,,the    ,,right ,,to ,,be ,,lazy       
,,and ,,other ,,studies      ,,by       
,,paul ,,lafargue      ,translated by   
,,charles ,h4 ,,kerr        ,,chicago   
,,charles ,h4 ,,kerr  ,,company         
,copyright1 #aijg      ,,by ,,charles   
,h4 ,,kerr  ,,company    ,illustration3 
,printer's stamp4          ,,preface    
,m4 ,thiers1 at a private session of the
 commission on primary education  of    
#ahdi1 said3 ,i wish to make the        
influence of the clergy all-powerful    
because ,i count upon it to propagate   
that good philosophy which teaches  man 
that he is here below to suffer1 and not
 that other philosophy  which on the    
contrary bids man to enjoy4 ,m4 ,thiers 
was stating  the ethics of the          
capitalist class1 whose fierce egoism   
and narrow  intelligence he incarnated4 
,the ,bourgeoisie1 when it was          
struggling against the nobility         
sustained  by the clergy1 hoisted the   
flag of free thought and atheism2 but   
once  triumphant1 it changed its tone   

and manner and today it uses religion   
to support its economic and political   
supremacy4 ,in the fifteenth and        
sixteenth centuries1 it had joyfully    
taken up the pagan tradition and        
glorified the flesh and its passions1   
reproved by ,christianity2 in our  days1
 gorged with goods and with pleasures1  
it denies the teachings of  its thinkers
 like ,rabelais and ,diderot1 and       
preaches abstinence to the              
wage-workers4 ,capitalist ethics1 a     
pitiful parody on ,christian ethics1    
strikes with its anathema the flesh of  
the laborer2 its ideal is to  reduce the
 producer to the smallest number of     
needs1 to suppress his  joys and his    
passions and to condemn him to play the 
part of a machine  turning out work     
without respite and without thanks4     
,the revolutionary socialists must take 
up again the battle fought by  the      
philosophers and pamphleteers of the    
bourgeoisie2 they must march  up to the 
assault of the ethics and the social    

theories of capitalism2  they must      
demolish in the heads of the class which
 they call to action  the prejudices    
sown in them by the ruling class2 they  
must proclaim in  the faces of the      
hypocrites of all ethical systems that  
the earth shall  cease to be the vale of
 tears for the laborer2 that in the     
communist  society of the future1 which 
we shall establish peaceably if we may1 
forcibly if we must1 the impulses of men
 will be given a free rein1  for all    
these impulses are by nature good1 we   
have nothing to avoid  but their misuse 
and their excesses1#a and they will not 
be avoided  except by their mutual      
counter-balancing1 balancing1 by the    
harmonious  development of the human    
organism1 for as ,dr4 ,beddoe says1 ,it 
is  only when a race reaches its maximum
 of physical development1 that it       
arrives at its highest point of energy  
and moral vigor4#b ,such was  also the  
opinion of the great naturalist ,charles
 ,darwin4#c    ,this refutation of the  

,right to ,work which ,i am republishing
 with  some additional notes appeared in
 the weekly ,egalit1 #ahhj1 second      
series4                                 
,p4 ,l4      ,sainte-,plagie ,prison1   
#ahhc4      ,,footnotes3    #a          
,descartes4 ,les ,passions de l'me4     
#b ,doctor ,beddoe4 ,memoirs of the     
,anthropological ,society4    #c        
,charles ,darwin4 ,descent of ,man4     
,,table ,,of ,,contents                 
,page      ,,the ,,right ,,to ,,be      
,,lazy--          ,i4 ,a ,disastrous    
,dogma                                  
#i         ,,ii4 ,blessings of ,work    
#ad        ,,iii4 ,the ,consequences of 
,over-,production                       
#cj         ,,iv4 ,new ,songs to ,new   
,music                                  
#dh         ,appendix                   
#eg      ,,socialism ,,and ,,the        
,,intellectuals                         
#fc      ,,the ,,bankruptcy ,,of        
,,capitalism                            
#aje      ,,the ,,woman ,,question      

#aaa      ,,the ,,socialist ,,ideal     
#aci      ,,the ,,rights ,,of ,,the     
,,horse ,,and ,,the ,,rights ,,of ,,man 
#aeg          ,,the ,,right ,,to ,,be   
,,lazy      ,let us be lazy in          
everything1 except in loving and        
drinking1 except    in being lazy4      
--,lessing4          ,i4    ,a          
,,disastrous ,,dogma4      ,a strange   
delusion possesses the working classes  
of the nations where  capitalist        
civilization holds its sway4 ,this      
delusion drags in its  train the        
individual and social woes which for two
 centuries have  tortured sad humanity4 
,this delusion is the love of work1 the 
furious  passion for work1 pushed even  
to the exhaustion of the vital force  of
 the individual and his progeny4        
,instead of opposing this mental        
aberration1 the priests1 the economists 
and the moralists have cast a  sacred   
halo over work4 ,blind and finite men1  
they have wished to be  wiser than their
 ,god2 weak and contemptible men1 they  

have presumed  to rehabilitate what     
their ,god had cursed4 ,i1 who do not   
profess to be  a ,christian1 an         
economist or a moralist1 ,i appeal from 
their judgement  to that of their ,god2 
from the preachings of their religious1 
economics  or free-thought ethics1 to   
the frightful consequences of work in   
capitalist society4    ,in capitalist   
society work is the cause of all        
intellectual degeneracy1  of all organic
 deformity4 ,compare the thorough-bred  
in ,rothschild's  stables1 served by a  
retinue of bipeds1 with the heavy brute 
of the  ,norman farms which plows the   
earth1 carts the manure1 hauls the      
crops4  ,look at the noble savage whom  
the missionaries of trade and the       
traders  of religion have not yet       
corrupted with ,christianity1 syphilis  
and the  dogma of work1 and then look at
 our miserable slaves of machines4#d    
,when1 in our civilized ,europe1 we     
would find a trace of the native  beauty
 of man1 we must go seek it in the      

nations where economic  prejudices have 
not yet uprooted the hatred of work4    
,spain1 which1  alas1 is degenerating1  
may still boast of possessing fewer     
factories  than we have of prisons and  
barracks2 but the artist rejoices in his
  admiration of the hardy ,andalusian1  
brown as his native chestnuts1  straight
 and flexible as a steel rod2 and the   
heart leaps at hearing  the beggar1     
superbly draped in his ragged capa1     
parleying on terms  of equality with the
 duke of ,ossuna4 ,for the ,spaniard1 in
 whom the  primitive animal has not been
 atrophied1 work is the worst sort of   
slavery4#e ,the ,greeks in their era of 
greatness had only contempt for  work3  
their slaves alone were permitted to    
labor3 the free man knew  only exercises
 for the body and mind4 ,and so it was  
in this era that  men like ,aristotle1  
,phidias1 ,aristophanes moved and       
breathed among the  people2 it was the  
time when a handful of heroes at        
,marathon crushed  the hordes of ,asia1 

soon to be subdued by ,alexander4 ,the  
philosophers  of antiquity taught       
contempt for work1 that degradation of  
the free  man1 the poets sang of        
idleness1 that gift from the ,gods3     
,o ,melibae ,deus nobis haec otia       
fecit4#f    ,jesus1 in his sermon on the
 ,mount1 preached idleness3 ,consider   
the  lilies of the field1 how they grow3
 they toil not1 neither do they  spin3  
and yet ,i say unto you that even       
,solomon in all his glory was not       
arrayed like one of these4 ,jehovah the 
bearded and angry god1 gave his         
worshipers the supreme example of ideal 
laziness2 after six days of  work1 he   
rests for all eternity4    ,on the other
 hand1 what are the races for which work
 is an organic  necessity8 ,the         
,auvergnians2 the ,scotch1 those        
,auvergnians of the  ,british ,isles2   
the ,galicians1 those ,auvergnians of   
,spain2 the  ,pomeranians1 those        
,auvergnians of ,germany2 the ,chinese1 
those  ,auvergnians of ,asia4 ,in our   

society1 which are the classes that love
  work for work's sake8 ,the peasant    
proprietors1 the little shop-keepers2   
the former bent double over their       
fields1 the latter crouched in their    
shops1 burrow like the mole in his      
subterranean passage and never stand  up
 to look at nature leisurely4    ,and   
meanwhile the proletariat1 the great    
class embracing all the  producers of   
civilized nations1 the class which in   
freeing itself will  free humanity from 
servile toil and will make of the human 
animal a  free being1--the proletariat1 
betraying its instincts1 despising its  
historic mission1 has let itself be     
perverted by the dogma of work4  ,rude  
and terrible has been its punishment4   
,all its individual and  social woes are
 born of its passion for work4          
,,footnotes3    #d ,european explorers  
pause in wonder before the physical     
beauty and  the proud bearing of the men
 of primitive races1 not soiled by what 
,paeppig calls the poisonous breath of  

civilization4 ,speaking of  the         
aborigines of the ,oceanic ,islands1    
,lord ,george ,campbell writes3  ,there 
is not a people in the world which      
strikes one more favorably  at first    
sight4 ,their smooth skin of a light    
copper tint1 their hair  golden and     
curly1 their beautiful and happy faces4 
,in a word1 their  whole person formed a
 new and splendid specimen of the 'genus
 homo'2  their physical appearance gave 
the impression of a race superior to    
ours4 ,the civilized men of ancient     
,rome1 witness ,caesar and ,tacitus1    
regarded with the same admiration the   
,germans of the communist tribes  which 
invaded the ,roman empire4 ,following   
,tacitus1 ,salvien1 the priest  of the  
fifth century who received the surname  
of master of the ,bishops1  held up the 
barbarians as an example to civilized   
,christians3 ,we are  immodest before   
the barbarians1 who are more chaste than
 we4 ,even  more the barbarians are     
wounded at our lack of modesty2 the     

,goths do  not permit debauchees of     
their own nation to remain among them2  
alone  in the midst of them1 by the sad 
privilege of their nationality and      
their name1 the ,romans have the right  
to be impure4 7,pederasty was  then the 
height of the fashion among both pagans 
and ,christians47 ,the  oppressed fly to
 the barbarians to seek for mercy and a 
shelter4 7,de  ,gubernatione ,dei47 ,the
 old civilization and the rising        
,christianity  corrupted the barbarians 
of the ancient world1 as the old        
,christianity  and the modern capitalist
 civilization are corrupting the savages
 of  the new world4    ,m4 ,f4 ,le,play1
 whose talent for observation must be   
recognized1 even  if we reject his      
sociological conclusions1 tainted with  
philanthropic  and ,christian           
pharisaism1 says in his book ,les       
,ouvriers ,europens  7#ahhe73 ,the      
,propensity of the ,bachkirs for        
laziness 7the ,bachkirs are             
semi-nomadic shepherds of the ,asiatic  

slope of the ,ural mountains72  the     
leisure of nomadic life1 the habit of   
meditation which this  engenders in the 
best endowed individuals4--all this     
often gives them a  distinction of      
manner1 a fineness of intelligence and  
judgement which  is rarely to be        
observed on the same social level in a  
more developed  civilization4444 ,the   
thing most repugnant to them is         
agricultural  labor3 they will do       
anything rather than accept the trade of
 a farmer4  ,agriculture is in fact the 
first example of servile labor in the   
history of man4 ,according to biblical  
tradition1 the first criminal1  ,cain1  
is a farmer4    #e ,the ,spanish proverb
 says3 ,descanzar es salud4 7,rest is   
healthful47    #f ,o ,melibaeus6 a god  
has granted us this idleness4 ,virgil's 
,bucolics4  7,see appendix47            
,,ii4    ,,blessings ,,of ,,work4       
,in #aggj at ,london1 an anonymous      
pamphlet appeared under the title1  ,an 
,essay on ,trade and ,commerce4 ,it made

 some stir in its time4  ,the author1 a 
great philanthropist1 was indignant that
 the factory  population of ,england had
 taken into its head the fixed idea that
 in  their quality of ,englishmen all   
the individuals composing it have  by   
right of birth the privilege of being   
freer and more independent  than the    
laborers of any country in ,europa4     
,this idea may have its  usefulness for 
soldiers1 since it stimulates their     
valor1 but the  less the factory workers
 are imbued with it the better for      
themselves  and the state4 ,laborers    
ought never to look on themselves as    
independent of their superiors4 ,it is  
extremely dangerous to encourage  such  
infatuations in a commercial state like 
ours1 where perhaps  seven-eighths of   
the population have little or no        
property4 ,the cure  will not be        
complete until our industrial laborers  
are contented to  work six days for the 
same sum which they now earn in four4   
,thus1  nearly a century before ,guizot1

 work was openly preached in ,london as 
a curb to the noble passions of man4    
,the more my people work1 the  less     
vices they will have1 wrote ,napoleon on
 ,may #eth1 #ahjg1 from  ,osterod4 ,i am
 the authority 444 and ,i should be     
disposed to order  that on ,sunday after
 the hour of service be past1 the shops 
be opened  and the laborers return to   
their work4 ,to root out laziness and   
curb  the sentiments of pride and       
independence which arise from it1 the   
author of the ,essay on ,trade proposed 
to imprison the poor in ideal           
work-houses1 which should become houses 
of terror1 where they should  work      
fourteen hours a day in such fashion    
that when meal time was  deducted there 
should remain twelve hours of work full 
and complete4    ,twelve hours of work a
 day1 that is the ideal of the          
philanthropists  and moralists of the   
eighteenth century4 ,how have we outdone
 this nec  plus ultra6 ,modern factories
 have become ideal houses of correction 

in  which the toiling masses are        
imprisoned1 in which they are condemned 
to compulsory work for twelve or        
fourteen hours1 not the men only but    
also women and children4#g ,and to think
 that the sons of the heroes  of the    
,terror have allowed themselves to be   
degraded by the religion  of work1 to   
the point of accepting1 since #ahdh1 as 
a revolutionary  conquest1 the law      
limiting factory labor to twelve hours4 
,they proclaim  as a revolutionary      
principle the ,right to ,work4 ,shame to
 the ,french  proletariat6 ,only slaves 
would have been capable of such         
baseness4  ,a ,greek of the heroic times
 would have required twenty years of    
capitalist civilization before he could 
have conceived such vileness4    ,and if
 the miseries of compulsory work and the
 tortures of hunger have  descended upon
 the proletariat more in number than the
 locusts of the  ,bible1 it is because  
the proletariat itself invited them4    
,this work1  which in ,june #ahdh the   

laborers demanded with arms in their    
hands1  this they have imposed on their 
families2 they have delivered up to  the
 barons of industry their wives and     
children4 ,with their own hands  they   
have demolished their domestic hearths4 
,with their own hands they  have dried  
up the milk of their wives4 ,the unhappy
 women carrying  and nursing their babes
 have been obliged to go into the mines 
and  factories to bend their backs and  
exhaust their nerves4 ,with their own   
hands they have broken the life and the 
vigor of their children4 ,shame  on the 
proletarians6 ,where are those          
neighborly housewives told of  in our   
fables and in our old tales1 bold and   
frank of speech1 lovers  of ,bacchus8   
,where are those buxom girls1 always on 
the move1 always  cooking1 always       
singing1 always spreading life1         
engendering life's joy1  giving painless
 birth to healthy and vigorous          
children8444 ,today we  have factory    
girls and women1 pale drooping flowers1 

with impoverished  blood1 with          
disordered stomachs1 with languid       
limbs4444 ,they have never  known the   
pleasure of a healthful passion1 nor    
would they be capable  of telling of it 
merrily6 ,and the children8 ,twelve     
hours of work  for children6 ,o1 misery4
 ,but not all the ,jules ,simon of the  
,academy  of ,moral and ,political      
,science1 not all the ,germinys of      
jesuitism  could have invented a vice   
more degrading to the intelligence of   
the  children1 more corrupting of their 
instincts1 more destructive of their    
organism than work in the vitiated      
atmosphere of the capitalist factory4   
,our epoch has been called the century  
of work4 ,it is in fact the  century of 
pain1 misery and corruption4    ,and all
 the while the philosophers1 the        
bourgeois economists--from  the         
painfully confused ,august ,comte to the
 ludicrously clear  ,leroy-,beaulieu2   
the people of bourgeois literature--from
 the quackishly  romantic ,victor ,hugo 

to the artlessly grotesque ,paul de     
,kock1--all have  intoned nauseating    
songs in honor of the god ,progress1 the
 eldest son  of ,work4 ,listen to them  
and you would think that happiness was  
soon  to reign over the earth1 that its 
coming was already perceived4 ,they     
rummaged in the dust of past centuries  
to bring back feudal miseries  to serve 
as a sombre contrast to the delights of 
the present times4  ,have they wearied  
us1 these satisfied people1 yesterday   
pensioners at  the table of the         
nobility1 today pen-valets of the       
capitalist class  and fatly paid8 ,have 
they reckoned us weary of the peasant1  
such as  ,la ,bruyre described him8     
,well1 here is the brilliant picture of 
proletarian delights in the year of     
capitalist progress #ahdj1 penned by    
one of their own men1 ,dr4 ,villerm1    
member of the ,institute1 the same  who 
in #ahdh was a member of that scientific
 society 7,thiers1 ,cousin1  ,passy1    
,blanqui1 the academician1 were in it71 

which disseminated among  the masses the
 nonsense of bourgeois economics and    
ethics4    ,it is of manufacturing      
,alsace that ,dr4 ,villerm speaks1--the 
,alsace  of ,kestner and ,dollfus1 those
 flowers of industrial philanthropy and 
republicanism4 ,but before the doctor   
raises up before us his picture of      
proletarian miseries1 let us listen to  
an ,alsatian manufacturer1 ,mr4  ,th4   
,mieg1 of the house of ,dollfus1 ,mieg  
,co41 depicting the condition  of the   
old-time artisan3 ,at ,mulhouse fifty   
years ago 7in #ahac1 when  modern       
mechanical industry was just arising7   
the laborers were all  children of the  
soil1 inhabiting the town and the       
surrounding villages1  and almost all   
owning a house and often a little       
field4#h ,it was  the golden age of the 
laborer4 ,but at that time ,alsatian    
industry did  not deluge the world with 
its cottons1 nor make millionaires out  
of  its ,dollfus and ,koechlin4 ,but    
twenty-five years after1 when ,villerm  

visited ,alsace1 the modern ,minotaur1  
the capitalist workshop1 had  conquered 
the country2 in its insatiable appetite 
for human labor it  had dragged the     
workmen from their hearths1 the better  
to wring them  and press out the labor  
which they contained4 ,it was by        
thousands  that the workers flocked     
together at the signal of the steam     
whistle4  ,a great number1 says         
,villerm1 five thousand out of seventeen
  thousand1 were obliged by high rents  
to lodge in neighboring villages4  ,some
 of them lived three or four miles from 
the factory where they  worked4#i    ,at
 ,mulhouse in ,dornach1 work began at   
five o'clock in the morning and  ended  
at eight o'clock in the evening1 summer 
and winter4 ,it was a  sight to watch   
them arrive each morning into the city  
and depart each  evening4 ,among them   
were a multitude of women1 pale1 often  
walking  bare-footed through the mud1   
and who for lack of umbrellas when the  
rain or snow fell1 wore their aprons or 

skirts turned up over their  heads4     
,there was a still larger number of     
young children1 equally  dirty1 equally 
pale1 covered with rags1 greasy from the
 machine oil  which drops on them while 
they work4 ,they were better protected  
from  the rain because their clothes    
shed water2 but unlike the women just   
mentioned1 they did not carry their     
day's provisions in a basket1 but  they 
carryed in their hands or hid under     
their clothing as best they  might1 the 
morsel of bread which must serve them as
 food until time for  them to return    
home4    ,thus to the strain of an      
insufferably long day--at least fifteen 
hours--is added for these wretches the  
fatigue of the painful daily  journeys4 
,consequently they reach home           
overwhelmed by the need of  sleep1 and  
next day they rise before they are      
completely rested in  order to reach the
 factory by the opening time4    ,now1  
look at the holes in which were packed  
those who lodge in the  town3 ,i saw at 

,mulhouse in ,dornach1 and the          
neighboring houses1 some  of those      
miserable lodgings where two families   
slept each in its corner  on straw      
thrown on the floor and kept in its     
place by two planks4444  ,this          
wretchedness among the laborers of the  
cotton industry in the  department of   
the upper ,rhine is so extreme that it  
produces this sad  result1 that while in
 the families of the manufacturers1     
merchants1  shop-keepers or factory     
superintendents1 half of the children   
reach  their twenty-first year1 this    
same half ceases to exist before the    
lapse of two years in the families of   
weavers and cotton spinners4            
,speaking of the labor of the workshop1 
,villerm adds3 ,it is not a  work1 a    
task1 it is a torture and it is         
inflicted on children of six  to eight  
years4 ,it is this long torture day     
after day which wastes  away the        
laborers in the cotton spinning         
factories4 ,and as to the  duration of  

the work ,villerm observes1 that the    
convicts in prisons  work but ten hours1
 the slaves in the west ,indies work but
 nine hours1  while there existed in    
,france after its ,revolution of #aghi1 
which had  proclaimed the pompous       
,rights of ,man factories where the day 
was  sixteen hours1 out of which the    
laborers were allowed only an hour and  
a half for meals4#aj    ,what a         
miserable abortion of the revolutionary 
principles of  the bourgeoisie6 ,what   
woeful gifts from its god ,progress6    
,the  philanthropists hail as           
benefactors of humanity those who having
 done  nothing to become rich1 give work
 to the poor4 ,far better were it to    
scatter pestilence and to poison the    
springs than to erect a capitalist      
factory in the midst of a rural         
population4 ,introduce factory work1    
and farewell joy1 health and liberty2   
farewell to all that makes life         
beautiful and worth living4#aa    ,and  
the economists go on repeating to the   

laborers1 ,work1 to increase  social    
wealth1 and nevertheless an economist1  
,destutt de ,tracy1  answers3 ,it is in 
poor nations that people are            
comfortable1 in  rich nations they are  
ordinarily poor2 and his disciple       
,cherbuliez  continues3 ,the laborers   
themselves in co-operating toward the   
accumulation of productive capital      
contribute to the event which sooner  or
 later must deprive them of a part of   
their wages4 ,but deafened and          
stupified by their own howlings1 the    
economists answer3 ,work1 always  work1 
to create your prosperity1 and in the   
name of ,christian meekness  a priest of
 the ,anglican ,church1 the ,rev4 ,mr4  
,townshend1 intones3 ,work1  work1 night
 and day4 ,by working you make your     
poverty increase and your  poverty      
releases us from imposing work upon you 
by force of law4 ,the  legal imposition 
of work gives too much trouble1 requires
 too much  violence and makes too much  
noise4 ,hunger1 on the contrary1 is not 

only  a pressure which is peaceful1     
silent and incessant1 but as it is the  
most natural motive for work and        
industry1 it also provokes to the  most 
powerful efforts4 ,work1 work1          
proletarians1 to increase social  wealth
 and your individual poverty2 work1     
work1 in order that becoming  poorer1   
you may have more reason to work and    
become miserable4 ,such is  the         
inexorable law of capitalist production4
    ,because1 lending ear to the        
fallacious words of the economists1 the 
proletarians have given themselves up   
body and soul to the vice of  work1 they
 precipitate the whole of society into  
these industrial  crises of             
over-production which convulse the      
social organism4 ,then  because there is
 a plethora of merchandise and a dearth 
of purchasers1  the shops are closed and
 hunger scourges the working people with
 its  whip of a thousand lashes4 ,the   
proletarians1 brutalized by the dogma of
  work1 not understanding that the      

over-work which they have inflicted     
upon themselves during the time of      
pretended prosperity is the cause of    
their present misery1 do not run to the 
granaries of wheat and cry3 ,we  are    
hungry1 we wish to eat4 ,true we have   
not a red cent1 but beggars as  we are1 
it is we1 nevertheless1 who harvested   
the wheat and gathered  the grapes4     
,they do not besiege the warehouse of   
,bonnet1 or ,jujurieux1  the inventor of
 industrial convents1 and cry out3 ,m4  
,bonnet1 here  are your working women1  
silk workers1 spinners1 weavers2 they   
are  shivering pitifully under their    
patched cotton dresses1 yet it is they  
who have spun and woven the silk robes  
of the fashionable women of all         
,christendom4 ,the poor creatures       
working thirteen hours a day1 had no    
time to think of their toilet4 ,now1    
they are out of work and have time  to  
rustle in the silks they have made4     
,ever since they lost their milk  teeth 
they have devoted themselves to your    

fortune and have lived in  abstinence4  
,now they are at leisure and wish to    
enjoy a little of the  fruits of their  
labor4 ,come1 ,m4 ,bonnet1 give them    
your silks1 ,m4 ,harmel  shall furnish  
his muslins1 ,m4 ,pouyer-,quertier his  
calicos1 ,m4 ,pinet his  boots for their
 dear little feet1 cold and damp4 ,clad 
from top to toe  and gleeful1 they will 
be delightful to look at4 ,come1 no     
evasions1  you are a friend of humanity1
 are you not1 and a ,christian into the 
bargain8 ,put at the disposal of your   
working girls the fortune they  have    
built up for you out of their flesh2 you
 want to help business1  get your goods 
into circulation1--here are consumers   
ready at hand4  ,give them unlimited    
credit4 ,you are simply compelled to    
give credit  to merchants whom you do   
not know from ,adam or ,eve1 who have   
given  you nothing1 not even a glass of 
water4 ,your working women will pay  the
 debt the best they can4 ,if at maturity
 they let their notes go to  protest1   

and if they have nothing to attach1 you 
can demand that they  pay you in        
prayers4 ,they will send you to paradise
 better than your  black-gowned priests 
steeped in tobacco4    ,instead of      
taking advantage of periods of crisis1  
for a general  distribution of their    
products and a universal holiday1 the   
laborers1  perishing with hunger1 go and
 beat their heads against the doors of  
the  workshops4 ,with pale faces1       
emaciated bodies1 pitiful speeches they 
assail the manufacturers3 ,good ,m4     
,chagot1 sweet ,m4 ,schneider1 give us  
work1 it is not hunger1 but the passion 
for work which torments us4  ,and these 
wretches1 who have scarcely the strength
 to stand upright1  sell twelve and     
fourteen hours of work twice as cheap as
 when they had  bread on the table4 ,and
 the philanthropists of industry profit 
by their  lockouts to manufacture at    
lower cost4    ,if industrial crises    
follow periods of over-work as          
inevitably as night  follows day1       

bringing after them lockouts and poverty
 without end1  they also lead to        
inevitable bankruptcy4 ,so long as the  
manufacturer  has credit he gives free  
rein to the rage for work4 ,he borrows1 
and  borrows again1 to furnish raw      
material to his laborers1 and goes on   
producing without considering that the  
market is becoming satiated  and that if
 his goods don't happen to be sold1 his 
notes will still  come due4 ,at his     
wits' end1 he implores the banker1 he   
throws himself  at his feet1 offering   
his blood1 his honor4 ,a little gold    
will do my  business better1 answers the
 ,rothschild4 ,you have #bj1jjj pairs of
  hose in your warehouse2 they are worth
 #bj;c4 ,i will take them at #d;c4  ,the
 banker gets possession of the goods and
 sells them at #f;c or #h;c1  and       
pockets certain frisky dollars which owe
 nothing to anybody3 but  the           
manufacturer has stepped back for a     
better leap4 ,at last the crash  comes  
and the warehouses disgorge4 ,then so   

much merchandise is thrown  out of the  
window that you cannot imagine how it   
came in by the door4  ,hundreds of      
millions are required to figure the     
value of the goods that  are destroyed4 
,in the last century they were burned or
 thrown into the  water4#ab    ,but     
before reaching this decision1 the      
manufacturers travel the world  over in 
search of markets for the goods which   
are heaping up4 ,they  force their      
government to annex ,congo1 to seize on 
,tonquin1 to batter  down the ,chinese  
,wall with cannon shots to make an      
outlet for their  cotton goods4 ,in     
previous centuries it was a duel to the 
death between  ,france and ,england as  
to which should have the exclusive      
privilege of  selling to ,america and   
the ,indies4 ,thousands of young and    
vigorous men  reddened the seas with    
their blood during the colonial wars of 
the  sixteenth1 seventeenth and         
eighteenth centuries4    ,there is a    
surplus of capital as well as of goods4 

