Moreover, when we extend our view in history we find that poverty has
been oftentimes in the past even much more prevalent than it is at
present. This question of poverty is, in other words, a world-old
question and is intimately bound up with the question of material
civilization--that is, man's conquest of nature--and with social
organization,--the relations of men to one another. At certain times in
history certain institutions like slavery have either obviated or
concealed poverty, and particularly its extreme expressions, in
dependence and legal pauperism. Nevertheless we can regard these
questions of poverty and pauperism as practically existing in all
civilizations and in all ages. This is not saying, however, that modern
poverty and pauperism may not have certain peculiar foundations in
modern social and industrial conditions. It is only saying that it is
useless to search wholly for the causes of poverty in conditions that
are peculiar to the modern world, because poverty and pauperism are not
peculiarly modern problems.
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