Quotation from: War of the Classes

Written by: Jack London


Nor can it be denied. The evidence is with him. The previous
centuries, and more notably the nineteenth, have marked the rise of
the common man. From chattel slavery to serfdom, and from serfdom
to what he bitterly terms "wage slavery," he has risen. Never was
he so strong as he is today, and never so menacing. He does the
work of the world, and he is beginning to know it. The world cannot
get along without him, and this also he is beginning to know. All
the human knowledge of the past, all the scientific discovery,
governmental experiment, and invention of machinery, have tended to
his advancement. His standard of living is higher. His common
school education would shame princes ten centuries past. His civil
and religious liberty makes him a free man, and his ballot the peer
of his betters. And all this has tended to make him conscious,
conscious of himself, conscious of his class. He looks about him
and questions that ancient law of development. It is cruel and
wrong, he is beginning to declare. It is an anachronism. Let it be
abolished. Why should there be one empty belly in all the world,
when the work of ten men can feed a hundred? What if my brother be
not so strong as I? He has not sinned. Wherefore should he hunger-
-he and his sinless little ones? Away with the old law. There is
food and shelter for all, therefore let all receive food and
shelter.

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