| New Edition (enlarged) | TWO PENCE |
| AN APPEAL TO THE YOUNG By Pierre Kropotkin PRICE - - - 2d. |
| WILLIAM REEVES | 83 Charing Cross Road, | |
| Bookseller Limited. | —London, W.C.2.— |
You must often have asked yourselves what is the cause of Anarchism, andwhy, since there are already so many Socialist schools, it is necessaryto found an additional one—that of Anarchism. In order to answer thisquestion I will go back to the close of last century.
You all know the characteristics which marked that epoch: there was anexpansion of intelligence, a prodigious development of the naturalsciences, a pitiless examination of accepted prejudices, the formationof a theory of Nature based on a truly scientific foundation,observation and reasoning. In addition to these there was criticism ofthe political institutions bequeathed to Humanity by preceding ages, anda movement towards that ideal of Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity whichhas in all times been the ideal of the popular masses. Fettered in itsfree development by despotism and by the narrow selfishness of theprivileged classes, this movement, being at the same time favoured by anexplosion of popular indignation, engendered the Great Revolution whichhad to force its way through the midst of a thousand obstacles bothwithout and within.
The Revolution was vanquished, but its ideas remained. Though at firstpersecuted and derided, they became the watchword for a whole century ofslow evolution. The history of the nineteenth century is summed up in aneffort to put in practice the principles elaborated at the end of lastcentury: this is the lot of revolutions: though vanquished theyestablish the course of the evolution which follows them. In the domainof politics these ideas are abolition of aristocratic privileges,abolition of personal government, and equality before the law. In the[Pg 3]economic order the Revolution proclaimed freedom of businesstransactions; it said—"Sell and buy freely. Sell, all of you, yourproducts, if you can produce, and if you do not possess the implementsnecessary for that purpose but have only your arms to sell, sell them,sell your labour to the highest bidder, the State will not interfere!Compete among yourselves, contractors! No favour shall be shown, the lawof natural selection will take upon itself the function of killing offthose who do not keep pace with the progress of industry, and willreward those who take the lead."
The above is at least the theory of the Revolution of 1789, and if theState intervenes in the struggle to favour some to the detriment ofothers, as we have lately seen when the monopolies of mining and railwaycompanies have been under di