“The new socialists who, on the one hand, pretend to speak in the name of sociological science and of the natural laws of evolution, declare themselves politically, on the other hand, as revolutionists.  Now, evidently science has nothing to do with their political action.  Although they take pains to say that by “revolution” they do not mean either a riot or a revolt—­an explanation also contained in the dictionary[96]—­this fact always remains, viz.:  that they are unwilling to await the spontaneous organization of society under the new economic arrangement foreseen by them in a more or less remote future.  For if they should thus quietly await its coming, who among them would survive to prove to the incredulous the truth of their predictions?

It is a question then of an evolution artificially hastened, that is to say, in other words, of the use of force to transform society in accordance with their wishes.” (p. 30.)

“The socialists of the Marxian school do not expect the transformation to be effected by a slow evolution, but by a revolution of the people, and they even fix the epoch of its occurence.” (p. 53.)

“Henceforth the socialists must make a decision and take one horn of the dilemma or the other.

“Either they must be theoretical evolutionists, WHO WAIT PATIENTLY until the time shall be ripe;

Or, on the contrary, they must be revolutionary democrats; and if they take this horn, it is nonsense to talk of evolution, accumulation, spontaneous concentration, etc.  ACCOMPLISH THEN THIS REVOLUTION, IF YOU HAVE THE POWER.” (p. 151.)

I do not wish to dwell on this curious “instigation to civil war” by such an orthodox conservative as the Baron Garofalo, although he might be suspected of the not specially Christian wish to see this “revolution of the people” break out at once, while the people are still disorganized and weak and while it would be easier for the dominant class to bleed them copiously....

Let us try rather to deliver M. Garofalo from another trouble; for on page 119 he exclaims pathetically:  “I declare on my honor I do not understand how a sincere socialist can to-day be a revolutionist.  I would be sincerely grateful to anyone who would explain this to me, for to me this is an enigma, so great is the contradiction between the theory and the methods of the socialists.”

Well then, console yourself, my excellent friend!  Just as in the case of the relationship between collective ownership and human degeneration, which seemed so “enigmatical” to this same Baron Garofalo—­and although he has not offered his gratitude for the solution of this enigma to the socialist Oedipus who explained it to him—­here also, in the case of this other enigma, the explanation is very simple.

On the subject of the social question the attitudes assumed in the domain of science, or on the field of politics, are the following: