~-~

The Religion
of Capital
By Paul Lafargue

A Satirical Exposure
of Capitals Claims
to Sanctity

Published by the
NEW YORK LABOR NEWS
PRICE
COMPANY
FIVE
45 ROSE STREET
CENT8
New York City
1918

--
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upon the capitalist clasv for a chance to earn a
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THE RI&T TO WORK

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is needed, and what tactics should be -putsued to
end the serf-like conditions in the snops and in-
dustrial plants of the United States is pointed out
and explained in

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 THE LONDON CONGRESS
The progress of Socialism is to such an extent disturbing
the peace of mind of the property-holding classes on both
sides of the Atlantic that during the coronation ceremonies
a large number of capitalists, together with their helpers,
gathered from all nations in a Congress at London, to de-
liberate upon the best means whereby to check the ominous
growth of Socialism.
Prominent among the representatives of the British
capitalist class were Premier Balfonr, Lord Roseberp, Joa-
eph Chamberlain and Rothschild. Emperor William couid
not, come in person, but he was represented by his brother,
Prince Henry, who, together with the an&Semite Ahl-
wardt and the pro-Semite Bleichroeder, Eugene Richter,
and many other German prominenciee, represented the
Empire. France, bustria, Spain, Russia and all the other
continental nations also had full delegations.
Strongest of all, however, was the representation of the
capitalist class of the TTnited States. Among the official
nrominencies were the Republican Judge Brewer of the
United States Supreme Court, and the Democratic Judge
Barrett of the Sew York Supreme Court: Judges Ricks,
Taft and Billings; Whitelaw Reid and Perry Belmont,
Thomas C. Platt, the Republican. and William C. Whit-
ney, the Democratic boss ; Mark Hanna, Tom L. Johnson,
Prof. George Gunton and Carroll D. Wright. Then there
were several members of the Vanderbilt family, J. Pier-
pont Morgan, John D. Rockefeller, John Wanamaker,
George Gould and Chauncey M. Depew. Besides these,
quite a number of gentlemen of the cloth thronged the
aisles : The Rev. Morgan Dix of the New York Trinity
Church and the Rev. J. Minot Savage conspicuous among
them. There were also Prof. Felix Adler, Prof. George D.
Herr-on, Hugh 0. Pentecost, President Rarper of Chicago
 5! THE RELIGIOS OF CAPITAL.

University, President Eliot and Prof Peabody of Harvard,

Prof. E. R. A. Seligman of Columbia and numerous other
minor professional luminaries. Last and not least in the
assemblage were Samuel Gompers, John Mitchell and
other of Senator Hannas labor lieutenants.
Never before had the spectacle been seen of so many
people, entertaining what is generally imagined to be hos-
tile and irreconcilable views, gathered from such different
points of the compass shaking hands as friends. The
Rev. J. Minot Savage tapped Hugh 0. Pentecost familiarly
on the shoulder; Lord Rosebery and Chamberlain chatted
pleasantly together; Carroll D. Wright and Prof. Gun-
ton were splitting their sides over some statistical tables
recently published by themselves ; William C. Whitney and
Thomas C. Platt entertained each other with humorous
incidents of their respective political parties ; Ahlwardt
and the Jewish capitalist Bleichroeder treated each other
* to anecdotes ; the Rev. Morgan Dix, who was engaged In
the pleasant pastime of footing up the rentals drawn by
the Trinity Church Corporation through the gambling
dens, tenement houses, grog shops and houses of prostitu-
tion located on its estate, was noticed not to mind being
disturbed by Prof. Felix Adler, with whom he soon fell to
laughing and joking. The cause that had brought all these
people together suppressed their personal animosities,
hushed their national antipathies, and established a com-
mon bond among all.
The Rev. Morgan Dix opened the deliberations with this
allocution to the body:
Man is governed by both spiritual and physical forces.
Uatil recently, the thing that we called religion was the
mystic force that swayed the minds of men; it enjoined
submission from the workers; it taught, and managed to
induce them to give up the-substance for the shadow; to
forget their earthly misery in dreams of a heavenly happi-
ness. But Socialism, this evil spirit of modern days, an-
nounces that it will establish paradise on earth, and instills
i the desire of enjoying life on this, instead of on the other
 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL. 2

side of the grave. With its pestiferous voice, Socialism

shouts into the ears of the wage-workers: You are being
robbed ; rise and free yourselves ! It is by these means
slowly making the once submissive and patient workiq
people ripe for rebellion, to the end of putting aside the
privileged classes, taking their wealth from the rich and
giving it to the poor, overthrowing religion, disbanding the
family, destroying art and sciences and reintroducing bar-
barism on earth. How is this enemy of civilization and
progress to be fought? What are the weapons we should
take up against Socialism ? Prince Bismarck, once the
arbiter of Europe, the modern Nebuchadnezzar, who ovcr-
ran Denmark, Austria and France, was overcome by a lot
of Socialist. shoemakers and tailors. The French conser-
vatives massacred; in 1848 and 1871: thousands upon
thousands of Socialists and turned Paris into a mammoth
shambles, but out of the blood of those wholesale butcheries
Socialism has since sprung up in all countries. After
every slaughter, Socialism rises with increased strength.
This monster has withstood the test of brute force. What
is to be done ?
Thereupon, one after another, the philosophers and free-
thinkers present rose and proposed, in elaborate addresses,
that Socialism be curbed by science.
The Rev. J. Rlinot Savage and his friends tried to listen
to these proposals with composure, but one of them could
finally not contain himself, and exclaimed impatientlv:
It is your accursed science that furnishes Socialism with
its most trenchant arguments.
You are ignorant of the natural philosophy that we
teach, retorted one of the followers of Herbert Spencer.
Our theory of evolution teaches that the low social status
of the working class is the inevitable result of the laws of
nature ; and that the privileged members of the upper
classes will evolute into higher and higher beings until
they shall have formed a new race. The people of that
race will resemble in nothing the beasts in human form
4 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL.

of the lower classes, who are not to be ruled, except whip

in hand.
God forfend, broke in another clerical gentleman,
that that theory of evolution of yours should ever reach
the ears of the working class; it would set them wild ; It
would drive them to desperation, from which popular up-
risings always spring up. You must be very simple-minded
if you flatter yourself with the notion that your mislead-
ing science could stem Socialism, a movement that holds
out to the working people the prospect of wealth for all,
and of the fullest physical and mental development of the
individual. If we are to remain a privileged class, and
continue to live at the expense of the working people, we
shall haveto coddle their imagination, and while we clip
the wool off these human sheep, entertain them with some
nursery tales of future happiness. But you, free-thinkers,
are pIayed out; you have stripped yourselves of the power
to do this.
Not at all ! interjected Prof. Felix Adler: You
should be more analytic in your observations. If you say
some free-thinkers have stripped themselves of the power
to coddle the people while fleecing them, you would be
right; but all of us have not taken KJ indiscreet a stand.
There are many free-thinkers, those of the ethical nomen-
clature, who have pre-eminently qualified themselves for
that difficult yet important work. We the Ethices--
capitaIist free-thinkers of the ethical schooLhave set
up the dogma that character must be improved before
improving the material condition of the people. This
dogma qualifies our system and us pre-eminently for the
task of curbing Socialism-a movement that is equipped
with the very strongest educational power, and whose dis-
tinguishing characteristic is to use these powers with won-
derful effect for the enlightenment of the people ; a move-
ment that, while it kindles the very highest and noblest
aspirations, correctly showsthat, to make the-sepossiblefor
the masses,their material condition must be first changed,
and then proceedsto point out with unerring precision the
 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL. 5

