The Kreutzer Sonata and Other Stories

ce-The organization of armed men, an army, is required by power to enable it to accomplish violence-The rise of power in society, that is, of violence, destroys by degrees the social life-conception-A

litary conscription destroys all the advantages of social life which it is the duty of the State to guard-General military conscription is the extreme limit of obedience, as it demands in the name of the State the abnegation of all that may be dea

ntly on the increase, while life itself, continuing to develop and to become more complex without changing its direction, as it increases the incongruities and suf

ease of the taxes and national debts of all countries, are the accidental results of a certain crisis in Euro

has crept into the social life-conception, and which has only become evident because it has arriv

fe from the individual to mankind in general, through the u

n the sum total of mankind, each individual will of his own accord sacrifice his interests to those of

us suggestion, and without compulsion, the individual merges his interests

l organizations,-the more individuals would be found striving to attain their ends at the expense of their fellow-m

o combine the idea of authority, otherwise violence, with tha

monly understood, is a means of coercion, by which a man is forced to act in opposition to his wishes. A man who submits to authority does not do as he pleases, he yields to compulsion, and in order to force a man to do something for which he has an av

s either the menace or the perpetration of these acts. This was the practice in the times of Nero and Genghis Khan, and is still in force even in the most liberal governments, like the republics of France and America. If men submit to authority, it is only because they fear that if they were to resist, they woul

nce is the bas

men, submitting to one will, forms what is called an army. The army has ever been and still is the basis of an authority, vested in the commanding generals; and the most engrossing interest of every

ed for the maintenance of authority which has brought in

ession, or by election, men who have gained authority are in no way different from their fellow-men; they are just like all others, not inclined to waive their own interests in favor of the many, but, since they hold power in their hands, are more likely to make the interests o

committing authority into the hands of infallible men, or of preventing its abuses. On the contrary, we know that men who have the authority, be they emperors, ministers of State, chiefs of police, or even policem

nception, and the organization based on it, a principle containing within itself the germs of dissolution,-the principle of authority, or the tyranny of the few over the many. In order that the authority held by certain men might fulfil its object, which is to restrain those who are trying to further their own interests to the detriment

om the very fact of its possession, must ever be far from being saints, the social

been an advantage,-that is, when the violence of the State was less than the violence of individuals toward each other,-we cannot help seeing now that this prerogative of the State, when violence no longer exists, c

in races, and were at enmity one with another; they employed violence, they spread desolation, they murdered one another. Thus devastation was on a scale both great and small: man fought with man, tribe with tribe, family with family, race with race, nation with nation.

other, and the tribes and families are not so likely to die out; while among the citizens of a State subjected to on

be to their advantage, as is illustrated by the fable that tells of the falling of the Varegs in Ru

t to bear with greater weight upon individuals formerly inimical to one another. The violence of the internal struggle, not annihilated by authority, is the offspring of authority itself. Authority is in the hands of men who, like all the rest,

omes in time worse than that which it is supposed to control: whereas, in the individual members of society, th

s of violence, always increasing in intensity. And though the violence of authority in the State is less striking than that of individual members of s

from design or unconsciously, rulers are always striving to reduce their subjects to the lowest

hen that lays the golden egg. But if the hen has ceased to lay, like the American Indians, the Fiji Islanders, or

the present time, is the position of the worki

ed to an immutable iron rule, which prescribes that they shall have scarcely enough to live upon, in order that their necessit

growth of power, the advantages accruing to those who have subm

n a ruder form, while in the constitutional monarchies, and in the republics of France and America, authority is distributed among a greater number of oppressors, and its manifestations are less rude; but the result

elieved that governments were instituted for their benefit, to preserve them from destruction, and that to permit the idea that men might liv

stimony, that as all nations had hitherto developed into the State form, this w

overnments, that is to say, their representatives, have endeavored, an

even of the detriment, of power enters more and more into the consciousness of men, it might endure forev

defense against other nations, forgetting that troops are principally ne

nationalities; and at the present time, in view of the communist, socialist, anarchist, and labor movements, it is a more urge

ws, although it has been carefully concealed from the people. The reason why the Swiss and Scottish Guards were hired to protect the popes and the French kings, and why the Russian regiments are so carefully shuffled, is in order that those which are posted in the interior may be recruited by men from t

f life is such as it is, not because it is natural for it to be so, or that the people are content to have it so, but becaus

alth earned and saved by working-men is not regarded as common property, but as something to be enjoyed by the chosen few; if certain men are invested with the power of levying taxes on labor, and with the right of using that money for whatsoever purposes they deem necessary; if the strikes of the working-men are suppressed, and the trusts of the capitalists are encouraged; if certain men are allowed to choose in the matter of religious and ci

