Anarchism

“ The Anarchists are therefore justified in assuming that Anarchism --- the absence of government --- will insure the widest and greatest scope for unhampered human development, the cornerstone of true social progress and harmony. ”

“ I neglect, in a word, the more than interesting history of the slow evolution of modern anarchism, and coming directly, without further ado, to the France of to-day, attack the questions,—What is anarchy? What does the anarchist want? ”

“ Those who give this answer are called Anarchists, and their movement, Anarchy or Anarchism. The complete Anarchist is the perfect idealist; the man whose goal is entire freedom of action for all, knowing this to be the only possible condition in which equality and fraternity can exist. ”

“ And a conception of Anarchism, which, on one hand, threatens every vested interest, and, on the other, holds out a vision of a free and noble life to be won by a struggle against existing wrongs, is certain to rouse the fiercest opposition, and bring the whole repressive force of ancient evil into violent contact with the tumultuous outburst of a new hope. ”

“ Anarchism assumed definite meaning; the struggle by the many in want against the few in power, then so pathetically feeble, became to her a war unto death; the goal of social freedom appeared tangible and alluringly near. ”

“ Of course we know that among those who call themselves Anarchists there are a minority of unbalanced enthusiasts who look upon every illegal and sensational act of violence as a matter for hysterical jubilation. Very useful to the police and the press, unsteady in intellect and of weak moral principle, they have repeatedly shown themselves accessible to venal considerations. They, and their violence, and their professed Anarchism are purchasable, and in the last resort they are welcome and efficient partisans of the bourgeoisie in its remorseless war against the deliverers of the people. ”

“ There is much less agreement among anarchists than there is among socialists concerning the means by which they hope to attain the goal.
Anarchism demands the disorganisation of the extant social order, founded upon coercion. Anarchism is revolutionary on principle, is the negation on principle of the old order. The anarchist conceives of revolution as mass revolution, and he regards the definitive revolution as an immediate practical possibility. ”

“ So we may express the difference between Socialism and Anarchism as being political, the one believing in the continuance of the legislative, and therefore coercive, state, the other believing only in an administrative and voluntary state. [1] Anarchism is in reality a form of individualism and cannot be dissociated from individualistic theories. ”

“ The concepts of Anarchism and its species have been defined; the most important errors have been removed; the most prominent Anarchistic teachings of earlier and recent times have been presented in detail. We have become acquainted with Anarchism's armory. We have seen all that can be objected against the State from all possible standpoints. We have been shown the most diverse orders of life as destined to take the State's place in future. The transition from the State to these orders of life has been represented to us in the most manifold ways. ”

“ The class struggle created by the enslavement of workers and their aspirations to liberty gave birth, in the oppression, to the idea of anarchism: the idea of the total negation of a social system based on the principles of classes and the State, and its replacement by a free non-statist society of workers under self-management. ”

“ Anarchism does not mean bloodshed; does not mean robbery, arson, etc. These monstrosities are, on the contrary, the characteristic features of capitalism. Anarchism means peace and tranquillity to all. Anarchism, or socialism, means the reorganization of society upon scientific principles and the abolition of causes which produce vice and crime. ”

“ We learn, second, that by the greater part of those who at present are scientifically concerned with Anarchism the teachings of these men are recognized as Anarchistic teachings only in so far as they relate to law, the State, and property ”

“ The Bear was the first to protest.
‘It is the curse of Anarchism that every one wants to have his own opinion. It seems to me that when men like ourselves, who have guided the movement [129] for years, are agreed on the right course of action, a new comrade ought to accept our decision.’
I did not retort that the word Anarchist, if it meant anything, meant one who had his own opinion and refused to be guided by the agreement of others. There is nothing a fanatic resents so much as reason, except ridicule. ”

“ The Anarchists are being hunted and persecuted for this in every clime, but in the face of it all Anarchism is gaining more and more adherents, and if you cut off our opportunities of open agitation, then will the work be done secretly. ”

“ It ought by all means to be avoided; it ought certainly not to be provoked. There is much alarm at the appearance of anarchism, of revolutionary theories and of all sorts of tendencies subversive of social order. ”

“ The philosophy of anarchism is included in the word "Liberty"; yet it is comprehensive enough to include all things else that are conducive to progress. No barriers whatever to human progression, to thought, or investigation are placed by anarchism; nothing is considered so true or so certain, that future discoveries may not prove it false; therefore, it has but one infallible, unchangeable motto, "Freedom." Freedom to discover any truth, freedom to develop, to live naturally and fully. ”

“ That whether this or that theory, this or that scheme regarding future arrangements were accepted was not a matter of choice, but one of historical necessity, and that to us the tendency of progress seemed to be Anarchism—that is, a free society without kings or classes—a society of sovereigns in which liberty and economic equality of all would furnish an unshakable equilibrium as a foundation for natural order. ”

“ We are fully outspoken in our ideas and aims, all our working for redemption is above board, we shun secret organization for our purposes. Our platform of principles, which will be found at the conclusion of this treatise, means what it professes, no more, no less.
We, therefore, protest against being confounded and in any way identified with Anarchists of any type; we are the implacable enemies of all anarchism. ”

“ We must distinguish between the ultimate condition of anarchism, the ideal which the anarchists aspire to attain, on the one hand, and the means proposed by anarchists to enable them to advance-towards that ideal.
The ultimate aim of anarchism is not difficult to specify. It is that there should be secured an absolutely free union of individuals, enabling them to satisfy their economic, biological, and mental needs in the absence of any kind of state and of any form of coercion. ”

