The utter inefficiency of Political reforms is exhibited by the fact that so long as Society remains in its present incoherent and warring state, the contests of its political parties must partake of the prevailing antagonism. Accordingly, we find that these contests everywhere are the mere conflicts of opposing material interests. They are dignified, it is true, with the name of battles for principles, but in reality they are not so; they are battles on narrow, selfish grounds, of class against class, of locality against locality, of business against business. The only sense in which they can be regarded as contests for principles, is that in some instances a large body of the people are more interested in the measures of one party than they are in those of another: consequently, the triumph of that party may be looked upon as a triumph for the Majority of the People. In general, however, the success of any of our political parties consists of putting one set of men out of office and another in, and substituting one series of selfish interests for another. It is on this account that their petty warfare is so perpetually renewed. Their apparent progress is nothing more than movement in a circle. Will any one pretend to say that either of the parties in this country are one jot in advance of their respective founders, Hamilton and Jefferson? After fifty years of incessant debate, excitement, and turmoil, precisely the same questions are agitated. The arguments, the appeals, the controversies of the earliest days of the Republic, with a few unimportant changes of names, would be just as applicable at this day. Now one party has been in the ascendant and now another; yet both ring the same eternal changes on the question of Bank-Tariff-Public Lands; Public Lands-Tariff -Bank.* We do not mean that there has been no progress in Society; for, thanks to Industry, Science and Art, there has been great progress. It is our Politics which has been smitten with shameful barrenness. What has been gained one day has been lost the next; what was established yesterday is demolished on the morrow; what one class has acquired has been at the expense of other classes. And the reason of this unceasing fluctuation we have seen, is, that the material interests of men, which are alone brought into the dispute, are for ever fluctuating, with time and place. They move this side and that, hither and thither, now up and now down, shifting with every adverse or propitious wind, modified by a thousand irregular influences, and always exhibiting the characteristics of caprice rather than of any settled law.

This very instability and fruitlessness of political controversy might have led our statesmen, had they been wise enough, into a discovery of the cause of the evil. The cause, we have seen, is in the universal and utter DIVERGENCY OF INTERESTS, which marks the processes of all civilized societies; and, therefore, the remedy indicated, in the nature of the complaint, is the adoption of some method by which we can produce CONVERGENCY OF INTERESTS. Yes, we proclaim it boldly, confidently, with emphasis, that the only cure for our social distresses, that the only means of real, true social progress, that the great want of age, is Social Re-organization on the principle of Unity of Interests.

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* Since these remarks were written, the National Reform and Liberty Parties have sprung up, and promise to infuse a new and better life into political action, God speed them in it!

VOL. II.-5

Unity alone can save us from the tangled incoherence and jarring self ishness of existing divisions. Unity alone can introduce order and freedom into the wild, weltering chaos of the social world. Unity is the grand reconciler, the source of all strength, the fountain of all joy. It is the enemy of Discord, of Confusion, of Duplicity, and of Wrong. It is the highest conception of the Mind; it is the synonym of Harmony and perfect Justice; it is the Central Truth of all sound Philosophy and Religion. God is ONE, and all his creation, visible and invisible, must be ONE. There must be unity of man with man, of man with the Universe, of man with God. All the deductions of human reason, all the teachings of Science, all the aspirations of the heart, all the promises of Scripture, point to the realization of Universal Unity. God's word is pledged to it; Man's soul demands it. Hell is hell, because it is notthere, and would become Heaven the moment it was found.

As the beginning of these grand, comprehensive, and holy Unities, we must have Unity in Society, the method of bringing about which we think we discover in the doctrine of Association.

§ III. THE ORGANIZATION OF Industry.

By Association, we mean the Organization of Industry in the Township.

Industry includes every productive exertion of human faculties and forces, and may be distinguished, for the sake of precision, into 1. Domestic Service, 2. Agriculture, 3. Manufactures, 4. Commerce, 5. Education, 6. The study and application of the Sciences, 7. The study and application of the Fine Arts. All these branches of human activity must be combined in a unitary organization.