only practical methods to change these material conditions,

and to introduce the prerequisites for the popular eleva-
tion of character.
It is undeniable that character, in the masses, id af-
fected by their material condition, not their material
condition by their character. Now then, by our preach-
ing the opposite doct.rine, by our exhortmg the peo-
ple to try and change their character first-matters
not how free-thinking or atheistic we may be-we take
the wind out of the sails of Socialism; we appear in
the light of great moralists and great apostles of educa-
tion ourselves, and as, furthermore, we present our doc-
trine in all the trappings of metaphysical learning, we
mystify our hearers-a great point for success in our com-
mon endeavor. You have no idea how many people can
be fooled in that way.
By reason of all this we, the Ethices, are best calcu-
lated to put a spoke in the wheels of Socialism, and pre-
serve our class privileges. Socialism is a tremendous edu-
cator-we strike the attitude of educators par excellence,
and nullify all the sense there is in education by carrying
it to the point of sublimated abstractness ; we seem to
agree with the final aim of Socialism-yet in our practice
we act contrariwise, by retarding the practical methods
to that end ; we seem to wish to move away from present
conditions, which we affect to condemn, and on the con-
demnation of which we bestow our prettiest phrases-yet
we induce the people to busy and wear themselves out with
profitless, petty and hopeless methods of reform ; we point
to the pinnacle of morality and freedom lighted by Social-
ism, and which we pretend to wish to reach-yet we urge
the people up tortuous and inaccessible paths where they
are sure to lose themselves amid brambles and brakes. For
turning a movement awry, there is nothing comparable
with seeming its friend, taking its lead, and then leading
it into the ground.
You theologians, churchianists-circumcised and uncir-
cumcised-cannot fill this mission because you deny the
0 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL.

possibility of happiness on earth and commend submission

to misery-the people have outgrown that, they will none
of it. You, Spencerian free-thinkers and atheists, cannot
fill that mission, because you do violence to the self-esteem
and self-respect of the working classes, by claiming they
are doomed to the fate of brutes-the people are too en-
lightened for that, they will none of it. Only we, the
Ethices, capitalist free-thinkers of the ethical nomencla-
ture, we alone can fill the desired mission ; we combine the
good points that there is in both of you and are free from
the bad points of which you both suffer; we admit the pos-
sibility of happiness on earth, thereby getting the people
on our side, and then we render that possibility an impos-
sibility by striving for it falsely; we deny the inevitable
brutalization of the working classes, thereby winning their
hearts, and then render their brutalization certain and
swift by falsely striving to prevent it. The ethical cul-
ture scheme is the scheme of schemes.
The war of words between the theologians and the phil-
osophers, joined in bv the free-thinkers, went on in this
wise for a considerable time, and began to threaten a split,
when the disputants were reminded by the Rev. Morgan
Dix that they had met, not to discuss articles of faith, but
to deliberate over the threatened social danger. Order
being restored, the notorious Statistician Mallock rose from
among a group of capitalists-Vanderbilts, Goulds, Roth-
schilds and others-who had all this while kept silent and
looked on at the quarrel between the clericals and the phil-
osophers. All eyes were immediately turned to Statis-
tician Mallock, and he addressed the assemblage in an im-
pressive tone. He said:
We need religion to curb the masses. But what re-
ligion? It must be a new religion. Now, then, the only
religion that answers the requirements of our days is the
Religion of Capita.1. Capital is the true, only and omni-
potent God. He manifests Himself in everything. He is
found in glittering gold and in stinking guano ; in a herd
of cattle and in a cargo of coffee; in brilliant stores that
 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL. 1

offer sacred literature for sale and in obscure booths of

lewd pictures; in gigantic machines, made of hardest steel,
and in elegant rubber goods. He is everywhere. Cap&M
is the God whom the whole world knows, sees, smells,
tastes. He is sensible to all our senses. He is the only
God that has not yet run against an atheist. The Priest
Solomon worshipped him after everything else seemed
vanity to him ; the Philosopher Schopenhauer was greatly
drawn to Him even after he was disappointed in everythiqg
else ; Herbert Spencer, in the midst of all his philosophic
perplexities, was not perplexed about that subject ; and Bob
Ingersoll, who mocked everything else, mocked not Him
A violent applause from Gould, Baring, the Vanderbilts,
Joseph Chamberlain, Carroll D. Wright and all the circum-
cised Christians and uncircumcised Jews of the intern& 1
tional brotherhood of gold, interrupted the speaker ;a%?&is
point. Mallock is right ! Capital is God, %iheonly
living God ! they shouted tumultuously. After the en-
thuslasm had subsided, Statistician Mallock proceeded:
To some He announcesHis presencein an awful man-
ner, to others tenderly, as a loving mother. When Capital
visits a country, it is as if a hurricane had Broken loose,
that tears down and destroys everything that &a&s in Hia
way-men, animals, the quick and the dead. When Euro-
pean Capital let Himself down in Egypt, He seized the
Fellahs with their beastsof burden, their wagons and their
prongs, as so many bladesof grass, and carried them off to
the Isthmus of Suez; with His iron hand He bent them
under the yoke of servitude; and there, scorched by the
sun, worried with hunger and thirst, attacked by fever, the
bonesof 30,000 of those beings whitened the banks of the
canal. Capital seizes upon free and healthy, strong and
happy people and immures them by the hundreds of thou-
sandsin the mills, the factories and the mines. There He
pumps out their blood ; when He lets them go again, they
are prematurely old, scrofulous, anaemic, consumptive.
The imagination of man has never yet been able to con-
ceive a more fearful, cruel and pitiless,God when enraged.
2* THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL.