,the financiers no  longer know where to
 place it4 ,then they go among the happy
 nations who  are loafing in the sun    
smoking cigarettes and they lay down    
railroads1  erect factories and import  
the curse of work4 ,and this exportation
 of  ,french capital ends one fine      
morning in diplomatic complications4 ,in
  ,egypt1 for example1 ,france1 ,england
 and ,germany were on the point of      
hairpulling to decide which usurers     
shall be paid first4 ,or it ends  with  
wars like that in ,mexico where ,french 
soldiers are sent to play  the part of  
constables to collect bad debts4#ac     
,these individual and social miseries1  
however great and innumerable  they may 
be1 however eternal they appear1 will   
vanish like hyenas  and jackals at the  
approach of the lion1 when the          
proletariat shall  say ,i will4 ,but to 
arrive at the realization of its        
strength the  proletariat must trample  
under foot the prejudices of ,christian 
ethics1  economic ethics and            

free-thought ethics4 ,it must return to 
its natural  instincts1 it must proclaim
 the ,rights of ,laziness1 a thousand   
times  more noble and more sacred than  
the anaemic ,rights of ,man concocted by
  the metaphysical lawyers of the       
bourgeois revolution4 ,it must accustom 
itself to working but three hours a day1
 reserving the rest of the day  and     
night for leisure and feasting4    ,thus
 far my task has been easy2 ,i have had 
but to describe real evils  well known1 
alas1 by all of us2 but to convince the 
proletariat that  the ethics innoculated
 into it is wicked1 that the unbridled  
work to  which it has given itself up   
for the last hundred years is the most  
terrible scourge that has ever struck   
humanity1 that work will become  a mere 
condiment to the pleasures of idleness1 
a beneficial exercise to  the human     
organism1 a passion useful to the social
 organism only when  wisely regulated   
and limited to a maximum of three hours 
a day2 this  is an arduous task beyond  

my strength4 ,only communist            
physiologists1  hygienists and          
economists could undertake it4 ,in the  
following pages  ,i shall merely try to 
show that given the modern means of     
production  and their unlimited         
reproductive power it is necessary to   
curb the  extravagant passion of the    
laborers for work and to oblige them to 
consume the goods which they produce4   
,,footnotes3    #g ,at the first        
,congress of ,charities held at         
,brussels in #aheg one  of the richest  
manufacturers of ,marquette1 near       
,lille1 ,m4 ,scrive1 to  the plaudits of
 the members of the congress declared   
with the noble  satisfaction of a duty  
performed3 ,we have introduced certain  
methods  of diversion for the children4 
,we teach them to sing during their     
work1  also to count while working4     
,that distracts them and makes them     
accept  bravely those twelve hours of   
labor which are necessary to procure    
their means of existence4 ,twelve hours 

of labor1 and such labor1  imposed on   
children less than twelve years old6    
,the materialists will  always regret   
that there is no hell in which to       
confine these ,christian  philanthropic 
murderers of childhood4    #h ,speech   
delivered before the ,international     
,society of ,practical  ,studies in     
,social ,economics1 at ,paris in ,may   
#ahfc1 and published in the  ,french    
,economist of the same epoch4    #i     
,note that this was before the era of   
railroads and street cars4              
7,translator47    #aj ,l4 ,r4 ,villerm4 
,tableau de l'tat physique et moral des 
ouvriers  dans les fabriques de coton1  
de laine et de soie 7#ahdj74 ,it is not 
because ,dollfus1 ,koechlin and other   
,alsatian manufacturers were            
republicans1 patriots and protestant    
philanthropists that they treated  their
 laborers in this way1 for ,blanqui1 the
 academician1 ,reybaud1 the  prototype  
of ,jerome ,paturot1 and ,jules ,simon1 
have observed the same  amenities for   

the working class among the very        
catholic and monarchical  manufacturers 
of ,lille and ,lyons4 ,these are        
capitalist virtues which  harmonize     
delightfully with all political and     
religious convictions4    #aa ,the      
,indians of the warlike tribes of       
,brazil kill their invalids  and old    
people2 they show their affection for   
them by putting an end  to a life which 
is no longer enlivened by combats1      
feasts and dances4  ,all primitive      
peoples have given these proofs of      
affection to their  relatives3 the      
,massagetae of the ,caspian ,sea        
7,herodotus71 as well as  the ,wens of  
,germany and the ,celts of ,gaul4 ,in   
the churches of ,sweden  even lately    
they preserved clubs called family clubs
 which served to  deliver parents from  
the sorrows of old age4 ,how degenerate 
are the  modern proletarians to accept  
with patience the terrible miseries of  
factory labor6    #ab ,at the           
,industrial ,congress held in ,berlin in

 ,jan4 #ba1 #ahgi1 the  losses in the   
iron industry of ,germany during the    
last crisis were  estimated at          
#aji1jef1jjj4    #ac ,m4 ,clemenceau's  
,justice said on ,april #f1 #ahhj1 in   
its financial  department3 ,we have     
heard this opinion maintained1 that even
 without  pressure the billions of the  
war of #ahgj would have been equally    
lost  for ,france1 that is under the    
form of loans periodically put out to   
balance the budgets of foreign          
countries2 this is also our opinion4    
,the loss of ,english capital on loans  
of ,south ,american ,republics is       
estimated at a billion dollars4 ,the    
,french laborers not only produced  the 
billion dollars paid ,bismarck1 but they
 continued to pay interest  on the war  
indemnity to ,ollivier1 ,girardin1      
,bazaine and other income  drawers1 who 
brought on the war and the rout4        
,nevertheless they still  have one shred
 of consolation3 these billions will not
 bring on a war  of reprisal4           

,,iii4    ,,the ,,consequences ,,of     
,,over-,,production4      ,a ,greek poet
 of ,cicero's time1 ,antiparos1 thus    
sang of the invention  of the water-mill
 7for grinding grain71 which was to free
 the slave  women and bring back the    
,golden ,age3 ,spare the arm which turns
 the  mill1 ,o1 millers1 and sleep      
peacefully4 ,let the cock warn you in   
vain  that day is breaking4 ,demeter has
 imposed upon the nymphs the labor  of  
the slaves1 and behold them leaping     
merrily over the wheel1 and  behold the 
axle tree1 shaken1 turning with its     
spokes and making the  heavy rolling    
stone revolve4 ,let us live the life of 
our fathers1 and  let us rejoice in     
idleness over the gifts that the goddess
 grants  us4 ,alas61 the leisure which  
the pagan poet announced has not come4  
,the blind1 perverse and murderous      
passion for work transforms the         
liberating machine into an instrument   
for the enslavement of free men4  ,its  
productiveness impoverishes them4    ,a 

good workingwoman makes with her needles
 only five meshes a minute1  while      
certain circular knitting machines make 
#cj1jjj in the same time4  ,every minute
 of the machine is thus equivalent to a 
hundred hours of  the workingwomen's    
labor1 or again1 every minute of the    
machine's  labor1 gives the workingwomen
 ten days of rest4 ,what is true for the
  knitting industry is more or less true
 for all industries reconstructed  by   
modern machinery4 ,but what do we see8  
,in proportion as the machine  is       
improved and performs man's work with an
 ever increasing rapidity  and          
exactness1 the laborer1 instead of      
prolonging his former rest  times1      
redoubles his ardor1 as if he wished to 
rival the machine4 ,o1  absurd and      
murderous competition6    ,that the     
competition of man and the machine might
 have free course1  the proletarians    
have abolished wise laws which limited  
the labor  of the artisans of the       
ancient guilds2 they have suppressed the

  holidays4#ad ,because the producers of
 that time worked but five  days out of 
seven1 are we to believe the stories    
told by lying  economists1 that they    
lived on nothing but air and fresh      
water8 ,not  so1 they had leisure to    
taste the joys of earth1 to make love   
and to  frolic1 to banquet joyously in  
honor of the jovial god of idleness4    
,gloomy ,england1 immersed in           
protestantism1 was then called ,merrie  
,england4 ,rabelais1 ,quevedo1          
,cervantes1 and the unknown authors of  
the  romances make our mouths water with
 their pictures of those monumental     
feasts#ae with which the men of that    
time regaled themselves between  two    
battles and two devastations1 in which  
everything went by the  barrel4         
,jordaens and the ,flemish ,school have 
told the story of these  feasts in their
 delightful pictures4 ,where1 ,o1 where1
 are the sublime  gargantuan stomachs of
 those days2 where are the sublime      
brains  encircling all human thought8   

,we have indeed grown puny and          
degenerate4  ,embalmed beef1 potatoes1  
doctored wine and ,prussian schnaps1    
judiciously combined with compulsory    
labor have weakened our bodies and      
narrowed our minds4 ,and the times when 
man cramps his stomach and the  machine 
enlarges its output are the very times  
when the economists  preach to us the   
,malthusian theory1 the religion of     
abstinence and the  dogma of work4      
,really it would be better to pluck out 
such tongues and  throw them to the     
dogs4    ,because the working class1    
with its simple good faith1 has allowed 
itself to be thus indoctrinated1 because
 with its native impetuosity  it has    
blindly hurled itself into work and     
abstinence1 the capitalist  class has   
found itself condemned to laziness and  
forced enjoyment1 to  unproductiveness  
and over-consumption4 ,but if the       
over-work of the  laborer bruises his   
flesh and tortures his nerves1 it is    
also fertile  in griefs for the         

capitalist4    ,the abstinence to which 
the productive class condemns itself    
obliges  the capitalists to devote      
themselves to the over-consumption of   
the  products turned out so riotously by
 the laborers4 ,at the beginning  of    
capitalist production a century or two  
ago1 the capitalist was a  steady man of
 reasonable and peaceable habits4 ,he   
contented himself  with one wife or     
thereabouts4 ,he drank only when he was 
thirsty and  ate only when he was       
hungry4 ,he left to the lords and ladies
 of the  court the noble virtues of     
debauchery4 ,today every son of the     
newly  rich makes it incumbent upon     
himself to cultivate the disease for    
which  quicksilver is a specific in     
order to justify the labors imposed upon
  the workmen in quicksilver mines2     
every capitalist crams himself with     
capons stuffed with truffles and with   
the choicest brands of wine in  order to
 encourage the breeders of blooded      
poultry and the growers of  ,bordelais4 

,in this occupation the organism rapidly
 becomes shattered1  the hair falls out1
 the gums shrink away from the teeth1   
the body  becomes deformed1 the stomach 
obtrudes abnormally1 respiration becomes
  difficult1 the motions become labored1
 the joints become stiff1 the  fingers  
knotted4 ,others1 too feeble in body to 
endure the fatigues of  debauchery1 but 
endowed with the bump of philanthropic  
discrimination1  dry up their brains    
over political economy1 or juridical    
philosophy  in elaborating thick        
soporific books to employ the leisure   
hours  of compositors and pressmen4 ,the
 women of fashion live a life of        
martyrdom1 in trying on and showing off 
the fairy-like toilets  which the       
seamstresses die in making4 ,they shift 
like shuttles from  morning until night 
from one gown into another4 ,for hours  
together  they give up their hollow     
heads to the artists in hair1 who at any
  cost insist on assuaging their passion
 for the construction of false          

chignons4 ,bound in their corsets1      
pinched in their boots1 dcollett  to    
make a coal-miner blush1 they whirl     
around the whole night through  at their
 charity balls in order to pick up a few
 cents for poor  people1--sanctified    
souls6    ,to fulfill his double social 
function of non-producer and            
over-consumer1 the capitalist was not   
only obliged to violate his  modest     
taste1 to lose his laborious habits of  
two centuries ago and to  give himself  
up to unbounded luxury1 spicy           
indigestibles and syphilitic  debauches1
 but also to withdraw from productive   
labor an enormous mass  of men in order 
to enlist them as his assistants4       
,here are a few figures to prove how    
colossal is this waste of  productive   
forces4 ,according to the census of     
#ahfa1 the population of  ,england and  
,wales comprised #bj1jff1bdd persons1   
#i1ggf1bei male and  #aj1bhi1ife female4
 ,if we deduct those too old or too     
young to work1 the  unproductive women1 

boys and girls1 then the ideological    
professions1  such as governors1        
policemen1 clergy1 magistrates1         
soldiers1  prostitutes1 artists1        
scientists1 etc41 next the people       
exclusively  occupied with eating the   
labor of others under the form of       
land-rent1  interest1 dividends1 etc4   
444 there remains a total of eight      
million  individuals of both sexes and  
of every age1 including the capitalists 
who function in production1 commerce1   
finance1 etc4 ,out of these eight       
millions the figures run3               
,agricultural laborers1 including       
herdsmen1 servants      and farmers'    
daughters living at home                
#a1jih1bfa    ,factory ,workers in      
cotton1 wool1 hemp1      linen silk1    
knitting                                
#fdb1fjg    ,mine ,workers              
#efe1hce    ,metal ,workers 7blast      
furnaces1 rolling mills1 etc47          
#cif1iih    ,domestics                  
#a1bjh1fdh    ,if we add together the   

textile workers and the miners1 we      
obtain  the figures of #a1bjh1ddb2 if to
 the former we add the metal workers1   
we have a total of #a1jci1fje persons2  
that is to say1 in each case a  number  
below that of the modern domestic       
slaves4 ,behold the magnificent  result 
of the capitalist exploitation of       
machines4#af ,to this class  of         
domestics1 the size of which indicates  
the stage attained by  capitalist       
civilization1 must still be added the   
enormous class of  unfortunates devoted 
exclusively to satisfying the vain and  
expensive  tastes of the rich classes3  
diamond cutters1 lace-makers1           
embroiderers1  binders of luxurious     
books1 seamstresses employed on         
expensive gowns1  decorators of villas1 
etc4#ag    ,once settled down into      
absolute laziness and demoralized by    
enforced  enjoyment1 the capitalist     
class in spite of the injury involved in
  its new kind of life1 adapted itself  
to it4 ,soon it began to look  upon any 

change with horror4 ,the sight of the   
miserable conditions  of life resignedly
 accepted by the working class and the  
sight of  the organic degradation       
engendered by the depraved passion for  
work  increased its aversion for all    
compulsory labor and all restrictions   
of its pleasures4 ,it is precisely at   
that time that1 without taking  into    
account the demoralization which the    
capitalist class had imposed  upon      
itself as a social duty1 the            
proletarians took it into their  heads  
to inflict work on the capitalists4     
,artless as they were1 they  took       
seriously the theories of work          
proclaimed by the economists and        
moralists1 and girded up their loins to 
inflict the practice of these  theories 
upon the capitalists4 ,the proletariat  
hoisted the banner1 ,he  who will not   
work ,neither shall he ,eat4 ,lyons in  
#ahca rose up for  bullets or work4 ,the
 federated laborers of ,march #ahga     
called their  uprising ,the ,revolution 

of ,work4 ,to these outbreaks of        
barbarous fury  destructive of all      
capitalist joy and laziness1 the        
capitalists had  no other answer than   
ferocious repression1 but they know that
 if they  have been able to repress     
these revolutionary explosions1 they    
have  not drowned in the blood of these 
gigantic massacres the absurd idea  of  
the proletariat wishing to inflict work 
upon the idle and reputable  classes1   
and it is to avert this misfortune that 
they surround  themselves with guards1  
policemen1 magistrates and jailors1     
supported  in laborious                 
unproductiveness4 ,there is no more room
 for illusion as  to the function of    
modern armies4 ,they are permanently    
maintained only  to suppress the enemy  
within4 ,thus the forts of ,paris and   
,lyons  have not been built to defend   
the city against the foreigner1 but to  
crush it in case of revolt4 ,and if an  
unanswerable example be called  for1 we 
mention the army of ,belgium1 that      

paradise of capitalism4 ,its  neutrality
 is guaranteed by the ,european powers1 
and nevertheless its  army is one of the
 strongest in proportion to its         
population4 ,the  glorious battlefields 
of the brave ,belgian army are the      
plains of the  ,borinage and of         
,charleroi4 ,it is in the blood of the  
unarmed miners and  laborers that the   
,belgian officers temper their swords   
and win their  epaulets4 ,the nations of
 ,europe have not national armies but   
mercenary  armies4 ,they protect the    
capitalists against the popular fury    
which  would condemn them to ten hours  
of mining or spinning4 ,again1 while    
compressing its own stomach the working 
class has developed abnormally  the     
stomach of the capitalist class1        
condemned to over-consumption4    ,for  
alleviation of its painful labor the    
capitalist class has withdrawn  from the
 working class a mass of men far        
superior to those still  devoted to     
useful production and has condemned them

 in their turn to  unproductiveness and 
over-consumption4 ,but this troop of    
useless mouths  in spite of its         
insatiable voracity1 does not suffice to
 consume all  the goods which the       
laborers1 brutalized by the dogma of    
work1 produce  like madmen1 without     
wishing to consume them and without even
 thinking  whether people will be found 
to consume them4    ,confronted with    
this double madness of the laborers     
killing themselves  with over-production
 and vegetating in abstinence1 the great
 problem of  capitalist production is no
 longer to find producers and to        
multiply  their powers but to discover  
consumers1 to excite their appetites and
  create in them fictitious needs4      
,since the ,european laborers1 shivering
  with cold and hunger1 refuse to wear  
the stuffs they weave1 to drink  the    
wines from the vineyards they tend1 the 
poor manufacturers in  their goodness of
 heart must run to the ends of the earth
 to find  people to wear the clothes and

 drink the wines3 ,europe exports every 
year goods amounting to billions of     
dollars to the four corners of  the     
earth1 to nations that have no need of  
them4#ah ,but the explored  continents  
are no longer vast enough4 ,virgin      
countries are needed4  ,european        
manufacturers dream night and day of    
,africa1 of a lake in the  ,saharan     
desert1 of a railroad to the ,soudan4   
,they anxiously follow the  progress of 
,livingston1 ,stanley1 ,du ,chaillu2    
they listen open-mouthed  to the        
marvelous tales of these brave          
travelers4 ,what unknown wonders  are   
contained in the dark continent6 ,fields
 are sown with elephants'  teeth1 rivers
 of cocoa-nut oil are dotted with gold1 
millions of  backsides1 as bare as the  
faces of ,dufaure and ,girardin1 are    
awaiting  cotton goods to teach them    
decency1 and bottles of schnaps and     
bibles  from which they may learn the   
virtues of civilization4    ,but all to 
no purpose3 the over-fed capitalist1 the

 servant class  greater in numbers than 
the productive class1 the foreign and   
barbarous  nations1 gorged with         
,european goods2 nothing1 nothing can   
melt away  the mountains of products    
heaped up higher and more enormous than 
the  pyramids of ,egypt4 ,the           
productiveness of ,european laborers    
defies all  consumption1 all waste4     
,the manufacturers have lost their      
bearings and know not which way to      
turn4 ,they can no longer find the raw  
material to satisfy the lawless         
depraved passion of their laborers for  
work4 ,in our woolen districts  dirty   
and half rotten rags are raveled out to 
use in making certain  cloths sold under
 the name of renaissance1 which have    
about the same  durability as the       
promises made to voters4 ,at ,lyons1    
instead of leaving  the silk fiber in   
its natural simplicity and suppleness1  
it is loaded  down with mineral salts1  
which while increasing its weight1 make 
it  friable and far from durable4 ,all  

our products are adulterated to aid  in 
their sale and shorten their life4 ,our 
epoch will be called the  ,age of       
adulteration just as the first epochs of
 humanity received  the names of ,the   
,age of ,stone1 ,the ,age of ,bronze1   
from the  character of their production4
 ,certain ignorant people accuse our    
pious  manufacturers of fraud1 while in 
reality the thought which animates  them
 is to furnish work to their laborers1  
who cannot resign themselves  to living 
with their arms folded4 ,these          
adulterations1 whose sole  motive is a  
humanitarian sentiment1 but which bring 
splendid profits  to the manufacturers  
who practice them1 if they are          
disastrous for  the quality of the      
goods1 if they are an inexhaustible     
source of  waste in human labor1        
nevertheless prove the ingenuous        
philanthropy  of the capitalists1 and   
the horrible perversion of the laborers1
 who  to gratify their vice for work    
oblige the manufacturers to stifle the  

cries of their conscience and to violate
 even the laws of commercial  honesty4  
,and nevertheless1 in spite of the      
over-production of goods1 in spite of   
the adulterations in manufacturing1 the 
laborers encumber the market  in        
countless numbers imploring3 ,work6     
,work6 ,their superabundance ought  to  
compel them to bridle their passion2 on 
the contrary it carries  it to the point
 of paroxysm4 ,let a chance for work    
present itself1  thither they rush2 then
 they demand twelve1 fourteen hours to  
glut  their appetite for work1 and the  
next day they are again thrown out  on  
the pavement with no more food for their
 vice4 ,every year in  all industries   
lockouts occur with the regularity of   
the seasons4  ,over-work1 destructive of
 the organism1 is succeeded by absolute 
rest  during two or four months1 and    
when work ceases the pittance ceases4   
,since the vice of work is diabolically 
attached to the heart of the  laborers1 
since its requirements stifle all the   

other instincts of  nature1 since the   
quantity of work required by society is 
necessarily  limited by consumption and 
by the supply of raw materials1 why     
devour  in six months the work of a     
whole year2 why not distribute it       
uniformly  over the twelve months and   
force every workingman to content       
himself  with six or five hours a day   
throughout the year instead of getting  
indigestion from twelve hours during six
 months8 ,once assured of their  daily  
portion of work1 the laborers will no   
longer be jealous of each  other1 no    
longer fight to snatch away work from   
each other's hands and  bread from each 
other's mouths1 and then1 not exhausted 
in body and  mind1 they will begin to   
practice the virtues of laziness4       
,brutalized by their vice1 the laborers 
have been unable to rise to the         
conception of this fact1 that to have   
work for all it is necessary  to        
apportion it like water on a ship in    
distress4 ,meanwhile certain            