What we propose distinctly, then, is, that this process of combination be begun in the Township, or in bodies of men equivalent in number and extent to an ordinary township. We say, in the townshipthe township is the element out of which all larger social Organizations are formed; because, throughout all nature, the process of Organization is commenced in a small centre of vitality, and gradually extended; because, in cases of unsuccessful experiment, little damage can result from failure on so small a scale; and because the township, while it is a compact and manageable body, still embraces all the means that are necessary for the complete and successful formation of a true Organic Society.

As to the principles, then, on which this Organization of the Township should be attempted, we propose, 1st. The Association of all its inhabitants into a Joint-Stock Company; 2d. A Central unitary Mansion and Workshop; 3d. The division of Labor according to the law of Groups and Series, which we shall subsequently explain; and 4th. The distribution of Profits or Benefits, in equitable proportions to the Capital, the Labor, and the Talent that may have concurred in their production. A word now on each of these points.

1. We adopt the Joint-Stock principle, which allows the amount of Capital contributed to the common fund by each individual to be represented by certificates of Stock, because we believe the possession of individual property to be necessary to the true and harmonic manifesta

tion of individual character, and the rightful exercise of individual liberty. The great defect, we think, of all the plans for co-operative Industry that have hitherto been attempted, was that the existence of the individual has been swallowed up in the Community, in utter contradiction to our natural sense of independence and justice, and in flagrant violation of a desire inherent in every mind to express its individuality in outward material forms and creative efforts.

2. We adopt a Central Unitary Mansion in which, however, the dwelling-houses of every family will be kept separate and distinct, to secure the vast and combined economies altogether impossible in a state of isolation; to provide neat and comfortable workshops for those engaged in all the branches of labor; to erect Schools, Museums, and Galleries of Art; to facilitate a ready change from one employment to another; to prevent needless and dangerous exposure to the inclemencies of the season; to treasure the accumulated Art and Science of one generation for the use of succeeding generations; and, by the fact of common ownership, to beget a spirit of corporate sympathy and mutual devotion.

3. We divide Labor into Groups and Series, because it is an arrangement indicated by Nature. Through all the kingdoms of created existence, Mineral, Vegetable, Animal and Human, we discover this division into Groups and Series, or into Genus, Species, and Variety. It is universally adopted by Naturalists, and admits of precise and comprehensive classifications. From the minutest atom to the largest world, there is nothing which does not arrange itself under this law of distributive order. Thus, too, in all the assemblages of Human Society, men, women, and children, in their pleasures, their recreations and their occupations, naturally form into Groups, united by some common bond of sympathy or attraction.

Now, we say that all kinds of industry are divisible into similar Groups and Series, or Classes, Orders, Species, &c., and that, as the industrial inclinations and tastes of men fall under the same law of distinction, there must be, in all societies embracing a sufficient number of persons, a perfect co-adaptation of the latter to the former-an accurate and well-defined, but voluntary, correspondence between aptitude and work. For every function to be performed there is an answering taste and capacity. A primary step then, in the Organization of Industry, is to divide and subdivide its processes into as many minute varieties as they admit, and to allow all laborers who are capable, men, women, or children, to engage freely in any branch they please, subject only to the laws which each Group and sub-Group may form for itself, and to the general unitary discipline of its appropriate Series.

By this simple mechanism, we hold that we can achieve the most stupendous advantages. We think that no one who will take the pains to study its probable workings can fail to see, that it would render all labor voluntary and agreeable; that the talents of each person would be consulted in the choice of his work, and, in this way, all productive forces be most effectively applied; that the most vivid emulation would be excited between the various groups, but which, however, would never degenerate into individual hostility; that each laborer might en

gage in many different vocations, and thus give an equable development to his faculties; and that the relationship of the groups would be such, that no one could labor for himself without laboring at the same time for his neighbor, yet in no instance diminish the recompense justly due to his individual exertions.

4. For, at the end of stated periods, there would be a distribution of profits, in the approximate proportion of five-twelfths to labor, fourtwelfths to capital, and three-twelfths to talent, estimating labor the highest, as being most necessary; capital more than talent in quality of its usefulness; while talent, being most agreeable and devolving upon few in number, would be the least rewarded. It would be easy to establish the proportion of labor to talent, the laborers in each group being classed according to capacity. There would be distinctions also between the groups and series, according to their degree of necessity, utility and agreeableness.

