SOCIALISM AND PHILISTINISM.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18896, 19 December 1924, Page 9

SOCIALISM AND PHILISTINISM.

Sir, —The delightfully rambling letter signed " E.N.D." would not call'tor any serious reply, did not its writer so completely mistake the point. He lias jumped to the end without studying the beginning. I may reassure him by stating that I have no connection with the House of Lords, which is becoming a sort of half-way house to the grave, f<{r wealthy, self-made men. I agree entirely with Shaw's remark that anyone who believes Socialism means human equality should have his neck wrung—and I pointed out that it is the typical belief of the Socialist propagandist. By him it is instilled into the worker until one is reminded of the chap in Hamlet who had poison poured into his ear while asleep. But Shaw is not a Socialist, and if he ever called himself one it is final proof that lie is not; there is no such thing as an Irish Socialist, for all Irishmen are descended from kings. Shaw 13 a thoroughly respectable married man, who writes plays in which the oldest moral platitudes are cleverly dished up with a. new seasoning of wit. The error of " E.N.D." and of all partially-edu-cated men who read Socialistic writers, is the belief that Socialism in practice consorts with Socialism in theory, coupled with an inability to state what Socialism is in theory. If they want to find„.out what the Socialistic crowd practices and wants to practice, let them study it firsthand 011 the Continent of Europe, or listen to what the crow of a liner would like to do to Lord Inchcape (a self-made man). The beliefs of the ordinary man are not found in text-books, but in the smoking carriage, the liar, the billiard room, and the forecastle. Anyone who is unable to grasp the problem of Socialism in life will find it stated accurately in " The Servile. State," by H. Bclloc, and " The Revolt Against Civilisation, bv L. Stoddard, which show just where thi» equality theory and the internationalist theorv are leading the world. Lastly, it " E.N.D." believes in the accepted writers " of Socialism, who are they? Does he follow " Progress nnd Poverty," by Henry George, or Toward Democracy." by Edward Carpenter, or is he a believer in Bertram! Russell who was a Bolshevik, but renegged when ho discovered what Bolshevism meant ? Does he subscribe to the exploded fallacies of Karl Marx, or does he propagate the Syndicalism ot Georges Rorel ? And does he agree with Bernard Shaw in saying " Democracy always prefers second-bests?" I began mv article bv saving. " What is Socialism ? tan anvone tell me if all its prophets are -it* variance. Otherwise I can only take it as being the mass of contradiction inscribed on the banners of equality and internationalism. Pnri.iT ok Philistia.