manufacturers in the name of capitalist 
exploitation have for a long  time      
demanded a legal limitation of the work 
day4 ,before the commission  of #ahfj on
 professional education1 one of the     
greatest manufacturers of  ,alsace1 ,m4 
,bourcart of ,guebwiller1 declared3 ,the
 day of twelve hours  is excessive and  
ought to be reduced to eleven1 while    
work ought to  be stopped at two o'clock
 on ,saturday4 ,i advise the adoption of
 this  measure1 although it may appear  
onerous at first sight4 ,we have tried  
it in our industrial establishments for 
four years and find ourselves  the      
better for it1 while the average        
production1 far from having  diminished1
 has increased4 ,in his study of        
machines ,m4 ,f4 ,passy quotes  the     
following letter from a great ,belgian  
manufacturer ,m4 ,ottevaere3  ,our      
machines1 although the same as those of 
the ,english spinning  mills1 do not    
produce what they ought to produce or   
what those same  machines would produce 

in ,england1 although the spinners there
 work two  hours a day less4 ,we all    
work two good hours too much4 ,i am     
convinced  that if we worked only eleven
 hours instead of thirteen we should    
have  the same product and we should    
consequently produce more economically4 
,again1 ,m4 ,leroy ,beaulieu affirms    
that it is a remark of a great ,belgian 
manufacturer that the weeks in which a  
holiday falls result in a  product not  
less than ordinary weeks4#ai    ,an     
aristocratic government has dared to do 
what a people1 duped in  their          
simplicity by the moralists1 never      
dared4 ,despising the lofty and  moral  
industrial considerations of the        
economists1 who like the birds  of ill  
omen1 croaked that to reduce by one hour
 the work in factories  was to decree   
the ruin of ,english industry1 the      
government of ,england  has forbidden by
 a law strictly enforced to work more   
than ten hours a  day1 and as before    
,england remains the first industrial   

nation of the  world4#bj    ,the        
experiment tried on so great a scale is 
on record2 the experience  of certain   
intelligent capitalists is on record4   
,they prove beyond a  doubt that to     
strengthen human production it is       
necessary to reduce  the hours of labor 
and multiply the pay days and feast     
days1 yet the  ,french nation is not    
convinced4 ,but if the miserable        
reduction of two  hours has increased   
,english production by almost one-third 
in ten  years1 what breathless speed    
would be given to ,french production  by
 a legal limitation of the working day  
to three hours4 ,cannot the  laborers   
understand that by over-working         
themselves they exhaust  their own      
strength and that of their progeny1 that
 they are used up  and long before their
 time come to be incapable of any work  
at all1  that absorbed and brutalized by
 this single vice they are no longer    
men but pieces of men1 that they kill   
within themselves all beautiful         

faculties1 to leave nothing alive and   
flourishing except the furious  madness 
for work4 ,like ,arcadian parrots1 they 
repeat the lesson of  the economist3    
,let us work1 let us work to increase   
the national  wealth4' ,o1 idiots1 it is
 because you work too much that the     
industrial  equipment develops slowly4  
,stop braying and listen to an          
economist1  no other than ,m4 ,l4       
,reybaud1 whom we were fortunate enough 
to lose a  few months ago4 ,it is in    
general by the conditions of hand-work  
that  the revolution in methods of labor
 is regulated4 ,as long as hand-work    
furnishes its services at a low price1  
it is lavished1 while efforts  are made 
to economize it when its services become
 more costly4#ba    ,to force the       
capitalists to improve their machines of
 wood and iron  it is necessary to raise
 wages and diminish the working hours of
  the machines of flesh and blood4 ,do  
you ask for proofs8 ,they can  be       
furnished by the hundreds4 ,in spinning1

 the self-acting mule was  invented and 
applied at ,manchester because the      
spinners refused to  work such long     
hours as before4 ,in ,america the       
machine is invading all  branches of    
farm production1 from the making of     
butter to the weeding  of wheat4 ,why1  
because the ,american1 free and lazy1   
would prefer a  thousand deaths to the  
bovine life of the ,french peasant4     
,plowing1 so  painful and so crippling  
to the laborer in our glorious ,france1 
is in  the ,american ,west an agreeable 
open-air pastime1 which he practices in 
a sitting posture1 smoking his pipe     
nonchalantly4      ,,footnotes3    #ad  
,under the old regime1 the laws of the  
church guaranteed the  laborer ninety   
rest days1 fifty-two ,sundays and       
thirty-eight holidays1  during which he 
was strictly forbidden to work4 ,this   
was the great  crime of catholicism1 the
 principal cause of the irreligion of   
the  industrial and commercial          
bourgeoisie3 under the revolution1 when 

once  it was in the saddle1 it abolished
 the holidays and replaced the week  of 
seven days by that of ten1 in order that
 the people might no longer  have more  
than one rest day out of the ten4 ,it   
emancipated the laborers  from the yoke 
of the church in order the better to    
subjugate them under  the yoke of work4 
,the hatred against the holidays does   
not appear until the modern  industrial 
and commercial bourgeoisie takes        
definite form1 between the  fifteenth   
and sixteenth centuries4 ,henry ,,iv    
asked of the pope that they  be reduced4
 ,he refused because one of the current 
heresies of the  day is regarding feasts
 7,letters of ,cardinal d',ossat74 ,but 
in #afff  ,perefixus1 archbishop of     
,paris1 suppressed seventeen of them in 
his  diocese4 protestantism1 which was  
the ,christian religion adapted to  the 
new industrial and commercial needs of  
the bourgeoisie1 was less  solicitous   
for the people's rest4 ,it dethroned the
 saints in heaven in  order to abolish  

their feast days on earth4    ,religious
 reform and philosophical free thought  
were but pretexts which  permitted the  
jesuitical and rapacious bourgeoisie to 
pilfer the feast  days of the people4   
#ae ,these gigantic feasts lasted for   
weeks4 ,don ,rodrigo de ,lara wins  his 
bride by expelling the ,moors from old  
,calatrava1 and the ,romancero  relates 
the story3      ,les bodas fueron en    
,burgos    ,las tornabodas en ,salas3   
,en bodas y tornabodas    ,pasaron siete
 semanas    ,tantas vienen de las gentes
    ,que no caben por las plazas        
7,the wedding was at ,bourges1 the      
infaring at ,salas4 ,in the wedding and 
the infaring seven weeks were spent4 ,so
 many people came that the town  could  
not hold them44474    ,the men of these 
seven-weeks weddings were the heroic    
soldiers of the  wars of independence4  
#af ,karl ,marx's ,capital4    #ag ,the 
proportion in which the population of   
the country is employed  as domestics in
 the service of the wealthy class       

indicates its progress  in national     
wealth and civilization4 7,r4 ,m4       
,martin1 ,ireland ,before  and ,after   
the ,union1 #ahah74 ,gambetta1 who has  
denied that there was  a social question
 ever since he ceased to be the poverty 
stricken  lawyer of the ,caf ,procope1  
undoubtedly alluded to this             
ever-increasing  domestic class when he 
announced the advent of new social      
strata4    #ah ,two examples3 ,the      
,english government to satisfy the      
peasants of  ,india1 who in spite of the
 periodical famines desolating their    
country  insist on cultivating poppies  
instead of rice or wheat1 has been      
obliged to undertake bloody wars in     
order to impose upon the ,chinese       
,government the free entry of ,indian   
opium4 ,the savages of ,polynesia1  in  
spite of the mortality resulting from it
 are obliged to clothe  themselves in   
the ,english fashion in order to consume
 the products of  the ,scotch           
distilleries and the ,manchester cotton 

mills4    #ai ,paul ,leroy-,beaulieu4   
,la ,question ,ouvrire au ,,xix sicle1  
#ahgb4    #bj ,it should be observed    
that this was written in #ahhc1 since   
which  time the ,united ,states has     
taken the first rank4 ,the soundness of 
,lafargue's reasoning is confirmed by   
the fact that in this country the  hours
 of labor in the most important         
industries are even less than in        
,england4 7,translator47    #ba ,louis  
,reybaud4 ,le coton1 son regime1 ses    
problmes 7#ahfc74          ,,iv4        
,,new ,,songs ,,to ,,new ,,music4       
,we have seen that by diminishing the   
hours of labor new mechanical  forces   
will be conquered for social production4
 ,furthermore1 by  obliging the laborers
 to consume their products the army of  
workers  will be immensely increased4   
,the capitalist class once relieved from
  its function of universal consumer    
will hasten to dismiss its train of     
soldiers1 magistrates1 journalists1     
procurers1 which it has withdrawn  from 

useful labor to help it in consuming and
 wasting4 ,then the labor  market will  
overflow4 ,then will be required an iron
 law to put a limit  on work4 ,it will  
be impossible to find employment for    
that swarm of  former unproductives1    
more numerous than insect parasites1 and
 after  them must be considered all     
those who provide for their needs and   
their  vain and expensive tastes4 ,when 
there are no more lackeys and generals  
to decorate1 no more free and married   
prostitutes to be covered with  laces1  
no more cannons to bore1 no more palaces
 to build1 there will  be need of severe
 laws to compel the working women and   
workingmen who  have been employed on   
embroidered laces1 iron workings1       
buildings1 to  take the hygienic and    
calisthenic exercises requisite to      
re-establish  their health and improve  
their race4 ,when once we begin to      
consume  ,european products at home     
instead of sending them to the devil1 it
 will  be necessary that the sailors1   

dock handlers and the draymen sit down  
and learn to twirl their thumbs4 ,the   
happy ,polynesians may then love  as    
they like without fearing the civilized 
,venus and the sermons of  ,european    
moralists4    ,and that is not all3 ,in 
order to find work for all the          
non-producers  of our present society1  
in order to leave room for the          
industrial  equipment to go on          
developing indefinitely1 the working    
class will  be compelled1 like the      
capitalist class1 to do violence to its 
taste  for abstinence and to develop    
indefinitely its consuming capacities4  
,instead of eating an ounce or two of   
gristly meat once a day1 when it  eats  
any1 it will eat juicy beefsteaks of a  
pound or two2 instead of  drinking      
moderately of bad wine1 it will become  
more orthodox than the  pope and will   
drink broad and deep bumpers of         
,bordeaux and ,burgundy  without        
commercial baptism and will leave water 
to the beasts4    ,the proletarians have

 taken into their heads to inflict upon 
the  capitalists ten hours of forge and 
factory2 that is their great  mistake1  
because of social antagonisms and civil 
wars4 ,work ought to be  forbidden and  
not imposed4 ,the ,rothschilds and other
 capitalists should  be allowed to bring
 testimony to the fact that throughout  
their whole  lives they have been       
perfect vagabonds1 and if they swear    
they wish to  continue to live as       
perfect vagabonds in spite of the       
general mania  for work1 they should be 
pensioned and should receive every      
morning  at the city hall a five-dollar 
gold piece for their pocket money4      
,social discords will vanish4 ,bond     
holders and capitalists will be first   
to rally to the popular party1 once     
convinced that far from wishing  them   
harm1 its purpose is rather to relieve  
them of the labor of  over-consumption  
and waste1 with which they have been    
overwhelmed since  their birth4 ,as for 
the capitalists who are incapable of    

proving their  title to the name of     
vagabond1 they will be allowed to follow
 their  instincts4 ,there are plenty of 
disgusting occupations in which to place
  them4 ,dufaure might be set at        
cleaning public closets1 ,gallifet#bb   
might perform surgical operations on    
diseased horses and hogs4 ,the  members 
of the amnesty commission might be sent 
to the stock yards to  pick out the oxen
 and the sheep to be slaughtered4 ,the  
senators might  play the part of        
undertakers and lackeys in funeral      
processions4 ,as for  the others1       
occupations could be found for them on a
 level with their  intelligence4        
,lorgeril and ,broglie could cork       
champagne bottles1 only  they would have
 to be muzzled as a precaution against  
intoxication4  ,ferry1 ,freycinet and   
,tirard might destroy the bugs and      
vermin in the  departments of state and 
other public houses4 ,it would1 however1
 be  necessary to put the public funds  
out of the reach of the capitalists  out

 of due regard for their acquired       
habits4    ,but vengeance1 harsh and    
prolonged1 will be heaped upon the      
moralists  who have perverted nature1   
the bigots1 the canters1 the hypocrites1
  and other such sects of men who       
disguise themselves like maskers  to    
deceive the world4 ,for whilst they give
 the common people to  understand that  
they are busied about nothing but       
contemplation and  devotion in fastings 
and maceration of their sensuality1--and
 that only  to sustain and aliment the  
small frailty of their humanity1--it is 
so  far otherwise that on the contrary1 
,god knows1 what cheer they make2  et   
,curios simulant1 sed ,bacchanalia      
vivunt4#bc ,you may read it  in great   
letters1 in the coloring of their red   
snouts1 and gulching  bellies as big as 
a tun1 unless it be when they perfume   
themselves with  sulphur4#bd ,on the    
days of great popular rejoicing1 when   
instead  of swallowing dust as on the   
#aeth of ,august and #adth of ,july     

under  capitalism1 the communists and   
collectivists will eat1 drink and dance 
to their hearts' content1 the members of
 the ,academy1 of moral and  political  
sciences1 the priests with long robes   
and short1 of the  economic1 catholic1  
protestant1 jewish1 positivist and      
free-thought  church2 the propagandists 
of ,malthusianism1 and of ,christian1   
altruistic1 independent or dependent    
ethics1 clothed in yellow1 shall  be    
compelled to hold a candle until it     
burns their fingers1 shall  starve in   
sight of tables loaded with meats1      
fruits and flowers and  shall agonize   
with thirst in sight of flowing         
hogsheads4 ,four times a  year with the 
changing seasons they shall be shut up  
like the knife  grinders' dogs in great 
wheels and condemned to grind wind for  
ten  hours4    ,the lawyers and         
legislators shall suffer the same       
punishment4 ,under the  regime of       
idleness1 to kill the time1 which kills 
us second by second1  there will be     

shows and theatrical performances always
 and always4 ,and  here we have the very
 work for our bourgeois legislators4 ,we
 shall  organize them into traveling    
companies to go to the fairs and        
villages1  giving legislative           
exhibitions4 ,the generals in riding    
boots1 their  breasts brilliantly       
decorated with medals and crosses1 shall
 go through  the streets and courts     
levying recruits among the good people4 
,gambetta  and his comrade ,cassagnac   
shall tend door4 ,cassagnac1 in full    
duelist  costume1 rolling his eyes and  
twisting his mustache1 spitting out     
burning tow1 shall threaten every one   
with his father's pistol#be and  sink   
into a hole as soon as they show him    
,lullier's portrait4 ,gambetta  will    
discourse on foreign politics and on    
little ,greece1 who makes a  doctor of  
him and would set ,europe on fire to    
pilfer ,turkey2 on great  ,russia that  
stultifies him with the mincemeat she   
promises to make of  ,prussia and who   

would fain see mischief brewing in the  
west of ,europe  so as to feather her   
nest in the east and to strangle        
nihilism at home2  on ,mr4 ,bismark who 
was good enough to allow him to         
pronounce himself on  the amnesty 444   
then uncovering his mountainous belly   
smeared over with  red and white and    
blue1 the three national colors1 he will
 beat the  tattoo on it1 and enumerate  
the delicate little ortolans1 the       
truffles  and the glasses of ,margaux   
and ,y'quem that it has gulped down to  
encourage agriculture1 and to keep his  
electors of ,belleville in good         
spirits4    ,in the barracks the        
entertainment will open with the        
,electoral ,farce4    ,in the presence  
of the voters with wooden heads and     
asses' ears1 the  bourgeois candidates1 
dressed as clowns1 will dance the dance 
of  political liberties1 wiping         
themselves fore and aft with their      
freely  promising electoral programs1   
and talking with tears in their eyes  of

 the miseries of the people and with    
copper in their voices of the  glories  
of ,france4 ,then the heads of the      
voters will bray solidly in  chorus1 hi 
han6 hi han6    ,then will start the    
great play1 ,the ,theft of the ,nation's
 ,goods4    ,capitalist ,france1 an     
enormous female1 hairy-faced and        
bald-headed1  fat1 flabby1 puffy and    
pale1 with sunken eyes1 sleepy and      
yawning1  is stretching herself out on a
 velvet couch4 ,at her feet ,industrial 
,capitalism1 a gigantic organism of     
iron1 with an ape-like mask1 is         
mechanically devouring men1 women and   
children1 whose thrilling and           
heart-rending cries fill the air2 the   
bank with a marten's muzzle1  a hyena's 
body and harpy-hands1 is nimbly flipping
 coins out of his  pocket4 ,hordes of   
miserable1 emaciated proletarians in    
rags1 escorted  by gendarmes with drawn 
sabers1 pursued by furies lashing them  
with  whips of hunger1 are bringing to  
the feet of capitalist ,france heaps  of

 merchandise1 casks of wine1 sacks of   
gold and wheat4 ,langlois1 his  nether  
garment in one hand1 the testament of   
,proudhon in the other and  the book of 
the national budget between his teeth1  
is encamped at the  head of the         
defenders of national property and is   
mounting guard4 ,when  the laborers1    
beaten with gun stocks and pricked with 
bayonets1 have  laid down their burdens1
 they are driven away and the door is   
opened  to the manufacturers1 merchants 
and bankers4 ,they hurl themselves pell 
mell upon the heap1 devouring cotton    
goods1 sacks of wheat1 ingots of  gold1 
emptying casks of wine4 ,when they have 
devoured all they can1  they sink down1 
filthy and disgusting objects in their  
ordure and  vomitings4 ,then the thunder
 bursts forth1 the earth shakes and     
opens1  ,historic ,destiny arises1 with 
her iron foot she crushes the heads of  
the capitalists1 hiccoughing1           
staggering1 falling1 unable to flee4    
,with  her broad hand she overthrows    

capitalist ,france1 astounded and       
sweating  with fear4           99       
99       99       99       99    ,if1   
uprooting from its heart the vice which 
dominates it and degrades  its nature1  
the working class were to arise in its  
terrible strength1  not to demand the   
,rights of ,man1 which are but the      
rights of capitalist  exploitation1 not 
to demand the ,right to ,work which is  
but the right  to misery1 but to forge a
 brazen law forbidding any man to work  
more  than three hours a day1 the earth1
 the old earth1 trembling with  joy     
would feel a new universe leaping within
 her4 ,but how should we  ask a         
proletariat corrupted by capitalist     
ethics1 to take a manly  resolution4444 
,like ,christ1 the doleful              
personification of ancient slavery1 the 
men1  the women and the children of the 
proletariat have been climbing          
painfully for a century up the hard     
,calvary of pain2 for a century         
compulsory toil has broken their bones1 

bruised their flesh1 tortured  their    
nerves2 for a century hunger has torn   
their entrails and their  brains4 ,o    
,laziness1 have pity on our long misery6
 ,o ,laziness1 mother of  the arts and  
noble virtues1 be thou the balm of human
 anguish6      ,,footnotes3    #bb      
,gallifet was the general who was       
directly responsible for the  massacre  
of thousands of ,french workingmen at   
the closing days of the  ,paris         
,commune4    #bc ,they simulate ,curius 
but live like ,bacchanals4 7,juvenal47  
#bd ,rabelais ,pantagruel1 ,book ,,ii4  
,chapter ,,xxxiv4 ,translation of       
,urquhart and ,motteux4    #be ,paul de 
,cassagnac1 like his father1 ,granier1  
was prominent as a  conservative        
politician1 journalist and duelist4     
,,appendix      ,our moralists are very 
modest people4 ,if they invented the    
dogma of  work1 they still have doubts  
of its efficacy in tranquilizing the    
soul1 rejoicing the spirit1 and         
maintaining the proper functioning of   

the entrails and other organs4 ,they    
wish to try its workings on the         
populace1 in anima vili1 before turning 
it against the capitalists1  to excuse  
and authorize whose vices is their      
peculiar mission4    ,but1 you1         
three-for-a-cent philosophers1 why thus 
cudgel your brains to  work out an      
ethics the practice of which you dare   
not counsel to your  masters8 ,your     
dogma of work1 of which you are so      
proud1 do you wish  to see it scoffed   
at1 dishonored8 ,let us open the history
 of ancient  peoples and the writings of
 their philosophers and law givers4 ,i  
could  not affirm1 says the father of   
history1 ,herodotus1 whether the ,greeks
  derived from the ,egyptians the       
contempt which they have for work1      
because ,i find the same contempt       
established among the ,thracians1 the   
,cythians1 the ,persians1 the ,lydians2 
in a word1 because among most           
barbarians1 those who learn mechanical  
arts and even their children are        

regarded as the meanest of their        
citizens4 ,all the ,greeks have been    
nurtured in this principle1 particularly
 the ,lacedaemonians4#bf    ,at ,athens 
the citizens were veritable nobles who  
had to concern  themselves but with the 
defense and the administration of the   
community1 like the savage warriors from
 whom they descended4 ,since  they must 
thus have all their time free to watch  
over the interests  of the republic1    
with their mental and bodily strength1  
they laid all  labor upon the slaves4   
,likewise at ,lacedaemon1 even the women
 were  not allowed to spin or weave that
 they might not detract from their      
nobility4#bg    ,the ,romans recognized 
but two noble and free professions1     
agriculture  and arms4 ,all the citizens
 by right lived at the expense of the   
treasury without being constrained to   
provide for their living by any  of the 
sordid arts 7thus1 they designated the  
trades71 which rightfully  belonged to  
slaves4 ,the elder ,brutus to arouse the

 people1 accused  ,tarquin1 the tyrant1 
of the special outrage of having        
converted free  citizens into artisans  
and masons4#bh    ,the ancient          
philosophers had their disputes upon the
 origin of ideas  but they agreed when  
it came to the abhorrence of work4      
,nature1  said ,plato in his social     
utopia1 his model republic1 ,nature has 
made no shoemaker nor smith4 ,such      
occupations degrade the people who      
exercise them4 ,vile mercenaries1       
nameless wretches1 who are by their     
very condition excluded from political  
rights4 ,as for the merchants           
accustomed to lying and deceiving1 they 
will be allowed in the city  only as a  
necessary evil4 ,the citizen who shall  
have degraded himself  by the commerce  
of the shop shall be prosecuted for this
 offense4 ,if he  is convicted1 he shall
 be condemned to a year in prison2 the  
punishment  shall be doubled for each   
repeated offense4#bi    ,in his         
,economics1 ,xenophon writes1 ,the      

people who give themselves  up to manual
 labor are never promoted to public     
offices1 and with good  reason4 ,the    
greater part of them1 condemned to be   
seated the whole day  long1 some even to
 endure the heat of the fire            
continually1 cannot  fail to be changed 
in body1 and it is almost inevitable    
that the mind  be affected4 ,what       
honorable thing can come out of a shop8 
asks  ,cicero4 ,what can commerce       
produce in the way of honor8 ,everything
  called shop is unworthy of an         
honorable man4 ,merchants can gain no   
profit  without lying1 and what is more 
shameful than falsehood8 ,again1 we must
  regard as something base and vile the 
trade of those who sell their  toil and 
industry1 for whoever gives his labor   
for money sells himself  and puts       
himself in the rank of slaves4#cj       
,proletarians1 brutalized by the dogma  
of work1 listen to the voice of  these  
philosophers1 which has been concealed  
from you with jealous  care3 ,a citizen 

who gives his labor for money degrades  
himself to the  rank of slaves1 he      
commits a crime which deserves years of 
imprisonment4    ,christian hypocrisy   
and capitalist utilitarianism had not   
perverted  these philosophers of the    
ancient republics4 ,speaking for free   
men1 they expressed their thought       
naively4 ,plato1 ,aristotle1 those      
intellectual giants1 beside whom our    
latter day philosophers are but         
pygmies1 wish the citizens of their     
ideal republics to live in the  most    
complete leisure1 for as ,xenophon      
observed1 ,work takes all the  time and 
with it one has no leisure for the      
republic and his friends4  ,according to
 ,plutarch1 the great claim of          
,lycurgus1 wisest of men1 to  the       
admiration of posterity1 was that he had
 granted leisure to the  citizens of    
,sparta by forbidding to them any trade 
whatever4 ,but our  moralists of        
,christianity and capitalism will       
answer1 ,these thinkers  and            

philosophers praised the institution of 
slavery4 ,perfectly true1  but could it 
have been otherwise1 granted the        
economic and political  conditions of   
their epoch8 ,war was the normal state  
of ancient  societies4 ,the free man was
 obliged to devote his time to          
discussing  the affairs of state and    
watching over its defense4 ,the trades  
were  then too primitive and clumsy for 
those practicing them to exercise  their
 birth-right of soldier and citizen2    
thus the philosophers and  law-givers1  
if they wished to have warriors and     
citizens in their  heroic republics1    
were obliged to tolerate slaves4 ,but do
 not the  moralists and economists of   
capitalism praise wage labor1 the modern
  slavery2 and to what men does the     
capitalist slavery give leisure8  ,to   
people like ,rothschild1 ,schneider1 and
 ,madame ,boucicaut1 useless  and       
harmful slaves of their vices and of    
their domestic servants4  ,the prejudice
 of slavery dominated the minds of      

