individual, by means of co-operation, but the creation of a new power, namely, the collective power of masses.[1]
Apart from the new power that arises from the fusion of many forces into one single force, mere social contact begets in most industries an emulation and a stimulation of the animal spirits that heighten the efficiency of each individual workman. Hence it is that a dozen persons working together will, in their collective working-day of 144 hours, produce far more than twelve isolated men each working 12 hours, or than one man who works twelve days in succession.[2] The reason of this is that a man is, if not as Aristotle contends, a political,[3] at all events a social animal.
Although a number of man may be occupied together at the same time on the same, or the same kind of work, yet the labour of each, as a part of the collective labour, may correspond to a distinct phase of the labour-process, through all whose phases, in consequence of co-operation, the subject of their labour passes with greater speed. For instance, if a dozen masons place themselves in a row, so as to pass stones from the foot of a ladder to its summit, each of them does the same thing; nevertheless, their separate acts form connected parts of one total operation; they are particular phases, which must be gone through by each stone; and the stones are thus earried up quicker by the 24 hands of the row of men than they could be if each man went separately up and down the
- ↑ “As one man cannot, and ten men must strain to lift a tun of weight, yet 100 men can do it only by the strength of a finger of each of them.” (John Bellers: “Proposals for raising a College of Industry.” London, 1696, p. 21.)
- ↑ “There is also” (when the same number of men are employed hy one farmer on 800 acres, instead of by ten farmers with 30 acres a piece) “an advantage in the proportion of servants, which will not so easily be understood but by practical men; for it is natural to say, as 1 is to 4, so are 3: to 12; but this will not hold good in practice; for in harvest time and many other operationa which require that kind of despatch by the throwing many hands together, the work is better and more expeditiously done; f. i, in harvest, 2 drivers, 2 loaders, 2 pitchers, 2 rakers, and the rest at the rick, or in the barn, will despatch double the work that the same number of hands would do if divided into different gangs on different farms.” (“An Inquiry into the connection between the present Price of Provisions and the Size of Farms.” By a Farmer. London, 1773, pp. 7, 8.)
- ↑ Strictly, Aristotle’s definition is that man is by nature a town-citizen. This is quite as characteristic of ancient classical society as Franklin’s definition of man, as a tool-making animal, is characteristic of Yankeedom.