And again, how loving, tender and considerate is He not

towards his chosen ones! For the well-beloved of Capital
fhe earth cannot produce too many good things Every
, day He invents new pleasures for them ; He produces new
species of flowers and fruits ; He brings forth new dishes
to stimulate their cloyed palates. Animate and inanimate
nature-everything-He hands over to them.
1 At the conclusion of this speech the whole assemblage
rose to its feet; even the clericals, the philosophers and
the free-thinkers were carried away. The applause was
unanimous and terrific : and above the din were heard these
disjointed exclamations, each of which produced new
rounds of applause, and more vociferous shouts of &ppro-
bation :
Capital is God !
He knows no political boundaries nor nationalities ; no
race nor sex ; He is the international God, the God of us
all !
He will subject the children of man to His law !
Away with all former religions, let us forget all the
dissensions they fomented !
We are one under the religion of Capital! etc., etc.
It was long before the turmoil and emotions evoked
by Statistician Mallocks new Revelation had sufficiently
subsided to enable the deliberations to proceed. Having
finally shouted itself hoarse, and exhausted itself with the
beating of hands, the Congress relapsed into quiet. Unani-
mity of aim being established, the rest was smooth sailing.
A Committee was appointed, composed of one representa-
tive from each nationality, to draw up the dogmas of the
new creed-The Religion of Capital-and report to the
Congress, which then adjourned to meet ten days later, in
order to give the Committee ample time to do its work
thoroughly.
The Congress adopted, when it re-assembled, the re- ,
port of the Committee, which consisted of a very complete
religious system, with its dogmas, catechism, prayers, in-
vocations and litanies. These are, however, kept so secret :
 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL. 9
that they are hard to get at. Nevertheless, I have sue-
ceeded in securing some fragments, and hereby submit
them to the public.

A C;1TECIIISM.
That Is to Say, An Instruction, to be Inculcated in the
Working People from Early Life.

Question.
Q. Fhat is your name?
A. Wagelvorker.
Q. \Tho are thy parents?
.4. My father was called Wageworker; my mothers
name is Poverty.
Q. Vhere wast thou born?
il. In a garret untlcr the roof of a tenement housewhich
my father and his comradesbuilt.
Q. Khat is thy religion?
d. The I?eligion of CAPITAL.
Q. What general duties does thy religion enjoin upon
thee ?
A. Two principally: first, the duty of Abnegation;
second, the duty of Toil. Xv religion commands me to
abdicate my rights to all property on earth, that common
mother of us all, to the treasures she bears in her womb.
to the product of her surface, to her wonderful fertilitv
through the light and the heat of the sun; it commands
me to abdicate my rights of property in the product of
the labor of mv hands and my brain. My religion com-
mands me to toil from early childhood to mv dying day-
to toil by sun light, gas light, or electric light, by day and
by night; to toil on the earth, under the earth. and in the
waters that are under the earth; to toil everywhere and
evermore.
Q. Does thy religion lay upon thee any other duties?
A. It lays upon me the further duty of self-denial and
 10 THE RElLIGJOS OF CAPITAL.
privation ; to still my hunger only partially ; to pinch all
my physical wants; and to suppressall my mental aspira-
tions.
Q. Does thy religion forbid thee to taste of certain
articles of food?
A. It forbids me to touch game, poultry and meat un-
less they arc of fourth rate quality, and it forbids me to
taste at all the better qualities of fish, wine or milk.
Q. What food does it aIlow thee?
A. Bread, potatoes, beans, herrings, the refuse of the
butcher shops and also sausages. To the end that I may
stimulate my exhausted strength, it also allows me adul-
terated wines, beer and similar liquors.
Q. What duties does thy religion lay upon thee wit11
regard to thyself?
A. To retrench my expenses, to live in narrow and
spare rooms, to wear torn, tattered and patched up clothes,
until they actually fall off my body in shreds. To go
about out at toes and heels and without stockings, exposed
to the wet and the soilure of the streets and roads.
Q. What duties does thy religion lay upon thee with
regard to thy family ?
A. To deny my wife and daughters all ornaments of
elegance and good taste ; to cause them to be dressedin
rude materials and with barely enough to escape being
hauled up by the police for indecent exposure. To teach
them not to shiver in the winter in calicos, and not to
smother in the summer in close or topfloor rooms, under
tin roofs heated with the heat of the Dog Days. To in-
culcate in my littlc ones. from their tenderest years, the
sacred principle of toil, to the end that they may be able
to earn their living from earlp childhood, and not become
a burden upon society: to teach them to go to bed without
a light and supperless: and to accustom them to the
misery that is their lot in life.
Q. What duties doesthy religion lay UPOL thee with re-
gard to society ?
A. To increase the national weaIth-first through my
it
 THE RELIGIOX OF CAPITAL. 11

toil, and next through ,my savings as soon as I can make

any.
Q. What does thy religion order thee to do with thy
savings ?
il. To entrust them to the savings banks and such
other institutions that have been established by philan-
thropic financiers, to the end that they may loan them
out to our bosses. We are commanded to place our earn-
ings at all times at the disposal of our masters.
Q. Does thy religion allow thee to touch thy savings ?
A. As rarely as possible; but it recommends to us not
to insist too strongly upon receiving our funds back; we
arc told we should patiently submit to our fate if the
philanthropic financiers are unable to meet our demands,
and inform us that our savings have gone up in smoke.
Q. Who is thy God ?
A. CAPITAL.
Q. Has He existed since the beginning of time ?
A. Our most learned high priests, the official political
economists, say He exists since the creation of the world.
At first, however, He was very little, hence His throne
was usurped by Jupiter and other Gods. But since about
the year 1500, He grew daily into power and glory, and
to-day He rules the world according to His will.
0. Js thy God omnipotent?
A. Yes. His grace can grant any and all enjoyments.
When He turns His Countenance from a person, a family.
a country, they are smitten with misery. The power of
the God CAPITAL increases with the increase of His bulk.
Daily does He conquer new countries; daily does He en-
large the swarms of His vassals, who devote their lives to
the mission of increasing His power.
Q. Who are the chosen ones of thv God ?
A. The Capitalists-manufacturers, merchants and
landlords.
Q. How does thy God reward thee ?
A. By furnishing work to me, my wife and my chil-
dren. down to the youngest.
12 THE RELIGIOX CW CAPITSL.

Q. Is that thy only reward ?

A. No. Our God allows us to help still our hunger,
by looking through the large pier glass windows of stylish
restaurants, devour with our eyes the delightful roasts and
delicacies that we have never tasted and never will taste,
becausethese viands are there only for the nourishment of
the chosen ones and their high priests. Out of His kind-
ness we are also allowed to warm our limbs, numb with
cold, by affording us occasional opportunities to admire
the soft fur and .the thick-spun woolen cloths exhibited m
large stores and intended for the comfort of the chosen
ones and their high priests only. He also grants us the
exquisite joy of regaling our eyes, on the streets and public
resorts, with the sight of the sacred crowds of Capitahsts
and Landlords, to admire their sleeknessand roundness,
together with their gorgeously decked lackeys and foot-
men asthey drive by in brilliant equipages.
Q. Are the chosenones of the samerace as thyself?
A. The manufacturers and landlords are kneaded out
of the sameclay as myself, but they have been chosenout
of thousands and millions.
Q. What have they done to deservethis elevation?
A. Nothing. Our God manifests His omnipotence by
bestowing His favors upon those who have not earned
them.
Q. Then is thy God unjust?
A. CAPITAL is the incarnation of Justice ; only, His
justice passeth our understanding. CAPITAL is omnipo-
tent. Were He compelled to bestow His grace upon those
who earned it, He would be weakened, becausethen His
power would have limits. Consequently, He can show His
power in no stronger way than by picking His favorites
from among pickpockets and idlers.
0. How does thy God punish thee ?
A. By sentencing me to idleness. From that moment *
I am ex-communicated; I then know not where to find
food, or where to lay myself down. From that moment I
and mine must perish with hunger and want.
 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL. 13

