One of the main reasons which caused a change in Bakunin’s father’s life was his marriage. Already over forty, he fell in love with a girl of eighteen, likewise of aristocratic birth, beautiful but poor. He married this young thing; and in order to quieten his conscience for this egoistic act, he endeavored for the rest of his life, not to raise her to his level but to reduce himself to her’s.
Bakunin’s mother came from the family Muraview. She was a niece of the hangman Muraview and of a hanged Muraview. She was a very common woman, vulgar and selfish. None of her children loved her. But they loved her father so much the more; for, during their childhood, he was always kind and affectionate towards them.
... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
I
The prophet of despair is ever with us ; and to him there is no silver lining to any cloud, no promise of sunshine after the storm, no people so fair and upright as to be able to act honorably unless force or fear are brought to bear upon them. To him the whole social horizon is shrouded in darkness, and not a ray of freedom’s sun is there to separate cloud from cloud. Humanity is inherently bad, and is for ever doomed to ‘be divided into dominated and dominators. Governments based on fraud and coercion, a representative system founded on legislative corruption, a poverty to offer the contrast to an equally immoral bestial luxury: these things are the ends of all being, the tombs of all aspirations, the alpha and omega of... (From: Marxists.org.)
The Moscow announcement, abolishing the Communist International, was made on Saturday, May 22, 1943. Naturally the Communist Parties in Britain and the United States were not consulted, but they went through the farce later of agreeing to their own dissolution. This pamphlet was printed at the time and its tone could not he altered. The Moscow announcement justifies the entire polemic of this pamphlet and my consistent opposition to the Third International, in the name of Communism. It gives point to the criticisms and comments that I have published consistently since 1919. These can be collected later in separate pamphlet form.
When reprinted, this pamphlet will need to be altered, to the extent that its text will become historical.... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Although he does not suspect it, the Anarchist usually lives in the ideal world, the world of reflexes. He battles against an abstraction called “Authority,” and imagines it to be the creator of the real world, the world of production and industrial exploitation. Too often he becomes crankish and endeavors to isolate himself from his fellows. He buries his head in the sand, leads the “simple life," and imagines that he has escaped from the evils of capitalism, and that everyone else can follow his example. He applauds his own mental greatness, and forgets that it is a parasite growth. He puts his own shoulder in the limelight, and forgets the amount of social labor-power necessary to produce his mental vigor.
This perso... (From: Marxists.org & RevoltLib.com.)
I.
From the rapidly growing spirit of unrest in the Labor Movement at home and abroad, and the bitter plaints to be heard in all countries at the historic failure of Parliamentary methods, it has been evident for some time past that the old principle of Trade Unionism would have to be consigned to the vortex of oblivion, together with the parliamentarism, constituting its political reflex, and the methods of alleged progressive procedure associated there- with, which have been relied on by various people to secure reforms as innumerable as the abuses begotten of the capitalist system. On the one hand, Irishmen, since the days of Parnell, have relied on the Home Rule proclivities of Members of the Westminster Playhouse for the accompli... (From: Marxists.org.)
Michel Bakunin was born in May, 1814, at Pryamuchina, situated between Moscow and Petrograd, two years after his friend, Alexander Herzen, first saw the light by the fires of Moscow. The future apostle of Nihilism was the son of a wealthy landed proprietor, who boasted a line of aristocratic ancestors. Economic conditions had decided that his natural destiny was the army. Consequently, at the age of fourteen, he entered the School of Artillery at St. Petersburg. Here he found, among a large minority of the students at least, an underground current of Liberalism which was only outwardly loyal and obedient to the behests of the Governmental despotism. Among themselves, these rebel students cherished the memories of the Decembrists of 182... (From: Anarchy Archives.)
Enrico Malatesta, born in Capua, on December 4th, 1853, went to Naples to study pharmacology, and immediately came under the influence of Bakunin, in 1871. His interest for me consists in the fact that he was a direct link between Bakunin and the anti-parliamentary propaganda that I commenced in London in 1906. The story of my association with Malatesta was told in the Herald of Revolt for June, 1912, and need not be repeated here. I remember Malatesta listening to one of my meetings at the corner of Garnault Place, Clerkenwell, before I became an Anti-Parliamentarian. As I was going away with my platform, he stopped me and said : "You are a strange person to be English because you are destined to be an Anarchist." Although I was never... (From: Marxists.org & RevoltLib.com & AnarchyArchives.)
“The State! Whatever the State saith is a lie; whatever it hath is a theft: all is counterfeit in it, the gnawing sanguinary, insatiate monster. It even bites with stolen teeth. Its very bowels are counterfeit." —— Friedrich Nietzsche
“Communism in material production, anarchy in the intellectual. —— that is the type of a Socialist mode of production, as it will develop from the rule of the proletariat——in other words, from the Social Revolution, through the logic of economic facts, whatever might be the wishes, intentions, and theories of the proletariat.” ——Karl Kautsky
I.
The argument that Socialism involves State tyranny of a type with which the worker is not una... (From: Marxists.org.)
Carlile now took over the absolute control of Sherwin’s publishing business, and dropped the title of Sherwin’s Register in favor of the Republican. In all, this journal ran into fourteen volumes, and was edited, for the most part, from Dorchester jail. We shall have occasion to refer to its contents in the course of the present biography. '
As we have seen, Thomas Paine’s Age of Reason, and Elihu Palmer's Principles of Nature, had already been condemned as blasphemous publications. This fact caused Carlile to feel it incumbent upon him to republish them in vindication of the absolute freedom of the Press. It is an evidence of Carlile’s disinterestedness that not only did he not agree with Paine’s theologica... (From: Marxists.org & RevoltLib.com.)
The Socialism of William Morris
Slightly revised from a shorthand report of as lecture delivered at the Seamore Picture House, Glasgow, October 25th, 1915.
My subject tonight is “The Socialism of William Morris.” In ‘dealing with this subject, I may say a few things that will come as a surprise to many orthodox Socialists who may be present, and to strangers who know nothing about Socialism or the movement. What I shall say will not be from the standpoint of wishing to shock people, but from that of educating them. If what I say seems a little strange or new, therefore, my hearers should remember that, from time to time, we come up against facts and ideals which are strange. The strange, however,... (From: Marxists.org & RevoltLib.com.)
Mother Grundy believes that the two sexes cannot smile, without contemplating the sex-act. That a pleasant day cannot be spent without a similar consequence. That mixed bathing leads to suggestion. That a handclasp is fatal, and, even in moments either of extreme sorrow or extreme joy, the most humble kiss of sympathy is dangerous. At one time, no man was allowed to speak to a woman unless he had “honorable intentions.” Properly translated, this meant dishonorable ones.
This is changed now, and Mother Grundy is wrong. The function of woman is not to share barracks with man, and bear him children. She is entitled to get all the health out of life possible. Free association gives that health; and as we mix no longer in the pres... (From: Marxists.org & RevoltLib.com.)
AUTHOR’S NOTE (1919 Edition).
Trade Unionism and The Class War was published first in 1911. It met with a great deal of criticism and received one complimentary notice. This was from “Dangle” in the Clarion! It was reprinted in 1914 in the Herald of Revolt. The present edition is revised. The introductory section is expanded into a chapter. The third section of the original pamphlet — which would have been the fourth as the essay now stands-treating with the question of representation is omitted. This properly belongs to the companion essay, Representation and the State, and will be embodied in it when that pamphlet is revised. Many persons object to the reasoning of this essay because they consider its logic ... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