,pythagoras and  ,aristotle1--this has  
been written disdainfully2 and yet      
,aristotle  foresaw3 that if every tool 
could by itself execute its proper      
function1 as the masterpieces of        
,daedalus moved themselves or as the    
tripods of ,vulcan set themselves       
spontaneously at their sacred work2  if 
for example the shuttles of the weavers 
did their own weaving1 the  foreman of  
the workshop would have no more need of 
helpers1 nor the  master of slaves4     
,aristotle's dream is our reality4 ,our 
machines1 with breath of  fire1 with    
limbs of unwearying steel1 with         
fruitfulness1 wonderful  inexhaustible1 
accomplish by themselves with docility  
their sacred  labor4 ,and nevertheless  
the genius of the great philosophers of 
capitalism remains dominated by the     
prejudice of the wage system1  worst of 
slaveries4 ,they do not yet understand  
that the machine is the  saviour of     
humanity1 the god who shall redeem man  
from the sordidae  artes and from       

working for hire1 the god who shall give
 him leisure and  liberty4              
,,footnotes3    #bf ,herodotus1 ,book   
,,ii4    #bg ,biot4 ,de ,l'abolition de 
,l'esclavage ancien en ,occident1 #ahdj4
    #bh ,livy1 ,book ,i4    #bi ,plato's
 ,republic1 ,book ,v4    #cj ,cicero's  
,de ,officiis1 ,i1 #db4                 
,,socialism ,,and ,,the ,,intellectuals 
,,address ,,delivered ,,at ,,paris      
,,march #bc1 #aijj1 ,,at ,a ,,meeting   
,,called ,,by ,,the  ,,group ,,of       
,,collectivist ,,students ,,attached    
,,to ,,the ,,parti ,,ouvrier            
,,fran,,ais4      ,ladies and           
,gentlemen3--,i am happy to deliver this
 address under the  presidency of       
,vaillant1 because it is a pledge of the
 close and lasting  union between our   
two organizations1 and because ,vaillant
 is one of the  intellectuals of the    
socialist party2 he is acknowledged to  
be the most  learned of ,french         
socialists and perhaps of ,european     
socialists1 now  that ,marx1 ,engels and

 ,lavroff are no longer with us4    ,the
 group of collectivist students which   
has organized this conference1  has been
 led to choose this subject1 because    
,french socialism has just  passed      
through a crisis which is not exactly   
one of growth1 though  such it has been 
called1 but which has been caused by the
 arrival  of a certain number of        
bourgeois intellectuals within the ranks
 of  the party4 ,it is therefore        
interesting to examine the situation of 
the intellectuals in capitalist society1
 their historic role since  the         
revolution of #aghi1 and the manner in  
which the bourgeoisie has  kept the     
promises it made them when it was       
struggling against the  aristocracy4    
,the eighteenth century was the century 
of reason--everything1 religion1        
philosophy1 science1 politics1          
privileges of classes1 of the state1  of
 municipalities1 was submitted to its   
pitiless criticism4 ,never  in history  
has there been such a fermentation of   

ideas and such a  revolutionary         
preparation of men's minds4 ,mirabeau1  
who himself  played a great role in the 
ideological agitation1 might well say in
  the national assembly3 ,we have no    
time to think1 but happily1 we  have a  
supply of ideas4 ,all that was needed   
was to realize them4  ,capitalism1 to   
reward the intellectuals who had labored
 with so much  enthusiasm for the coming
 of its revolution1 promised them honors
 and  favors2 intelligence and wisdom1  
as well as virtue1 should be the  sole  
privileges of the society it was        
founding upon the ruins of the  old     
order4 ,promises cost it little2 it     
announced to all men that it  brought   
them joy and happiness1 with liberty1   
equality and fraternity1  which1        
although eternal principles1 were now   
born for the first time4  ,its social   
world was to be so new that even before 
the ,republic was  proclaimed1 ,camille 
,desmoulins demanded that they begin a  
new era which  should date from the     

taking of the ,bastile4    ,i need not  
teach you what application capitalism   
has made of these  eternal principles   
which by way of cynical raillery1 the   
,republic  carves on the lintels of her 
prisons1 her penitentiaries1 her        
barracks  and her halls of state4#ca ,i 
will only remind you that savage and    
barbarous tribes1 uncorrupted by        
civilization1 living under the  regime  
of common property1 without inscribing  
anywhere these eternal  principles1     
without even formulating them1 practice 
them in a manner  more perfect than ever
 was dreamed of by the capitalists who  
discovered  them in #aghi4    ,it did   
not take long to determine the value of 
the promises of  capitalism2 the very   
day it opened its political shop1 it    
commenced  proceedings in bankruptcy4   
,the constituent assembly1 which        
formulated  the ,rights of man and of   
the citizen and proclaimed equality     
before the  law1 discussed and voted1 in
 #agij1 an electoral act which          

established  inequality before the law2 
no one was to be a voter but the active 
citizen1 paying in money a direct tax   
equal to three days' labor1 and  no one 
was to be eligible to office but the    
citizen paying a direct  tax of a silver
 mark1 about #ee francs4 ,but under the 
law of the  silver mark1 clamored       
,loustallot1 ,desmoulins and the        
intellectualists  without real estate1  
,jean ,jacques ,rousseau1 whose ',social
 ,contract is  the bible of the         
revolution1 would be capable neither of 
voting nor  of holding office4 ,the     
electoral law deprived so many citizens 
of  political rights1 that in the       
municipal elections of #agij1 at ,paris1
  a city which counted about half a     
million inhabitants1 there were but     
#ab1jjj voters1 ,bailly was chosen mayor
 by #aj1jjj votes4    ,if the eternal   
principles were not new1 it is also true
 that the  flattering promises made by  
the intellectuals had already begun to  
be  realized before the advent of       

capitalism to power4 ,the church1 which 
is a theocratic democracy1 opens her    
bosom to all4 ,that they may  enter1 all
 lay aside their titles and privileges1 
and all can aspire  to the highest      
positions2 popes have risen from the    
lower ranks of  society4 ,sixtus ,fifth 
had in his youth tended swine4 ,the     
church of the  middle ages jealously    
attracted to herself the thinkers and   
men of  learning1 although she respected
 the preference of those who wished to  
remain laymen1 but extended over them   
her protection and her favors2  she     
allowed them all boldness of thought1 on
 the single condition of  keeping up the
 appearance of faith1 and never leaving 
her enclosure  to lavish themselves upon
 the vulgar4 ,thus ,copernicus might    
write and  dedicate to the pope his     
treatise on the revolutions of the      
celestial  bodies1 in which1 contrary to
 the teaching of the ,bible1 he proves  
that the earth turns around the sun4    
,but ,copernicus was a canon at         

,frannbourg and he wrote in ,latin4     
,when a century later ,galileo1 who  was
 not identified with the clergy and who 
on the contrary sought the  protection  
of the secular authorities1 professed   
publicly1 at ,venice  and ,florence1 the
 theories of ,copernicus1 the ,vatican  
stretched out  its terrible hand over   
him and forced the illustrious old man  
to deny  his scientific belief4 ,even   
after the crisis of protestantism1 the  
church preserved its liberality toward  
the scientists who belonged  to it4     
,mersenne1 a monk of the order of the   
,minimes1 one of the  great geometers of
 the seventeenth century1 a precursor   
and friend  of ,descartes1 corresponded 
freely with ,hobbes1 the father of      
modern  materialism2 the notes of the   
,french edition of ,de ,cive contain    
fragments of this correspondence4       
,the church1 in keeping up this liberal 
conduct1 may have been animated  by a   
disinterested love of pure science1 but 
what chiefly concerned  her was the     

interest of her dominancy2 she wished to
 monopolize the  intellectuals and      
science1 just as in the old theocratic  
,egypt the  priests had done to whom the
 ,greek thinkers resorted in search of  
the  first elements of science and      
philosophy4    ,it would be insulting   
capitalism to attribute to it a         
disinterested  love of science1 which   
from its point of view has but one      
reason for  existence1 that of utilizing
 natural forces to the enhancement of   
its wealth4 ,it cares nothing for pure  
speculation and it is by way  of        
self-defence that it allows its         
scientists to devote their mental       
energy to theoretic researches instead  
of exhausting it on practical           
applications4 ,this contempt for pure   
speculation is shown under a            
philosophic form in the positivism of   
,auguste ,comte1 who embodies so  well  
the narrowness of the groveling spirit  
of capitalism4    ,but if science apart 
from its industrial applications does   

not interest  the bourgeoisie their     
solicitude for the intellectuals takes  
on none  of the forms which we saw in   
that of the church1 and nowhere is their
  indifference to them better shown than
 in the relative position of  material  
property and of intellectual property   
before the law4    ,material property1  
whatever its origin1 is by capitalist   
law a thing  eternal2 it is forever     
assured to its possessor2 it is handed  
down from  father to son to the end of  
the centuries1 and no civil or political
  power may lay upon it a sacrilegious  
hand4 ,we have lately seen a            
characteristic example of this          
inviolability of material property4     
,the keeper of the signal station at    
,durban transmitted to the ,boers       
heliographic dispatches informing them  
regarding the ships which  entered the  
harbor1 the men1 the horses and the     
munitions of war which  they            
transported4 ,his treason brought him   
#abe1jjj francs1 which1 like  an        

intelligent capitalist1 he deposited in 
the bank4 ,the ,english  military       
authorities seized the traitor1         
condemned him and shot him1  but they   
respected his property so honorably     
acquired1 and his widow  and son are now
 its legitimate possessors4 ,the law1   
apart from certain  variations1 being   
the same in all capitalist countries1   
things go on in  ,france as in ,england4
 ,no authority could lay hand on the    
property of  ,bazaine1 nor make ,de     
,lesseps1 ,cottu and their families     
disgorge the  millions artfully         
extracted from the lambs on ,panama     
canal stock4    ,this legal sanctity of 
property is a new thing1 in ,france it  
dates  from the revolution of #aghi4    
,the old regime1 which had small respect
  for this sort of property1 authorized 
the confiscation of the property  of    
those legally condemned1 and the        
abolition of confiscation is one  of the
 first reforms demanded in the petitions
 of ,paris and several  provincial      

cities to the states general4           
,capitalism1 by forbidding the          
confiscation of property obtained by    
fraudulent and infamous means1          
proclaims that the source of its fortune
 is quite as fraudulent and  infamous as
 that of criminals and traitors4        
,capitalist law has none of these       
amenities for intellectual property4    
,literary and artistic property such as 
the law protects at all has but  a      
precarious life1 limited to the life of 
the author and a certain time  after his
 death--fifty years according to the    
latest legislation2 that  time passed1  
it lapses into common property2 for     
example1 beginning  with ,march of this 
year1 any publisher has the right to    
bring out for  his own profit the works 
of ,balzac1 the genius of romantic      
literature4    ,literary property1      
though a matter of interest to          
publishers1 who  are certainly few in   
number1 brings no benefit to the mass of
 the  capitalist class1 but not so with 

property in inventions1 which is of     
prime importance to all the             
manufacturing and mercantile            
capitalists4  ,consequently over it the 
law extends no protection4 ,the         
inventor1 if he  wishes to defend his   
intellectual property against capitalist
 pirates1  must begin by buying that    
right1 taking out a patent1 which he    
must  renew every year2 on the day he   
misses a payment1 his intellectual      
property becomes the lawful prey of the 
robbers of capitalism4 ,even if  he     
pays1 he can secure that right only for 
a time2 in ,france1 fourteen  years4    
,and during these few years1 not long   
enough generally to get  his invention  
fully introduced into practical         
industry1 it is he1 the  inventor1 who  
at his own expense has to set in motion 
the machinery of  the law against the   
capitalist pirates who rob him4    ,the 
trade-mark1 which is a capitalistic     
property that never required  any       
intellectual effort1 is on the contrary 

indefinitely protected by  law like     
material property4    ,it is with       
reluctance that the capitalist class has
 granted the  inventor the right of     
defending his intellectual property1 for
 by  virtue of its position as the      
ruling class it regards itself as       
entitled to the fruits of intellectual  
labor as well as of manual  labor2 just 
as the feudal lord asserted his right of
 possession over  the property of his   
serfs4 ,the history of the inventors of 
our century  is the monstrous story of  
their spoliation by the capitalists2 it 
is a  long and melancholy roll of       
martyrs4 ,the inventor1 by the very fact
 of  his genius1 is condemned with his  
family to ruin and suffering4    ,it is 
not only inventions requiring long and  
laborious study1 heavy  outlay for their
 completion and long time for their     
introduction1 that  plunge the inventor 
into the inferno of poverty2 this is    
equally true  of inventions that are    
most simple1 most immediately applicable

 and  most fertile in rich results4 ,i  
will mention but one example3 there     
lately died at ,paris in extreme poverty
 a man whose invention saves  millions  
of francs a year to the railroads and   
mining companies2  he had discovered a  
way to utilize the mountains of coal    
dust that  encumbered the neighborhood  
of wharfs and mines by converting it    
into  briquettes1 such as are today in  
common use for fuel4    ,the capitalist 
bourgeoisie1 the most revolutionary     
class that ever  oppressed human        
societies1 cannot increase its wealth   
without  continuously revolutionizing   
the means of production1 continuously   
incorporating into its industrial       
equipment new applications of           
mechanics1 chemistry and physics4 ,its  
thirst for inventions is so  insatiable 
that it creates factories for           
inventions4 ,certain ,american          
capitalists united in constructing for  
,edison at ,menlo ,park the most        
wonderful laboratory in the world1 and  

in putting at his disposal  trained     
scientists1 chosen workmen1 and the     
ordinary materials  necessary to make   
and keep on making inventions which the 
capitalists  patent1 exploit or sell4   
,edison1 who is himself a shrewd        
business man1  has taken care to secure 
for himself a part of the benefits      
brought by  the ,menlo ,park inventions4
    ,but not all inventors are able like
 ,edison to dictate terms to the        
capitalists who equip invention         
factories4 ,the ,thompson-,houston      
,company  at ,paris and ,siemens at     
,london and ,berlin1#cb in connection   
with  their plants for turning out      
electrical machinery1 have laboratories 
where ingenious men are kept busy       
searching out new applications of       
electricity4 ,at ,frankfort the         
manufactory of aniline dyes1 the largest
  in the world1 where anti-pyrine1 that 
mineral quinine1 was discovered1  keeps 
on its pay roll more than a hundred     
chemists to discover new  products of   

coal-tar4 ,each discovery is at once    
patented by the house1  which1 by way of
 encouragement1 gives a reward to the   
inventor4    ,we may up to a certain    
point regard all factories and workshops
  as laboratories for inventions1 since 
a considerable number of  improvements  
in machinery have been devised by       
workmen in the course  of their work4   
,the inventor having no money to patent 
and apply his  discovery1 the employer  
takes out the patent in his own name1   
and in  accordance with the spirit of   
capitalist justice1 it is he who reaps  
all the benefit4 ,when the government   
takes it into its head to rewards       
talent1 it is the employer who receives 
the decoration2 the inventive  workman1 
who is not an intellectual1 continues to
 revolve like the  other machines under 
the black and greasy number which       
distinguishes  him1 and as in this      
capitalist world he must be content with
 little1 he  consoles himself for his   
poverty by the reflection that his      

invention  is bringing wealth and honor 
to his employer4    ,the capitalist     
class1 which to increase its wealth is  
in pressing need  of inventions1 is in  
even more imperative need of            
intellectuals to  supervise their       
application and to direct its industrial
 machinery4 ,the  capitalists1 before   
they equipped invention factories1 had  
organized  factories to turn out        
intellectuals4 ,dollfus1                
,scherer-,kestner and  other employes of
 ,alsace1 the most intelligent1 most    
philanthropic  and consequently the     
heaviest exploiters in ,france before   
the war1  had founded with their spare  
pennies at ,mulhouse1 schools of design1
  of chemistry and of physics1 where the
 brightest children of their  workmen   
were instructed gratis1 in order that   
they might always have  at hand and at  
reasonable figure the intellectual      
capacities required  for carrying on    
their industries4 ,twenty years ago the 
directors of the  ,mulhouse school      

persuaded the municipal council of      
,paris to establish  the city school of 
chemistry and physics4 ,at the          
beginning1 whether  it is still the case
 ,i do not know1 the pupils were        
recruited in the  common schools1 they  
received a higher education1 gratis1 a  
dinner at  noon at the school1 and fifty
 francs a month to indemnify the parents
  for the loss from the fact that their 
sons were not in the workshop4    ,on   
the platform of the constituent assembly
 of #agij the ,marquis of  ,foucault    
could declare that to be a laborer it   
was not necessary to  know how to read  
and write4 ,the necessities of          
industrial production  compel the       
capitalist of today to speak in language
 altogether  different2 his economic    
interests and not his love of humanity  
and  of science force him to encourage  
and to develop both elementary and      
higher education4    ,but the slave     
merchants of ancient ,rome were1 by the 
same title1  patrons of education4 ,to  

the more intelligent of their human     
merchandise they gave instruction in    
medicine1 philosophy1 ,greek            
literature1 music1 science1 etc4 ,the   
education of the slave enhanced  his    
market value4 ,the slave who was an     
expert cook brought a better  figure    
than the slave doctor1 philosopher or   
literator4 ,in our days it  is still so2
 the big capitalists pay their chief    
cooks better than the  state pays the   
professors of liberal arts1 even though 
they be members  of the ,institute4 ,but
 contrary to the practice of the ,roman 
slave  merchants1 our capitalist class  
lavishes instruction only in order to   
depress the selling price of            
intellectual capacity4    ,greek        
mythology tells how ,midas had the gift 
of turning everything  into gold2 the   
capitalist class has a similar property1
 it transforms  everything that it      
touches into merchandise2 it has done   
this for  intellectual capacities2      
chemists1 engineers and ,latin scholars 

are  bought like she-asses and guano4   
,a voice3 ,and they buy deputies1 too6  
,people who have no tallow nor veal nor 
socks to sell have their  conscience and
 their votes2 when they are deputies1   
they are bought4    ,when intellectual  
capacities become merchandise they have 
to be treated  like other merchandise1  
and they are4 ,when there are many      
oysters in  the market the price of     
oysters goes down1 but when the arrivals
 are  scarce the price goes up4 ,when   
chemists and engineers are plenty on the
  labor market1 the price of inventors  
and of chemists goes down4 ,now  that   
the ,central ,school and the ,school of 
,physics and ,chemistry turn  out yearly
 upon the pavements of ,paris chemists  
by the dozen1 their  price has          
considerably gone down4 ,twenty years   
ago the capitalist paid  a chemist      
reasonably1 he gave him #ajj to #abj a  
month and engaged him  by the year4 ,the
 employers whose regard for an employee 
is measured by  what they have to pay   

him1 were full of politeness and        
consideration  for their chemists who   
cost so dear4 ,but since they have been 
abundant1  their price has fallen to #dj
 and #cj a month2 in the north they are 
not engaged by the year but for the     
sugar season1 which lasts three or  four
 months1 at the end of which they are   
discharged with the workmen4  ,go and   
shift for yourself1 says the employer4  
,next fall when the beets  come ,i know 
,i shall find chemists to superintend   
making them into  sugar4    ,the        
chemists are not exceptional2 you know  
only too well that in all  branches     
there is an over-production of          
intellectuals1 and that when  a place is
 vacant1 tens and hundreds offer        
themselves to fill it2 and  it is this  
pressure which permits the capitalists  
to lower the price  of the intellectuals
 and to put it even below the wage of   
the manual  laborer4    ,poverty is     
harder for the intellectual than for the
 workingman2 it  bruises him morally and

 physically4 ,the workingman1 enduring  
hardships  from childhood and knocking  
about the street and the shops1 is      
accustomed to enduring the troubles of  
life2 the intellectual1 brought  up in a
 hot-house1 has the life bleached out of
 him by the shadow of  the college      
walls1 his nervous system is            
over-developed and takes on an          
unhealthy impressionability4 ,what the  
workingman endures thoughtlessly  is to 
him a painful shock4 ,the intellectual  
is wounded to the depths  of his moral  
being by the exigencies of a            
wage-worker's life4 ,with the  same or  
even a higher wage the intellectual is  
in a worse economic  condition than the 
laborer1 for the latter may dress as    
cheaply as he  likes1 but the former1 if
 only not to offend the eye of his      
employer  and his chiefs with whom he is
 brought in contact is obliged to dress 
expensively and even elegantly4 ,he must
 save on his food what he has  to spend 
on his clothing4    ,the capitalists    

have degraded the intellectuals below   
the economic  level of the manual       
laborers4 ,this is their reward for     
having so  magnificently prepared the   
way for the bourgeois revolution of the 
eighteenth century4    ,jaures in his   
preface to the ,socialist ,history of   
,france says that  the intellectual     
bourgeoisie1 offended by a brutal and   
commercial  society and disenchanted    
with the bourgeois power1 is rallying to
 the  support of socialism4             
,unfortunately nothing could be less    
exact4 ,this  transformation of the     
intellectual faculties into merchandise1
 which  ought to have filled the        
intellectuals with wrath and            
indignation1  leaves them indifferent4  
,never would the free citizen of the    
ancient  republics of ,athens and ,rome 
have submitted to such degradation4 ,the
  free man who sells his work1 says     
,cicero1 lowers himself to the rank  of 
the slaves4 ,socrates and ,plato were   
indignant against the ,sophists  who    

required pay for their philosophic      
teaching1 for to ,socrates and  ,plato  
thought was too noble a thing to be     
bought and sold like carrots  and shoes4
 ,even the ,french clergy of #aghi      
resented as a mortal insult  the        
proposition to pay a salary for worship4
 ,but our intellectuals are  accustoming
 themselves to such degradation4        
,spurred on by the mercantile passion1  
they are never better satisfied  with   
themselves or with society than when    
they succeed in selling  their          
intellectual merchandise at a good      
price2 they have even come  to the point
 of making its selling price the measure
 of its value4  ,zola1 who is one of the
 most distinguished representatives of  
literary  intellectualism1 estimates the
 artistic value of a novel by the number
  of editions sold4 ,to sell their      
intellectual merchandise has become  in 
them such an all-absorbing principle    
that if one speaks to them of           
socialism1 before they inquire into its 

theories1 they ask whether in  the      
socialistic society intellectual labor  
will be paid for and whether  it will be
 rewarded equally with manual labor4    
,imbeciles6 they have eyes but they see 
not that it is the capitalist           
bourgeoisie which establishes that      
degrading equality3 and to increase  its
 wealth degrades intellectual labor to  
the point of paying it at a  lower rate 
than manual labor4    ,we should have to
 put off the triumph of socialism not to
 the year  #b1jjj but to the end of the 
world if we had to wait upon the        
delicate1  shrinking and impressionable 
hesitancy of the intellectuals4 ,the    
history of the century is at hand to    
teach us just how much we have a  right 
to expect from these gentlemen4         
,since #aghi governments of the most    
diverse and opposed character have      
succeeded each other in ,france2 and    
always1 without hesitation1 the         
intellectuals have hastened to offer    
their devoted services4 ,i am not       

merely speaking of those two-for-a-cent 
intellectuals who litter up  the        
newspapers1 the parliaments and the     
economic associations2 but ,i  mean the 
scientists1 the university professors1  
the members of the  ,institute2 the     
higher they raise their heads1 the lower
 they bow the  knee4    ,princes of     
science1 who ought to have conversed on 
equal terms with  kings and emperors1   
have marketed their glory to buy offices
 and favors  from ephemeral ministers4  
,cuvier1 one of the mightiest geniuses  
of the  modern era1 whom the revolution 
took from the household of a nobleman   
to make of him at twenty-five years one 
of the ,museum professors1  ,cuvier took
 the oath of allegiance and served with 
fidelity the  ,republic1 ,napoleon1     
,louis ,,xviii1 ,charles ,x and ,louis  
,philippe1 the last  of whom created him
 a peer of ,france to reward him for his
 career of  servility4    ,to devote    
one's self to all governments without   
distinction is not  enough4 ,pasteur    

placed his glorious name at the service 
of the  financiers1 who placed him in   
the administrative council of the       
,credit  ,foncier1 side by side with    
,jules ,simon1 with dukes and counts1   
with  senators1 deputies and            
ex-ministers1 in order to entrap the    
lambs4  ,when ,de ,lesseps was equipping
 his colossal swindle of the ,panama    
canal1  he enrolled the intellectuals of
 the ,institute1 of the ,french         
,academy1  of literature1 of the clergy1
 of all the circles of higher life4     
,it is not in the circle of the         
intellectuals1 degraded by centuries  of
 capitalist oppression1 that we must    
seek examples of civic courage  and     
moral dignity4 ,they have not even the  
sense of professional                   
class-consciousness4 ,at the time of the
 ,dreyfus affair1 a certain  minister   
discharged1 as if he had been a mere    
prison guard1 one of the  professors of 
chemistry in the ,polytechnic school who
 had had the rare  courage to give      

