The Iron Heel Page #9

"The Iron Heel" by Jack London, published in 1908, is a dystopian political novel that explores themes of authoritarianism, class struggle, and revolution. It is considered one of the earliest examples of dystopian fiction, influencing later works like 1984 and Brave New World.

• Novel

								

horrible!”

“Has the Church protested?” Ernest insisted.

“The Church does not know.” The Bishop was struggling hard.

“Yet the command to the Church was, ‘Feed my lambs,’” Ernest sneered.
And then, the next moment, “Pardon my sneer, Bishop. But can you wonder
that we lose patience with you? When have you protested to your
capitalistic congregations at the working of children in the Southern
cotton mills?[8] Children, six and seven years of age, working every
night at twelve-hour shifts? They never see the blessed sunshine. They
die like flies. The dividends are paid out of their blood. And out of
the dividends magnificent churches are builded in New England, wherein
your kind preaches pleasant platitudes to the sleek, full-bellied
recipients of those dividends.”

 [8] Everhard might have drawn a better illustration from the Southern
 Church’s outspoken defence of chattel slavery prior to what is known
 as the “War of the Rebellion.” Several such illustrations, culled from
 the documents of the times, are here appended. In 1835 A.D., the
 General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church resolved that: “slavery
 is recognized in both the Old and the New Testaments, and is not
 condemned by the authority of God.” The Charleston Baptist
 Association issued the following, in an address, in 1835 A.D.: “The
 right of masters to dispose of the time of their slaves has been
 distinctly recognized by the Creator of all things, who is surely at
 liberty to vest the right of property over any object whomsoever He
 pleases.” The Rev. E. D. Simon, Doctor of Divinity and professor in
 the Randolph-Macon Methodist College of Virginia, wrote: “Extracts
 from Holy Writ unequivocally assert the right of property in slaves,
 together with the usual incidents to that right. The right to buy and
 sell is clearly stated. Upon the whole, then, whether we consult the
 Jewish policy instituted by God himself, or the uniform opinion and
 practice of mankind in all ages, or the injunctions of the New
 Testament and the moral law, we are brought to the conclusion that
 slavery is not immoral. Having established the point that the first
 African slaves were legally brought into bondage, the right to detain
 their children in bondage follows as an indispensable consequence.
 Thus we see that the slavery that exists in America was founded in
 right.”
    It is not at all remarkable that this same note should have been
    struck by the Church a generation or so later in relation to the
    defence of capitalistic property. In the great museum at Asgard
    there is a book entitled “Essays in Application,” written by Henry
    van Dyke. The book was published in 1905 of the Christian Era. From
    what we can make out, Van Dyke must have been a churchman. The book
    is a good example of what Everhard would have called bourgeois
    thinking. Note the similarity between the utterance of the
    Charleston Baptist Association quoted above, and the following
    utterance of Van Dyke seventy years later: “The Bible teaches that
    God owns the world. He distributes to every man according to His
    own good pleasure, conformably to general laws.”

“I did not know,” the Bishop murmured faintly. His face was pale, and
he seemed suffering from nausea.

“Then you have not protested?”

The Bishop shook his head.

“Then the Church is dumb to-day, as it was in the eighteenth century?”

The Bishop was silent, and for once Ernest forbore to press the point.

“And do not forget, whenever a churchman does protest, that he is
discharged.”

“I hardly think that is fair,” was the objection.

“Will you protest?” Ernest demanded.

“Show me evils, such as you mention, in our own community, and I will
protest.”

“I’ll show you,” Ernest said quietly. “I am at your disposal. I will
take you on a journey through hell.”

“And I shall protest.” The Bishop straightened himself in his chair,
and over his gentle face spread the harshness of the warrior. “The
Church shall not be dumb!”

“You will be discharged,” was the warning.

“I shall prove the contrary,” was the retort. “I shall prove, if what
you say is so, that the Church has erred through ignorance. And,
furthermore, I hold that whatever is horrible in industrial society is
due to the ignorance of the capitalist class. It will mend all that is
wrong as soon as it receives the message. And this message it shall be
the duty of the Church to deliver.”

Ernest laughed. He laughed brutally, and I was driven to the Bishop’s
defence.

“Remember,” I said, “you see but one side of the shield. There is much
good in us, though you give us credit for no good at all. Bishop
Morehouse is right. The industrial wrong, terrible as you say it is, is
due to ignorance. The divisions of society have become too widely
separated.”

“The wild Indian is not so brutal and savage as the capitalist class,”
he answered; and in that moment I hated him.

“You do not know us,” I answered. “We are not brutal and savage.”

“Prove it,” he challenged.

“How can I prove it . . . to you?” I was growing angry.

He shook his head. “I do not ask you to prove it to me. I ask you to
prove it to yourself.”

“I know,” I said.

“You know nothing,” was his rude reply.

“There, there, children,” father said soothingly.

“I don’t care—” I began indignantly, but Ernest interrupted.

“I understand you have money, or your father has, which is the same
thing—money invested in the Sierra Mills.”

“What has that to do with it?” I cried.

“Nothing much,” he began slowly, “except that the gown you wear is
stained with blood. The food you eat is a bloody stew. The blood of
little children and of strong men is dripping from your very
roof-beams. I can close my eyes, now, and hear it drip, drop, drip,
drop, all about me.”

And suiting the action to the words, he closed his eyes and leaned back
in his chair. I burst into tears of mortification and hurt vanity. I
had never been so brutally treated in my life. Both the Bishop and my
father were embarrassed and perturbed. They tried to lead the
conversation away into easier channels; but Ernest opened his eyes,
looked at me, and waved them aside. His mouth was stern, and his eyes
too; and in the latter there was no glint of laughter. What he was
about to say, what terrible castigation he was going to give me, I
never knew; for at that moment a man, passing along the sidewalk,
stopped and glanced in at us. He was a large man, poorly dressed, and
on his back was a great load of rattan and bamboo stands, chairs, and
screens. He looked at the house as if debating whether or not he should
come in and try to sell some of his wares.

“That man’s name is Jackson,” Ernest said.

“With that strong body of his he should be at work, and not
peddling,”[9] I answered curtly.

 [9] In that day there were many thousands of these poor merchants

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