Page:The Case for Capitalism (1920).djvu/136

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his outlay, make good the depreciation of his tools and leave him a profit. He may sometimes win his victory at the expense of those whom he has underpaid, or in some rare cases by barbarous ill-treatment of natives whom he has enslaved, overworked and even tortured. But whenever a profit was made it could only be done by providing some one with something that he wanted or thought that he wanted. Capitalism working through competition and freedom must please the consumer to prosper, and the consumer is the mass of humanity. From this point of view its achievements, smirched and blotted as they are about the hinder parts, are sweet and cleanly as compared with those of diplomacy which have drenched the world in blood, or of churches that have used the torch of God's Word to light holocausts of good earnest people who differed slightly with them concerning their belief in Him.

Capitalism incidentally was working for peace though it is commonly accused of being the ally if not the father of Militarism. Seeing that the pages of history were black with Militarism long before Capitalism in its modern form was heard of, to make the latter the father