We might dwell upon these principles, and show their actual foundation in human nature, and the necessity of their operating in perfect harmony, but our space compels us to refer the inquirer for these details to the works of the Immortal Genius from whom they were derived— CHARLES FOURIER. He has worked out the results with the precision and comprehensiveness that ever characterize True Science. It is to him that we are indebted for what we consider the only right formula of Social Organization. His profound and searching intellect seems to have penetrated all the mysteries of social existence, to have grasped all its elements, and with a wisdom that has never been surpassed by Man, combined them in a whole of glorious harmony and perfection. A discoverer of more important truth, in the walks of Science, has never appeared on Earth; and we rejoice in the privilege of making his views known to our fellow-men. But while we are speaking of this lofty genius and noble-hearted man, let us say, that we only profess to teach such parts of his system as are positive and which we understand. There are some of his more speculative views, relating to cosmogony and the future manner of society, for which we do not hold ourselves responsible. But for all that he has revealed to us in regard to the Organization of Industry-for his clear and exhausting analysis of present Society for the mathematical rigor of his demonstrations of the need and advantages of Combination-for the simplicity and beauty of his Social Mechanism-for the grandeur of his views of Human Naturefor his ennobling conceptions of our Destiny on Earth-for the magnificence of his Intellect and the goodness of his Heart-for his strong, abiding, deathless love of the Brother, and intense devotion to the discovery of the will of God-we feel the sincerest admiration, the deepest gratitude. He was the chosen instrument of Divine Mercy, in imparting a New and Grand Science to Humanity.

But we must return to the more immediate subject of our address.

§ IV. OBVIOUS ADVANTAGES OF THIS ORGANIZATION.

This Organization of Industry, then, which we propose, may be described simply as a method of producing concentration and organic unity in all the useful branches of human exertion. That it is no

"visionary scheme," but a rational and indispensable condition of improvement in Society, everybody must confess who will only reflect, for a moment, upon what have been, and must be, the results of combination, applied to the different elements of social life, as enumerated in the preceding section.

In Agriculture, unity of management in a large farming establishment -where capital and intelligence would never be wanting, where the laborers would be properly rewarded for their diligence and skill, where the distribution of crops could be accurately adjusted to the nature and variety of soils, where no part of the hurried and complicated work of the Summer would suffer for want of attention, where substantial granaries would secure the harvest against all the vicissitudes of the seasons and of accident, and where the highest degree of scientific and practical knowledge could be combined in all kinds of cultivation through the concurrence of the experience of many-is so obviously superior in point of produce and economy, to the impoverished and miserable specimens of husbandry which prevail on our small farms, with neither capital, skill, nor labor, subject inevitably to mismanagement, and altogether unable to take advantage of the various properties of the soil, the view needs only to be suggested to a sound mind to be instantly appreciated.

In Manufacturing Industry, the advantages of well-regulated combination would be still more desirable and immense. By concentrating the capital and skill of a whole community-by bringing the different departments of mechanical execution into the closest neighborhood and helpfulness-by introducing the minutest division of labor-by rendering available the largest economies in steam or other power, in machinery, in fuel, in rent, insurance, taxes and space-and, at the same time, by avoiding that pestiferous competition among individuals which withers the energies of workmen, the products of labor could be multiplied to an incredible extent, and with less wear and tear of human muscles and less loss of human sympathy, in a century, than is now expended under the system of separated and competitive establishments in a year. But we are speaking, under this head, of the merely mechanical and productive advantages of unitary combination.

In Commerce, it is hardly necessary to refer to the vast superiority of concentration over separation and antagonism. If we recur to the evils of incoherent commerce, to which we have before alluded to the perplexities and frauds of retail dealing, and to the great positive losses which accrue from every unnecessary multiplication of agents, or needless enlargement of the profits of mere middle-men between Producer and Consumer; and if we remember that all these evils could be avoided in a more compact and concentrated arrangement of the inhabitants of the townships, or by a more direct interchange of commodities between different States, we shall at once see how immeasurably society at large would be the gainer, both as to the amount of its products and as to facility in the modes of their distribution.

It is in Domestic Service that the benefits of combination over isolation display themselves in high degree. Domestic Service, which now requires two-thirds of the human race to supply the mere bodily domes

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