HUMANITY.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XCVII, Issue 11180, 30 January 1897, Page 2

HUMANITY.

TO THE EDIfOB. Sib, —Professor Bickerton’s letter makes us think. When I say “ us,” I mean the workers —all who honestly work, or wish to work, all who know what it means to toil and to be tired,' W hen I say "makes iis think,” I do not mean that we have not thought before. Happily, the current of thought is ever widening and deepening the channel of the workers’ minds. And in this fact lies our ground for hope for the future. At first when I read Professor Bickerton’s letter I felt dismayed ; the look-out over the world seemed so hopeless, till I began to realise that there are the gentle, poetic feelings of melancholy and dissatisfaction. There is also abroad the very lively and active feeling of criticism. It was inevitable ; the spread of education must lead to the development of criticism. The poor criticise the rich; the congregation criticises the clergyman, and is often indignant because the preacher assumes it to he without reading or thought. The young criticise their elders, sometimes voicing thoir thoughts, more often in silence. The unlearned criticise the learned, because the learned show resentment if the workers think, and boldly express themselves. The philanthropised criticise the philanthropist. The represented criticise the representatives. The “domestic help” has her mistress under review, and so on. The spirit of criticism is rife amongst us. I forgot to say that we all thoroughly overhaul the newspaper, and fully believe that editors would rather we cavilled at every sentence, than that we accept what they-write as just the gospel, or in a dull and don’t-care spirit. It will have been noticed of late that an old fashion has revived amongst some, viz., that of decrying education, beyond the very simplest rudiments, for the great mass of the people. This absurdity was, to a very large extent, laid to rest. It is reviving, and why ? Simply because thtf consequences are being seen and felt in the arousing of the critical spirit. When the workers have become also the thinkers of the world, we shall see that everything will he worked on a different principle. The workers will realise, seeing that they have suffered so deeply, so frightfully, that not in the amassing of gold lies happiness for the human race, but in a reasonable amount of comfort for everybody; not in the enlarging of charitable institutions, but in payment of and the receiving of good wages, and in the institution of short hours of labour; not in the searching into the innermost recesses of disease, hut in the “ nationalisation of health.” It is a mistake for the thinkers to suppose that the workers merely wish to oust tlie present idlers, and take theirplaces. Revolutions, though perchance a painful necessity in the past, show us that to a large extent they are powerless to reform abuses, unless we look on such as the plough which prepared the soil for a better sowing. It is very truly said that up to this century evolution was unconscious, that now it has become conscious. Professor Bickerton puts before us that the human race must be improved, and we bow to his decision, all acknowledging that improvement is necessary, and it strikes one that New Zealand is just the place in which socialistic ideas should flourish. Indeed, it is evident that we are advancing. A bishop has blessed Mr Seddon for brotherly legislation, and what is Socialism

but brotherliness? If this continues we shall never see people in New Zealand working at manufactures which cause suffering and death, or wages reduced to starvation point for the sake of cheapening goods.—l am, &c. LOUISA BLAKE.