"It is that the Capitalist has found a slave that has
supplanted the labour and ingenuity of man. Once he was an
artizan: at the best, he now only watches machines; and even
that occupation slips from his grasp, to the woman and the
child. The capitalist flourishes, he amasses immense wealth;
we sink, lower and lower; lower than the beasts of burthen;
for they are fed better than we are, cared for more. And it
is just, for according to the present system they are more
precious. And yet they tell us that the interests of Capital
and of Labour are identical.
"If a society that has been created by labour suddenly becomes
independent of it, that society is bound to maintain the race
whose only property is labour, from the proceeds of that
property, which has not ceased to be productive.
"When the class of the Nobility were supplanted in France,
they did not amount in number to one-third of us Hand-Loom
weavers; yet all Europe went to war to avenge their wrongs,
every state subscribed to maintain them in their adversity,
and when they were restored to their own country, their own
land supplied them with an immense indemnity. Who cares for
us? Yet we have lost our estates.
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