Q. What are the sins that call this punishment upon

thy head ?
A. None. CAPITAL throws me out of work whenever
it pleases Him.
Q. What prayers does thy religion commend to thee ?
A. I pray not with words. My prayer is LABOR. The
bare utterance of any other prayer would interfere with my
actual prayer-Lanoa. This is the only prayer that profits,
because it is the only one that pleases CAPITAL and that
produces surplus values.
Q. Where do you pray ?
A. Everywhere. On the fields and in the work-shops ;
in mills and mines ; ashore and at sea. To the end that
our prayer be granted, we are in duty bound to lay our
freedom, our dignity, our will at the feet of CAPITAL. At
the ringing of the bell, at the whistling of the machine,
we must hasten to congregate, and, once engaged in prayer,
set our arms and legs, hands and feet in motion like auta-
mata, we must grunt and swear, we must strain our
muscles and exhaust our nerves. At our prayer meetings
we must submit with humble mien and patiently to the ilI-
temper and insults of the boss and his foremen; they are
always right. We must never utter a complaint if the
boss lowers our wages and raises our hours of work ; every-
thing he does is right, and is done for our best. We must
consider it an honor if the boss takes undue liberties with
our wives and daughters. Rather than ever to allow a
complaint to escape our lips, rather than ever to allow our
blood to boil, rather than ever to think of striking, we
should submit to all trials, swallow our bread moistened
with our own spittle only, and drink dirtv water to wash
that down. Should we be impertinent enough to dare find
fault with such treatment, then would our masters scourge
us with the prisons and penitentiaries, sharp-cutting sabres,
repeating rifles, cannons, policemens clubs and even the
gxllo~s. They would clap us behind the bars if we wern
to grumble; they would now us down if we were to do
14 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL.

aught that is contrary to the decrees of the laws which

they have enacted and promulgated.
&. Do you expect any reward after death?
A. A very great one. After I am dead CAPITAL al-
lows me to lie down and rest; I am then freed from hun-
ger and cold, and from the fear of what forevermore. I
then enjoy the eternal peace of the GRAVE.

THE CAPITALISTS BREVIARY.

The Nature of the God Capital.

1. Hearken unto the words of CAPITAL, thy God.

2. I am the man-eating God ; I seat myself at the table
in the mills, factories, mines and yards, and feed upon
workingmen. I transform their substance into godly
CAPITAL. I am the Unsolvable Riddle. My substanceis
eternal, and yet it rests upon perishable flesh; my strength
is derived from human weakness. The inert force of
CAPITAL is the life-force of the workingman.
3. I am the Immeasurable Spirit of the civilized
world; my body has innumerable forms and is manifold.
I live in and pervade everything that is bought and sold.
I am active in every article of merchandise; none has,
besidesme, any separate existence.
4. I shine m gold and stink in dung; I ferment in wine
and am poison in vitriol. I live in everything.
5. Man sees,feels, smells and tastes my body, but my
spirit is finer than ether, and is still less comprehensible
to the senses. Mv spirit is CREDIT. It needs no tangible
body to manifest >tself.
6. I animate and transform everything. No chemist
is like unto me. I transform wide meadow lands, heavy
metal and bellowing herds into paper stocks. At the
breath of my nostrils, raiIroads and blasting furnaces,
factories and mines dance and hop, hand in hand, at the
Exchanges, the Temples consecratedto my worship.
7. In those countries where the Bank rules, nothing i::
 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL. 15
done without my consent. I manure Labor; I impress the
otherwise irresistible forces of nature into servile toil for
man; I put at his disposal the powerful lever of all the
conquests of Science.
8. I weave around human societies the golden web of
commerce and of industry.
9. Man, destitute of CAPITAL, wanders naked through
life, beset round about. by enemies,who are equipped with
all the weaponsof torture and of death.
10. If he be strong as an ox, the burden he bears will
be doubled; if he be diligent as the ant, his toil will be in-
creased.
11. What are Science, Labor and Virtue without
CAPITAL? Only vanity and a wearinessto the flesh.
12. Without the grace of CAPITAL, Science drives man
towards the path of insanity, and Labor and Virtue cast
him into the abyssof misery.
13. Neither Science, nor Virtue, nor Labor can satisfy
the spirit of man; I alone can slake the thirsty cravings of
his passions.
14. I yield and withdraw myself at my pleasure; I
give no account of my acts, I am the Omnipotent, the Sole
Ruler of the quick and the dead.

The Chosen Ones of Capital.

Man, this corrupt mass of clay, comes nakedl ?nto the
world, to be finally enclosedin a box to decomposeunder
the earth, and to fructify with his ashesthe grassesof the
fields.
2. Yet it is this very vessel, full of corruption, that I
have chosen to represent Me ; Me, CaPITAL ; Me, the modt
powerful Being under the sun.
3. I pick out my chosen ones not upon the strength
of their intelligence, nor upon the strength of their beauty,
nor yet upon the strength of their youth; but only upon
the strength of my own sweet whim.
4. Their stupidity, their vices, their ugliness, their
senility are so many evidences of my arbitrar-y power.
 16 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL.
L\% 5. People pronounce the silly sallies of the Capitalist
Tbright; they assure him his genius needs not the science
(of the learned J poets invoke his inspiration ; artists await
his criticism upon their knees ; women swear to him he is
ttheir ideal; philosophers reason his vices into virtue; and
political economists discover that his idleness is the source
of all activity. Because I have made him My chosen one,
everybody sees in the Capitalist the incarnation of Virtue,
of Beauty and of Genius.
6. A horde of working people toil for My Chosen one,
while he eats, drinks, gambles and sleeps.
7. The Capitalist labors neither with his hands nor
with his head.
8. He has laboring cattle-men, women and children
-to till the land, to smelt the iron, to weave the cloth ;
he has foremen and superintendents to rule the toilers ; he
has learned men to do his thinking. The Capitalists own
work runs into the sewer exclusively.
9. I heap perpetual well-being upon My chosen ones.
What is there on earth more real than to eat, drink and
wallow in physical pleasures? All else is vanity and
sorrow.
10. I alleviate all sorts of suffering in the end that
. the world may be good and agreeable to My chosen ones.
11. Sight has its organ ; so have the senses of smell,
touch, taste, hearing and love. I deny nothing to My
chosen ones that either their eyes, their months or any
of their other organs may crave.
12. Virtue has two faces: the Virtue of the Capitalist
is Enjoyment; the Virtue of the working class is priva-
tion.
13. The Capitalist seizes whatever he likes on earth ;
he is master; if he is cloyed in one way, he tries to please
himself in another.
14. The Capitalist is the law. Lawgivers grind out
lays according to his needs; philosophers fit morals to his
habits; whatever he does is just and good; everv act that
injures his interests is a crime and must be punished.
 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL. 17

15. I reserve for My chosen ones a joy that remains

unknown to the wageworkers. To make Profit is the most
inspiring pleasure. When my chosen ones rake in Profits,
they may lose their mothers, their wives, their children,
their dog and their honor-yet they preserve their equan-
imity. On the other hand, to make no Profit is an irre-
parable misfortune for which the Capitalist knows no
consolation.

