Sometimes He Would Advise Me To Read

Sometimes He Would Advise Me To Read Poetry, And Would Send Me In His Letters Quantities Of Verses And Whole Poems, Which He Wrote From Memory. 'read Poetry,' He Wrote: 'poetry Makes Men Better.' How Often, In My Later Life, I Realized The Truth Of This Remark Of His! Read Poetry: It Makes Men Better.

A Different Conception Of Society, Very Different From That Which Now Prevails, Is In Process Of Formation. Under The Name Of Anarchy, A New Interpretation Of The Past And Present Life Of Society Arises, Giving At The Same Time A Forecast As Regards Its Future, Both Conceived In The Same Spirit As The Above-mentioned Interpretation In Natural Sciences. Anarchy, Therefore, Appears As A Constituent Part Of The New Philosophy, And That Is Why Anarchists Come In Contact, On So Many Points, With The Greatest Thinkers And Poets Of The Present Day.

The Whole Aspect Of The Universe Changes With This New Conception. The Idea Of Force Governing The World, Of Pre-established Law, Preconceived Harmony, Disappears To Make Room For The Harmony That Fourier Had Caught A Glimpse Of: The One Which Results From The Disorderly And Incoherent Movements Of Numberless Hosts Of Matter, Each Of Which Goes Its Own Way And All Of Which Hold Each Other In Equilibrium.

Either The State For Ever, Crushing Individual And Local Life, Taking Over In All Fields Of Human Activity, Bringing With It Its Wars And Its Domestic Struggles For Power, Its Palace Revolutions Which Only Replace One Tyrant By Another, And Inevitably At The End Of This Development There Is ... Death! Or The Destruction Of States, And New Life Starting Again In Thousands Of Centers On The Principle Of The Lively Initiative Of The Individual And Groups And That Of Free Agreement.the Choice Lies With You!

But Times And Tempers Are Changed. Rebels Are Everywhere To Be Found Who No Longer Wish To Obey The Law Without Knowing Whence It Comes, What Are Its Uses, And Whither Arises The Obligation To Submit To It, And The Reverence With Which It Is Encompassed. The Rebels Of Our Day Are Criticizing The Very Foundations Of Society Which Have Hitherto Been Held Sacred, And First And Foremost Amongst Them That Fetish, Law.