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THE  SOCIALISM  OF  TO-DAY.

declares,  “  desires  a  universal  revolution,  at  once  social,  philosophical, ­
  economical,  and  political,  in  order  that  the  existing
order  of  things—which  is  founded  on  property,  on  exploitation,
on  the  principle  of  authority,  whether  religious,  metaphysical,
doctrinaire  after  the  manner  of  the  bourgeoisie,  or  revolutionary
after  the  manner  of  the  Jacobins—may  be  absolutely  overthrown, ­
  so  that  not  one  stone  of  it  shall  remain  upon  another,
first  throughout  Europe,  and  then  in  the  rest  of  the  world.
Raising  the  cry  of  ‘  Peace  for  the  workers  !  Liberty  for  the
oppressed  !  ’  and  ‘  Death  to  tyrants,  exploiters,  and  patrons  of  all
kinds  !  ’  we  wish  to  destroy  all  States  and  all  Churches,  w  ith
all  their  institutions  and  laws,  religious,  political,  juridical,  financial, ­
  magisterial,  academical,  economical,  and  social,  in  order
that  all  these  millions  of  poor  human  beings,  who  are  cheated,
enslaved,  overworked',  and  exploited—having  been  at  last
delivered  from  their  masters  and  benefactors,  whether  official
or  officious,  whether  associations  or  individuals—may  henceforth ­
  and  for  ever  breathe  in  absolute  freedom.”  This  is  plainly
Rousseau’s  idea,  expressed  with  the  emphasis  of  the  Oriental
and  the  violence  of  the  Tartar.  Man,  especially  the  worker,
is  crushed  by  the  immense  superstructure  of  the  social  edifice
which  the  centuries  have  piled  up.  How  to  free  him  ?  There
is  only  one  way  :  to  hurl  it  all  down  and  level  it  even  with  the
ground.  Everything  must  be  swept  away  so  as  to  produce
“perfect  amorphism  ;”  for  if  one  single  ancient  form  be
preserved,  “  it  will  become  the  embryo  from  which  all  the  old
social  iniquities  will  spring  up  again.”
Still,  however  perfect  this  amorphism  may  be,  to  whatever
extreme  the  work  of  destruction  may  be  pushed,  there  will  yet
remain  some  men  living  and  working  beside  each  other.  What
political  tie  will  unite  them  ?  How  w  ill  property  and  the  distribution ­
  of  products  be  regulated  ?  In  the  programme  of  the
Alliance,  we  can  find  only  vague  indications  on  this  head.
The  ideal  of  the  future  is  evidently  borrowed  from  what  exists
in  Russia  to-day.  Land  will  be  the  collective  property  of  the
Commune,  which  will  distribute  it  among  the  inhabitants.
Industrial  workers  will  be  associated  in  “  artel,”  that  is  to  say,
in  co-operative  societies.  But  it  is  a  crime  to  attempt  at  pre-