Swarajya, December 17, 1960
The falsehood assiduously and almost successfully spread that capitalists and, therefore, capital are enemies of the people must be cleared, if we desire true progress and happiness. The short lived pleasure that arises from the successful operations issuing out of hatred and jealousy is not happiness or a step towards progress. It is really suicidal.
Capital is that portion of wealth which is applied to the production of more wealth, as seed grain is that portion of the harvest, which is kept and applied to the production of more grain. A good farmer knows the value of good seed grain. A good statesman ought to know the value of capital. Anything done to discourage the building up of capital is a suicidal policy.
The socialist attack on capital will result in national loss, and the drive towards equality will prove to be a drive towards suicide. It destroys the real source of progress, viz., individual incentive, initiative and enterprise.
All dictators fly the socialist flag. They tell people in their shrill tones that socialism is people’s welfare, and that their mission is to establish general happiness through socialism. It takes a great deal of courage and sacrifice to oppose this, especially when a start is given to the demagogues and they are entrenched in power.
The falsehood assiduously and almost successfully spread that capitalists and, therefore, capital are enemies of the people must be cleared, if we desire true progress and happiness. The short lived pleasure that arises from the successful operations issuing out of hatred and jealousy is not happiness or a step towards progress. It is really suicidal.
Capital is that portion of wealth which is applied to the production of more wealth, as seed grain is that portion of the harvest, which is kept and applied to the production of more grain. A good farmer knows the value of good seed grain. A good statesman ought to know the value of capital. Anything done to discourage the building up of capital is a suicidal policy. It may be pleasant to eat up the seed grain, be it one’s own or another’s accumulation, taken in force or by the use of the power of the State. The pleasure derived from consuming the grain robbed from another is as transient as it is illegal. What follows is permanent privation. The socialist attack on capital will result in national loss and the drive towards equality will prove to be a drive towards suicide. When people are enslaved or oppressed, a so-called ‘national purpose’ may be cultivated. But when a nation is civilized and free, the policy of forcing energies into a single channel giving it the name of a national purpose is a technique employed by tyrants and totalitarian demagogues. It destroys the real source of progress, viz., individual incentive, initiative and enterprise. The ambition of dictators is unquenchable. Like fire it feeds on itself. They pretend to know the national purpose better than the nation itself, and give that name to their own mad follies and ambitions. By reiteration and fraud they make the people imagine that it is their purpose. Thus do dictators (and they are of various types) kill individual initiative and enslave people before leading them to ruin.
All dictators fly the socialist flag. They tell people in their shrill tones that socialism is people’s welfare, and that their mission is to establish general happiness through socialism. Fundamental rights, they declare, should be violated in order to achieve the national purpose. Anyone who protests is dubbed by them an enemy of social welfare, and in order to suppress arguments, they take power to suppress people.
It takes a great deal of courage and sacrifice to oppose this, especially when a start is given to the demagogues and they are entrenched in power. But there is no way to save the nation from enslavement and ruin except by firm resistance and the education of the people to reject the fraud, and deprive the demagogues of their power.