public expression to his opinion4 ,when 
in a factory the  employer dismisses a  
workman in too arbitrary a fashion1 his 
comrades  grumble1 and sometimes quit   
work1 even though misery and hunger     
await  them in the street4    ,all his  
colleagues in the ,polytechnic school   
bowed their heads in  silence2 each one 
crouched in self-regarding fear1 and    
what is still  more characteristic1 not 
a single partisan of ,dreyfus in the    
,society  of the ,rights of ,man or in  
the ranks of the press raised a voice to
  remind them of the idea of            
professional solidarity4 ,the           
intellectuals1  who on all occasions    
display their transcendental ethics1    
have still a  long road to travel before
 they reach the moral plane of the      
working  class and of the socialist     
party4    ,the scientists have not only 
sold themselves to the governments  and 
the financiers2 they have also sold     
science itself to the                   
capitalist-bourgeoisie4 ,when in the    

eighteenth century there was  need to   
prepare the minds of men for the        
revolution1 by sapping the  ideologic   
foundations of aristocratic society1    
then science fulfilled  its sublime     
mission of freedom2 it was              
revolutionary2 it furiously  attacked   
,christianity and the intuitional       
philosophy4 ,but when the  victorious   
bourgeoisie decided to base its new     
power on religion1 it  commanded its    
scientists1 its philosophers and its men
 of letters to  raise up what they had  
overthrown2 they responded to the need  
with  enthusiasm4 ,they reconstructed   
what they had demolished2 they proved   
by scientific1 sentimental and romantic 
argument the existence of ,god  the     
father1 of ,jesus the son and of ,mary  
the virgin mother4 ,i do not  believe   
history offers a spectacle equal to that
 presented in the first  years of the   
nineteenth century by the philosophers1 
the scientists  and the literary men1   
who from revolutionaries and            

materialists  suddenly transformed      
themselves into reactionaries1          
intuitionalists and  catholics4    ,this
 backward movement still continues2 when
 ,darwin published his  ,origin of      
,species1 which took away from ,god his 
role of creator in the  organic world1  
as ,franklin had despoiled him of his   
thunderbolt1 we  saw the scientists1 big
 and little1 university professors and  
members  of the ,institute1 enrolling   
themselves under the orders of          
,flourens1  who for his own part had at 
least his eighty years for an excuse1   
that they might demolish the ,darwinian 
theory1 which was displeasing  to the   
government and hurtful to religious     
beliefs4 ,the intellectuals  exhibited  
that painful spectacle in the fatherland
 of ,lamark and of  ,geoffroy           
,saint-,hilaire1 the creators of the    
evolution theory1 which  ,darwin        
completed and made proof against        
criticism4    ,today1 now that the      
clerical anxiety is somewhat appeased1  

the  scientists venture to profess the  
evolution theory1 which they never      
opposed without a protest from their    
scientific conscience1 but they  turn it
 against socialism so as to keep in the 
good graces of the  capitalists4        
,herbert ,spencer1 ,haeckel and the     
greatest men in the  school of          
,darwinism demonstrate that the         
classification of individuals  into rich
 and poor1 idlers and laborers1         
capitalists and wage-earners1  is the   
necessary result of the inevitable laws 
of nature1 instead of  being the        
fulfillment of the will and the justice 
of ,god4 ,natural  selection1 they say1 
which has differentiated the organs of  
the human  body1 has forever fixed the  
ranks and the functions of the social   
body4  ,they have1 through servility1   
even lost the logical spirit4 ,they are 
indignant against ,aristotle because he1
 being unable to conceive of the        
abolition of slavery1 declared that the 
slave was marked off by nature2  but    

they fail to see that they are saying   
something equally monstrous  when they  
affirm that natural selection assigns to
 each one his place  in society4        
,thus it is no longer ,god or religion  
which condemn the workers to            
wretchedness--it is science4 ,never was 
there an intellectual bankruptcy  more  
fraudulent4    ,m4 ,brunetires1 one of  
those intellectuals who do not feel     
their  degradation and who joyfully     
fulfill their servile task1 was right   
when  he proclaimed the failure of      
science4 ,he does not suspect how       
colossal  this bankruptcy is4           
,science1 the great emancipator1 that   
has tamed the powers of nature1  and    
might in so doing have freed man from   
toil to allow him to develop  freely his
 faculties of mind and body2 science1   
become the slave of  capital1 has done  
nothing but supply means for capitalists
 to increase  their wealth1 and to      
intensify their exploitation of the     
working class4  ,its most wonderful     

applications to industrial technique    
have brought to  the children1 the women
 and the men of the working class       
nothing but  over-work and misery6      
,the middle-class revolutionary party of
 #aghi cried out in horror and          
indignation against the lords1 who      
through the long summer nights          
compelled their serfs to beat the ponds 
near their castles in order  to keep the
 frogs from croaking4 ,what would they  
say if they saw what  we see8           
,improvements in lighting date from the 
capitalist period4 ,at  the end of the  
last century ,argant and ,carcel        
invented the lamp with  a double current
 of air1 at the beginning of this       
,chevreul invented  the stearic candle1 
then gas was discovered1 then petroleum1
 then  the electric light1 turning night
 into day4 ,what benefits have these    
scientific improvements in lighting     
brought to the workers8 ,they have      
enabled employers to impose night work  
upon millions of proletarians1  not in  

the midsummer nights and in the balmy   
air of the fields1 but  through nights  
of summer and winter in the poisonous   
air of the  workshops and factories4    
,the industrial applications of         
mechanics  and chemistry have           
transformed the happy and stimulating   
work of the  artisan into a torture     
which exhausts and kills the            
proletarian4    ,when science subdued   
the forces of nature to the service of  
man1 ought  she not to have given       
leisure to the workers that they might  
develop  themselves physically and      
intellectually2 ought she not to have   
changed  the vale of tears into a       
dwelling place of peace and joy8 ,i ask 
you1  has not science failed in her     
mission of emancipation8    ,the obtuse 
capitalist himself is conscious of this 
failure2 so he  directs his economists  
and his other intellectual domestics to 
prove to  the working class that it has 
never been so happy and that its lot    
goes  on improving4    ,the economists1 

considering that to deserve the good    
graces of  the capitalists it was not   
enough to falsify economic facts1 are   
suppressing economic science1 which is  
becoming dangerous for the  domination  
of capital4 ,ever since ,adam ,smith and
 ,ricardo they go on  repeating the same
 errors regarding value1 regarding the  
productivity  of the predatory and idle 
capitalist1 compiling facts and         
arranging  statistics which guide the   
capitalists in their speculations2 but  
they  dare not draw conclusions and     
build systems with the materials that   
they have accumulated4 ,when ,ricardo   
wrote1 the phenomena of modern          
production were beginning their         
evolution1 their communist tendencies   
could not be perceived1 one could then  
study them without taking sides  and    
could build up a science without fear of
 wounding the interests  of capital4    
,but now that they have arrived at their
 full development  and show clearly     
their communal tendencies1 the          

economists shut their  eyes that they   
may not see1 and they wage war against  
the principles  established by ,ricardo1
 which after having served as a basis   
for the  old bourgeois economy1 have    
become the points of departure of the   
,marxian economy4 ,to take a whack at   
the socialist theories and put          
themselves at the service of the        
financiers1 like barkers and fakirs of  
their bogus goods1 are the intellectual 
functions of the economists4  ,latterly 
the owners of silver mines have enlisted
 them to sing the  praises of           
bimetallism1 while ,cecil ,rhodes1      
,barnato1 ,beit1 ,robbers   ,company    
called them in to boom the ,transvaal   
gold mines4    ,the intellectuals of art
 and literature1 like the jesters of the
 old  feudal courts1 are the            
entertainers of the class which pays    
them4 ,to  satisfy the tastes of the    
capitalists and beguile their           
leisure--this  is their sole artistic   
aim4 ,the men of letters are so well    

broken to  this servile duty that they  
do not understand the spirit of ,molire1
  their great ancestor1 all the while   
that they adore the letter of his       
works4 ,molire is the writer most       
written about in ,france2 learned  men  
have devoted themselves to gathering up 
the scattered fragments  of his erratic 
and careless youth1 to fixing the date  
and the hour  of the representations of 
his comedies2 if they had unearthed an  
authentic piece of excrement from him   
they would have set it in gold  and     
would kiss it devotedly1 but the spirit 
of ,molire escapes them4  ,you have     
read1 as ,i have1 many critical analyses
 of his dramas4 ,did  you ever find one 
of them which brought out in clear light
 the role of  this militant playwright1 
who more than a century before          
,beaumarchais  and before revolution1 at
 ,versailles1 in the very court of the  
great  monarch1 thrust at the nobility  
of the court and of the provinces1      
attacked the church before which        

,descartes and the rest trembled1       
hurled his jests at ,aristotle1 the     
unquestioned authority of ,la           
,sorbonne1 that secular church2 who     
ridiculed the ,pyrrhonism which the     
neo-,kantians of our own days oppose to 
the materialist philosophy of  ,marxian 
socialism1 but which then was the weapon
 of the catholics1 of  ,pascal1 of      
,huet1 the bishop of ,avranches1 to     
strike and to overthrow  human reason1  
with its impudent desire or reaching    
knowledge by its  own strength4         
,pitiful1 wretched reason1 clamored     
these ,kantians before  ,kant1 you can  
know nothing without the aid of faith6  
,molire is unique  in ,european         
literature1 you must go back to the     
epoch of glorious  ,athens to find his  
counterpart in ,aristophanes4    ,if the
 bourgeois critics timidly and          
unintelligently mention this side  of   
,molire1 there is another of which their
 ignorance is complete4  ,molire was the
 man of his class1 the champion of the  

bourgeois class4  ,like the socialists  
who say to the workers1 ,break with the 
liberal  bourgeoisie1 which deceives you
 when it does not slaughter you2 he     
cried to the ,georges ,dandins and to   
the bourgeois noblemen1 ,avoid  the     
nobles like pests2 they deceive you1    
mock you and rob you4    ,the great     
capitalist bourgeoisie does not choose  
to work1 either  with its hands or its  
brain2 it chooses merely to drink1 to   
eat1 to  practice lewdness and to look  
dignified in its beastly and cumbersome 
luxury2 it does not even deign to occupy
 itself with politics2 men like         
,rothschild1 ,de ,lesseps1 ,vanderbilt1 
,carnegie1 ,rockefeller1 do not run  for
 office2 they find it more economical to
 buy the deputies than the  voters1 and 
more convenient to put their clerks into
 the ministries  than to take part in   
parliamentary struggles4 ,the big       
capitalists  interest themselves only in
 the operations of the stock exchange1  
which  afford the delights of gambling2 

they dignify these by the pompous name  
of speculations1--a word formerly       
reserved for the highest processes  of  
philosophical or mathematical thought4  
,the capitalists are getting  themselves
 replaced in the supervision and        
management of the great  industrial and 
commercial enterprises by intellectuals1
 who carry  them on1 and usually are    
well paid for doing so4 ,these          
intellectuals  of industry and politics1
 the privileged portion of the wage     
class1  imagine that they are an        
integral part of the capitalist class1  
while  they are only its servants2 on   
every occasion they take up its defense 
against the working class1 which finds  
in them its worst enemies4              
,intellectuals of this description can  
never be led into socialism2  their     
interests are too closely bound up with 
those of the capitalist  class for them 
to detach themselves and turn against   
it4 ,but below  these favored few there 
is a swarming and famishing throng of   

intellectuals whose lot grows worse in  
proportion to the increase of  their    
numbers4 ,these intellectuals belong to 
socialism4 ,they ought  to be already in
 our ranks4 ,their education ought to   
have given  them the necessary          
intelligence to deal with social        
problems1 but it  is this very education
 which obstructs their hearing and keeps
 them  away from socialism4 ,they think 
their education confers on them a       
social privilege1 that it will permit   
them to get through the world  by       
themselves1 each making his own way in  
life by crowding out his  neighbor or   
standing on the shoulders of everyone   
else4 ,they imagine  that their poverty 
is transitory and that they only need a 
stroke of  good luck to transform them  
into capitalists4 ,education1 they      
think1  is the lucky number in the      
social lottery1 and it will bring them  
the grand prize4 ,they do not perceive  
that this ticket given them  by the     
capitalist class is a fraud1 that labor1

 whether manual or  intellectual1 has no
 other chance than to earn its daily    
pittance1  that it has nothing to hope  
for but to be exploited1 and that the   
more  capitalism goes on developing1 the
 more do the chances of an individual   
raising himself out of his class go on  
diminishing4    ,and while they build   
castles in ,spain1 capital crushes them1
 as it has  crushed the small merchants 
and the small manufacturers1 who thought
  they1 too1 with free credit and a     
little luck1 might become first-class   
capitalists1 whose names should be      
written in the ,great ,book of the      
,public ,debt4    ,the intellectuals1 in
 all that has to do with the            
understanding of  the social movement1  
do not rise above the intellectual level
 of  those little bourgeois who scoffed 
so fiercely at the bunglers of  #ahcj   
and who1 after being ruined and merged  
in the proletariat1 none  the less      
continue to detest socialism2 to such a 
degree were their  heads perverted by   

the religion of property4 ,the          
intellectuals1 whose  brains are stuffed
 with all the prejudices of the         
bourgeois class1 are  inferior to those 
little bourgeois of #ahcj and #ahdh who 
at least were  not afraid of gunpowder2 
they have not their spirit of           
combativeness1  they are true           
imbeciles1--if we restore to this word  
its original ,latin  meaning of unsuited
 for war4 ,without resistance they      
endure rebuffs and  wrongs and they do  
not think of uniting1 of organizing     
themselves to  defend their interests   
and give battle to capital on the       
economic field4    ,the intellectual    
proletariat as we know it is a recent   
growth1 it has  especially developed in 
the last forty years4 ,when after the   
amnesty of  the condemned of the        
,commune1 we began again the socialist  
propaganda1  believing that it would be 
easy to draw the intellectuals into the 
movement we took up our dwelling in     
their cultured ,latin quarter1  ,guesde 

taking up his residence in the ,rue de  
la ,pitie1 ,vaillant in the  ,rue ,monge
 and ,i in the ,boulevard de ,port      
,royal4 ,we became acquainted  with     
hundreds of young men1 students of law1 
of medicines1 of the  sciences1 but you 
can count on your fingers those whom we 
brought into  the socialist camp4 ,our  
ideas attracted them one day1 but the   
next day  the wind blew from another    
quarter and turned their heads4    ,an  
honorable merchant of ,bordeaux1 a      
prominent member of the municipal       
council1 said in the time of the empire 
to my father1 who was disturbed  over my
 socialism3    ,friend ,lafargue1 you   
must let youth take its course2 ,i was a
 socialist  when ,i studied at ,paris1  
,i was connected with the secret        
societies  and ,i took part in the      
movement for demanding of ,louis        
,philippe the  pardon of ,barbes4 ,the  
young men of our age turn quickly1 let  
them get  back to their homes and they  
develop prominent abdomens and become   

reactionaries4    ,we welcomed joyfully 
the entrance of ,jaures into socialism2 
we thought  that the new form which he  
brought to our propaganda would make it 
penetrate into circles that we had not  
been able to touch4 ,he has  in fact    
made a decided impression on the        
university circle1 and we  owe it in    
part to him that the nurslings of the   
,ecole ,normale have  ideas regarding   
the social movement which are a little  
less absurd  and formless than those    
with which their learning and           
intelligence  have hitherto been        
contented4 ,lately1 joining forces with 
the radical  politicians who had lost   
their working-class following1 they have
  invaded the socialist party4 ,their   
souls overflow with the purest          
intentions2 if their peaceful habits    
prevent them from throwing  themselves  
into the conflict1 and if their lofty   
culture forbids them  to take their     
place in the ranks of the comrades1 they
 nevertheless  condescend to instruct us

 in ethics1 to polish off our ignorance1
 to  teach us how to think1 to offer us 
such crumbs of science as we may be     
able to digest1 and to direct us2 they  
modestly offer themselves to us  as     
leaders and schoolmasters4    ,these    
intellectuals who have spent their youth
 in the university  that they might     
become experts on exercises1 polishers  
of phrases1  philosophers or doctors1   
imagine one can improvise himself into a
  master of the socialist theory by     
attending a single lecture or by the    
careless reading of a single pamphlet4  
,naturalists who had felt the  need of  
painful research to learn the habits of 
mollusks or of the  polyps who live in a
 community on the coral banks1 think    
that they know  enough to regulate human
 societies1 and that by keeping their   
stand  on the first steps of the        
ascending ladder of animal life they can
  the better discern the human ideal4   
,the philosophers1 the moralists1  the  
historians and the politicians have aims

 equally lofty2 they bring  an abundant 
supply of ideas and a new method of     
action to replace the  imperfect theory 
and tactics which in all capitalist     
countries have  served to build up      
socialist parties strong in numbers1    
unity and  discipline4    ,the class    
struggle is out of fashion1 declare     
these professors of  socialism4 ,can a  
line of demarcation be drawn between    
classes8 ,do not  the working people    
have savings bank accounts of #bj1 #dj  
and #ajj1  bringing them #ej cents1     
#a4ej and #c4jj of interest yearly8 ,is 
it not  true that the directors and     
managers of mines1 railroads and        
financial  houses are wage-workers1     
having their functions and duties in the
  enterprises which they manage for the 
account of capitalists8 ,the  argument  
is unanswerable1 but by the same token  
there is no vegetable  kingdom nor      
animal kingdom because we can not       
separate them with  an ax1 as it were1  
for the reason that at their points of  

contact1  vegetables and animals merge  
into each other4 ,there is no longer any
  day or any night because the sun does 
not appear on the horizon at the  same  
moment all over the earth1 and because  
it is day at the antipodes  while it is 
night here4    ,the concentration of    
capital8 ,a worn-out tune of #ahej4 ,the
 corporations  by their stocks and bonds
 parcel out property and distribute it  
among  all the citizens4 ,how blinded we
 were by our sectarianism when we       
thought that this new form of property1 
essentially capitalistic1  was enabling 
the financiers to plunge their thieving 
hands into the  smallest purses1 to     
extract the last pieces of silver4      
,the poverty of the working class6 ,but 
it is diminishing and soon will         
disappear through the constant increase 
of wages1 while interest  on money is   
constantly diminishing2 some fine day it
 will descend  to zero and the bourgeois
 will be overjoyed to offer their       
beloved  capital on the altar of        

socialism4 ,that to-morrow or the day   
after  the capitalist will be forced to 
work1 is the prediction of ,mr4         
,waldeck-,rousseau4 ,and there are      
intellectuals whose condition grows     
worse in proportion as capitalism       
develops1 who are stultified by the     
utterances of the employers to a point  
where they affirm that the  position of 
wage-workers is improving1 and there are
 intellectuals  who assume to possess   
some knowledge of political economy1 who
 affirm  that interest on money is      
rapidly diminishing4 ,could these       
reformers  of socialism perchance be    
ignorant that ,adam ,smith calculated at
 the  end of the eighteenth century that
 #c per cent was the normal interest  of
 capital running no risk1 and that the  
financiers of our own epoch  consider   
that it is still around #c per cent that
 the interest rate  must fluctuate4 ,if 
a few years ago this rate seemed to fall
 below #b  per cent1 it has risen today 
above #c per cent4 ,capital is          

merchandise1  like intellectual         
capacities and carrots2 as such it is   
subject to  the fluctuations of supply  
and demand4 ,it was then more offered   
than  demanded1 whereas since the       
development of the industrial plant of  
,russia1 since the opening of ,china to 
,european exploitation1 etc41 the       
over-supply of capital has been absorbed
 and its price rises with its  scarcity4
 ,but the intellectuals have too many   
trifles to think of and  too many       
harmonious phrases to construct for     
giving any thought to  economic         
phenomena4 ,they take for sterling      
truths all the lies of the  capitalists1
 and repeat with pious conviction the   
old litanies of the  orthodox economic  
church3 ,there are no classes1 wealth is
 coming to be  distributed more and more
 equitably1 the workers are growing     
richer and  those living on incomes are 
growing poorer1 and the capitalist      
society  is the best of all possible    
societies2 these truths shine forth like

  suns and none but partisans and       
mystics can deny them4    ,these        
intellectuals propose to modify the     
tactics as well as the  theories of the 
socialist party2 they wish to impose    
upon it a new  method of action4 ,it    
must no longer strive to conquer the    
public powers  by a great struggle1     
legal or revolutionary as need may be1  
but let  itself be conquered by every   
ministry of a republican coalition2 it  
is  no longer to oppose the socialist   
party to all the bourgeois parties2     
what is needed is to put it at the      
service of the liberal party2 we  must  
no longer organize it for the class     
struggle1 but keep it ready  for all the
 compromises of politicians4 ,and to    
further the triumph of  the new method  
of action1 they propose to disorganize  
the socialist  party1 to break up its   
old systems and to demolish the         
organizations  which for twenty years   
have labored to give the workers a sense
 of  their class interests and to group 

them in a party of economic and         
political struggle4    ,but the         
intellectuals will lose their labors2   
thus far they have only  succeeded in   
drawing closer the ties uniting the     
socialists of the  different            
organizations1 and in making themselves 
ridiculous4    ,the intellectuals ought 
to have been the first of all the       
various  groups to revolt against       
capitalist society1 in which they occupy
  a subordinate position so little in   
keeping with their hopes and  their     
talents1 but they do not even understand
 it2 they have such a  confused idea of 
it that ,auguste ,comte1 ,renan1 and    
others more or less  distinguished have 
cherished the dream of reviving for     
their benefit an  aristocracy copied    
after the model of the ,chinese mandarin
 system4 ,such  an idea is a reflection 
of past ages in their heads1 for nothing
 is  in more absolute opposition with   
the modern social movement than such    
pretensions4 ,the intellectuals in      

previous states of society formed  a    
world outside and above that of         
production1 having charge only of       
education1 of the direction of religious
 worship1 and of the political          
administration4    ,the mechanic        
industry of these societies combine in  
the same producer1  manual labor and    
intellectual labor2 it was for example  
the same  cabinetmaker who designed and 
executed the piece of furniture1 who    
bought its first material and who even  
undertook its sale4 ,capitalist         
production has divorced two functions   
which once were indissolubly  united2 on
 the one side it puts the manual        
workers1 who become more  and more      
servants of the machine1 and on the     
other the intellectual  workers1        
engineers1 chemists1 managers1 etc4 ,but
 these two categories  of workers1      
however different and contrary they may 
be in their  education and habits1 are  
welded together1 to the point that a    
capitalist industry can not be carried  

on without manual laborers any  more    
than without intellectual wage-workers4 
,united in production1 united under the 
yoke of capitalist exploitation1  united
 they should be also in revolt against  
the common enemy4 ,the  intellectuals1  
if they understood their own real       
interests would come  in crowds to      
socialism1 not through philanthropy1 not
 through pity for  the miseries of the  
workers1 not through affectation and    
snobbery1  but to save themselves1 to   
assure the future welfare of their wives
  and children1 to fulfill their duty to
 their class4 ,they ought to be  ashamed
 of being left behind in the social     
battle by their comrades in  the manual 
category4 ,they have many things to     
teach them1 but they have  still much to
 learn from them2 the workingmen have a 
practical sense  superior to theirs1 and
 have given proof of an instinctive     
intuition  of the communist tendencies  
of modern capitalism which is lacking to
  the intellectuals1 who have only been 

able by a conscious mental effort  to   
arrive at this conception4 ,if only they
 had understood their own  interests1   
they would long since have turned       
against the capitalist  class the       
education which it has generously       
distributed in order  better to exploit 
them2 they would have utilized their    
intellectual  capacities1 which are     
enriching their masters1 as so many     
improved  weapons to fight capitalism   
and to conquer the freedom of their     
class1  the wage-working class4         
,capitalist production1 which has       
overthrown the old conditions of life   
and of work1 has elaborated new forms1  
which already can be discerned  without 
supernatural vision1 but which to the   
intellectuals remain  sealed under seven
 seals4 ,one of the leading lights of   
intellectualism1  ,m4 ,durkheim1 in his 
book1 ,the ,division of ,labor1 which   
made some  noise in university circles1 
can not conceive of society except on   
the social pattern of ancient ,egypt1   

each laborer remaining1 his life        
through1 penned up in one single trade4 
,however1 unless one is so  unfortunate 
as to be affected by the hopeless       
near-sightedness of the  ,ecole         
,normale1 one can not help seeing that  
the machine is suppressing  trades1 one 
after the other1 in a way to let only   
one survive1 that  of the machinist1 and
 that when it has finished its          
revolutionary  work which the socialists
 will complete by revolutionizing       
capitalist  society1 the producer of the
 communist society will plow and sow    
with  the machine today1 will spin1 will
 turn wood or polish steel to-morrow1   
and will exercise in turn all the trades
 to the greater profit of his  health   
and his intelligence4    ,the industrial
 applications of mechanics1 chemistry   
and physics1  which1 monopolized by     
capital1 oppress the worker1 will1 when 
they  shall be common property1         
emancipate man from toil and give him   
leisure  and liberty4    ,mechanical    

production1 which under capitalist      
direction can only buffet  the worker   
back and forth from periods of over-work
 to periods of  enforced idleness1 will 
when developed and regulated by a       
communist  administration1 require from 
the producer1 to provide for the normal 
needs of society1 only a maximum day of 
two or three hours in the  workshop1 and
 when this time of necessary social     
labor is fulfilled he  will be able to  
enjoy freely the physical and           
intellectual pleasures of  life4    ,the
 artist then will paint1 will sing1 will
 dance1 the writer will  write1 the     
musician will compose operas1 the       
philosopher will build  systems1 the    
chemist will analyze substances not to  
gain money1 to  receive a salary1 but to
 deserve applause1 to win laurel        
wreaths1 like  the conquerors at the    
,olympic games1 but to satisfy their    
artistic and  scientific passion2 for   
one does not drink a glass of champagne 
or kiss  the woman he loves for the     

benefit of the gallery4 ,the artist and 
the  scientist may then repeat the      
enthusiastic words of ,kepler1 that hero
  of science3 ,the elector of ,saxony   
with all his wealth can not equal  the  
pleasure ,i have felt in composing the  
,mysterium ,cosmographicum4    ,will not
 the intellectuals end by hearing the   
voice of the socialist  calling them to 
the rescue1 to emancipate science and   
art from the  capitalist yoke1 to       
liberate thought from the slavery of    
commercialism8      ,,footnotes3    #ca 
,ever since the ,french ,revolution the 
law has required the words  ,libert4    
,egalit4 ,fraternit4 to be placed over  
the door of every  public building in   
,france4--,translator4    #cb ,it is a  
well-known fact that in the ,american   
establishments of  these and similar    
companies each workman before receiving 
employment  must sign papers            
transferring to the corporation the     
title to all  inventions made by him    
while in its service4--,translator4     

