In short the working man of our generation, even when an advanced politician, looked on himself as a free citizen like any other man, and had no consciousness of his position as a proletarian, or that the reason for his existence, as a workman, was that he 270 might produce profit by his labour for his master. His ideal (again as a workman) was good wages and constant employment; that is, enough to enable him to live without much trouble in a constant condition of inferiority. His ideal of prosperity as an individual was becoming a master and extracting profits from his old associates, like the French soldier, who is conventionally supposed to carry the Marshal's baton in his knapsack. This is now so much changed that the mass of the working classes is beginning to feel its position of economical slavery; there is no longer amongst 1t any hostility to Socialism; and those working men who take genuine interest in general politics are in favour of Socialist tendencies as far as they understand them; so that nowadays the Socialist lecturer rather finds a difficulty in drawing out opposition to his views, until he begins to deal with details.
On the other hand, though the working class is awakening to a consciousness of its condition, it is sluggish in political activity. But this is, no doubt, a passing 271 phase with the workmen, easily accounted for by their absorption in the immediate industrial struggle; and on this side also, progress is certainly being made. The old battle between the workmen and the manufacturers is still, necessarily, going on; but is changing its character. There is in it less of the mere dispute between two parties to a contract admitted as necessary by either, and more of an instinct of essentially opposed interests between employers and employed, and even of revolt; the working men are beginning to assume that they have a right to some share 1n the control of manufacture; the masters for their part perceive this new spirit, and have begun a definite attack on the organisations which are instinct with it. One occasion has arisen which has appealed strongly to the instincts of the working classes generally, and has united them in a socio-political demand, to wit the