of temperament matter less and less as the general policy becomes fixed, and in a few years the old leaders from whose disputes the general policy emerged must all have left the stage.  The younger men inherit an established platform and know nothing of the old-time quarrels and distrusts.  They will come together more easily.  If the organised propaganda of Socialism continues—­and that perhaps is not a matter of certainty—­it seems to me improbable that it will be carried on for long by three separate societies.  In some way or other, in England as in so many other countries, a United Socialist organisation will be constituted.

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But what of the future of Fabian ideas?  In a passage already quoted Mr. Barker indicates that the dominance of “Collectivism of the Fabian order” ceased three or four years ago, and he goes on to indicate that it has been replaced by an anti-state propaganda, taking various forms, Syndicalism, Guild Socialism, and the Distributivism of Mr. Belloc.  It is true that Fabianism of the old type is not the last event in the history of political thought, but it is still, I venture to think, the dominant principle in political progress.  Guild Socialism, whatever its worth, is a later stage.  If our railways are to be managed by the Railwaymen’s Union, they must first be acquired for the community by Collectivism.

This is not the place to discuss the possibilities of Guild Socialism.  After all it is but a form of Socialism, and a first principle of Fabianism has always been free thought.  The leading Guild Socialists resigned from the Society:  they were not expelled:  they attempted to coerce the rest, but no attempt was made to coerce them.  Guild Socialism as a scheme for placing production under the management of the producers seems to me to be on the wrong lines.  The consumer as a citizen must necessarily decide what is to be produced for his needs.  But I do not belong to the generation which will have to settle the matter.  The elderly are incompetent judges of new ideas.  Fabian doctrine is not stereotyped:  the Society consists in the main of young people.  The Essayists and their contemporaries have said their say:  it remains for the younger people to accept what they choose, and to add whatever is necessary.  Those who repudiated the infallibility of Marx will be the last to claim infallibility for themselves.  I can only express the hope that as long as the Fabian Society lasts it will be ever open to new ideas, ever conscious that nothing is final, ever aware that the world is enormously complex, and that no single formula will summarise or circumscribe its infinite variety.[57]

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