PREFACE.
The present time is a most hazardous one. Good men and women, of all stations in society, recognize that the existing social conditions are most unjust and likely to suffer a serious crash in the not far distant future. Naturally enough the thinkers of the age, are trying, through the channels of pleasing fiction, to present a solution of the knotty social problem which confronts us; but, in the present writer's opinion, although their efforts have been an inestimable boon to humanity, they have all, with perhaps one exception, fallen short of the desired goal. “Looking Backward” is too impracticable, and too authoritarian to be desirable even if it were practicable; as the clever Writer of “Looking Further Forward” has well shown; “Caesar's Column,” although a masterpiece of destructive reasoning, is unsatisfactory to those who would see society build itself anew; “News from Nowhere” is too exclusively sentimental; while the hosts of minor works are not characterized by any ideas of special value in the solution of the problem. Even “Freeland,” the able work of Dr. Hertzka which towers above all the others in profundity of thought and correct economic insight, is based upon a scheme of such colossal magnitude as to somewhat detract from its immediate utility, and furthermore it relies for its execution upon the means of the wealthy. In the present work the writer endeavors to show how the oppressed classes can work out their own emancipation without reliance upon the uncertain assistance of the wealthy.
The author gladly acknowledges the valuable assistance rendered by Mr. Philip Kleinmann and Mr. David A. Crichton (late Government Agricultural lecturer), who have supplied valuable information used in working out some of the details; and also several other gentlemen and ladies, who have kindly furnished some useful particulars.
If the present work should be the means of stimulating the workers to strive to emancipate themselves by rational methods, the author's labors will not have been in vain.
Melbourne, November, 1892.
