The Factory System and Christianity

Ultimately any political question is a religious question. A nation which is permeated with evil ideas will inevitably tend to put those ideas into practice and will eventually succeed unless its evil ideas are countered by others. So also a nation which is permeated with good ideas will put those ideas into practice. It is also true that the existence of evil conditions in a country is evidence of the existence of evil ideas in a people; and in a country when bad conditions are prevalent obviously evil ideas must be prevalent. It is therefore necessary, seeing that evil ideas underlie evil conditions, that evil ideas be supplanted by good ideas, for if we spend our energies combating evil conditions without combating the evil ideas underlying them, we can achieve at best palliatives, and do nothing for the salvation of souls, the real object of political activity.

It is true that Governments are properly, not concerned with ideas but with conditions; but as ideas underlie conditions it is necessary the Governments should be informed, impregnated by ideas. The Church exists for the salvation of souls. Governments exist to create and preserve such conditions as are consistent with the salvation of souls.

If we say that the object of man’s existence is man’s salvation and that the object of Christianity is to promote man’s salvation and that the Church exists to promote Christianity we may go on to say that the only question of any importance in any sphere of activity is whether or no this or that thing is or is not consistent with Christianity.

If for instance I am asked whether or no I believe in machinery I may reply that the question is properly not whether or no I believe in machinery but whether machinery is consistent with Christianity—and obviously machinery as such is consistent with Christianity, though many machines may be used for objects which are inconsistent with Christianity. Christianity is the test.

It is necessary, perhaps, to be clear about the word “consistent” and not confuse it with the word “compatible.” For many things are compatible with Christianity which are inconsistent with it. Thus slavery is not incompatible with Christianity but is undoubtedly inconsistent. A man may be a slave or even a slave-master and yet be a Christian, just as a man may be murdered or a murderer and yet be a Christian. A man may even be a good Christian and yet be a slave-owner or a murderer if by some strange chance it has not been brought home to him that slave owning and murder are inconsistent with Christianity; and a man may be a very good Christian and yet be a slave, for though, in the slave, rebellion may be a virtue, for some slaves rebellion is too difficult.

If, then, it be said that such a thing as a Factory or the Factory System is inconsistent with Christianity, it must be clearly understood that that is not saying that a man who works in a factory cannot be a Christian; nor is it saying that a factory owner or one owning shares in a factory or one buying or using things made in a factory cannot be a Christian, for in all these cases the relationship of the soul with God may be good and right and beautiful and the factory is simply a material circumstance the evil of which is not recognized. It is not necessary here to judge of the state of conscience in which men may own factories or work in them or buy their products. Here it is only required to show that it is in the system of production called the Factory System that is unchristian. The individual owner or worker may be a Christian under any circumstances—a system is Christian or unchristian by its own nature.

The factory system is unchristian primarily because it deprives workmen of responsibility for their work. A factory “hand” is not responsible for the work he does.

Any workshop in which the workman works simply for his wages and the master simply for his profit is, in essence, that thing called a factory. Factories are generally thought of as large places where many men work. Factories may be quite small places where very few men are employed. Factories are often, or even generally, large places because when workmen are only concerned with wages and masters with profits the small workshop is uneconomical. The Rent and Taxes and working expenses in a small workshop are not in proportion to the size of the place and numbers employed, so that, however willing the workmen may be to work in a small shop, the master will always be keen to increase its size and thus enlarge its output and his profits without proportionately increasing his expenses.

The Christian attitude to life and work is that we live and work primarily in order that we may glorify God. The obtaining of the means to go on living is a secondary consideration (“Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His justice and all these things shall be added unto you”) and the obtaining of profits is, from a Christian point of view, no consideration at all. The laborer is worthy of his hire.

In a factory men simply work for their wages, the masters for their profits, and neither work for the Glory of God.

If a factory hand started thinking about God’s glory and began to discover it in his work the whole factory would be put out of gear at once. There is no room for individual fancies of that sort.

Furthermore, just as the factory, for economic reasons, tends to become a large place, so it tends to become a place where labor is divided and subdivided. The division of labor still further reduces the responsibility of the workman and makes absolute the impossibility of his glorifying God in his work. But division of labor reduces the labor expenses and that is the chief consideration for masters.