,,the ,,bankruptcy ,,of ,,capitalism    
,the nineteenth century was the century 
of capitalism4 ,capitalism  filled that 
century to overflowing with its         
commerce1 its industry1  its manners1   
its fashions1 its literature1 its art1  
its science1  its philosophy1 its       
religion1 its politics and its civil    
code1 more  universal than the laws     
imposed by ,rome upon the nations of the
 ancient  world4 ,the capitalist        
movement1 starting from ,england1 the   
,united  ,states and ,france1 has shaken
 the foundations of ,europe and of the  
world4 ,it has forced the old feudal    
monarchies of ,austria and ,germany  and
 the barbaric despotism of ,russia to   
put themselves in line2 and in  these   
last days it has gone into the extreme  
,east1 into ,japan1 where  it has       
overthrown the feudal system and        
implanted the industry and the  politics
 of capitalism4    ,capitalism has taken
 possession of our planet2 its fleets   
bring  together the continents which    

oceans had separated2 its railroads1    
spanning mountains and deserts1 furrow  
the earth2 the electric wires1  the     
nervous system of the globe1 bind all   
nations together1 and their             
palpitations reverberate in the great   
centers of population4 ,now for  the    
first time there is a contemporary      
history of the world4 ,events in        
,australia1 the ,transvaal1 ,china1 are 
known in ,london1 ,paris1 ,new ,york1   
at the moment they are brought about1   
precisely as if they happened in  the   
outskirts of the city where the news is 
published4    ,civilized nations live   
off the products of the whole earth4    
,egypt1  ,india1 ,louisiana1 furnish the
 cotton1 ,australia the wool1 ,japan the
  silk1 ,china the tea1 ,brazil the     
coffee1 ,new ,zealand and the ,united   
,states the meat and grain4 ,the        
capitalist carries in his stomach and on
  his back the spoils of the universe4  
,the study of natural phenomena has     
undergone an unprecedented1 an          

unheard-of1 development4 ,new sciences1 
geology1 chemistry1 physics1  etc41 have
 arisen4 ,the industrial application of 
the forces of nature  and of the        
discoveries of science has taken on a   
still more startling  development2 some 
of the geometrical discoveries of the   
scientists  of ,alexandria1 two thousand
 years old1 have for the first time been
  utilized4    ,the production of       
machine industry can provide for all    
demand and more4  ,the mechanical       
application of the forces of nature has 
increased man's  productive forces      
tenfold1 a hundredfold4 ,a few hours'   
daily labor1  furnished by the          
able-bodied members of the nation1 would
 produce  enough to satisfy the material
 and intellectual needs of all4    ,but 
what has come of the colossal and       
wonderful development of science1       
industry and commerce in the nineteenth 
century8 ,has it made humanity          
stronger1 healthier1 happier8 ,has it   
given leisure to the producers8  ,has it

 brought comfort and contentment to the 
people8    ,never has work been so      
prolonged1 so exhausting1 so injurious  
to man's  body and so fatal to his      
intelligence4 ,never has the industrial 
labor  which undermines health1 shortens
 life and starves the intellect been  so
 general1 been imposed on such          
ever-growing masses of laborers4 ,the   
men1 women and children of the          
proletariat are bent under the iron yoke
  of machine industry4 ,poverty is their
 reward when they work1 starvation  when
 they lose their jobs4    ,in former    
stages of society1 famine appeared only 
when the earth  refused her harvests4   
,in capitalist society1 famine sits at  
the hearth  of the working class when   
granaries and cellars burst with the    
fruits  of the earth1 and when the      
market is gorged with the products of   
industry4    ,all the toil1 all the     
production1 all the suffering of the    
working  class has but served to        
heighten its physical and mental        

destitution1  to drag it down from      
poverty into wretchedness4              
,capitalism1 controlling the means of   
production and directing the  social and
 political life of a century of science 
and industry1 has  become bankrupt4 ,the
 capitalists have not even proved       
competent1 like  the owners of chattel  
slaves1 to guarantee to their toilers   
the work to  provide their miserable    
livelihood2 capitalism massacred them   
when they  dared demand the right to    
work--a slave's right4#cc    ,the       
capitalist class has also made a failure
 of itself4 ,it has seized  upon the    
social wealth to enjoy it1 and never was
 the ruling class more  incapable of    
enjoyment4 ,the newly rich1 those who   
have built up their  fortunes by        
accumulating the filchings from labor1  
live like strangers  in the midst of    
luxury and artistic treasures1 with     
which they surround  themselves through 
a foolish vanity1 to pay homage to their
 millions4    ,the leading capitalists1 

the millionaires and billionaires1 are  
sad specimens of the human race1 useless
 and hurtful4 ,the mark of  degeneracy  
is upon them4 ,their sickly offspring   
are old at birth4 ,their  organs are    
sapped with diseases4 ,exquisite meats  
and wines load down  their tables1 but  
the stomach refuses to digest them2     
women expert in  love perfume their     
couches with youth and beauty1 but their
 senses are  be-numbed4 ,they own       
palatial dwellings in enchanting sites1 
and they  have no eyes1 no feeling for  
joyful nature1 with its eternal youth   
and change4 ,sated and disgusted with   
everything1 they are followed           
everywhere by ennui as by their shadows4
 ,they yawn at rising and when  they go 
to bed2 they yawn at their fests and at 
their orgies4 ,they  began yawning in   
their mother's womb4    ,the pessimism  
which1 in the wake of capitalist        
property1 made its  appearance in       
ancient ,greece six centuries before    
,jesus ,christ1 and  which has since    

formed the foundation of the moral and  
religious  philosophy of the capitalist 
class1 became the leading characteristic
  of the philosophy of the second half  
of the nineteenth century4 ,the         
pessimism of ,theognis sprang from the  
uncertainties and vicissitudes of  life 
in the ,greek cities1 torn by the       
perpetual wars between rich and  poor2  
the pessimism of the capitalist is the  
bitter fruit of satiety1  ennui and the 
impoverishment of the blood4    ,the    
capitalist class is falling into its    
second childhood2 its  decreptitude     
appears in its literature1 now returning
 to its  starting point4 ,romantic      
literature1 the literary form proper to 
the  capitalist class1 which started out
 with the romantic ,christianity  of    
,chateaubriand1 is returning to the same
 point1 after passing  through the      
historical novel and the character      
novel4 7,witness in this  country the   
immense sale of ,ben ,hur and its       
imitators4--,translator47  ,capitalism1 

which in its virile and combative youth 
in the eighteenth  century had wished to
 emancipate itself from ,christianity1  
resigns  itself in its old age to       
practices of the grossest superstition4 
,the capitalist class1 bankrupt1 old1   
useless and hurtful1 has finished  its  
historic mission2 it persists as ruling 
class only through its  acquired        
momentum4 ,the proletariat of the       
twentieth century will  execute the     
decree of history2 will drive it from   
its position of  social control4 ,then  
the stupendous work in science and      
industry  accomplished by civilized     
humanity1 at the price of such toil and 
suffering1 will engender peace and      
happiness2 then will this vale of  tears
 be transformed into an earthly         
paradise4      ,,footnote3    #cc ,i    
allude to the ,days of ,june1 #ahdh4    
,the ,insurgents demanded the  ,right to
 ,work4          ,,the ,,woman          
,,question      ,the bourgeois has      
thought and still thinks that woman     

ought to  remain at home and devote her 
activity to supervising and directing   
the housekeeping1 caring for her        
husband1 and manufacturing and          
nourishing children4 ,even ,xenophon1 at
 the time when the bourgeoisie  was     
newly born and was taking its shape in  
ancient society1 traced  the main       
outlines of this ideal of woman4 ,but if
 through the course  of centuries1 this 
ideal may have appeared reasonable1     
because it  corresponded to economic    
conditions which prevailed1 it is no    
longer  anything more than an           
ideological survival1 since these       
conditions have  ceased to exist4       
,the domestication of woman presupposes 
that she fulfills in the  household     
certain numerous functions which absorb 
all her energy2 now1  the most important
 and the most exacting of these domestic
 labors--the  spinning of wool and      
linen1 the cutting and making up of     
clothing1  laundry work1 baking1        
etc41--are carried on by capitalistic   

industry4  ,it furthermore presupposes  
that man by his contribution to the     
family  capital and his earnings        
provides for the material needs of the  
family2 now1 among the comfortable      
bourgeoisie1 marriage is as much an     
association of capitals#cd as a union of
 persons and often the capital          
contributed by the wife exceeds that of 
the husband1 and in the small           
bourgeoisie the gains of the father of  
the family have fallen so low  that the 
children1--girls as well as boys1--are  
compelled to earn their  living in      
business1 railroad offices1 banks1      
teaching1 civil service  positions1     
etc41 while it often happens that the   
young wife continues  to work outside in
 order to help out the resources of the 
housekeeping1  when the earnings of the 
husband do not suffice to cover the     
expenses4    ,the daughters and wives of
 the small bourgeoisie1 as well as those
  of the working class1 thus enter into 
competition with their father1  brothers

 and husband4 ,this economic antagonism1
 which the bourgeoisie  had prevented   
from developing by confining the wife to
 the family  dwelling1 is becoming      
general and is intensified in proportion
 as  capitalistic production develops2  
it invades the fields of the liberal    
professions--medicine1 law1 literature1 
journalism1 the sciences1  etc41--where 
man had reserved for himself a monopoly1
 which he imagined  was to be eternal4  
,the laborers1 as is always the case1   
have been the  first to draw the logical
 consequences of the participation of   
woman  in social production2 they have  
replaced the ideal of the artisan1--the 
wife who is nothing but a               
housekeeper1--by a new ideal1--woman as 
a  companion in their economic and      
political struggles for the raising of  
wages and the emancipation of labor4    
,the bourgeois has not yet succeeded in 
understanding that his ideal  is already
 long since out of date and that it must
 be remodeled  to correspond to the new 

conditions of the social environment2   
nevertheless since the first half of the
 nineteenth century the ladies  of the  
bourgeoisie have begun to protest       
against their inferior  position in the 
family1 so much the more intolerable in 
that their  dowry placed them on a      
footing of equality with the husband2   
they  rebelled against the domestic     
slavery and the parsimonious life to    
which they were condemned1 as well as   
the deprivation of intellectual  and    
material enjoyments which was imposed   
upon them2 the bolder ones  went so far 
as to demand free love and to ally      
themselves with the  utopian sects which
 preached the emancipation of woman4#ce 
,the  philosophers and the moralists had
 the simplicity to believe that they    
would stop the woman movement by        
opposing to it the sacred interest  of  
the family1 which they declared could   
not survive without the  subjection of  
woman to the labors of the household1   
the sewing on  of shirt buttons1 the    

mending of hose1 etc41 her duty was to  
devote  herself to these obscure and    
thankless labors1 in order that man     
might freely unfold and display his     
brilliant and superior faculties4       
,these same philosophers1 who lectured  
the rebellious ladies on the  cult of   
the family1 sang the praises of         
capitalist industry1 which1  by forcing 
the wife away from the domestic hearth  
and her child's  cradle to condemn her  
to the forced labor of the factory1     
destroys the  working-class family4     
,the bourgeois ladies laughed at the    
sermons1 equally imbecile and  ethical1 
of these solemn philosophers2 they kept 
on their way and  attained the end they 
set for themselves2 like the patrician  
lady of  ancient ,rome and the countess 
of the eighteenth century1 they threw   
off the cares of housekeeping and of the
 nursing of the child upon  mercenaries1
 that they might devote themselves      
wholly to the toilet1  that they might  
be the most luxuriously arrayed dolls in

 the capitalist  world and in order to  
make business move4 ,the daughters and  
wives of  ,american plutocracy have     
attained the extreme limits of this sort
 of  emancipation2 they are transforming
 their fathers and husbands into        
accumulators of millions1 which they    
squander madly4 ,since the toilet  does 
not exhaust the entire activity of the  
ladies of capitalism1 they  find        
amusement in breaking the marriage      
contract in order to assert  their      
independence and improve the race4 ,the 
,communist ,manifesto  remarks that the 
innumerable divorce suits in which      
adultery is alleged  are indisputable   
proofs of the respect inspired in the   
bourgeois of  both sexes by the sacred  
bonds of marriage which the licentious  
socialists talk of loosening4    ,when  
the daughters and wives of the small    
bourgeoisie1 obliged to  earn their     
living and to increase the resources of 
the family1 began  to invade the stores1
 the offices1 the civil service and the 

liberal  professions1 the bourgeois were
 seized with anxiety for their means  of
 existence already so reduced2 feminine 
competition would reduce  them still    
further4 ,the intellectuals who took up 
the defense of the  males1 thought it   
prudent not to start afresh with the    
ethical sermons  which had miscarried so
 piteously in the case of the wealthy   
bourgeois  ladies2--they appealed to    
science2 they demonstrated by reasons   
which  were irrefutable and loftily     
scientific that woman cannot emerge from
  the occupations of housekeeping       
without violating the laws of nature    
and history4 ,they proved to their      
complete satisfaction that woman  is an 
inferior being1 incapable of receiving a
 higher intellectual  education and of  
furnishing the combination of attention1
 energy and  agility demanded by the    
professions in which she was entering   
into  competition with man4 ,her brain1 
less voluminous1 less heavy and less    
complex than that of man1 is a child's  

brain4 ,her less developed  muscles have
 not the strength for attack and for    
resistance2 the  bones of her forearm1  
her pelvis1 her femur1 and in fact all  
her  osseous1 muscular and nervous      
system do not permit her to undertake   
more than the routine of the household4 
,nature designed her in all her         
organization to be the servant of man1  
just as the odious god of the  ,jews and
 ,christians marked out the race of ,ham
 for slavery4    ,history contributed   
its startling confirmation of these     
ultra  scientific truths2 the           
philosophers and the historians affirmed
 that  always and everywhere the wife1  
subordinate to the man1 had been  shut  
up in the house1 in the woman's         
apartments2 if such had been her  lot in
 the past1 such was to be her destiny in
 the future1 was the  positive          
declaration of ,auguste ,comte1 the     
profoundest of bourgeois  philosophers4 
,lombroso1 the illustrious comedian1    
went him one better3  he seriously      

declared that social statistics         
proclaimed the inferiority  of woman1   
since the number of female criminals is 
below that of male  criminals2 while    
buried in these figures1 he might have  
added that the  statistics of insanity  
demonstrate the same inferiority4 ,thus 
we see  that ethics1 anatomy1           
physiology1 social statistics and       
history riveted  forever upon woman the 
chains of domestic servitude4      ,,ii4
    ,bachofen1 ,morgan and a crowd of   
anthropologists have revised the        
opinion of the historians and           
philosophers upon the role played by    
woman in the past4 ,they have shown that
 everywhere the paternal  family1 which 
subordinated woman to man1 had been     
preceded by the  maternal family1 which 
gave the first place to woman4 ,the     
,greek  language contains the record of 
her two conditions3 while the ,spartans1
  among whom matriarchal customs        
persisted1 still continued to call  her 
despoina1 the mistress of the house1 the

 sovereign1 the other  ,greeks gave to  
the wife the name damar1 the subdued1   
the vanquished4  ,the ,odyssey1 in      
characterizing ,nausicaa1 says that she 
is parthenos  admes1 the girl not       
subdued1 that is to say1 without a      
husband1  without a master4 ,the modern 
expression yoke of marriage preserves   
the ancient idea4    ,hesiod1 in        
opposition to ,homer1 who tells only of 
patriarchal customs1  preserves precious
 recollections of the matriarchal       
family2 he tells  us that when it       
existed man1 even if he were a hundred  
years old1  lived with his prudent      
mother1--he was fed in her house like a 
great  child4 7,works and ,days1 ,v4    
#abi-acj47 ,it was not the woman who    
then had  the child's brain1 but the    
man2 everything seems in fact to prove  
that her intelligence was the first to  
develop4 ,this intellectual  superiority
 caused her to be deified before man in 
the primitive  religions of ,egypt1 the 
,indies1 ,asia and ,greece1 and caused  

the first  inventions of the arts and   
trades1 with the exception of metal     
working1  to be attributed to goddesses 
and not to gods4 ,the ,muses1 originally
  three in number1 were in ,greece1 even
 in preference to ,apollo1 the          
goddesses of poetry1 music and the      
dance4 ,isis1 mother of corn ears  and  
lady of bread1 and ,demeter1 lawgiver1  
had taught the ,egyptians and  ,greeks  
the tillage of barley and wheat and made
 them renounce their  anthropophagic    
repasts4 ,the woman appeared to the     
pre-patriarchal man1  like the ,germans 
whom ,tacitus knew1 as having within    
herself something  holy and             
providential1 aliquid sanctum et        
providum 7,germania ,,viii74  ,her      
prudence and foresight gave her this    
divine character4 ,must we  conclude    
that this intellectual superiority1     
which manifested itself  when the       
economic environment is rudimentary1 is 
a natural phenomenon8    ,but1 in any   
case1 it may be asserted that the       

vitality of woman is  superior to that  
of man4 ,the life insurance companies of
 the ,united  ,states1 ,england and     
,holland1 which do not base their       
calculation upon  scientific fairy tales
 of the intellectuals but upon mortality
 tables1  pay woman an annuity below    
that which they give man1 because her   
probabilities of death are less4 ,here  
for example is the annuity paid  for a  
capital of #a1jjj by ,american and      
,dutch companies3#cf                    
,new ,york4        ,holland4      ,age4 
,men4    ,women4    ,men4    ,women4    
#ej years       #gf4dg   #fi4eg   #gf4hj
   #gc4fj    #fj years        #ig4bd    
#hh4jc    #ih4ej    #ic4ej    #gj years 
#acd4ca   #abb4dh   #adb4jj   #acf4gj   
#hj years       #ahc4ie   #afh4jj       
#bbb4gj   #baa4gj    ,it may be objected
 that man1 leading a more active life1  
is more  subject to accidents1 diseases1
 and other causes of death1 and that    
consequently the prolonged life of woman
 does not prove the higher  vitality of 

her organism1 but the advantages of a   
life less subject to  accident4    ,the 
answer to this objection is found in the
 statistics of the various  nations4    
,there is in no country a perfect       
equilibrium between the  number of women
 and that of men2 for #a1jjj men there  
are in ,belgium  #a1jje women1 in       
,france #a1jad1 in ,england #a1jfb1 in  
,scotland #a1jga and  in ,norway #a1jia4
 ,nevertheless in these countries with  
the feminine  preponderance there is an 
excess of masculine births3 of the whole
  of ,western ,europe for every #ajjj   
girls there are born from #a1jdj to     
#a1jfj boys4 ,if1 in spite of this      
excess of masculine births1 more  girls 
survive1 it is because the greater      
mortality of the boys shows  the balance
 in favor of the girls2 and this higher 
mortality cannot  be explained by the   
life of man being more subject to       
accident1 since  it is observed at an   
early age1 notably during the first two 
years4  ,all the diseases of childhood1 

with the exception of diphtheria and    
whooping cough1 are to a perceptible    
extent more fatal among boys than  among
 girls2 from zero to five years the male
 sex is particularly  frail2 at all     
ages1 except between ten and fifteen    
years1 the male  mortality is in excess 
of the female4    ,the superior vitality
 of the female sex is also noticeable in
  the greater ease with which it builds 
up its organism4 ,m4 ,iribe1            
superintendent of the sanitarium of     
,hendaye1 to which are sent ,parisian   
children from three to fourteen years of
 age1 who are afflicted with  anaemia1  
incipient tuberculosis1 scrofula and    
rickets1 reports that at  the time of   
their dismissal1 at the end of six      
months1 the progress in  weight1 girth  
and chest development is incomparably   
higher in the girls  than in the boys1  
the increase in weight is double and    
often more4    ,the same statement has  
been made by other superintendents of   
sanitariums4 7,bulletin ,medical1 ,no4  

#ha1 #aijc47    ,woman undeniably       
possesses a greater vitality than man4  
,m4 ,gustav  ,loisel has made inquiry as
 to whether this difference existed in  
embryonic life1 and what may be its     
cause8 ,he has communicated the  results
 of his inquiries to the ,biological    
,society of ,paris1 which  published    
them in its ,bulletin of ,november #f1  
#aijc4    ,m4 ,loisel availed himself of
 #gib weights and measurements made upon
 #gb  foetuses at the ,maternity        
,hospital of ,paris by ,c4 ,e4          
,legou2#cg from  the following weights  
of the foetuses at three1 four1 five and
 six  months he obtains the following   
figures3                                
,males4   ,females4   ,differences4     
,grammes4       ,grammes4    ,total     
weight       #aijh4ah   #agjh4aa        
#bjj4jg in favor of males    ,kidneys   
#af4hg     #ag4ai     #b4fg in favor of 
males    ,superrenal glands     #e4ae   
#f4dc     #j4cb in favor of females     
,liver                #hh4ce     #if4ca 

