“Now look how the bosses do things! They have a good wish to make out like honest people with the worker from whom they buy labor power, with the merchant from whom they buy raw materials, but they have an eternal flaw, and the rest of us workers, who know how the industry works, shall go on strike. But to sell a commodity for more than it is worth is like selling with false weights, which is illegal. Therefore, if the workers were to expose their bosses’ tricks, they would be forced to close their factories; and to produce goods based on need, maybe they would open large government facilities; that would be much better.”

So the daydreaming worker arrived at home; and there, dined, went to bed, and slept deeply, dreaming of the disappearance of bosses and the creation of government workshops.

Sleep, poor friend, sleep in peace, while hope still rests within you. Sleep in peace, for the disappointing day will soon come. Soon you will learn how your boss can sell their goods for profit, without defrauding anyone. He will make you see how one becomes a capitalist, and a large capitalist, while remaining perfectly honest.

Now your dreams will never again be so peaceful. You will see capital in your nights, like a nightmare, that presses you and threatens to crush you. With terrified eyes you will see it get fatter, like a monster with one hundred proboscises that feverishly search the pores of your body to suck your blood. And finally you will learn to assume its boundless and gigantic proportions, its appearance dark and terrible, with eyes and mouth of fire, morphing its suckers into enormous hopeful trumpets, within which you’ll see thousands of human beings disappear: men, women, children. Down your face will trickle the sweat of death, because your time, and that of your wife and your children will soon arrive. And your final moan will be drowned out by the happy sneering of the monster, glad with your state, so much richer, so much more inhumane.