The Duties of the Capitalist.

1. Many are called, but few are chosen. Every day I
reduce the number of My chosen ones.
2. I give Myself up to the Capitalists; I divide Myself
among them. Each chosen one receives a share of INDI-
VISIBLE CAPITAL, but he is allowed to keep it only if he
increasesit, if he causesit to bear Profit. CAPITAL with-
draws Himself from him who doesnot iive up to His laws.
3. I have chosenthe Capitalist to the end that he may
knock off surplus values; his mission is to heap up Profits.
4. To the end that he may be able to give himself up,
free and unhampered, to this hunt after Profits, the Capi-
talist strips himself of all bonds of friendship and of kin;
whenever it concerns the making of Profits, he must know
neither friend nor brother, neither wife, mother nor chil-
dren.
5. He rises above those trivial bounds which divide
mortals into separate fatherlands and parties. Before he
is American or English, Irish or Scotch, French or Ger-
man, the Capitalist is an Exploiter. He is only incident-
ally a republican, a democrat, a monarchist, a conservative
or a so-called radical. Gold has its own color, but, as
against gold, the Capitalist has no color of his own.
6. With equal equanimity the capitalist rakes in the
. money that is wet with tears, soaked in blood, or soiled
with dung.
7. He makes no sacrifices to common prejudices. He
is not a manufacturer for the purpose of producing good _
merchandise, but for the purpose of producing mer-
 18 1HE RELIGION OF CAPITAL.

chandise that will fetch large gains. He does not

establish stock companies for the purpose of distributing
dividends among the stockholders, but for the purpose of
drawing to himself the moneys which these own, and TV
which they have no right. For the small Capitalist is
condemned to disaqpear, to be swallowed up by the large
Capitalist. This is the law of CAPITAL.
8. When I raise a man to the dignity of Capitalist, I
thereby transfer to him a part of my own omnipotence
over mankind and all that there is.
9. The Capitalist says: Society, that is myself; Mor-
ality, that is my Private Interest.
10. When the interests of a single Capitalist are in-
jured, the whole of society suffers. The inability to in-
crease Capital is the greatest of all ills, the one ill for which
there is no cure or redress.
11. The Capitalist causes production to be carried olr,
but he does not himself produce. Every physical or men-
tal exercise is forbidden to him. It would draw him away
from his sacred mission-to heap up Profits.
12. The Capitalist does not become a metaphysica1
squirrel, that turns its wheel and grinds out wind.
13. He cares little whether the heavens announce the
glory of God; he does not inquire whether the grasshopper
chirps with its legs or otherwise; nor does it concern him
whether the ant is a Capitalist.
14. He troubles himself little about either the begin-
ning or the end of things; it suffices him to cause them ta
draw Profits.
15. He allows those attacked with the mania of official
political economy to declaim upon monometallism or bime-
tallism to their hearts content, but he quietly pockets aI1
the coin he can lay hands on, whether it be of silver or of
gold.
16. He allows scientists to fathom nature, and inven-
tors to apply the forces of nature to industry, but he
quickly appropriates their work, lust as soon as it has
demonstrated its aptitude for exploitation.
 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL. . 19

17. He does not cudgel his brains with the inquiries

about the good and the beautiful.
18. He applauds dissertations about Eternal Truths,
but he makes money with whatever adulterations business
may require.
19. He does not speculate upon the nature of Virtue,
of Conscience, or of Love, but upon their market price.
20. He does not inquire whether freedom is a good
thing in itself; he takes all freedom to himself, and leaves
only the name of the thing to the working class.
21. He enters into no controversy upon the question
whether Right precedes Might; he knows he is in posses-
sion of all rights, being in possession of CAPITAL.
22. He neither opposes nor favors universal suflrage;
he neither opposes nor favors a limited suffrage. He pur-
chases the votes where it is limited; where it is universal
he throws dust into the eyes of the electors. If he has at
all any preferences, it is in favor of universal suffrage, be-
cause it is cheaper. While, under a limited suffrage, he
would have to buy both the voters and their elected candi-
dates, under utiarsal suffrage he need buy drily the SUC-
cessful candidates.
23. He takes no hand in?ke..clatter about free trade or
protection. He is alternately protec&n& and free trader,
according as his business may require.
24. He is not burdened with any principles, not eOee
with the principle of having none.
25. The Capitalist is in My hand a roa of iron, where-
with to drive the stubborn herd of wage workers.
26. The Capitalist smothers in his heart every human
feeling; he knows no pity. He treats his fellow men
harder than his beasts of burden. Men, women and chil-
dren are to him only profit-grinding machines. His heart
is iron-clad to the end that his eyes map see the sufferings
of the workers and his ears may hear their cry of rage or
pain, without causing him a pang.
27. As a hydraulic press comes down slowly and
squeezes dry the fruit that is to be pressed and reduces it
29 THE REJXGIOS OF CAPITAL
to the lowest weight, so likewise does the Capitalist press
the tvorkingmen dry and flat until he has squeezedout of
them all the labor power that their musclescontain. Every
drop of their sweat he crystallizes into CAPITAL. When,
however, the workingman is used up and exhausted, and,
despite all further pressure, can yield no further surplus
labor, then he is forthwith thrown away by the Capitalist
as so much offal or manure.
25. The Capitalist. who spareshis workingmen betrays
Me and himself.
29. The Capitalist turns men, women and children into
merchandise, to the end that he who owns neither tallow.
nor wool, nor any other commodity may be at least enabled
to sell the power of his muscles, his skill, or his learning.
Before man can be converted into CAPITAL he must first
become merchandise.
30. I am CAPITAL, the Lord of Creation ; the Capitalist
is my representative. Before him all men are equal-they
are all equally subject to his exploitation. The day laborer,
who pawns <hismuscles; the engineer, who offers for sale
his technical knowledge; the cashier, who sells his honor ;
the Congressman,who barters his vote ; the prostitute, who
gives up her body-all are, to the Capitalist, subjects of
exploitation,
31. He compels the workingmen to recuperate their
forces with coarse ana adulterate$ food, to the end that
they may be able to sell themselvescheaper.
3?. He compels the workingmen to acquire the abstem-
iousnessof a hermit, the patience of an ass,the endurance
of an ox at their labor.
33. The workingmen belong to the Capitalist.. They
are his estate, his property. He causeshis workingmen to
bsnwatched with Argus eyes in the factories. Thep mav
not interrupt their work &th either a word of an unneces-
sa.rv motion.
41. The workingmans time is monev: everv minute
that he losesis a theft he commits upon the Canitalid.
35. The pressureof the Capitalist follows the working-
 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL. 21

men as a shadow into their very shanty or tenement. They

may not allow either their minds to be contaminated by
reading, or listening to, Socialist addresses, nor their bodies
to indulge in excessive sport. The wage worker is ex-
pected to go straight from the workshop to his abode, eat
and lie down, to the end that on the following day he may
place at the disposal of his master a pliant mind and a
body able to exert itself to the utmost.
36. The Capitalist does not recognize any rights of the
workingman, not even the right to slavery, yclept the right
to labor.
37. He strips the workingmen of their intelligence
and of the cunning of their special trades, and transfers
these to the machine that is virtually in perpetual motion.

