich class, and, moreover, it must be remarked that the class which lacked wealth was the class that produced it. This surely was but a sorry result of all the struggles of man towards civilization. No man was good enough to be master over others, to own them. Whatever the result of such a thing might be to them, it ruined him, morally at all events. Equality of fellowship was necessary for developing the innate good and restraining th» innate evil in everyone. We wanted to be friends and good fellows, not masters over one another (applause). Socialism said that society must be the condition of man’s existence as man. and that the aim of that society was even something higher than the greatest happiness of the greatest number. The aim must he to offer a chance of happiness to everyone, a chance of happiness which he himself alone could refuse; to give every man an opportunity for the full development of each human capacity. Socialism denied the title of society to any system whicn degraded one class to exalt another, and asserted that if we injured even any one member of society for the benefit of all the rest we poisoned and corrupted the springs of our society (applause). The real aim of socialism was the destruction of monopoly, and the assuring to everyone born into the world his full share of happiness (applause). The motto they should inscribe on their banner was, "From each what he can do: to each what he needs” (applause.)