and satisfy now, so far as that is possible for them, in the various forms of popular art, or as may be seen to-day it Paris and Vienna by the “Theatre socialiste” and at Brussells by the free musical matinees, instituted by the socialists and frequented by a constantly growing number of workingmen.  It is just the same with regard to scientific instruction, as witness “University Extension” in England and Belgium.  And all this, notwithstanding the present total lack of artistic education, but thanks to the exigence among the workers of these countries of an economic condition lees wretched than that of the agricultural or even the industrial proletariat in countries such as Italy.

And from another point of view, what are the museums if not a form of collective ownership and use of the products of art?

It is again, as always, the same fallacy which (at page 216) makes M. Garofalo write:  “The history of Europe, from the fifth to the thirteenth centuries, shows us, by analogy, what would happen to the world if the lower classes should come into power....  How to explain the medieval barbarism and anarchy save by the grossness and ignorance of the conquerors? The same fate would inevitably await the modern civilization, if the controlling power should fall into the hands of the proletarians, who, assuredly, are intellectually not superior to the ancient barbarians and MORALLY ARE FAR INFERIOR TO THEM!”

Let us disregard this unjustified and unjustifiable insult and this completely erroneous historical comparison.  It is enough to point out that it is here supposed that by a stroke of a magic wand “the lower classes” will be able in a single day to gain possession of power without having been prepared for this by a preliminary moral revolution, a revolution accomplished in them by the acquired consciousness of their rights and of their organic solidarity.  It will be impossible to compare the proletarians in whom this moral revolution shall have taken place with the barbarians of the Middle Ages.

* * * * *

In my book Socialismo et Criminalita, published in 1883, and which to-day my adversaries, including M. Garofalo (p. 128 et seq.), try to oppose to the opinions which I have upheld in my more recent book, Socialisme et science positive (the present work), I have developed two theses: 

I. That the social organization could not be suddenly changed, as was then maintained in Italy by the sentimental socialists, since the law of evolution dominates with sovereign power the human world as well as the inorganic and organic world;

II.  That, by analogy, crime could not disappear absolutely from among mankind, as the Italian socialists of those days vaguely hinted.