PTOVeTbS.

1. The sailor is assailed by storms, the miner is ex-

posed to explosions and landslides, the toilers in factories
are in danger from the wheels of the machine; everywhere
the wage-slaves are threatened with death and mutilation.
The Capitalist, being an idler, is protected from all such.
accidents.
2 Labor racks and kills, but does not enrich. Riches
arc not eotten by,personal labor, but by causing others to
lab01
3. Property is the fruit of labor and the reward of
idleness.
4. Wine is not squeezed out of stones, nor Profits out
of a corpse; only the quick are fit subjects for exploitation.
The hangman, who dispatches a criminal, cheats the Capi-
talist of a subject of exploitation.
5. Benevolence draws no interest.
6. When you lay yourself down to sleep, it is better to
be able to say: 1 have done good business than I have
done a good deed.
7. The Capitalist who causes his workingmen to work
fourteen out of twen$y-four hours has not wasted his day.
22 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL.

8. Spare neither the good nor the poor workingman;

the good horse needs the spur as well as the poor.
9. It takes longer for a workingman to become a Capi-
talist than for the leaf of the mulberry to grow up to the
size of Pikes Peak.
10. Philanthropy means to steal wholesale, and give
away retail.
11. Co-operation means to allow the workingmen to
work together with the machine.
12. Profit-sharing meansto take the lions share of the
products of the wageworkers.
13. The Capitalist is a devotee of freedom. He gives
no aims, becausealms-giving robs the unemployed of the
freedom to die of hunger.
14. The Capitalist has two tongues in his mouth; he
usesthe one at buying, the other at selling.
15. To rob everybody means to rob nobody.
16. Honor and sentiment are poison in business.
li. Mistrust the dishonorable man, but place no con-
fidence in the honest one.
18. Coins carry the image of a bird, because,like birds,
they belong to him who catches them.
19. Greenbacks are always picked up, even if they drop
in the mud,
20. Thou worriest over many things; thou borrowest
much care; thou wouldst be honest; thou strivest after
wisdom ; thou strainest after office and #honor. All these
are vanity and vexation of spirit. Only one thing is real:
CAPITAL, and CAPITAL once more.
21. Youth withers and beauty wilts. Only gold does
not age, neither does it wrinkle.
22. Gold is the soul of the Capitalist; it is the motive
power of his actions.
23. Verily I say unto you, %t is more glorious to be a
purse filled with gold and bank notes than a person loaded
with talent and virtue who trots to market to sell himself
like an ass.
 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL. 23
24. Genius, Talent, Modesty, Honor and Beauty exist
only becausethey have a market price.
25. Virtue and labor are useful and profitable only
when some one else employs them. To the Capitalist,
there is nothing above eating and drinking and worship-
ping at the shrine of Venus. Nothing is so real to him,
when the end of his days approaches,as the actual enjoy-
ments he has wallowed in.
26. So long as the Capitalist sojourns on the earth,
warmed and lighted by the sun, he must enjoy life and be
of good cheer. Youth comes only once; none can escape
ugly and inconvenient old age, that grabs man by the head
and leads him on to death.
27. In the grave, whither thou travelest, thou wilt find
only worms.
28. Except a full stomach, that digests lustily, and
powerful, contented animal spirits, all else is vanity and
vexation of spirit.

Ultima Verba.
1. I am CAPITAL, the King of the earth.
2. I strut about with Falsehood, Envy, Covetousness,
Deception and Murder as My bodyguard. I carry war into
cities and famiIies. Wherever I passI sow Rage, Despair,
and Hopelessness.
3. I am the pitiless God. I feel well in the midst of
strife and suffering. I butcher the wageworkersand do not
spare even My chosenones, the Capitalists.
4. The wageworker is unable to tear himself from Me.
When, like the hunted deer, he flees before Me beyond the
mountains, he finds Me there ahead of him ; when he, try-
ing to escapeMe, crossesthe ocean,he finds Me waiting for
him on the shoreswhere he lands. The wageworker is *My
prisoner; the earth is his prison.
5. I smite the Capitalists with a dull and stupid sense
of well-being. My chosen ones are physical and mental
24 THE RELlGION OF CANTAL.
eunuchs. Their descendantsrun out into idiocy and impo-
tence.
6. I pour over the Capitalist everything that is desir-
able, but I deprive him of every wish. I load his board
with the most toothsome viands, but I deprive him of ap-
petite. I throw upon his bed the handsomestand youngest
of women, but their caressesare unable to fire his ex-
hausted body. Everything in the world cloys him-tired
and feelingless, he yawns away his life. He longs for noth-
ing, yet is he afraid of death.
7. According as it may please Me, and in ways that
man is unable to fathom, .I fall upon My chosenones, and
hurl them down into the hell of wage-slavery.
8. Capitalists are My tools. I use them as a cat-of-a-
thousand-tails to scourgethe herd of the wageworkers with. .
I raise My chosenones to the highest places in society, and
yet I despisethem.
9. I am the God, who moves the world and upset the
brains of men.
10. The poet of antiquity has prophesied the era of
C?pitalism. He sang: As yet ill is mixed with good ; yet
the day will come when there will be neither family bonds.
nor justice, nor virtue. Hades and Nemesiswill reascend
to heaven, and then there will be no cure for the-ill.
That day has come; like unto the ravenous sharks of the
seasand the wild beastsof prey in the woods, men now de-
vour one another without pity.
11. I laugh at the wisdom of man, Work, and vou will
have plenty; work and pour locker will be filled, so
saith ancient wisdom. But I say unto you: Work,
and want and misery will be your faithful compan-
ions ; work, and you will carry to the pawnbroker your last
bit of furniture.
12. I am the God, who revolutionizes the nations of the
world. I bend the mighty under my leveling voke.
13. The day Socialism should come into power, that
day would be supremacy of the God CAPITAL be at end.
That gloomy day I, CAPITAL, would ceaseto rule the world,
 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL. 25
I would become the slave of the workingman whom I
hate. He would no longer kneel before Me, his own handi-
work, he would rear himself erect on his feet, and, on earth,
recognize only Nature as his sovereign mistress.
14. Woe will be Me and My chosen ones should that day
ever dawn.

PRAYERS FOR CAPITALISTS.

