Petr Alekseevich Kropotkin

Russian papers mentioned it pretty frequently in their columns, but they were not allowed to speak of its principles or what it was doing, I felt that it must be a great movement, full of consequences, but I could not grasp its aims and…

When they spoke of the United States of Europe they understood the brotherhood of workers, the weapons of war transformed into tools, and these tools used by all members of society for the benefit of all--‘the iron returned to the…

They meant not only the reign of equality as regards criminal law and political rights, but particularly economic equality.

The movement spread like wildfire in France, Belgium, Italy, and Spain, bringing to the front a great number of intelligent, active, and devoted workers, and attracting to it some decidedly superior men and women from the wealthier…

A force, never before suspected to exist, grew stronger every day in Europe; and if the movement had not been arrested in its growth by the Franco-German war, great things would probably have happened in Europe, deeply modifying the…

Unfortunately, the crushing victory of the Germans brought about abnormal conditions in Europe; it stopped for a quarter of a century the normal development of France, and threw all Europe into a period of militarism, which we are still…

In all the industrial centres of Switzerland numerous and animated sections of the International existed, and thousands of workers flocked to their meetings, at which war was declared upon the existing system of private ownership of land…

The workers asserted with increasing emphasis that of all the divisions which exist in modern society by far the most important is that between the owners of capital and those who not only come into the world penniless, but are doomed to…

The workers were called upon to make their own revolution--to take the land for the peasants and the factories for the workers themselves, and to abolish the oppressive centralized organization of the State, whose historical mission always…

They contain the theories or the scientific arguments in favour of socialist aspirations, but they give no idea how the workers accept socialist ideals, and how they could put them into practice.

All discussions about the impracticability of socialism and the necessary slowness of evolution are of little value, because the speed of evolution can only be judged from a close knowledge of the human beings of whose evolution we are…

The more I read the more I saw that there was before me a new world, unknown to me, and totally unknown to the learned makers of sociological theories--a world that I could know only by living in the Workingmen’s Association and by meeting…

It was a people’s university as well as a people’s forum.

The workers had built all their hopes on the international movement.

All hoped that a great social revolution, peaceful or not, would soon come and totally change the economic conditions.

No one desired class war, but all said that if the ruling classes rendered it unavoidable, through their blind obstinacy, the war must be fought over, provided it would bring with it well-being and liberty to the down-trodden masses.

One must have lived among the workers at that time to realize the effect which the sudden growth of the Association had upon their minds--the trust they put in it, the love with which they spoke of it, the sacrifices they made for it.

Every day, week after week and year after year, thousands of workers gave their time and their coppers, taken upon their very food, in order to support the life of each group, to secure the appearance of the papers, to defray the expenses…

Another thing that impressed me deeply was the elevating influence which the International exercised.

Most of the Paris Internationalists were almost total abstainers from drink, and all had abandoned smoking. ‘Why should I nurture in myself that weakness?’ they said.

Outsiders never realize the sacrifices which are made by the workers in order to keep their labour movements alive.

No small amount of moral courage was required to join openly a section of the International Association, and to face the discontent of the master and a probable dismissal at the first opportunity, with the long months out of work which…

But, even under the best circumstances, belonging to a trade union, or to any advanced party, requires a series of uninterrupted sacrifices.

For us it may be a pleasure to spend a couple of hours at a meeting, but for men whose working day begins at five or six in the morning those hours have to be stolen from necessary rest.

I saw how much the toiling masses needed to be helped by men possessed of education and leisure in their endeavours to spread and to develop the organization; but few and rare were those who came to assist without the intention of making…