How We Shall Live Then.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 447, 19 February 1890, Page 6

How We Shall Live Then.

W iLUAM Morris, in his lecture called ‘ How We Shall Live Then,’ delivered at a meeting of a society called the Fellowship of New Life, gave an interesting account of his conversion to Socialism. Early in life the poet-painter awoke to the misery of the world ana the degradation of art which he had chosen as his favourite occupation and as a means of livelihood. His tendencies to Socialism, which was then, however, a mere name to him, weie furthered by a study of Ruskin’s works and of Mill’s ‘ Objections to I Socialism,’ the ‘ muddle-headed theories of a usually clear-headed man.’ But the idea that real art and imaginative literature were in danger of being crushed by the existing state of society seems to have been the strongest argument in inducing the young enthusiast to take part in what he might well term ‘a big job’—the reconstruction of society. Mr Morris then sketched the reconstructed society in the hope of which he lives—an ‘ earthly paradise,’ where there will be neither private property, rent, nor interest, and except for drudgery no great cities, no paupers, no criminals, no gaols, nor workhouses, and when people shall return to the old mode of travelling by stage coach, or, as Mr Morris would himself prefer, in a tilted wagon. Every man is to take his part in healthy outdoor occupation and exercise, or, if he does not, will be regarded as something less than a man, a diseased being. Indoor work, what as we now call art, science, and imaginative literature, will be pursued for pleasure, and not for profit, and not to the exclusion of outdoor work. ‘Quill driving’ and ‘official sauntering ’ what he termed smooth disagreeable arts—are to be done by machinery if they must bo done at all, while buying and selling are to be left to those in whom the taste for such a sordid occupation survives 'from the present age. The discussion which followed was very lively, threatening at times to merge into a controversy on the currency or on theological questions. Several lestheticlooking ladies were present, one rising to ask a question of Mr Morris. My readers may be interested to know that Mr Morris is a splendidly-built man, with a fine head covered with grey curls. He invariably dresses in navy blue, with a blue shirt, ana frequently a tie of revolutionary red. He looks more of the jolly sea captain than a poet or painter. He would scorn the -name of either, and calls himself a decorative workman.