Page:Roads to freedom.djvu/66

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64
Roads to Freedom

of liberty; and because the good, from the moment that it is commanded, becomes evil from the point of view of true morality, of human morality (doubtless not of divine), from the point of view of human respect and of liberty. Liberty, morality, and the human dignity of man consist precisely in this, that he does good, not because it is commanded, but because he conceives it, wills it, and loves it.


We do not find in Bakunin's works a clear picture of the society at which he aimed, nor any argument to prove that such a society could be stable. If we wish to understand Anarchism, we must turn to his followers, and especially to Kropotkin—like him, a Russian aristocrat familiar with the prisons of Europe, and like him, an Anarchist who in spite of his internationalism is imbued with a fiery hatred of the Germans.

Kropotkin has devoted much of his writing to technical questions of production. In "Fields, Factories, and Workshops" and "The Conquest of Bread" he has set himself to prove that if production were more scientific and better organized, a comparatively small amount of quite agreeable work would suffice to keep the whole population in comfort. Even assuming, as we probably must, that he somewhat exaggerates what is possible with our present scientific knowledge, it must nevertheless be conceded that his contentions contain a very large measure of truth. In attacking the subject of production he has shown that he knows what is the really crucial question. If civilization and progress are to be compatible with equality, it is necessary that equality should not involve long hours of painful toil