#a4bh in favor of females    ,spleen    
#b4ei      #b4ch     #g4ij in favor of  
females    ,thymus                #c4hi 
#c4ig     #j4ba in favor of males       
,heart                #aj4ig     #ab4fj 
#j4jh in favor of females    ,lungs     
#dg4bi     #dd4fb     #a4fc in favor of 
females    ,brain               #bcf4id 
#bce4ag     #a4ag in favor of males     
,these figures thus show us1 says ,m4   
,loisel1 a preponderance already        
existing in favor of the females as     
regards the kidneys1 the superrenal     
glands1 the liver1 the thymus and the   
heart2 this predominance is the  more   
noticeable since the total weight of the
 body is larger in the  male than in the
 female4    ,if now we take the relation
 between the total weight and the weight
 of  the organs which are heaviest in   
the male1 we find that the proportion   
is still in favor of the female3        
,,proportion ,,of ,,total ,,weight4     
,males4       ,females4    ,spleen   #a 
to #gcf       #a to #gah    ,lungs    #a

 to  #dj       #a to  #ch    ,brain     
#a to   #h       #a to   #g    ,the     
organs here examined1 brain included1   
are thus absolutely or  relatively      
heavier in the female foetus than in the
 male foetus4    ,m4 ,loisel has also   
examined into the proportion of the     
weights of  the different organs to the 
total weight according to the age of the
  foetus4 ,he has prepared a table1 from
 which ,i take only the figures         
concerning the brain3                   
,proportion of    ,,age         ,,total 
,,weight     weight of brain            
to total weight4               ,males   
,females    ,males   ,females           
,grammes  ,grammes    #c ,months        
#eh4cc   #fe4if     #a_/f4e   #a_/g     
#d ,months   #afg4be  #ahb4eh           
#a_/g4c   #a_/f4f    #e ,months         
#ccf4cc  #bie4jj     #a_/g4f   #a_/g4e  
#f ,months   #gcb4eh  #fcf4jj           
#a_/h4c   #a_/g4c    ,the weight of the 
male foetus1 which is below that of the 
female  foetus1 at three months1 when   

the sex has just been determined1 grows 
more rapidly and the proportion between 
the weight is always to the  advantage  
of the females from the fourth month on4
    ,to sum up1 says ,m4 ,loisel1 all   
the organs are heavier in the female    
foetus than in the male foetus up to    
about the fourth month4 ,the            
predominance then passes over to the    
male1 but only for the lungs  and the   
organs for sex-union1 thus the cardiac  
muscle always remains  heavier in the   
female4 ,the organs which are of real   
service to the  individual during the   
embryonic life always remain more       
developed in  the female sex4    ,if now
 we consider that the differences in    
favor of the females are  especially in 
the liver1 the heart1 the superrenal    
glands and the  kidneys1 we shall come  
to the conclusion that the greater      
vitality of  the female organisms       
corresponds to their being better       
nourished and  better purified4#ch      
,,iii4    ,the superior organization    

possessed by woman at birth1 assuring   
her  throughout her life a much greater 
vitality1 is probably demanded  by the  
part she plays in the production of the 
species1 a part  altogether more        
prolonged and exhausting than that of   
the man who1  when fertilization is     
accomplished1 has no more to do1 while  
then  the travail of woman begins1 to   
continue during long months1 through    
pregnancy and after birth4 ,the women of
 savage tribes suckle their  children   
for two years and more4 ,it sometimes   
happens that the male  pays dear for his
 inutility2 after union1 the bees kill  
the males1  and the male spider must    
hastily take himself off that he may not
 be  devoured by the larger and stronger
 female4 ,among the ,sakawas1 at  the   
annual feast of ,mylitta ,anaitis1 they 
sacrificed at ,babylon the  handsome    
slave who had just united with the      
priestess who incarnated  the ,assyrian 
goddess4 ,this bloody religious         
ceremonial must have been a             

reproduction of an ,amazonian custom4   
,the life of savagery and barbarism     
permits woman to develop her            
superiority from birth2 each sex there  
has its special function2 it  is the    
division of labor in embryo4 ,the man1  
whose muscular system is  more          
developed1 fights1 hunts1 fishes and    
sits down1 according to the  ,australian
 native1 he regards all the rest as     
under the jurisdiction  of woman1 whose 
function puts brain activity into play  
at an earlier  epoch4 ,she has charge of
 the communal house1 which often        
shelters a  clan of more than one       
hundred individuals2 she prepares       
clothing from  skins and other raw      
materials2 she charges herself with the 
cultivation  of the garden1 the rearing 
of domestic animals and the manufacture 
of household utensils2 she preserves1   
economizes1 cooks1 distributes  the     
provisions1 vegetable and animal1 which 
have been gathered during  the course of
 the year2 and like the ,valkyries of   

the ,scandinavians  and the ,keres of   
the pre-,homeric ,greeks1 she           
accompanies the warrior  on the field   
battle1 aids in the fray1 raises him up 
if he is wounded  and cares for him2 her
 assistance is so appreciated that1     
according to  ,tacitus1 the barbarians  
who under the leadership of ,civilis    
revolted  against ,vespasian1 were      
seized with pity for the ,roman soldiers
 because  their wives did not accompany 
them when they marched to combat4       
,plato likewise who1 like the chosen    
ones initiated in the ,eleusinian       
,mysteries1 was more informed regarding 
ancient customs than is  supposed1 makes
 the women to be present in the battles 
of the warriors  of his ,republic4      
,these multiple and diverse functions1  
which obliged woman to reflect1  to     
calculate1 to think of the morrow and to
 look ahead at long range1  must        
necessarily have developed her          
intellectual faculties2 thus the        
craniologists say that only a slight    

difference exists between the  cranial  
capacity of the two sexes in the        
negroes1 the ,australians1  and the red 
skins1 while they find that it goes on  
increasing among  civilized people4     
,woman is for the careless and          
improvident savage1 a  providence2 she  
is the prudent and prescient being who  
presides over  his destinies from birth 
to death4 ,man1 making his religions    
with  the events and the intellectual   
acquisitions of his daily life1 was     
thus obliged to begin by deifying woman4
 ,the pre-,homeric ,greeks and  ,romans 
had placed their destinies under the    
control of goddesses1  the              
,fates--,moirai1 ,parcae--whose name    
signifies in the ,latin language        
sparing1 economic1 and in the ,greek the
 part which falls to each  one in the   
distribution of food or of booty4    ,if
 we relieve the rich and poetical ,greek
 mythology of the symbolical1           
allegorical and mystical lucubrations   
with which the philosophers  and the    

poets of the classical epoch and the    
,alexandrine period have  overloaded and
 complicated it1 and which the ,german  
mythologists1  servilely copied by those
 of ,france and ,england1 have carried  
on to  their own more perfect confusion1
 it becomes an inestimable storehouse   
of prehistoric customs which preserves  
the memory of the manners  which        
travelers and anthropologists now       
observe living again among  the savages 
and barbarous nations of ,africa and the
 ,new ,world4 ,the  mythological legend 
furnishes us with information of the    
relative value  of feminine and         
masculine intelligence among the        
,greeks1 before they  had entered upon  
the patriarchal period4    ,jupiter1 the
 father of the gods1 as ,homer1 ,hesiod 
and ,aeschylos  call him1 after having  
driven the feminine divinities from     
,olympus1  enthroned there the          
patriarchate1 which for some generations
 had  been established upon earth2 the  
religious heaven always reflects        

terrestrial manners as the moon reflects
 the light of the sun4 ,but  ,jupiter1  
who like every barbarian1 knew how to   
use his fists 7,iliad  ,,xv4 #bbh71 who 
boasted that he was the strongest of the
 gods1 and who  to dominate the others  
kept next his throne two servants1      
,force and  ,violence1 always ready to  
obey his orders1 was inadequately       
prepared by  his intellectual qualities 
to replace woman in the government of   
the  ,olympian family2 in order to      
supply the capacities which were lacking
  to him1 ,hesiod tells us that he      
married ,metis1 the wisest among        
mortals and gods4 ,the savage and the   
barbarian1 that he may take into        
himself the courage of a fallen enemy1  
devours his throbbing heart2  ,jupiter  
carried off ,metis to assimilate her    
cunning1 her prudence  and her wisdom1  
for her name in the ,greek language has 
these diverse  meanings2 these qualities
 were considered as belonging to woman4 
,but the process of assimilation took   

some time1 if we may judge from  the    
rascally farce played upon him by       
,prometheus4 ,the latter killed  and    
butchered an enormous ox1 in one pile he
 placed the flesh which  he covered with
 the skin upon which he deposited the   
entrails2 in  another pile he put the   
bare bones which he adroitly concealed  
under  heaps of fat4 ,you have divided  
the parts very badly1 said the father   
of gods and men4 ,most worthy ,jupiter1 
greatest of living gods1  take the part 
that your wisdom counsels you to choose1
 replied the  astute ,prometheus4 ,the  
ruler of the heavens1 listening only to 
his  gluttony1 laid both hands upon the 
heap of fat amid the laughter of  the   
,olympians2 his wrath was terrible when 
he saw the bare bones4  7,theogony #dce 
et seq47 ,such a farce would hardly have
 been played in  the ,olympian heaven   
had it not been that on the earth       
similar tests had  been required to     
prove to the ,father that his           
intellectual faculties  did not justify 

him in taking the place of the ,mother  
in the leadership  of the family and the
 management of its property4    ,the    
higher position in the family and       
society1 which man conquered  by brute  
force1 while it compelled him to a      
mental activity to which  he was little 
accustomed1 at the same time put at his 
disposal  opportunities for reflection  
and development which constantly        
increased4 ,woman1 subdued1 as the      
,greek expression has it1 shut up in    
the narrow circle of the family1 the    
leadership of which had been taken  from
 her1 and having little or no contact   
with the outside world1 saw  on the     
contrary a great reduction of the means 
of development which  she had enjoyed1  
and to complete her subjection she was  
forbidden the  intellectual culture     
which was given to man4 ,if in spite of 
these  fetters and these disadvantages1 
the disastrous effects of which cannot  
be exaggerated1 the brain of woman      
continued to evolve1 it was because     

woman's intelligence profited through   
the progress realized by the  masculine 
brain2 for one sex transmits to the     
other the qualities which  it has       
acquired2 thus pullets of certain       
varieties inherit the spurs  which are  
highly developed among the cocks1 while 
in other varieties  they transmit to the
 males their exaggerated crests4 ,it is 
fortunate1  says ,darwin upon this      
point1 that the equal transmission of   
the  characteristics of both sexes has  
been a general rule in the whole  series
 of mammals1 otherwise1 it is probable  
that man would have become  as superior 
to woman in intellectual power as the   
peacock is to the  female in ornamental 
plumage4 7,descent of ,man--,sexual     
,selection1 ,,viii  and ,,xix47    ,but 
defects as well as valuable qualities   
are transmitted from one sex  to the    
other3 if woman has profited by the     
brain-growth of man1 he  has in his turn
 been retarded in his development by the
 sluggishness  in the development of    

woman's brain1 produced by the reduction
 to the  smallest minimum of            
intellectual activity to which he has   
condemned  her4 ,the breeders who seek  
the choicest results are as careful to  
have irreproachable females as males2   
amateur cockfighters attach as  much    
importance to the selection of the      
pullets as to the cocks1 they  produce  
only from those which are armed with    
spurs and which have the  fighting      
spirit4 ,it may be said that humanity1  
since it emerged from  communism of the 
clan to live under the system of private
 property1 has  been developed by the   
efforts of one sex alone and that its   
evolution  has been retarded through the
 obstacles interposed by the other sex4 
,man by systematically depriving woman  
of the means of development1  material  
and intellectual1 has made of her a     
force retarding human  progress4    ,in 
fact if we study and compare the        
different periods of savagery  and      
barbarism1 we cannot but observe the    

continuous and remarkable  progress in  
human mind1 because women and men1      
exercising freely their  physical and   
mental faculties1 contribute equally to 
the evolution of  the species2 this has 
been retarded ever since humanity       
entered into  the period of civilization
 and private property1 because then     
woman1  constrained and confined in her 
development1 cannot contribute to  it in
 so effective a way4 ,the senile        
stagnation in which ,china has          
vegetated for more than a thousand years
 can only be attributed to  the         
degradation of woman1 which has gone to 
the point of the cruel  mutilation of   
her feet that she may be imprisoned the 
more closely  in the woman's quarters4  
,europe also suffers from the           
degradation of  woman1 since in spite of
 the extraordinary material progress of 
these  last two thousand years and the  
increasing and no less extraordinary    
accumulation of human knowledge1 it     
cannot be maintained that the  brain of 

the civilized modern exceeds in power   
and capacity that of  the ,greeks of the
 classic epoch1 which extends from the  
seventh to  the fourth century before   
the ,christian era4 ,it is certain that 
a  ,victor ,hugo1 a ,zola1 or any       
university graduate or doctor has stored
  in his brain an abundance of positive 
and diversified conceptions not         
possessed by ,aeschylus1 ,anaxagoras1   
,protagoras and ,aristotle1 but that    
does not prove that his imagination and 
his intelligence1 or that of  his       
contemporaries is more rich1 more varied
 and more vast than that of  the        
generations of ,ionia and ,attica1 who  
were the artificers of that             
incomparable budding and blossoming of  
science1 philosophy1 literature  and art
 at which history marvels and who       
reveled in that subtle and  paradoxical 
play of sophistical philosophy1 the like
 of which has not  again been seen4 ,the
 sophists--,photagoras1 ,gorgias1       
,socrates1 ,plato1  etc41 stated1       

discussed and solved the problems of the
 spiritualistic  philosophy and many    
others besides3 yet the ,hellenes of    
,asia ,minor and  of ,greece had emerged
 from barbarism only a few centuries    
before4 ,many  reasons may be cited to  
explain this arrest in human            
development1 but  the principal one is  
the subjection of woman4      ,,iv4     
,capitalist production1 which takes     
charge of most of the labors to  which  
woman devoted herself in the gentile    
house1 has levied into its  army of     
wage-workers in factory1 shop1 office   
and schoolroom1 the  wives and daughters
 of the working class and of the small  
bourgeoisie1  in order to procure cheap 
labor4 ,its pressing need of            
intellectual  capacities has set aside  
the venerable and venerated axiom of    
masculine  ethics3 to read1 write and   
count ought to be all of a woman's      
knowledge2 it has required that girls   
like boys be instructed in the          
rudiments of the sciences4 ,the first   

step once taken1 they could not  be     
forbidden to enter the universities4    
,they proved that the feminine  brain1  
which the intellectuals had declared a  
child's brain1 was as  capable as the   
masculine brain of receiving all        
scientific instruction4  ,the abstract  
sciences 7mathematics1 geometry1        
mechanics1 etc471 the  first whose study
 had been accessible to woman1 were also
 the first in  which they could give the
 measure of their intellectual          
capacities2  they are now attacking the 
experimental sciences 7physiology1      
physics1  chemistry1 applied mechanics1 
etc471 in ,america and ,europe there    
arises  a throng of women who are       
marching on a level with men in spite of
 the  inferiority of the conditions of  
development in which they have lived    
since their first infancy4    ,as       
,capitalism has not snatched woman from 
the domestic hearth and  launched her   
into social production to emancipate    
her1 but to exploit  her more           

ferociously than man1 so it has been    
careful not to overthrow  the economic1 
legal1 political and moral barriers     
which had been raised  to seclude her in
 the marital dwelling4 ,woman1 exploited
 by capital1  endures the miseries of   
the free laborer and bears in addition  
her  chains of the past4 ,her economic  
misery is aggravated2 instead of being  
supported by her father or husband1 to  
whose rule she still submits1  she is   
obliged to earn her living2 and under   
the pretext that she has  fewer         
necessities than man1 her labor is paid 
less2 and when her  daily toil in the   
shop1 the office or school is ended1 her
 labor in  the household begins4        
,motherhood1 the sacred1 the highest of 
social  functions1 becomes in           
capitalistic society a cause of horrible
 misery1  economic and physiologic4 ,the
 social and economic condition of woman 
is  a danger for the reproduction of the
 species4    ,but this crushing and     
pitiful condition announces the end of  

her  servitude1 which begins with the   
establishment of private property and   
which can end only with its abolition4  
,civilized humanity1 oppressed  by the  
mechanical mode of production1 turns its
 face toward a society1  based on common
 property1 in which woman1 delivered    
from the economic1  legal and moral     
chains which bind her1 may develop      
freely her physical  and intellectual   
faculties1 as in the time of the        
communism of the  savages4    ,the      
savages1 to forbid primitive promiscuity
 and successfully restrain  the circle  
of sexual relations1 found no other     
means than to separate  the sexes2 there
 are reasons for believing that the     
women took the  initiative in this      
separation1 which the specialization of 
their  functions consolidated and       
emphasized4 ,this was manifested        
socially by  religious ceremonials and  
secret languages peculiar to each set   
and  even by struggles2#ci and after    
having taken the character of violent   

antagonism1 it ended in the brutal      
subjection of woman1 which still        
survives although it is progressively   
attenuated in proportion as the         
competition of the two sexes becomes    
more general and intense upon  the      
economic field4 ,but the modern         
antagonism will not end with the        
victory of one sex over the other1 for  
it is one of the phenomena of  the      
struggle of labor against capital1 which
 will find its solution in  the         
emancipation of the working class in    
which women as well as men are          
incorporated4    ,the technique of      
production which tends to suppress the  
specialization  of trades and functions 
and to replace muscular effort by       
attention  and intellectual skill and   
which1 the more it is perfected1 mingles
  and confounds man and woman the more  
in social labor1 will prevent the       
return of the conditions which in savage
 and barbarous nations had  maintained  
the separation of the sexes4 ,common    

property will put an end  to the        
economic antagonism of specialization4  
,but if it is possible to catch a       
glimpse of the end of female servitude  
and of the antagonism of the sexes and  
to conceive for the human  species an   
era of incomparable bodily and mental   
progress1 brought  about by women and   
men of a high development in muscle and 
brain1 it is  impossible to foresee the 
sexual relations of free and equal women
 and  men who will not be united nor    
separated by sordid material interests  
and by the gross ethics engendered by   
such interests4 ,but if we may  judge by
 the present and the past1 men1 in whom 
the genetic passion  is more violent and
 more continuous than in women--the same
 phenomenon  is observed in the males   
and females of the whole animal         
series--will  be obliged to exhibit     
their physical and intellectual         
qualities to  win their sweethearts4    
,sexual selection1 which1 as ,darwin has
 shown1  fulfilled an important role in 

the development of the animal species   
and which1 with rare exceptions1 has    
ceased to play this part in the         
,indo-,european races for about three   
thousand years1 will again become  one  
of the most active factors in the       
perfecting of the human race4           
,motherhood and love will permit women  
to regain the higher position  which she
 occupied in primitive societies1 the   
memory of which has been  preserved by  
the legends and myths of the ancient    
religions4      ,,footnotes3    #cd ,the
 dowry has played an important role in  
the history of woman3  at the beginning 
of the patriarchal period the husband   
buys her from  her father1 who has to   
refund her purchase price if for any    
cause  whatever he repudiates her and   
sends her back to her family2 later this
  purchase price is returned to him and 
constitutes her dowry1 which  her       
relatives are accustomed to double4     
,from the moment when the wife  enters  
into her husband's house with a dowry1  

she ceases to be a slave  whom he may   
dismiss1 sell and kill4 ,the dowry1     
which in ,rome and ,athens  became a    
legal charge upon the property of the   
husband1 was1 in case  of her           
repudiation or divorce1 to be restored  
to her in preference to  any creditor4  
,no pleasure is derived from the riches 
which a woman  brings into the          
household1 says a fragment of           
,euripides1 they only  serve to render  
divorce difficult4 ,the comic authors   
ridiculed the  husbands1 who in fear of 
a suit over the dowry1 fell into        
dependence  upon the wife4 ,a character 
in ,plautus says to a husband who is    
talking  against his wife1 ,you accepted
 the money of her dowry1 you sold your  
authority--imperium4 ,the wealthy ,roman
 matrons carried their insolence  to    
such a point that they did not trust the
 management of their dowry  to their    
husbands1 they gave it over to the      
stewards1 who sometimes  fulfilled with 
them another service1 as the            

evil-speaking ,martial  states4         
,adultery on the part of the wife       
involved a legal divorce and the        
restitution of the dowry1 but rather    
than come to this painful  extremity1   
the husbands preferred to close their   
eyes to the foibles  of their wives2 at 
,rome and at ,athens the law had to     
strike at them  in order to recall them 
to their marital dignity2 in ,china a   
certain  number of bamboo strokes were  
applied to the soles of their feet4 ,the
  penalties not being sufficient to     
encourage the husbands to repudiate     
their adulterous wives1 the law1 in     
order to prop up masculine virtue1      
permitted those who denounced the       
infidelity of the wife to retain a  part
 of the dowry2 there were then men who  
married only in prospect  of the        
adultery of the wife4 ,the ,roman women 
evaded the law by having  themselves    
enrolled in the censor's book on the    
list of prostitutes1  to whom it did not
 apply4 ,the number of matrons inscribed

 became so  considerable that the       
,senate1 under ,tiberius passed a decree
 forbidding  women who had a patrician  
for a grandfather1 husband or father to 
traffic in their bodies4 7,tacitus1     
,annals ,,ii41 #he47 ,adultery on the   
part of the wife in the patrician       
society of antiquity1 as well as  in the
 aristocratic society of the eighteenth 
century1 had become so  general that it 
had so to speak entered into the social 
customs4 ,it was  looked upon lightly as
 a corrective and accompaniment of      
marriage4    #ce ,the ,saint ,simon     
manifesto of #ahcj announced that the   
religion of  ,saint ,simon had come to  
put an end to that shameful traffic1    
that  legal prostitution1 which under   
the name of marriage often blesses  the 
monstrous union of self-surrender and   
egoism1 of light and of  ignorance1 of  
youth and decrepitude4    #cf ,the      
,french companies make no differences   
between the sexes because  they pay very
 small annuities4 ,la ,gnerale1 the most

 important one in  ,france1 gives for   
#a1jjj at the age of #ej years an       
annuity of #fd4bj2  at #fj years #hj4hj2
 at #gj years #aah4ej2 at #hj years     
#acd4gj4 ,thus  it realizes immense     
profits3 its shares which in #ahai were 
worth #gej  francs each were quoted last
 ,january at #ca1cjj francs4    #cg ,e4 
,legou4 ,some ,considerations on the    
,development of the ,foetus4  ,paris4   
#aijc4 ,the weights and measurements of 
,m4 ,legou were made for  official use4 
#ch ,the latest observations upon ants  
and bees tend to prove that the         
fertilized eggs would give birth to     
females and to workers2 and the         
nonfertilized to males1 which           
consequently would be born from eggs    
that  are less complex4    #ci ,a4 ,w4  
,howit1 who observed among the          
,australians a species of  sexual       
totemism1 says that it often happens    
that the women and men of  one and the  
same clan fight1 when the animal that   
serves as the totem  for one sex is     

killed by the other sex4          ,,the 
,,socialist ,,ideal      ,our comrades  
in ,germany were discussing some time   
since the question  whether ,socialism  
is a science4 ,socialism is not and     
cannot be a  science for the simple     
reason that it is a political party and 
must  disappear when its work is        
accomplished after the abolition of the 
classes which gave birth to it2 but the 
end which it pursues is  scientific4    
,guizot1 who had a vague idea of the    
theory of the class  struggle--himself a
 product of the ,revolution1 which was a
 dramatic  struggle between             
classes--said with good reason that a   
class cannot  emancipate itself until it
 possesses the qualities requisite for  
taking  the leadership of society2 now  
one of these qualities is to have a     
more or less definite conception of the 
social order which it proposes  to      
substitute for that which is oppressing 
it4 ,this conception cannot  but be a   
social ideal1 or1 to employ a scientific

 word1 a social  hypothesis2 but an     
hypothesis1 as well in the natural      
sciences as in  social science1 may be  
utopian or scientific4    ,socialism1   
because it is a political party of the  
oppressed class1  has therefore an      
ideal4 ,it groups and organizes the     
efforts of the  individuals who wish to 
build on the ruins of capitalist        
society1 based  upon individual         
property1 an ideal or hypothetical      
society based upon  common property in  
the means of production4    ,only       
through the class struggle can modern   
socialism realize its  social ideal1    
which possesses the qualities demanded  
of any hypothesis  that claims a        
scientific character4 ,the fact of      
choosing a scientific  goal1 and of     
trying to reach it only through the     
class struggle1  distinguishes it from  
the ,socialism of #ahdh1 which was      
pursuing through  the reconciliation of 
classes a social ideal which could not  
but be  utopian considering the historic

 moment in which it was conceived4      
,socialism has thus evolved from ,utopia
 into science4 ,engels has traced  the  
main lines of this evolution in his     
memorable pamphlet1 ,socialism1         
,utopian and ,scientific4 ,it is the    
same with all sciences1 which begin     
with ,utopia to arrive at positive      
knowledge2 this course is imposed by    
the very nature of the human mind4      
,man progresses in social life as in    
intellectual life1 only by starting     
from the known and traveling toward the 
unknown1 and that unknown must  be      
represented by the imagination2 that    
imaginary conception of the  unknown1   
which cannot but be hypothetical1 is one
 of the most powerful  incentives to    
action1 it is the very condition of     
every forward  step4 ,it is natural that
 men like ,bernstein in ,germany and    
,jaurs in  ,france should seek to       
domesticate ,socialism and to put it in 
tow of  liberalism1 accusing it of      
hypnotising its soldiers with an ideal  

of  the year #cjjj1 which makes them    
live in the expectation of a ,messianic 
catastrophe and reject the immediate    
advantages of an understanding  and     
co-operation with bourgeois parties1 and
 which blinds them to  their shocking   
errors regarding the concentration of   
wealth1 the  disappearance of small     
industry and the middle class1 the      
increase of  class antagonisms1 the     
spreading and intensification of the    
misery of  the working class1 etc4      
,these errors may have been plausible   
hypotheses  before #ahdh1 but since then
 events have shown their falsity4 ,this 
unfortunate ideal prevents them from    
descending from the revolutionary       
heights to accept the responsibilities  
of power and of setting aside  the cause
 of labor to devote themselves entirely 
tongue and pen1 to  the rehabilitation  
of a millionaire leader2 it obliges them
 to oppose  all exterior policies and   
acts1 to vote not a cent nor a soldier  
for  colonial expeditions1 which carry  

labor1 ,christianity1 syphilis and the  
alcoholism of civilization to the       
barbaric tribes4 ,the neo-methodists  of
 the ancient and outworn gospel of the  
brotherhood of classes advise  the      
socialists to suppress their ideal1 or1 
since it unfortunately  captivates the  
masses of the people1 to speak of it    
without caring  for it1 as ,jaurs does1 
that they may consecrate themselves to  
practical necessities1 to the vast plans
 of agricultural and industrial         
co-operation1 to popular universities1  
etc4    ,the dilettantes of politics1   
these practical groundlings of          
opportunism1 nevertheless hold          
themselves up for transcendent idealists
  and march with their eyes fixed upon  
the stars1 because they substitute  for 
ideas a brilliant orchestra of sonorous 
words and eternal  principles4    ,these
 bourgeois idealists edge their way in  
everywhere2 after the  ,revolution of   
#aghi they rebuked the scientists for   
their hypotheses  and their theories2   

according to them science should have   
stopped with  the study of facts in     
themselves without dreaming of uniting  
them into  a general system4 ,what is   
the use of cutting stones without       
putting  up a building1 replied         
,geoffroy-,saint-,hilaire1 the genial   
disciple  of ,lamarck1 who lived to see 
the extinction of his theory on the     
continuity of species1 which1 only      
thirty years after his death1 was  to   
take on a new birth with ,darwin4 ,they 
are still reproaching the  physiologists
 for wasting their time in elaborating  
hypotheses which  last on an average    
only three years and which cannot       
explain what  takes place in a muscle   
which contracts and in a brain which    
thinks4  ,they grumble against the      
hypotheses of the physicists1 who do not
 know  the real nature of elasticity1 of
 electrical conductivity1 or even  what 
happens when a particle of sugar is     
dissolved4 ,they would like  to prohibit
 scientists from any speculation because

