Upton Sinclair

“ The winds of an early fall shrilled outside, and life suddenly seemed to Hal a stern and merciless thing. He had thought in his youthful fervour it would be thrilling to be a revolutionist; but to be an ant, one of millions and millions, to perish in a bottomless ditch--that was something a man could hardly bring himself to face! ”

“ Hal was interested to hear how Edstrom dealt with this attitude. "Mary," he said, "did you ever read about ants in Africa?"
"No," said she.
"They travel in long columns, millions and millions of them. And when they come to a ditch, the front ones fall in, and more and more of them on top, till they fill up the ditch, and the rest cross over. We are ants, Mary."
"No matter how many go in," cried the girl, "none will ever get across. There's no bottom to the ditch!"
He answered: "That's more than any ant can know. Mary. All they know is to go in. They cling to each other's bodies, even in death ”

“ Ever since these mines had been started, the operators had controlled the local powers of government, and now, in the emergency, they had brought in the state militia as well, and used it frankly to drive the strikers back to work. They had seized the leaders and active men, and thrown them into jail without trial or charges ”