QUESTION

Karl Marx (1818-1883), is the acknowledged founder of
present-day Socialism, the species called democratic; and his
work on Capital can be taken for a fair exposition of its
tenets. It condemns the present condition of society as de-
plorable and unjust. It is deplorable, because in business
everybody does as he likes, trusts capture the wealth of the
world, capital practically destroys competition, and mankind
goes into two armies, the classes and the masses, captains of
industry and the proletariat, or capitalists and slaves to cap-
italists. It is unjust, because capital enriches itself by taking
unfair advantage of labor, monopolizing such channels of
wealth as land, factories, mines, railways, and seizing every
opportunity to rob the masses of the fruit of their labor.
