Of the great social changes which resulted from the discovery of the
Indestructibility of Life.
When this period of the acquaintance of everyone with everyone else had
been reached, very little time intervened before a completely
socialistic system was established all over the world. In fact it soon
became obvious to all that private property had now become a clumsy
incumbrance. The substitution of socialism was greatly facilitated by
the extreme ease with which all the necessaries, and most of the
luxuries, of life were procurable. This was partly due to the favourable
climatic and other conditions of the planet, and partly to the
extraordinary progress which had been made in the physical sciences in
general, and in chemistry in particular. The universal abundance of
vegetable life has been already noticed, and also the absence of all
noxious and destructive types of the animal kingdom. Food, in the shape
of esculent fruits, grew everywhere and in superfluous abundance; and,
for all who tired of these, a perfect equivalent for the flesh of
animals was readily available.
Hesperian chemists had, long before this, completely solved the problem,
which still baffles their terrestrial brethren, of the artificial
formation of organic compounds from their ultimate elements. For
instance, the seeming roast-beef with which I was regaled on my first
morning in Lucetta, had just before been manufactured from some carbon,
azote, and water, with a very small admixture of fluorine and potassium,
without interfering with and inconveniencing any animal whatever. All
the purveyors of provisions were good chemists. It is true that, some
thousands of years earlier, the Hesperians were in the habit of using
animal food, but the practice has been for ages abandoned, and is now
regarded with abhorrence. Milk and butter and eggs are also manufactured
with equal ease, and of singular excellence, out of similar materials.
So much for the supply of food. As for their clothing, it is exceedingly
simple, and is made exclusively from vegetable products. It is worn,
indeed, merely as a protection from heat or cold; for the notion of
there being anything indecorous in appearing in a state of nudity has no
existence in the Hesperian mind. Thus, the two great leading wants being
easily supplied, the population being all personally known to each
other, and a due consideration for the wishes of their neighbours being
universally recognized as a ground of moral obligation—engrained as this
had been into the disposition of each through ages of exercise—the
establishment of a perfect socialistic system was easily accomplished.
The state of society which, at the time of my visit, prevailed over the
whole planet, was one which could not have existed under less favourable
conditions of life. It was not based on the chimerical theory that
everybody is supposed to sacrifice himself for everybody else; and thus
unite in each person the incongruous characters of a greedy baby and a
self-denying saint—selfishly and unscrupulously taking from others the
fruits of their labour, while unselfishly yielding up whatever he has
earned by his own hard work. Far from it: the Hesperian system was
founded on the fair and rational doctrine of give and take, honestly
carried out. No one was afflicted with an inscrutable desire of
thrusting a ‘happiness’ on his neighbour which he, for himself,
repudiated with scorn. The gifts of nature were so very liberal that a
small amount of daily labour on the part of each person sufficed to
discharge his debt to the society; and this amount was, by everyone,
regarded as a rigorous debt of honour, never to be shirked or evaded in
any way.
In the appointment of this prescribed quantity, it was a recognized
maxim in practice that, whenever it was possible, the inclination of the
labourer should be consulted. Special commissioners entrusted with this
task were from time to time appointed in each town and district. The
work proceeded with great smoothness. Everyone was anxious to do his
share honestly. There were none of those idle scamps whose only object
is to loaf around in idleness at the expense of their neighbours, and
whose existence elsewhere renders every form of socialism an
impossibility, except under a system of espionage so rigorous as to
render life an intolerable burden. Everyone, by this time, being quite
competent for the work of every skilled trade or calling, exchanges of
allotted tasks were easily effected. The more irksome the labour, the
shorter was the time required from the labourer. Sometimes it would
happen that a man or woman would prefer, instead of working for a short
time each day, to execute a long task by continuous labour, so as to
have leisure afterwards for some special pursuit; this also was a matter
easily arranged.
This organization of labour was not nearly so complicated a business as
such a task would be if attempted on the earth, even if we were to
assume that the average terrestrial character was as well-conditioned as
that of the Hesperians. For it is plain that, under the Hesperian
conditions of life, the number of separate callings and professions is
comparatively small. A world where there are no children has no need for
the vast machinery of education; the great army of schoolmasters,
tutors, and professors is non-existent. The absence of death leaves no
place for the undertaker and his ghastly satellites. There are no
clergy, for there is no known God.
Medical science is, as has been already noticed, in a very strange
condition, or rather is non-existent. Dissection of the vital parts of
the body being impossible, the physician is indebted to the analogy of
the lower animals for his hypotheses as to the structure of the rational
being. Fortunately, diseases are unknown.
As for surgery, a singular revolution in its practice was an immediate
result of the discovery of the real nature of evanescence. In the
earlier ages, before the weariness of life had set in to any great
extent, the occurrence of any grave bodily lesion, which, though not
fatal, was sufficient to involve a serious mutilation, or the entire
loss of organs of perception, was a calamity so great that the
inhabitants of the earth, confined as they are to one short bodily life,
would find it hard, even in imagination, to realize its severity. In
spite of all precautions such accidents sometimes took place, and the
unhappy sufferers, reluctant to surrender their whole existence, would
often consent to undergo operations which had the effect of leaving them
to abide for ever as helpless, mutilated trunks. So the Hesperian
surgeons were skilful amputators of limbs, and they could, and often
did, perform other serious operations for the purpose of preserving the
patient from evanescence. Still their success was but small, for the
wretched condition of the sufferer usually led to the extinction of his
life under the metronomic law of Adverse Balance—evanescence, in fact,
was only postponed.
But, as the world-weariness gained ground, few were found who were
willing to purchase life at so heavy a price. And finally, when the true
nature of evanescence was understood, all operations except those of the
most trifling character ceased at once. Whenever a serious accident
takes place, an anæsthetic sufficiently powerful to destroy life is
administered, and the patient awakes immediately, with his organism
restored, at the South Pole.
The complete establishment of the communistic system also contributed to
the simplicity of the social arrangements in the planet; inasmuch as all
the multifarious professions which are incidental to the tenure of
private property collapsed at once. There was no further need for
lawyers, attorneys, bankers, stockbrokers—still less for
stock-jobbers—and the great multitude formerly required to serve as
policemen, coast-guards, and excisemen, were now at liberty for more
directly useful occupations.