BOOK IV OF THE OPERATION OF OPINION IN SOCIETIES AND INDIVIDUALS CHAPTER IV Of Tyrannicide Diversity of opinions on this subject. - Argument in its vindication. - The destruction of a tyrant not a case of exception. - Consequences of tyrannicide. - Assassination described. Importance of sincerity. A QUESTION connected with the mode of effecting political melioration, and which has been eagerly discussed among political reasoners, is that of tyrannicide. The moralists of antiquity contended for the lawfulness of this practice; by the moderns it has been generally condemned. The arguments in its favor are built upon a very obvious principle. "Justice ought universally to be administered. Crimes of an inferior description are restrained, or pretended to be restrained, by the ordinary operations of jurisprudence. But criminals by whom the welfare of the whole is attacked, and who overturn the lib...
The text is from my copy of Emma Goldman's Anarchism and Other Essays. Second Revised Edition. New York & London: Mother Earth Publishing Association, 1911. pp. 151-172. FRANCISCO FERRER AND THE MODERN SCHOOL EXPERIENCE has come to be considered the best school of life. The man or woman who does not learn some vital lesson in that school is looked upon as a dunce indeed. Yet strange to say, that though organized institutions continue perpetuating errors, though they learn nothing from experience, we acquiesce, as a matter of course. There lived and worked in Barcelona a man by the name of Francisco Ferrer. A teacher of children he was, known and loved by his people. Outside of Spain only the cultured few knew of Francisco Ferrer's work.... (From : Anarchy Archives.)