This eighteenth-century modern plan specifically makes provision for certain untoward rights, perquisites and disabilities which have, in the course of time and shifting circumstance, become incompatible with continued peace on earth and good-will among men.
There are two main counts included in this modern --
eighteenth-century -- plan, which appear unremittingly to make for discomfort and dissension under the conditions offered by the New Order of things: -- National Ambition, and the Vested Rights of ownership. Neither of the two need be condemned as being intrinsically mischievous. Indeed, it may be true, as has often been argued, that both have served a good purpose in their due time and place; at least there is no need of arguing the contrary. Both belong in the settled order of civilised life; and both alike are countenanced by those principles of truth, equity and validity that go to make up the modern point of view. It is only that now, as things have been turning during the later one hundred years, both of these immemorially modern rights of man have come to yield a net return of hardship and ill-will for all those peoples who have bound up their fortunes with that kind of enterprise. The case might be stated to this effect, that the fault lies not in the nature of these untoward institutions of national sovereignty and vested rights, nor in those principles of self-help which underlie them, but only in those latter-day facts which stubbornly refuse to fall into such lines as these forms of human enterprise require for their perfect and beneficent working. The facts, particularly the facts of industry and science, have outrun these provisions of law and custom; and so the scheme of things has got out of joint by that much, through no inherent weakness in the underlying principles of law and custom. The ancient and honorable principles of self-help are as sound as ever; it is only that the facts have quite unwarrantably not remained the same. The fault lies in the latter-day facts, which have not continued in suitable shape.
Such, in effect, has been the view habitually spoken for by many thoughtful persons of a conservative turn, who take an interest in concerting measures for holding fast that which once was good, in the face of distasteful facts.
The vested right of ownership in all kinds of property has the sanction of the time-honored principles of individual self-direction, equal opportunity, free contract, security of earnings and belongings, self-help, in the simple and honest meaning of the word. It would be quite bootless to find fault with these reasonable principles of tolerance and security. Their definitive acceptance and stabilisation in the eighteenth century are among the illustrious achievements of Western civilisation;
and their roots lie deep in the native wisdom of mankind. They are obvious corollaries under the rule of Live and let live, --
an Accidental version of the Golden Rule. Yet in practical effect those vested rights which rest blamelessly on these reasonable canons of tolerance and good faith have today become the focus of vexation and misery in the life of the civilised peoples.
Circumstances have changed to such effect that provisions which were once framed to uphold a system of neighborly good-will have now begun to run counter to one another and are working mischief to the common good.
Any impartial survey of the past one-hundred-fifty years will show that the constituent principles of this modern point of view governing the mutual rights and obligations of men within the civilised nations have held their ground, on the whole, without material net gain or net loss. It is the ground of Natural Rights, of self-help and free bargaining. Civil rights and the perquisites and obligations of ownership have remained substantially intact over this interval of a hundred and fifty years, but with some slight advance in the way of Live and let live at certain points, and some slight retrenchment at other points. So far as regards the formal stipulations, in law and custom, the balance of class interests within these countries has, on the whole, not been seriously disturbed. In this system of Natural Rights, as it has worked out in practice, the rights of ownership are paramount; largely because the other personal rights in the case have come to be a matter of course and so have ceased to hold men's attention.
So, in the matter of the franchise, e.g., the legal provisions more nearly meet the popular ideals of the modern point of view today than ever before. An the other hand the guiding principles in the case at certain other points have undergone a certain refinement of interpretation with a view to greater ease and security for trade and investment; and there has, in effect, been some slight abridgement of the freedom of combination and concerted action at any point where an unguarded exercise of such freedom would hamper trade or curtail the profits of business, -- for the modern era has turned out to be an era of business enterprise, dominated by the paramount claims of trade and investment. In point of formal requirements, these restrictions imposed on concerted action "in restraint of trade"
