This volume—which it has been desired to make known to the great publicin the French language—in entering upon a question so complex and sovast as socialism, has but a single and definite aim.
My intention has been to point out, and in nearly all cases by rapid andconcise observations, the general relations existing betweencontemporary socialism and the whole trend of modern scientific thought.
The opponents of contemporary socialism see in it, or wish to see in it,merely a reproduction of the sentimental socialism of the first half ofthe Nineteenth Century. They contend that socialism is in conflict withthe fundamental facts and inductions of the physical, biological andsocial sciences, whose marvelous development and fruitful applicationsare the glory of our dying century.
To oppose socialism, recourse has been had to the individualinterpretations a