Socialism then does not stand to-day for Communism. On the contrary, it demands that the workers be assured, as exactly as is humanly possible, the product of their labor, and not share it with the idle and vicious on the one hand or be deprived of it by the capitalist on the other.
One reason why Communism has been discarded by the Socialist party is that generations of competition have so molded human nature that it is extremely probable that production would suffer were it suddenly eliminated. A man who has accustomed himself to the stimulus of arsenic cannot be suddenly deprived of arsenic without developing the symptoms of arsenical poisoning. It will doubtless be indispensable to maintain competition in the coöperative commonwealth. There is no longer question then of discarding competition; the question is in what doses shall it be administered; in doses that produce the pauperism and prostitution of to-day, or in doses that will furnish the necessary stimulus for human exertion without pushing that stimulus to exhaustion and degeneracy?
This question brings us to our next subject:
§ 3. SOCIALISM WILL NOT SUPPRESS COMPETITION
No modern Socialist maintains that all competition is bad, or that it would be advisable to eliminate competition altogether from production and distribution. But it has become the duty of every sane man to consider whether it may not be possible to eliminate the excessive competition that gives rise to pauperism, prostitution, and crime. To answer this question, we must begin by determining what competition is good and what bad; and if the bad can be eliminated and the good maintained.
Competition is a part of the joy of life; healthy children race one another as they are let out from school; they challenge one another to wrestle and leap; and when they are tired of emulation, they join hands and dance. Competition and coöperation are the salt and the sweet of life; we want the one with our meat and the other with our pudding; we do not want all salt or all sweet; for too much sweet cloys the mouth while too much salt embitters it.
We all unconsciously recognize this by encouraging games and discouraging gambling. Now what is the difference between games and gambling? One is a wholesome use of time for the purpose of wholesome amusement; the other is an unwholesome abuse of time for the purpose of making money. The one incidentally encourages a beneficial action of muscle and brain; the other, on the contrary, promotes a detrimental appetite for unlawful profit.