“ And it can not be submerged in the swamp of Anarchism, as Anarchism is a negation of the necessity of government and governmental power during the period of transition from the rule of the bourgeoisie to the rule of the proletariat. ”

“ The leading principles of anarchism are marked by great clearness and simplicity, and may be summed up as the rejection of all external authority and of all private appropriation of land and capital. All human relations will depend on the free action and assent of the individuals concerned. ”

“ What unites anarchism, socialism, and democracy is the common man's impatience of rule, his hatred of lords and masters, his opposition to laws he does not himself make, his disallowance of separate and special claims, rights, and privileges—this on the negative side. ”

“ By deeds and not by words have they written their definition of anarchism, and I am taking and using the term in this volume in the sense in which it is used most commonly by people in general. If this offends the anarchists of the non-resistant or passive-resistant type, it cannot be helped. It is the meaning that the most active of the anarchists have themselves given it. ”

“ Anarchism, to me, means not only the denial of authority, not only a new economy, but a revision of the principles of morality. It means the development of the individual as well as the assertion of the individual. IT means self-responsibility, and not leader worship. ”

“ As a rule the advocates of anarchism admit that social organisation is essential; but they detest every kind of organisation, and above all every kind of political organisation, that implies the use of compulsion or of coercive methods. What anarchists regard as permissible, what they desire to achieve, is a kind of social spontaneity, a spontaneous organisation ”

“ And now, what has Anarchism to say to all this, this bankruptcy of republicanism, this modern empire that has grown up on the ruins of our early freedom? We say this, that the sin our fathers sinned was that they did not trust liberty wholly. They thought it possible to compromise between liberty and government, believing the latter to be "a necessary evil," and the moment the compromise was made, the whole misbegotten monster of our present tyranny began to grow. Instruments which are set up to safeguard rights become the very whip with which the free are struck.
Anarchism says, Make no laws whatever concerning speech, and speech will be free; ”

“ In destroying government and statutory laws, Anarchism proposes to rescue the self-respect and independence of the individual from all restraint and invasion by authority. Only in freedom can man grow to his full stature. Only in freedom will he learn to think and move, and give the very best in him. Only in freedom will he realize the true force of the social bonds which knit men together, and which are the true foundation of a normal social life. ”

“ And anarchism, however beautiful it might appear as an ideal, was hardly a trustworthy weapon with which to oppose the greedy, hard-hearted, despotic monarchs who governed all the surrounding countries. ”

“ Logically, the relationship of the individual to the organised social whole cannot be assumed apriori to be one of opposition, of anarchistic opposition, and we find as a historical fact that anarchism originated in the later stages of political and social organisation. A non-organised whole may more readily be conceived as an opposition to the organised whole. ”

“ ANARCHISM:—The philosophy of a new social order based on liberty unrestricted by man-made law; the theory that all forms of government rest on violence, and are therefore wrong and harmful, as well as unnecessary. ”

“ Anarchism rouses man to rebellion against this black monster. Break your mental fetters, says Anarchism to man, for not until you think and judge for yourself will you get rid of the dominion of darkness, the greatest obstacle to all progress. ”

“ That is why it would be wrong to attribute the monopoly of acts of revolt to Anarchism. And, in fact, when we pass in review the acts of revolt of the last quarter of a century, we see them proceeding from all parties. ”

“ Destruction and violence! How is the ordinary man to know that the most violent element in society is ignorance; that its power of destruction is the very thing Anarchism is combating? Nor is he aware that Anarchism, whose roots, as it were, are part of nature's forces, destroys, not healthful tissue, but parasitic growths that feed on the life's essence of society. It is merely clearing the soil from weeds and sagebrush, that it may eventually bear healthy fruit. ”

“ One of the most vital principles of anarchism, a principle which distinguishes it from all revolutionary ideology, is its empiric view "that differences of brain and of intellectual capacity do not imply any differences whatsoever in the nature of the stomach and of physical needs ”

“ A defence of a crime involves compulsion of some sort, whether the force of a superstitious law or the power of popular Anarchy. How, then, does Anarchism conflict with Socialism or Individualism as above defined? ”

“ It would be impossible to represent here, in a short sketch, the penetration, on the one hand, of Anarchist ideas into modern literature, and the influence, on the other hand, which the libertarian ideas of the best contemporary writers have exercised upon the development of Anarchism. ”

“ Formidable popular movements, stamped with the character of Anarchism, took place several times in the past. Villages and cities rose against the principle of government, against the supporters of the State, its tribunals, its laws, and they proclaimed the sovereignty of the rights of man. They denied all written law, and asserted that every man should govern himself according to his conscience. ”

“ Anarchism is the great liberator of man from the phantoms that have held him captive; it is the arbiter and pacifier of the two forces for individual and social harmony. ”

“ Anarchism responds to each particular struggle by repeating and reapplying the same simple and all-embracing lesson, because this lesson has from the beginning been considered the be-all and end-all of the movement. ”

“ It is the difference between liberty and constraint, between Anarchism and government, because Anarchism means voluntary coöperation instead of forced participation. ”

“ Direct action, having proven effective along economic lines, is equally potent in the environment of the individual. There a hundred forces encroach upon his being, and only persistent resistance to them will finally set him free. Direct action against the authority in the shop, direct action against the authority of the law, direct action against the invasive, meddlesome authority of our moral code, is the logical, consistent method of Anarchism.
Will it not lead to a revolution? Indeed, it will. No real social change has ever come about without a revolution. ”

“ Anarchism is the only philosophy which brings to man the consciousness of himself; which maintains that God, the State, and society are non-existent, that their promises are null and void, since they can be fulfilled only through man's subordination. ”