FABIER, JOHANNES. - Dominican preacher and controversialist, b. in Augsburg c. 1475, d. 1530. He was prior of Augsburg (1507), vicar general of the
proponents include Bernard Shaw and Sidney Webb, who sought to give a new formula for socialism inspired by the most recent developments in economic science.
The Fabian Society, founded in 1884, takes its name from the Roman dictator Fabius Cunctator and is inspired by the cautious policy symbolized by him. Like that of Marx, the doctrine of the Fabians has a theoretical side and a historical side, but in their study of the existing economic society they avoided the error into which Marx had fallen; they rejected Ricardo’s law of value, instead making extensive use of the law of rent, and succeeded in convincingly demonstrating that a large part of national wealth was consumed by the idle classes in the form of rent and interest. Economic analysis provided the Fabians with the means to criticize the existing system, and historical inquiry suggested to them the appropriate solution. During the last part of the 19th century, social evolution had certainly made state control a reality; legal protections had been granted to the economically weaker classes in the form of industrial and health regulations, etc., while important branches of economic activity, such as postal services, tram operations, and the supply of gas and water, had been taken over by public entities. With the same certainty as Marx, but for different reasons, the Fabians therefore announced that socialism was inevitable and declared that all economic activities of society would one day be controlled by public entities. These hopes were disappointed. State and municipal enterprises have continued to develop, but have remained almost exclusively limited to certain services that have a monopolistic character; they have not invaded the fields where competition is most active, and it seems that this trend stops before reaching the point at which it would provoke a social revolution.
added later is the episode of the dispute between the Christians of Cartena and those of Caesarea, who claimed his body after the peace.
The martyr is not commemorated in the Hieronymian Martyrology, but on July 31 in that of Ado, as now in the Roman Martyrology (p. 314).