to exchange their products? State Socialism could solve this problem by the Prussian process of rationing, leaving no freedom of choice to anybody, either in what they make or what they consume. But how are the Guilds to solve the question? Would not enterprise and initiative be checked under Guild monopoly almost as seriously as under State control? Who is to decide as to right of entry to a Guild? Would the guildsmen really work better for a Guild than for an ordinary employer? What would happen if any of the Guilds, exercising, as they would, a watertight monopoly, started the game—at which all could play with differing degrees of success—of mutual exploitation?
And this strange new formula about "organization by function"—what did it mean? If a man is to be a butcher, baker, or candlestick-maker first, and a citizen of his country, or a member of the human brotherhood, second, it seems to be a rather material standpoint. It would surely tend to produce a selfish and sectional outlook, very different from the conception of each as a member of a great community, in which divergent interests are, or might be, attuned by co-operation and competition into a cheerful and inspiring harmony. A study of Guild Socialist literature, in spite of
