ABSTRACT
Marxists have tried to explain the feeling of solidarity with which the working class is animated as the outcome of the workers’ community of interests against the employers. For Marxists, the ethic of working-class solidarity, in respect both of origin and purpose, is a simple matter of class. In their view, working-class solidarity comes about more or less as follows. A doctrine, therefore, which tries to establish the motive of working-class solidarity upon interest, is not only indefensible from the historical and psychological outlook, but is also harmful from the practical point of view, for it breaks down the bridge which, in every one’s conscience, leads from private economic interest to the general moral law. Social eschatology implies a faith in an abrupt change of the social state, the applying equally to the overthrow of the pagan empire of Rome, and to the uplifting of the poor to a position higher than that of the rich and the powerful.