 it is disastrous  and may lead into    
error4 ,but the latter protest and      
declare that  imagination is one of the 
first and most indispensable faculties  
of  the scientist1 and that the         
hypotheses to which they give birth1    
even  though they be erroneous and able 
to survive only three years1 are        
nevertheless the necessary condition of 
all scientific progress4    ,if the     
communist ideal were an hypothesis      
undemonstrable and false it  would still
 be a propelling force of social        
progress1 but such is not  the case4    
,the hypothesis in science1 as in the   
social field1 is the more               
undemonstrable and susceptible of error 
in proportion as the data  contributing 
to its elaboration are less numerous and
 more uncertain4  ,greek science1 which 
had to furnish a conception of the world
 when the  data regarding the phenomena 
of nature were of the most rudimentary1 
was obliged to resort to hypotheses     
which for boldness and intuitive        

accuracy are marvels of history and of  
thought2 after having admitted1         
according to the vulgar opinion1 that   
the earth was flat1 and that  the temple
 of ,delphi was situated at its center1 
they put forth the  hypothesis of its   
spherical form1 then undemonstrable4    
,socialism1 which dates from the first  
years of the nineteenth century1        
started1 like ,greek science1 from      
hypotheses the more erroneous1 and  from
 ideal the more utopian1 in that the    
social world which it proposed  to      
transform was less known2 and at that   
epoch could not be known for  the       
excellent reason that it was in course  
of formation4    ,the machine operated  
by steam was beginning to edge into     
industry  where the tool1 managed by the
 artisan1 was moved by human power1  and
 in some rare circumstances by animals1 
wind or waterfalls4 ,the  ,socialist    
thinkers1 as ,engels observes1 were then
 obliged to draw from  their own brain  
the social ideal which they could not   

extract from the  tumultuous economic   
environment in full course of           
transformation4  ,they grasped again1   
infusing new life into it1 the communist
 ideal  which has slumbered in the mind 
of man since he emerged from the        
communism of primitive society which the
 poetic ,greek mythology calls  the     
golden age and which has awakened to    
shine here and there with a  glorious   
splendor at great epochs of social      
upheaval4 ,they sought1  then1 to       
establish communism1 not because the    
economic environment  was ready for its 
introduction1 but because men were      
miserable1  because the laws of justice 
and equality were violated1 because the 
precepts of the ,christ could not be    
followed in their purity4 ,the          
communistic ideal1 not springing from   
economic reality1 was then but  an      
unconscious reminiscence of a           
prehistoric past1 and came only  from   
idealistic notions upon a justice1 an   
equality and a gospel law  no less      

idealistic2 it is then idealistic in the
 second degree1 and  consequently       
utopian4    ,the ,socialists of the     
first half of the nineteenth century1   
who  rekindled the communist ideal1 had 
the rare merit of giving it a           
consistency less idealistic4 ,they spoke
 little of the ,christian  religion1 of 
justice and of equality2 ,robert ,owen  
laid the  responsibilities of social    
evils upon the family1 property and     
religion2 ,charles ,fourier criticises  
the ideas of justice and morality       
introduced by the bourgeois ,revolution 
of '#hi with incomparable  animation and
 irony4 ,they did not weep over the     
misery of the poor1  but left that to   
,victor ,hugo and the charlatans of     
romanticism4 ,they  preached the social 
problem from its realistic side1 the    
only side  from which it can be solved4 
,they used their talents to prove that  
a social organization of production     
would succeed in satisfying the  desires
 of all without reducing the share of   

any1 not even that of the  privileged   
capitalist class4 ,meanwhile the recent 
application of steam  and machinery     
demanded also a new organization of     
labor1 and this was  the constant       
concern of the industrial bourgeoisie4  
,the socialists were  thus pursuing the 
same end as the industrials2 bourgeois  
and socialists  might consequently come 
to an understanding4 ,we therefore find 
in the  socialist sects of that epoch   
industrials1 engineers and financiers   
who in the second half of the century   
cast away their sympathy for the        
workers and occupied an important place 
in capitalist society4    ,the socialism
 of that epoch could not under these    
conditions be  anything else than       
pacific2 instead of entering on the     
struggle with  the capitalists1 the     
socialists thought only of converting   
them to  their system of social reform  
from which they were to be the first to 
benefit4 ,they proclaimed the           
association of capital1 intelligence and

  labor1 the interests of which1        
according to them1 were identical6 they 
preached a mutual understanding between 
the employer and the employed1  between 
the exploiter and the exploited2 they   
know no class struggle2  they condemned 
strikes and all political agitation1    
especially if it  were revolutionary2   
they desired order in the street and    
harmony in the  workshop4 ,they         
demanded1 finally1 nothing more than was
 desired by the  new industrial         
bourgeoisie4    ,they foresaw that      
industry1 strengthened by the motive    
power of steam1  machinery and the      
concentration of the instruments of     
labor1 would have  a colossal producing 
power1 and they had the simplicity to   
believe that  the capitalists would     
content themselves with taking only a   
reasonable  part of the wealth thus     
created1 and would leave to their       
co-operators1  the manual and           
intellectual laborers1 a portion        
sufficient to enable  them to live in   

comfort4 ,this socialism was            
marvellously agreeable  to capital1     
since it promised an increase of wealth 
and advised an  understanding between   
the laborer and the employer4 ,it       
recruited  the great majority of its    
adepts in the educational hotbeds of the
  bourgeoisie4 ,it was utopian1         
therefore it was the socialism of the   
intellectuals4    ,but precisely because
 it was utopian1 the laborers1 in       
constant  antagonism with their         
employers on questions of labor and     
hours1  looked on it with suspicion4    
,they could understand nothing of this  
socialism which condemned strikes and   
political action and which  assumed to  
harmonize the interests of capital and  
labor1 of the  exploiter and exploited4 
,they kept aloof from the socialists and
 gave  all their sympathies to the      
bourgeois republicans1 because they were
  revolutionary4 ,they joined their     
secret societies and climbed with them  
upon the barricades to make riots and   

political revolutions4    ,marx and     
,engels took socialism at the point to  
which the great utopians  had brought   
it1 but instead of torturing their      
brains to improvise the  organization of
 labor and of production1 they studied  
that which was  already created by the  
very necessities of the new mechanical  
industry  which had arrived at a degree 
of development sufficient to permit  its
 power and its tendency to be apparent4 
,its productivity was so  enormous1 as  
,fourier and ,saint ,simon had foreseen1
 that it was capable  of providing      
abundantly for the normal needs of all  
the members of  society4 ,this was the  
first time in history that such a       
productive  power had been observed1 and
 it was because capitalist production   
could  satisfy all needs1 and for that  
reason alone1 that it is possible to    
reintroduce communism1 that is to say   
the equal participation of all in       
social wealth1 and the free and complete
 development of the physical1           

intellectual and moral faculties4       
,communism is no longer a utopia but a  
possibility4    ,machinery replaces the 
individualistic production of the small 
industry1 by the communistic production 
of the capitalistic factory1  but       
property in the means of labor has      
remained individual1 as in the  time of 
the small industry4 ,there is then a    
contradiction between the               
individualistic mode of possession and  
the communist mode of production  and   
this contradiction translates itself    
into the antagonism between  the laborer
 and the capitalist employer4 ,the      
producers1 who form the  immense        
majority of the nation1 no longer       
possess the instruments  of labor1 the  
possession of which is centralized in   
the idle hands  of a decreasing         
minority4 ,the social problem imposed by
 mechanical  production will be solved1 
as the social problems imposed by       
preceding  modes of production have been
 solved1 by precipitating the evolution 

begun by economic force1 by finishing   
the expropriation of the  individual in 
the means of production1 by giving to   
the communistic  mode of production the 
communistic mode of possession which it 
demands4    ,the communism of           
contemporary socialists no longer       
proceeds1 like that  of former times1   
from the cerebral lucubrations of gifted
 thinkers2 it  proceeds from economic   
reality1 it is the final goal of the    
economic  forces which1 without         
attracting the attention of the         
capitalists and  their intellectuals1   
have fashioned the communistic mold of a
 new  society1 the coming of which we   
only have to hasten4 ,communism1 then1  
is no longer a utopian hypothesis2 it is
 a scientific ideal4 ,it may be  added  
that never has the economic structure of
 any society been better  and more      
completely analyzed than capitalist     
society1 and that never  was a social   
ideal conceived with such numerous and  
positive data as  the communist idea of 

modern socialism4    ,although it is the
 economic forces which fashion men at   
the pleasure  and spur them to action1  
and although these constitute the       
mysterious  force determining the great 
currents of history which the           
,christians  attribute to ,god1 and the 
free-thinking bourgeois assign to       
,progress1  to ,civilization1 to the    
,immortal ,principles and other similar 
manitous1  worthy of savage tribes1 they
 are nevertheless the product of human  
activity4 ,man1 who created them and    
brought them into the world1 has  thus  
far let himself be guided by them2 yet  
now that he has understood  their nature
 and grasped their tendency1 he can act 
upon their  evolution4 ,the socialists  
who are accused of being stricken by    
,oriental  fatalism and of relying upon 
the good pleasure of economic forces to 
bring to light the communist society    
instead of crossing their arms  like the
 fakirs of official ,economics1 and of  
bending the knee before  its fundamental

 dogma1 laissez faire1 laissez passer1  
propose on  the contrary to subdue them1
 as the blind forces of nature have been
  subdued1 and force them to do good to 
men instead of leaving them to  work    
misery to the toilers of civilization4  
,they do not wait for their  ideal to   
fall from heaven as the ,christians hope
 for the grace of  ,god1 and the        
capitalists for wealth2 they prepare1 on
 the contrary1  to realize it1 not by   
appealing to the intelligence of the    
capitalist  class and to its sentiments 
of justice and humanity1 but by fighting
  it1 by expropriating it from its      
political power1 which protects its     
economic despotism4    ,socialism1      
because it possesses a social ideal1 has
 in consequence  a criticism of its own4
 ,every class which struggles for its   
enfranchisement seeks to realize a      
social ideal1 in complete opposition    
with that of the ruling class4 ,the     
struggle is waged at first in  the      
ideological world before the physical   

shock of the revolutionary  battle4 ,it 
thus begins the criticism of the ideas  
of the society which  must be revolted  
against1 for the ideas of the ruling    
class are the  ideas of society1 or     
these ideas are the intellectual        
reflection of  its material interests4  
,thus1 the wealth of the ruling class is
 produced by slave labor2  religion1    
ethics1 philosophy and literature agree 
in authorizing  slavery4 ,the ugly ,god 
of the ,jews and ,christianity strikes  
with his  curse the progeny of ,ham1    
that it may furnish slaves4 ,aristotle1 
the  encyclopedic thinker of ,greek     
philosophy1 declares that slaves are    
predestined by nature and that no rights
 exist for them1 for there  can be no   
rights except between equals4 ,euripides
 in his tragedies  preaches the doctrine
 of servile morality2 ,st4 ,paul1 ,st4  
,augustine and  the ,church teach slaves
 submission to their earthly masters    
that they  may deserve the favor of     
their heavenly master2 ,christian       

civilization  introduced slavery into   
,america and maintains it there until   
economic  phenomena prove that slave    
labor is a method of exploitation more  
costly and less profitable than free    
labor4    ,at the epoch when the        
,greco-,roman civilization was          
dissolving1 when the  labor of artisans 
and free workers began to be substituted
 for slave  labor1 pagan religion1      
philosophy and literature decided to    
accord them  certain rights4 ,the same  
,euripides who advised the slave to lose
 his  personality in that of the master 
does not wish him to be despised4       
,there is nothing shameful in slavery   
but the name1 says the pedagogue  in    
,ion1 the slave1 moreover1 is not       
inferior to the free man when  he has a 
noble heart4 ,the mysteries of ,eleusis 
and of ,orphism1 like  ,christianity1   
which continues their work1 admit slaves
 among their  initiated and promise them
 liberty1 equality and happiness after  
death4    ,the dominating class of the  

,middle ,ages being military1 the       
,christian  religion and social ethics  
condemned lending money at interest1 and
  covered the lender with infamy2 to    
take interest for money loaned  was then
 something so ignominious that the      
,jewish race1 obliged to  specialize    
itself in the trade of money1 still     
bears the shame of it4  ,but today1 now 
that the ,christians have become ,jews1 
and the ruling  class lives on the      
interest of its capital1 the trade of   
the lender at  interest is the most     
honorable1 the most desirable1 the most 
exclusive4    ,the oppressed class1     
although the ideology of the oppressing 
class  is imposed upon it1 nevertheless 
elaborates religious1 ethical and       
political ideas corresponding to its    
condition of life2 vague and  secret at 
first1 they gain in precision and force 
in proportion as the  oppressed class   
takes definite form and acquires the    
consciousness  of its social utility and
 of its strength2 and the hour of its   

emancipation is near when its conception
 of nature and of society  opposes      
itself openly and boldly to that of the 
ruling class4    ,the economic          
conditions in which the bourgeois moves 
and evolves make  of it a class         
essentially religious4 ,christianity is 
its work and will  last as long as this 
class shall rule society4 ,seven or     
eight centuries  before ,christ1 when   
the bourgeoisie had its birth in the    
commercial  and industrial cities of the
 ,mediterranean sea1 we may observe the 
elaboration of a new religion2 the gods 
of paganism created by warrior  tribes  
could not be suited to a class          
consecrated to the production  and sale 
of merchandise4 ,mysterious cults 7the  
mysteries of the  ,cabiri1 of ,demeter1 
of ,dionysus1 etc47 revive the religious
 traditions  of the prehistoric         
matriarchical period2 the idea of a soul
 and its  existence after death revive2 
the idea of posthumous punishments and  
rewards to compensate for acts of social

 injustice are introduced1  etc4 ,these 
religious elements1 combined with the   
intellectual data of  ,greek philosophy1
 contribute to form ,christianity1 the  
religion1 par  excellence1 of societies 
which have for their foundation property
  belonging to the individual and the   
class which enrich themselves by  the   
exploitation of wage labor4 ,for fifteen
 centuries all the movements  of the    
bourgeoisie1 either for organization1 or
 for self-emancipation1  or for the     
acquisition of power have been          
accompanied and complicated  by         
religious crises2 but always            
,christianity more or less modified     
remains the religion of society4 ,the   
revolutionists of #aghi1 who in the     
ardor of the struggle promised          
themselves to de-,christianize ,france1 
were eager when the bourgeoisie were    
victorious to raise again the  altars   
they had overthrown and to reintroduce  
the cult that they had  proscribed4     
,the economic environment which produces

 the proletariat relieves  it on the    
contrary from every idea of sentiment4  
,there is not seen  either in ,europe   
nor in ,america among the laboring      
masses of the great  industries any     
anxiety to elaborate a religion to      
replace ,christianity1  nor any desire  
to reform it4 ,the economic and         
political organizations  of the working 
class are completely uninterested as to 
any doctrinal  discussion of religious  
and spiritual dogmas1 although they     
combat the  priests of all cults because
 they are the lackeys of the capitalist 
class4    ,the victory of the           
proletariat will deliver humanity from  
the nightmare  of religion4 ,the belief 
in superior beings to explain the       
natural  world and the social           
inequality1 and to prolong the dominion 
of the  ruling class1 and the belief in 
the posthumous existence of the soul  to
 recompense the inequality of fate will 
have no more justification  once man1   
who has already grasped the general     

causes of the phenomena  of nature1     
shall live in a communist society from  
whence shall have  disappeared the      
inequality and the injustice of         
capitalistic society4    ,the militant  
socialists1 following the example of the
 encyclopedists  of the eighteenth      
century1 have to make a merciless       
criticism of the  economic1 political1  
historical1 philosophical1 moral and    
religious  ideas of the capitalist class
 in order to prepare in all spheres  of 
thought the triumph of the new ideology 
which the proletariat  introduces into  
the world4          ,,the ,,rights ,,of 
,,the ,,horse ,,and ,,the ,,rights ,,of 
,,man      ,capitalist ,civilization has
 endowed the wage-worker with the       
metaphysical ,rights of ,man1 but this  
is only to rivet him more closely  and  
more firmly to his economic duty4    ,i 
make you free1 so speak the ,rights of  
,man to the laborer1 free to  earn a    
wretched living and turn your employer  
into a millionaire2 free  to sell him   

your liberty for a mouthful of bread4   
,he will imprison you  ten hours or     
twelve hours in his workshops2 he will  
not let you go till  you are wearied to 
the marrow of your bones1 till you have 
just enough  strength left to gulp down 
your soup and sink into a heavy sleep4  
,you  have but one of your rights that  
you may not sell1 and that is the  right
 to pay taxes4    ,progress and         
,civilization may be hard on            
wage-working humanity1 but  they have   
all a mother's tenderness for the       
animals which stupid bipeds  call lower4
    ,civilization has especially favored
 the equine race3 it would be too  great
 a task to go through the long list of  
its benefactions2 ,i will  name but a   
few1 of general notoriety1 that ,i may  
awaken and inflame the  passionate      
desires of the workers1 now torpid in   
their misery4    ,horses are divided    
into distinct classes4 ,the equine      
aristocracy enjoys  so many and so      
oppressive privileges1 that if the      

human-faced brutes  which serve them as 
jockeys1 trainers1 stable valets and    
grooms were  not morally degraded to the
 point of not feeling their shame1 they 
would have rebelled against their lords 
and masters1 whom they rub  down1 groom1
 brush and comb1 also making their beds1
 cleaning up their  excrements and      
receiving bites and kicks by way of     
thanks4    ,aristocratic horses1 like   
capitalists1 do not work2 and when they 
exercise themselves in the fields they  
look disdainfully1 with a               
coupon-clipper's contempt1 upon the     
human animals which plow and seed  the  
lands1 mow and rake the meadows1 to     
provide them with oats1 clover1  timothy
 and other succulent plants4    ,these  
four-footed favorites of ,civilization  
command such social  influence that they
 impose their wills upon the            
capitalists1 their  brothers in         
privilege2 they force the loftiest of   
them to come with  their beautiful      
ladies and take tea in the stables1     

inhaling the acrid  perfumes of their   
solid and liquid evacuations4 ,and when 
these lords  consent to parade in       
public1 they require from ten to twenty 
thousand  men and women to stack        
themselves up on uncomfortable seats1   
under the  broiling sun1 to admire their
 exquisitely chiseled forms and their   
feats of running and leaping4 ,they     
respect none of the social dignities    
before which the votaries of the ,rights
 of ,man bow in reverence4  ,at         
,chantilly not long ago one of the      
favorites for the grand prize  launched 
a kick at the king of ,belgium1 because 
it did not like the  looks of his head4 
,his royal majesty1 who adores horses1  
murmured an  apology and withdrew4      
,it is fortunate that these horses1 who 
can count more authentic  ancestors than
 the houses of ,orleans and             
,hohenzollern1 have not been  corrupted 
by their high social station3 had they  
taken it into their  heads to rival the 
capitalists in aesthetic pretentions1   

profligate  luxury and depraved tastes1 
such as wearing lace and diamonds1 and  
drinking champagne and                  
,chateau-,margaux1 a blacker misery and 
more  overwhelming drudgery would be    
impending over the class of             
wage-workers4    ,thrice happy is it for
 proletarian humanity that these equine 
aristocrats have not taken the fancy of 
feeding upon human flesh1  like the old 
,bengal tigers which rove around the    
villages of ,india  to carry off women  
and children2 if unhappily the horses   
had been  man-eaters1 the capitalists1  
who can refuse them nothing1 would have 
built slaughter-houses for wage-workers1
 where they could carve out  and dress  
boy sirloins1 woman hams and girl roasts
 to satisfy their  anthropophagic       
tastes4    ,the proletarian horses1 not 
so well endowed1 have to work for their 
peck of oats1 but the capitalist class1 
through deference for the  aristocrats  
of the equine race1 concedes to the     
working horses rights  that are far more

 solid and real than those inscribed in 
the ,rights of  ,man4    ,the first of  
rights1 the right to existence1 which no
 civilized society  will recognize for  
laborers1 is possessed by horses4       
,the colt1 even before his birth1 while 
still in the fetus state1 begins  to    
enjoy the right to existence2 his       
mother1 when her pregnancy has  scarcely
 begun1 is discharged from all work and 
sent into the country  to fashion the   
new being in peace and comfort2 she     
remains near him to  suckle him and     
teach him to choose the delicious       
grasses of the meadow1  in which he     
gambols until he is grown4    ,the      
moralists and politicians of the ,rights
 of ,man think it would  be monstrous to
 grant such rights to the laborers2 ,i  
raised a tempest  in the ,chamber of    
,deputies when ,i asked that women1 two 
months before  and two months after     
confinement1 should have the right and  
the means  to absent themselves from the
 factory4 ,my proposition upset the     

ethics  of civilization and shook the   
capitalist order4 ,what an abominable   
abomination--to demand for babies the   
rights of colts4    ,as for the young   
proletarians1 they can scarcely trot on 
their little  toes before they are      
condemned to hard labor in the prisons  
of  capitalism1 while the colts develop 
freely under kindly ,nature2 care is    
taken that they be completely formed    
before they are set to work1 and  their 
tasks are proportioned to their strength
 with a tender care4    ,this care on   
the part of the capitalists follows them
 all through their  lives4 ,we may still
 recall the noble indignation of the    
bourgeois  press when it learned that   
the omnibus company was using peat and  
tannery waste in its stalls as a        
substitute for straw3 to think of the   
unhappy horses having such poor litters6
 ,the more delicate souls of  the       
bourgeoisie have in every capitalist    
country organized societies  for the    
protection of animals1 in order to prove

 that they can not be  excited by the   
fate of the small victims of industry4  
,schopenhauer1 the  bourgeois           
philosopher1 in whom was incarnated so  
perfectly the gross  egoism of the      
philistine1 could not hear the cracking 
of a whip without  his heart being torn 
by it4    ,this same omnibus company1   
which works its laborers from fourteen  
to sixteen hours a day1 requires from   
its dear horses only five to  seven     
hours4 ,it has bought green meadows in  
which they may recuperate  from fatigue 
or indisposition4 ,its policy is to     
expend more for the  entertainment of a 
quadruped than for paying the wages of a
 biped4 ,it  has never occurred to any  
legislator nor to any fanatical advocate
 of  the ,rights of ,man to reduce the  
horse's daily pittance in order to      
assure him a retreat that would be of   
service to him only after his  death4   
,the ,rights of ,horses have not been   
posted up2 they are unwritten  rights1  
as ,socrates called the laws implanted  

by ,nature in the  consciousness of all 
men4    ,the horse has shown his wisdom 
in contenting himself with these rights1
  with no thought of demanding those of 
the citizen2 he has judged that  he     
would have been as stupid as man if he  
had sacrificed his mess of  lentils for 
the metaphysical banquet of ,rights to  
,revolt1 to ,equality1  to ,liberty1 and
 other trivialities which to the        
proletariat are about  as useful as a   
cautery on a wooden leg4                
,civilization1 though partial to the    
equine race1 has not shown herself      
indifferent to the fate of the other    
animals4 ,sheep1 like canons1  pass     
their days in pleasant and plentiful    
idleness2 they are fed in  the stable on
 barley1 lucerne1 rutabagas and other   
roots1 raised by  wage-workers2         
shepherds conduct them to feed in fat   
pastures1 and when  the sun parches the 
plain1 they are carried to where they   
can browse on  the tender grass of the  
mountains4    ,the ,church1 which has   

burned her heretics1 and regrets that   
she can not  again bring up her faithful
 sons in the love of mutton1 represents 
,jesus1 under the form of a kind        
shepherd1 bearing upon his shoulders a  
weary lamb4    ,true1 the love for the  
ram and the ewe is in the last analysis 
only  the love for the leg of mutton and
 the cutlet1 just as the ,liberty of    
the ,rights of ,man is nothing but the  
slavery of the wage-worker1 since  our  
jesuitical ,civilization always         
disguises capitalist exploitation  in   
eternal principles and bourgeois egoism 
in noble sentiments2 yet at  least the  
bourgeois tends and fattens the sheep up
 to the day of the  sacrifice1 while he 
seizes the laborer still warm from the  
workshop  and lean from toil to send him
 to the shambels of ,tonquin or         
,madagascar4    ,laborers of all crafts1
 you who toil so hard to create your    
poverty  in producing the wealth of the 
capitalists1 arise1 arise6 ,since the   
buffoons of parliament unfurl the       

,rights of ,man1 do you boldly demand   
for yourselves1 your wives and your     
children the ,rights of the ,horse4     
,,the ,,end4                            
,transcriber's ,note3                   
,minor typographical errors have been   
corrected without note4                 
,punctuation and spelling were made     
consistent when a predominant       form
 was found in this book2 otherwise they 
were not changed4                       
,ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines 
were retained4                          
,footnotes were moved to the end of     
chapters and numbered in one            
continuous sequence4                    
,italicized words are surrounded by     
underline characters1 like         this4