Towards democracy
392 Towards Democracy
To place a nation squarely on its own base, spreading out its people far and wide in honored usefulness upon the soii,
Building up all uses and capacities of the land into the 7
life of the masses,
So that the riches of the Earth may go first and foremost to those who produce them, and so onward into the whole structure of society ;
To render the life of the people clean and gracious, vital from base to summit, and selfdetermining, .
Dependent simply on itself and not on cliques and coteries of speculators anywhere; and springing thus inevitably up into wild free forms of love and fellowship ;
To make the wild places of the lands sacred, keeping the streams pure, and planting fresh blooms along their edges ; to preserve the air crystalline and without taint—tempting the. sun to shine where before was gloom ;
To adorn the woodlands and the high tops with new —
trees and shrubs and winged and footed things,
Sparing all living creatures as far as possible rather than |
destroying them ; What a pleasure!
To do all this in singleness of heart were indeed to openys
up riches for mankind of which few dreamSo much, so infinitely more than what is now called Wealth...
But to-day the lands are slimed and fenced over withir denials ; and those who would cannot get to them, and thoses who own have no joy in them—except such joy as a dog mayy
have in a fodderam.