The modern factory system is as servile and even more unchristian than the pagan system of slavery. The pagan slave-owner merely owned the slave’s body. In the absence of a factory system of workshop organization the slave’s mind was, in practice, his own and the work done by slaves was often of a kind for which each slave was in a high degree actually and personally responsible. The modern factory system is a refinement on the ancient slave system, for in the factory system the workman’s mind is owned by the master, while his body is legally free. Thus the Christian tradition of opposition to physical slavery has been dodged and the master has been able to reap all the benefits of slavery without any apparent violation of freedom. But the violation is coming to be recognized on all hands and especially by the workman himself. The so-called “labor unrest” is not, as the masters would have us suppose, entirely due to the unbridled greed of the workmen and their appetite for high wages. It is really due to the workman’s instinctive, if inarticulate, desire for freedom and responsibility and if it chiefly takes the form of a demand for higher wages and shorter hours, this is only a case of “the biter bit,” for higher profits and longer holidays is the chief ambition of the masters. The worship of money is a worship which the workman has learned from his superiors.

Now there are two lines of opposition to arguments such as these. On the one hand are those who, while agreeing that the factory system is in many respects unwholesome, say that by a proper system of “scientific management” all the evils of factory work can be done away with. On the other are those who, disregarding any real or imaginary objections to factory life and work, are so obsessed by the notion that the populations of the modern world could not be fed and clothed and housed by any other system than that of factories that they regard as mere foolishness any suggestions for a return to production by small workshops owned by individual workmen and worked by them with a few assistants and apprentices. The one kind says: we see the evil but it can be remedied by “scientific management,” the other kind says: evil or no evil—the factory system is essential to the modern world.

There is no need to argue here about the remedy proposed by those who advocate “scientific management” nor to argue with those who talk about large populations. They have great possessions and are pretty sure to turn away sorrowful. Our only concern is to discover the truth that the modern system of production is evil. If that be admitted the remedy is obvious.

It is a Christian principle that every individual soul is responsible and not irresponsible. It is Christian teaching that the first human activity is the love of God and the glorifying of Him. It is not sufficient that God be glorified by faith; it is equally necessary that He be glorified by works. The modern system of factory production deprives men of the power to glorify God in their works and of the responsibility for so doing. Therefore the Factory System is evil and damned. And just as Slavery, being discovered to be inconsistent with Christianity, was gradually destroyed by Christians, so the Factory System, being discovered to be servile and therefore inconsistent with Christianity, will be gradually destroyed by Christians.

Laus tibi Christe! Vade Satanas!

Note 1: St. Thomas Aquinas says (Summa Ia, Q. 96, Art. 4): “Liber est causa sui, servus autem ordinatur ad alium.” This is to say: The freeman is responsible for himself, but for the slave another is responsible.

Note 2: The various schemes of co-operation between masters and men—“profit sharing,” “combined management,” etc.— make no attempt to attack the problem at its root. They are merely attempts to stay the discontent of the workers and they are bound to fail; for the real, though as yet unexpressed, cause of discontent is not lack of money, but lack of responsibility. Just as slavery is wrong, however well treated the slaves—so factory production is wrong, however well paid the hands. Factory production is wrong because it is production for profit and because it deprives the workman of responsibility. Even “combined management” must fail, in spite of its presumed gift of partial responsibility to the men, because there still remains in the combination one party, that of the masters, whose interests are primarily the making of profits, and those interests are bound to clash with those of the men, for the men are first of all workmen and not financiers and the interests of the workmen have since the beginning of the world been different from, and opposed to, those of buyers and sellers.

Appendix

The Factory System is unchristian because:

• It puts the service and glory of man before the service and glory of God.
• It promotes the comfort of man and destroys the worship and praise of God.
• It puts the making of money before the making of goods.
• It puts quantity before quality—for quantity can be determined by measurement, whereas quality demands imagination and cannot be measured.
• It deprives the workman of responsibility for his work.
• It is subject only to “efficient causes” and not to “final causes.”
• It depends upon the notion that “it is more blessed to receive than to give.”
• It destroys the personal relationship of maker to buyer.
• It promotes the war of classes (masters versus men).
• It prevents Trades Unions from becoming Trades Guilds.
• It promotes the notion that leisure time is more to be desired than work time, for it deprives the workman of any power to express his own ideas in his work or to get any amusement out of it, thus causing him always to look forward to the time when he will stop work.
• It flatters the consumer to capture his custom, and covers the land with damnable advertisements.
• It subdivides labor so that a workman becomes merely a tool.
• It puts a premium upon mechanical dexterity and a discount upon intellectual and spiritual ability in the workman.
• It undermines the family, for it drags both men and women into its net and destroys home work and home life.
• It depends upon militarism, for without the support of the military the system would have been destroyed in its beginnings and the strike is only rendered abortive because in the last resort the soldiers can be brought out to shoot down the strikers.
• It promotes wars, for it destroys local markets and makes trade dependent upon “world markets” and financial magnates. Over-production is inevitable and when there is over-production there must be a struggle for fresh markets.

*Originally published in Eric Gill, It All Goes Together: Selected Essays (New York: The Devin-Adair Company, 1944), 21-27.