scientifically constructed machinery are
taking the place of the simple
manipulation of the human hand--there has
arisen, all the world over, a
large body of males who find that their ancient fields of labour have
slipped or are slipping from them, and who discover that the modern world
has no place or need for them. At the gates of our dockyards, in our
streets, and in our fields, are to be found everywhere, in
proportion as
modern civilisation is really
dominant, men whose bulk and mere animal
strength would have made them as warriors
valuable" target="_blank" title="a.无价的,非常重要的">
invaluable members of any
primitivecommunity, and who would have been
valuable even in any simpler
civilisation than our own, as machines of toil; but who, owing to lack of
intellectual or
delicatemanual training, have now no form of labour to
offer society which it stands really in need of, and who
therefore tend to
form our Great Male Unemployed--a body which finds the only powers it
possesses so little needed by its fellows that, in return for its intensest
physical labour, it hardly earns the poorest sustenance. The material
conditions of life have been rapidly modified, and the man has not been
modified with them; machinery has largely filled his place in his old field
of labour, and he has found no new one.
It is from these men, men who, viewed from the broad humanitarian
standpoint, are often of the most
lovable and interesting type, and who
might in a simpler state of society, where
physical force was the
dominating
factor, have been the heroes, leaders, and chiefs of their
people, that there arises in the modern world the bitter cry of the male
unemployed: "Give us labour or we die!" (The problem of the
unemployedmale is, of course, not nearly so modern as that of the
unemployed female.
It may be said in England to have taken its rise in almost its present form
as early as the fifteenth century, when economic changes began to sever the
agricultural labourer from the land, and rob him of his ancient forms of
social toil. Still, in its most acute form, it may be called a modern
problem.)
Yet it is only upon one, and a
comparatively small, section of the males of
the modern civilised world that these changes in the material conditions of
life have told in such fashion as to take all useful
occupation from them
and render them
wholly or
partlyworthless to society. If the modern man's
field of labour has
contracted at one end (the
physical), at the other (the
intellectual) it has immeasurably expanded! If machinery and the command
of inanimate motor-forces have rendered of
comparatively little value the
male's mere
physical motor-power, the demand upon his
intellectualfaculties, the call for the
expenditure of
nervousenergy, and the exercise
of
delicate manipulative skill in the labour of human life, have
immeasurably increased.
In a million new directions forms of honoured and remunerative social
labour are
opening up before the feet of the modern man, which his
ancestors never dreamed of; and day by day they yet increase in numbers and
importance. The
steamship, the hydraulic lift, the
patent road-maker, the
railway-train, the electric tram-car, the steam-driven mill, the Maxim gun
and the torpedo boat, once made, may perform their labours with the
guidance and
assistance of
comparatively few hands; but a whole army of men
of science, engineers, clerks, and highly-trained
workmen is necessary for
their
invention,
construction, and
maintenance. In the domains of art, of
science, of
literature, and above all in the field of
politics and
government, an almost
infiniteextension has taken place in the fields of
male labour. Where in
primitive times woman was often the only builder,
and patterns she daubed on her hut walls or traced on her
earthen vessels
the only attempts at
domestic art; and where later but an individual here
and there was required to design a king's palace or a god's
temple or to
ornament it with statues or paintings, today a
mighty army of men, a
million strong, is employed in producing plastic art alone, both high and
low, from the traceries on wall-paper and the illustrations in penny
journals, to the production of the pictures and statues which adorn the
national collections, and a
mighty new field of toil has opened before the
anciently
hunting and fighting male. Where once one ancient witch-doctress
