and conventional principles of economic right and wrong.
There is little agreement among socialists as to a programme for the future. Their construcUve proposals are ill-defined and inconsistent and almost entirely negative. The negative character of the socialistic propaganda haa been made a jMjint of disparagement by its critics, perhaps justly. But their predilection for shifty ieono-
S3S THE THEOBT OP BDaDTESS KKTERPBISB
daMn, u weD as the vagaeDeaB and incomiBtcaey of their constnictire pn^xjaah, are in the ptemit oonnectioD to be taken as erideDoe that the sttitode of the socialists caimot be exj^ened in positive terms given by the institutions at present in force. It may also be evidence of the tmtenabilitj of the socialistic ideals; but the merits of the eodalist contentions do not concern the present inquiry. The qoefltion here is as to the nature and causes of the socialist disaffection ; it does not concern the profounder and more delicate point, as to the validity of the socialist contentions.