will find it out whenever attempts are m

in order to maintain a system of life which, far from having developed from the needs of the people

ced labor of its subjects, and ever ready to pounce upon its neighbor and take possession of the goods which it has won from the labor of its own subjects. Hence it is that every government needs an army, not only for home use, but to guard

to overawe its own subjects; its neighbor tak

jects of the State. The causes for the expansion of armies are contemporary, the one depending on the other; armies are needed against internal attempts at revolt, as well as for external defense. The one depend

and compelled at last to adopt the expedient of a general conscription as a me

than all the others were forced to do likewise. Thus all the citizens took up arms to assist in

atural to arrive; at the same time it is the last expression of the innate contradiction of the

em of conscription is that men, after having made every sacrifice to escape from the cruel struggle and uncertainties of life, are once more called upon to undergo all the dangers they had hoped to escape, and moreover, the community-the State for which the individuals gave up their previous advantages-is now exposed to the same risk of destruction from which the individual himself

sloping inward-he braces them; the ceiling begins to hang down-he supports that; and when the boards between give way, other brace

The general military conscription nullifies all those a

protection of property and labor, as well as co?peration for the purposes

of war absorb the greater part of the productions

or is practically destroyed. Where war is ever threatening to brea

t be murdered, and therefore he would find it for his advantage to suffer certain privations if by that means he succeeded in escaping all these perils, he might have believed this, especially as the sacrifices required by the State promised him the hope of a peaceful e

not in this. Wherever military conscription exists, every citizen who becomes a soldier likewise becomes a supporter of the State system, and a pa

e State of which he cannot approve. Every dynastic and political feud, all the executions resulting from such feuds, the crushing of rebellions, the use of the military in dispersing mobs, in putting down strikes, all extortionate taxation, the injustice of land ownership and the limitations of freedom of labor,-all this is done, if not directly by the troops, then by the police supported by the troops. He who performs his military duty becomes a participant in all these acts, about which he often feels more than dubious, and which are in most cases directly

whole fabric. The time has come when the ever growing abuses of governments, and their mutual contests, have required from all their subjects not only material but moral sacrifices, till each man pauses and asks himself, Can I make these sacrifices? And for whose sake am I to make them

in the second place, without the State we should be like savages, possessing neither religion, morals, education, instruction, commerce, means of communic

"we should be subjected to violence and to

te might defend us, no longer exists. But if, when they speak of the men from whose attacks the government defends us, we understand that they mean the criminal classes, in that case we know that they are not extraordinary beings, like beasts of prey among sheep, but are men very much like ourselves, who are naturally just as reluctant to commit crimes as those against whom they commit them. We know now that threats and punishments are powerless to decrease the numbers of such men, but that their numbers may be decreased by change of environment and by moral i

oral, religious, or international; there would be no means of communication. Were

eral interest-commercial, industrial, or economical-without the assistance of the State, such is not the case at present. The widely diffused means of communication and transmission of thought have achieved this result,-that when the modern man desires to found societ

ishment, torture, and slavery; with the establishment of freedom of the press and liberty of meeting. Furthermore, State authorities and governments nowadays not only do not co?perate, but they directly hinder the a

rnment authority, nations would

o answer this last argu

uropean nation professes the same principles of liberty and fraternity, and therefore needs no defense against its neighbor. But if one speaks of defense against barbarians, then one per cent of the troops und

is required to sacrifice his peace, his safety, and his life, can escape the

if he refused to comply with it. If the majority of people prefer obedience to insubordination, it is not because they have given the subject dispassionate consideration, weighing the advantages and disadvantages, but because they are, so to speak, under the influence of hypnotic suggestion. Men submit to demands like this without using their reason or making the least effort of the will. It requires independent reasoning, as well as effort, to refuse submission,-effort which some men are in

d not guilty, or I may be dealt with as they treat the Mennonites in Russia-that is, be compelled to serve my term of military service by performing some non-military work; if, on the contrary, an unfavorable verdict is rendered, I shall be condemned to exile or i

nastic contortions, and after being detained from one to five years I shall be released, but still obliged for ten years longer to hold myself in readiness at any moment I may be summoned to execute the orders these people give me. And if I am less fortunate I shall be sent to the wars, still in the same condition of slavery, and there I shall be forced to slay fellow-men of other countries who never d

adations and committed all the cruel deeds required of him, he may, provided he be not killed, receive some scarlet or golden bauble to decorate his clown's attire; or if he

y, of winning the respect of good men, and, above all, he will enjoy the assurance

d disadvantages are about the same, if we include one important addition to the disadvantages. The special disadvantage for a man of the working-class who has not refus

port it by taking part in the military service, and still less by weighing the comparative advantages and disadvantages of submission or non-submission for the individual himself. It is decided irrevocably and withou