may have been the only creature in a whole district who
studied the nature
of herbs and earths, or a
solitarywizard experimenting on poisons was the
only individual in a whole territory interrogating nature; and where later,
a few score of al
chemists and astrologers only were engaged in examining
the
structure of substances, or the
movement of planets, today thousands of
men in every civilised
community are labouring to unravel the mysteries of
nature, and the practical
chemist, the
physician, the anatomist, the
engineer, the
astronomer, the mathematician, the electrician, form a
mighty
- occupation [,ɔkju´peiʃən] a.职业的;军事占领的 (初中英语单词)
- cultivate [´kʌltiveit] vt.耕作;培植;培养 (初中英语单词)
- abroad [ə´brɔ:d] ad.海外;到处;广泛 (初中英语单词)
- starve [stɑ:v] v.(使)饥饿 (初中英语单词)
- maiden [´meidn] n.少女 a.未婚的 (初中英语单词)
- cottage [´kɔtidʒ] n.村舍;小屋;小别墅 (初中英语单词)
- sunshine [´sʌnʃain] n.日光,阳光 (初中英语单词)
- swiftly [´swiftli] ad.迅速地,敏捷地 (初中英语单词)
- temper [´tempə] n.韧度 v.锻炼;调和 (初中英语单词)
- physical [´fizikəl] a.物质的;有形的 (初中英语单词)
- primary [´praiməri] a.主要的 n.居首位的 (初中英语单词)
- import [im´pɔ:t, ´impɔ:t] vt.&n.进口;输入 (初中英语单词)
- humanity [hju:´mæniti] n.人类;人性;仁慈 (初中英语单词)
- chemist [´kemist] n.化学家;药剂师 (初中英语单词)
- otherwise [´ʌðəwaiz] ad.另外 conj.否则 (初中英语单词)
- culture [´kʌltʃə] n.修养;文化;饲养 (初中英语单词)
- invention [in´venʃən] n.创造;发明;虚构 (初中英语单词)
- delicate [´delikət] a.精美的;微妙的 (初中英语单词)
- instance [´instəns] n.例子,实例,例证 (初中英语单词)
- comparatively [kəm´pærətivli] ad.比较地;比较上 (初中英语单词)
- energy [´enədʒi] n.活力,精力;能力 (初中英语单词)
- wherever [weər´evə] conj.无论在哪里 (初中英语单词)
- proportion [prə´pɔ:ʃən] n.比率 vt.使成比例 (初中英语单词)
- valuable [´væljuəbəl, -jubəl] a.有价值的,贵重的 (初中英语单词)
- therefore [´ðeəfɔ:] ad.&conj.因此;所以 (初中英语单词)
- factor [´fæktə] n.因素;原动力;要素 (初中英语单词)
- wholly [´həul-li] ad.完全,十足;统统 (初中英语单词)
- partly [´pɑ:tli] ad.部分地;不完全地 (初中英语单词)
- nervous [´nə:vəs] a.神经的;神经过敏的 (初中英语单词)
- opening [´əupəniŋ] n.开放;开端 a.开始的 (初中英语单词)
- patent [´peitənt, ´pæ-] a.专利的 n.专利品 (初中英语单词)
- assistance [ə´sistəns] n.协作;援助;帮助 (初中英语单词)
- construction [kən´strʌkʃən] n.建设;修建;结构 (初中英语单词)
- literature [´litərətʃə] n.文学;文献;著作 (初中英语单词)
- politics [´pɔlitiks] n.政治(学);政治活动 (初中英语单词)
- primitive [´primitiv] a.原始的 n.原始人 (初中英语单词)
- domestic [də´mestik] a.家庭的;本国的 (初中英语单词)
- temple [´tempəl] n.庙宇;寺院;太阳穴 (初中英语单词)
- structure [´strʌktʃə] n.结构,构造;组织 (初中英语单词)
- movement [´mu:vmənt] n.活动;运动;动作 (初中英语单词)
- physician [fi´ziʃən] n.(内科)医生 (初中英语单词)
- manhood [´mænhud] n.人格;男子气概 (高中英语单词)
- spinning [´spiniŋ] n.纺织 a.纺织品的 (高中英语单词)
- contented [kən´tentid] a.满足的;心满意足的 (高中英语单词)
- reaper [´ri:pə] n.收割者;收割机 (高中英语单词)
- extract [ik´strækt, ´ekstrækt] vt.取出;摘录 n.精华 (高中英语单词)
- continually [kən´tinjuəli] ad.不断地,频繁地 (高中英语单词)
- intellectual [,inti´lektʃuəl] n.知识分子 (高中英语单词)
- expenditure [ik´spenditʃə] n.消费;经费;费用 (高中英语单词)
- electricity [i,lek´trisiti] n.电;电学;电流 (高中英语单词)
- community [kə´mju:niti] n.团体;社区;公众 (高中英语单词)
- worthless [´wə:θləs] a.无价值的 (高中英语单词)
- maintenance [´meintinəns] n.保持;主张;保养 (高中英语单词)
- infinite [´infinit] a.无限的,无穷的 (高中英语单词)
- extension [ik´stenʃən] n.延长;扩展;延期 (高中英语单词)
- mighty [´maiti] a.强有力的 ad.很 (高中英语单词)
- studied [´stʌdid] a.故意的;有计划的 (高中英语单词)
- solitary [´sɔlitəri] a.独居的;孤独的 (高中英语单词)
- astronomer [ə´strɔnəmə] n.天文学家 (高中英语单词)
- dispense [di´spens] v.分配;施与;执行 (英语四级单词)
- forsake [fə´seik] vt.遗弃,抛弃,摒绝 (英语四级单词)
- upstairs [,ʌp´steəz] ad.在楼上 a.楼上的 (英语四级单词)
- accomplished [ə´kʌmpliʃt] a.完成了的;熟练的 (英语四级单词)
- exertion [ig´zə:ʃən] n.努力;行使;活动 (英语四级单词)
- explosive [ik´spləusiv] a.易爆炸的 n.炸药 (英语四级单词)
- accessible [ək´sesəbəl] a.易接近的;可到达的 (英语四级单词)
- physically [´fizikəli] ad.按照自然规律 (英语四级单词)
- arisen [ə´rizn] arise的过去分词 (英语四级单词)
- dominant [´dɔminənt] a.统治的;占优势的 (英语四级单词)
- manual [´mænjuəl] a.用手(操作)的 n.手册 (英语四级单词)
- unemployed [,ʌnim´plɔid] a.闲着的,失业的 (英语四级单词)
- steamship [´sti:m,ʃip] n.大轮船 (英语四级单词)
- workmen [´wə:kmen] n.workman的复数 (英语四级单词)
- wizard [´wizəd] n.术士;男巫 (英语四级单词)
- bereft [bi´reft] bereave的过去分词 (英语六级单词)
- unborn [,ʌn´bɔ:n] a.未生的;将来的 (英语六级单词)
- calling [´kɔ:liŋ] n.点名;职业;欲望 (英语六级单词)
- garner [´gɑ:nə] v.收藏;取得 (英语六级单词)
- especial [i´speʃəl] a.特别的,特殊的 (英语六级单词)
- powerless [´pauələs] a.软弱的;无资源的 (英语六级单词)
- mastery [´mɑ:stəri] n.精通;控制;优势 (英语六级单词)
- taking [´teikiŋ] a.迷人的 n.捕获物 (英语六级单词)
- invaluable [in´væljuəbəl] a.无价的,非常重要的 (英语六级单词)
- lovable [´lʌvəbəl] a.可爱的 (英语六级单词)
- contracted [kən´træktid] a.收缩了的;缩略的 (英语六级单词)
- earthen [´ə:θən, -ðən] a.泥土做的;大地的 (英语六级单词)
- hunting [´hʌntiŋ] n.打猎 (英语六级单词)