The Investors Prayer.
My father, CAPITAL, who are on earth, Almighty God,
who changest the course of rivers, tunnelest mountains,
separatest contiguous shores, and meltest into one distant
nations, Creator of Merchandise, and Source of Life, oh,
Thou, who rulest Kings and subjects, laborers and employ-
ers, may Thy Kingdom be for evermore on earth. Give
us plentiful purchasers to take our goods off our hands,
without looking too closely whether these be genuine or
shoddy, pure or adulterated. Give us needy working peo-
ple, who will accept the hardest work and the lowest pay
without grumbling. Send us gudgeons who may be allured
by the tempting bait of our prospectuses, and ensnared in
the network of our fair promises. Cause our debtors to
pay us their debts in full. Lead us not into the peniten-
tiary, but deliver us from bankruptcy, and grant ~8 never
ceasing dividends. Amen.

Confession of Faith.
I believe in CAPITAL, the ruler of body and mind.
I believe in PROFIT, His Right-hand Bower, and in
CRJZDIT, His Left-hand Bower, both of which proceed from
and are one with Him.
I believe in GOLD and SILVER, which, melted in the cru-
cible, cut up into bullion, and stamped in the mint, make
their a.ppearance in the world as coin, but, after having
rolled over the earth, and being found too heavy, descend
into the vaults of the BANKS, and reascend in the shape of
PAPER MONEY.
26 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL.
I believe in DIVIDENDS, in 5 per cents, 4 per cents and 3
per cents, and also in smaller per cents, that are shaved
from notes.
I believe in NATIONAL DEBTS, which secure CAPITAL.
against the risks of trade, industry, and the fluctuations of
the money market.
I believe in PRIVATE PROPERTY, the fruit of the labor of
others; and I also believe in its existence from and for alI
time.
I believe in the necessity of &snnY-the furnisher of
wage slaves,and the mother of surplus labor.
I believe in the eternity of the WAGE SYBTEM, which
setteth the workingman free from all the cares of holding
property.
I believe in the EXTENSION of the hours of work, and in.
the REDUCTION of wages; and I also believe in the adul-
teration of goods.
I believe in the holy dogma: BUY CHEAP AND SELL.
DEAR, and thereby in the fundamental principles of our
sacrosanct Church, as revealed by professional Political!
Economy. Amen.

Invocation.
Hail unto The, oh MISERY ; Thou art full of grace. Thou
dost oppressand bend the workingman ; Thou dost torture,
his entrails with perpetual hunger, and Thou dost con-
demn him to sell his life and his freedom for a~pieee-&
bread. Thou dost break the spirit of rebellion, and Thou
dost consecrate the proletarian, his wife and his children
to hard labor for life in the capitalist penitentiaries, called
factories, mills and mines. Hail unto thee, blessed
MISERY !

&?oration of Gold. .
GOLD,wonderful merchandise, who tarriest within Thy-
self all other merchandises;
 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL. 27
GOLD, first-born merchandise, who converted au 0th
merchandises into Thyself;
Thou, who weighest and measured everything;
Thou, the completest, most ideal personification of the
God CAPITA-L;
Thou, the noblest, most wonderful element of Nature;
Thou, who canst be tainted by neither worm, mildew nor
rust ;
GOLD,unchangeable merchandise, blooming flower, bril-
liant ray of light, luminous sun, Thou immaculate metal,
who, torn from the entrails of the earth, the noble mother
of all things, turnest Thyself away, buriest Thyself in the
safes of usurers, and the vaults of Banks, and from that
place of concealment, where Thou liest in large heaps,
transferrest Thv power to common, wretched paper to the
end that it mul&ply and increase tenfold;
GOLD, inert metal, that settest the world jn motion, be- .
fore Thy brilliant majesty mankind has bent the knee for
centuries, and has humbly adored Thee !
Oh, bestow Thy godlike grace upon the faithful, who in-
voke Thee, and, to possess Thee, sacrifice everything-honor
and virtue, the esteemof mankind, the love of woman, their
soul, the children of their Own marrow and bone-and
who are not held back even by their own self-respect!
GOLD, Thou supreme, invincible, all-conquering power,
Oh, hearken unto our prayer!
Thou builder of cities and destroyer of empires; Thou
load-star of Morality ; Thou custodian of Conscience;
Thou, who dictatest laws to the nations, and who bendest to
Thy yoke Congressesand Parliaments, Presidents, Kings
of Emperors ;
Oh, hem-kenunto our prayer!
Thou, who purchasest the decisions of Judges, and the
votes of Congressmen;
Oh, hearken unto our prayer!
Thou, who callest into being flowers and fruits, nn-
known to Nature ; Thou, who spreadest.vice and virtue;
Thou, who quickened art and luxury ;
28 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL.
Oh, hearken unto our Prayer!
Thou, who smilest upon the Capitalist in his cradle, and
who frownest and maltreatest the proletarian on the lap of
his mother ;
Oh, hearken unto our prayer!
GOLD, Thou tireless wanderer, who are versed in all ras-
,cality and in all the tricks of scoundrelism.
Incline Thine ear toward us!
Thou interpreter of all tongues ; Thou most skilful of
all pimps; Thou resistless seducer; Thou standard of man ;
Oh, incline Thine ear toward v..s!
Thou Messenger of Peace and Herald of Strife; Thou
Jdistributer of leisure and, of excessive toil; Thou staff of
virtue and of corruption ;
Oh, incline Thine ear Toward us!
GOLD, Thou who are cursed and invoked in numberless
prayers ; who art honored by Capitalists and loved by pros-
titutes,
Oh, incline Thine ear toward us!
Thou, who startest evil and good; Thou, who art the for-
tune and misfortune of man ; Thou, who healest the sick,
and who art balm to all pain ;
Oh, incline Thine ear toward us!
Thou, who bewitchest the world, and confusest the hu-
man intellect; Thou, who turnest uglinessinto beauty, and
dullness into cleverness; Thou, who reconcilest all things ;
who makest shame and dishonor estimable. and renderest
theft and prostitution respectable;
Oh, incline Thine ear toward us!
Thou, who heapest upon cowardice the glory that be-
longs to bravery; Thou, who securest to ugliness the hom-
age that belongs to beauty ; Malignant wizard, who pro-
cure& to senility and impotence the love that belongs to
yen and vigor ;
Incline Thine ear toward US!
Demon, who in&test to murder, and lettest insanity
IOOW;
Oh, incline Thine ear toward U-S!
 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL. 29

Thou flaming torch that lightest the path of life; Thou

leader, protector and savior of the Capitalist ;
Oh, incline Thine ear toward US!
GOLD, Thou Lord of Fame, and sun of Justice ; GOLD,
Thou strength and warmth of life; illustrious GOLD,
Oh, come to us!
GOLD,Thou well beloved of the Capitalist; Thou scourge
of the workingman,
Oh, come to us!
Thou mirror of enjoyment; Thou, who turnest to the
idler the fruits of labor,
Oh, come to us!
Thou, who fillest the cellars and pantries of those who
neither plow nor sow, who neither plant nor harvest,
Oh, come to us!
Thou liberator from labor, who degradest man and COT-
ruptest his race,
Oh, come to us!
Thou sum of all strength, knowledge and intellect of the
Capitalist,
Oh, come to us!
Oh, come to us, seductive GOLD, Thou highest hope, the
beginning and end of all capitalist activity, of a11capital-
ist thought, and of all capitalist feeling ! Amen.

