"You must be wrong.

I know that there is much that is sad and wicked in this world.

I know that the Church has lost the--what you call the proletariat."* * Proletariat: Derived originally from the Latin PROLETARII, the name given in the census of Servius Tullius to those who were of value to the state only as the rearers of offspring (PROLES); in other words, they were of no importance either for wealth, or position, or exceptional ability.
"You never had the proletariat," Ernest cried.

"The proletariat has grown up outside the Church and without the Church." "I do not follow you," the Bishop said faintly.
"Then let me explain.

With the introduction of machinery and the factory system in the latter part of the eighteenth century, the great mass of the working people was separated from the land.