
“… If we do not restore the Institution of Property we cannot escape restoring the Institution of Slavery; there is no third course.”
Synopsis of the Servile State
Introduction - The Subject of This Book
Section One - Definitions
Section Two - Our Civilisation Was Originally Servile
Section Three - How the Servile Institution Was for a Time Dissolved
Section Four - How the Distributive State Failed
Section Five - The Capitalist State in Proportion as It Grows Perfect Grows Unstable
Section Six - The Stable Solutions of This Instability
Section Seven - Socialism Is the Easiest Apparent Solution of the Capitalist Crux
The work opens with a stark warning: without a true restoration of private property, society risks slipping back into a new form of slavery. It sets out to define the building blocks of wealth—capital, labor, means of production—and to explain how those concepts shape the modern state. By tracing the logical steps from ownership to dependence, the author invites listeners to reconsider the assumptions that underlie contemporary industrial life.
From the ancient slave economies of pagan cultures through the Christian shift toward serfdom and the brief flourishing of a distributive order, the narrative maps the long arc of Western economic history. It then turns to the English experience of the sixteenth‑century upheavals that birthed capitalism, exposing the internal tensions that make the system inherently unstable. As the analysis unfolds, the book poses a pressing question: can any lasting alternative emerge without recreating the very servitude it seeks to escape?
Language
en
Duration
~3 hours (224K characters)
Publisher of text edition
Project Gutenberg
Credits
an Anonymous Volunteer
Release date
2021-03-20
Rights
Public domain in the USA.

1870–1953
Best known for sharp essays and mischievous verse, this French-born English writer moved easily between history, politics, travel writing, and satire. His books could be playful or fiercely argumentative, and they helped make him one of the most recognizable literary voices of the early 20th century.
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