LAMENTATIONS
OF
Job Capitalist, A Bankrupt.
CAPITAL, my God and my Master, why hast Thou turned
Thy countenance from me.? What sin have I committed
that Thou shouldst cast me from the heights of prosperity,
and plague me with the burden of poverty ?
2. Have I not lived according to Thy laws? Were my
actions not agreeableto the Law and the Statute?
3. Canst Thou charge me with ever having worked?
Have I not tasted al1 pleasures, which my millions and my
30 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL.

senses allowed ? Have I not harnessed men, women and

children into my service, and driven them even beyond the
point of endurance? Have I ever returned to them more
than starvation wages ? Have I ever .allowed myself to
be touched by the want or the despair of my workingmen ?
4. CAPITAL, my God, I have adulterated the goods,
which I sold, without concerning myself about whether or
not I thereby poisoned the consumer. I have skinned to
the bone the gudgeons, who were caught by the bait of my
prospectuses.
5. I lived only to enjoy and to increase my wealth ;
and Thou hast blessed my irreproachable conduct, my
meritorious life, by bestowing upon me for my private en-
joyment, women and young boys, dogs and servants, the
pleasures of the flesh and the gratification of vanity.
6. And now have I lost everything, and I am cast off.
7. My competitors rejoice over my ruin, and my friends
turn away from me ; they do not even trouble themselves
to blame me, and to give me useless advice; they know me
no more. My former mistresses bespatter me on the street
with the mud of the equipages, which I bought for them
with my money.
8. Misery lays its heavy hand upon me ; like unto prison
walls it bars me from the rest of mankind. I stand alone;
everything within me and around me is gloomy.
9. My wife, who now has no money to spend in cos-
metics wherewith to paint her face and disguise herself,
now appears before me in all her physical ugliness. My
son, brought up to idleness, does not even understand the
extent of my misfortune--idiot that he is! The eyes of
my daughters run like two fountains at the recollection of
the matches that they missed.
10. But what are the sufferings of mine when com-
pared with my misfortunes ? There where I once gave
orders as a master, I now receive a kick if I offer myself
as a humble suitor!
11. Everpthina has turned into dung and stench to me
in my present hell. My body, stiffened and full of aches
 THE RELIGION OF CAPITAL. 31

from the hardness of my couch, sore and bitten by bedbugs

and other insects, finds now no rest; my soul no longer
tastes the sleep that brings on oblivion.
12. 0 how happy are the wretches, who never were
acquainted with aught but poverty and dirt! They know
not the pleasures of soft cushions, and sweet tastes ; their
thick skins have no feeling, then dulled senses are not
subject to nausea.
13. Why was I made to taste of joy, and then to be
left with nothing but the remembrance of better days,
more galling than a gambling debt?
14. Better had it been, oh Lord, to have cast my birth
in misery, than my closing days, after thou didst bring me
up in wealth.
15. What can I do to earn my dry crust of bread?
16. My hands, accustomed only to carrying gold rings,
and to fingering bank-notes, cannot handle the tools of
labor. My brain, accustomed only to busy itself with the
question how to escape work, how to rest from the exertion
of owning wealth, how to get rid of the weariness of idle-
ness, how to overcome the effects of gluttony, is unfit for
the mental activity that is requisite even to write letters,
and foot up bills.
15. Is it then possible, oh Lord. that Thou canst smite
so pitilessly a being, who never disobeyed any of Thy com-
mandments ?
18. Oh, it is wrong, it is unjust, it is immoral that I
should lose the wealth, that the labor of others has heaped
up so painfully for me !
19. When the Capitalists, my former comrades, .behold
m.v misfortune, thep will learn that Thy grace IS but a
whim, tha,t Thou bestowest it without predilection, and
withdrawest it without reason.
20. Who will henceforth believe in Thee?
21. What Capitalist will be sufIicientlv daring and
senseless to accept Thy Law; to enervate himself in idle-
ness and with riotous living and revelry, if the future is
32 THE RELJGIOI; OF CAPITAL.
so uncertain and so threatening? If the slightest breeze,
that blows on the Stock Exchange, may sweep away the
best grounded fortunes? If nothing is lasting? If the
rich man of tc-day may be the beggar of the morrow?
22. Man will curse Thee, God CAPITAL, when they be-
hold my degradation ; they will deny Thy power, when they
measure the depth of my fall; they will reject Thy favors.
23. For the sake of Thine own glory, restore me to my
former position. Raise me from my lowliness, becausemy
heart is filling with gall, and curses are thronging to my
lips !
24. Wild God, blind God, stupid God ! Beware lest the
scalesfinally drop from the eyes of the rich, and they per-
ceive that they are moving carelessly on the verge of an
abyss; Tremble, lest they throw Thee into the abyss, to
fill it up, and join hands with the Socialists to dethrone
Thee.
25. Yet, what profanity, what blasphemy am I now
guilty of !
26. Powerful God, pardon me these insane and crim-
inal words. Thou art the Master, who distributest the good
things of the earth, without inquiring after the merits of
Thy chosen ones, and withdrawing Thy gifts at Thy pleas-
ure. Thou knoweet what Thou doest.
27. Thou smite& my interests ; Thou art only trying
me for my g0oa.
28. 0 friendly, loving God, grant me Thy favor once
more! Thou art Justice itself; and when Thou smite&
me, it must be that I have unconsciously done somewrong.
29. 0 Lord, if Thou returnest my riches to me, I vow,
I will obey. Thy laws with increased rigor. I will exploit
the wageworkers more mercilessly than ever; I will deceive
the consumerswith <greatercunning; I will pluck the stock-
holders and investors more wholesale.
30. I crawl before Thee like a dog before the master
who beats him. I am Thy property. May Thy will be
done!
 GUSTAV BANG:

CRISES IN EUROPEAN
HISTORY
Translated by Arnold Petersen

A PAMPHLET WHICH EVERY STUDENT OF

HISTORY AND ECONOMICS SHOULD POSSESS
As an economic interpretation of three important crises in
European history it is perhaps one of the best, considering
the brevity of the work. Dr. Bang here employs to the best
advantage the Marxian key, and succeeds in unravelling what
to the average reader usually appear to be mysteries or near-
mysteries. As the author explains in his introduction, the mo-
tive power of historical changes is to be found in the econom-
ic basis of a given society, in the methods of production and
exchange .peculiar to that society. To put it in this manner
is, of course, to lay oneself open to the charge of teaching that
the economic basis, and nothing else, influences the historicai
processes. Dr. Bang, however, in the concrete examples
chosen furnishes ample evidence to show that while that un-
doubtedly is the chief, and in the long run the really important
factor, the line cannot be drawn too sharply between cause and
effect, seeing the effect frequently reacts upon the cause, stim-
ulating it and aiding in accelerating (or retarding temporarily,
as the case may be) the historical process.-From the preface

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