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THE  SOCIALISM  OF  TO-DAY.

of  the  insurgent  Cantonalists.  In  Germany  there  have  been
repeated  attempts  at  regicide  ;  finally,  in  Russia,  where  all
freedom  is  suppressed,  there  have  been  unheard-of  crimes  and
a  situation  worse  than  a  revolution,  for  it  is  Society  itself  that
is  in  a  state  of  siege.
In  every  country  there  exist  two  parties  :  that  which  wishes
to  conserve  what  is,  or  even  to  re-establish  what  has  been  ;
and  that  which  seeks  to  reform,  and  sometimes,  in  its  impatience, ­
  to  destroy  everything.  Just  as  the  motion  of  the
earth  is  the  resultant  of  centripetal  and  centrifugal  forces,  so
Society  moves  on  under  the  combined  action  of  the  spirit  of
conservation  and  the  spirit  of  reform.  Try  to  suppress  them,
and  you  will  provoke  alternately  revolutions  and  reactions.
Give  them  free  play,  and  progress  will  be  fulfilled  by  means
of  a  series  of  compromises  and  reforms,  as  in  England,  Belgium,
and  Switzerland.
Switzerland  seemed  to  present  a  soil  admirably  prepared  for
Socialism.  As  early  as  1843  Weitling  had  preached  Communism ­
  there.  The  refugees  of  the  insurrections  of  1848
had  founded  associations  there,  amongst  others  those  of  the
“  German  Brothers  ”  {Deutsche  Brüder).  The  Grüíliverein,
which  had  a  newspaper,  the  Grüttianer,  and  sections  in  the
majority  of  the  cantons,  was  gained  over  to  the  ideas  of
the  Socialist  democrats.  The  Russians  Bakunin  and  Utin,  the
Italians  Rosetti  and  Ghalino,  and  agitators  banished  from  all
countries,  arrived  in  Switzerland,  the  only  asylum  which  remained
to  them  on  the  Continent.  Johann  Philippe  Becker,  a  friend
of  Marx,  was  here  the  apostle  of  the  International.  In  1864
he  succeeded  in  founding  the  first  section  of  the  Association,
and  soon  sections  were  established  in  the  majority  of  the  towns
and  industrial  centres.  At  one  time  there  were  thirty-two  in
Geneva  alone.  Becker  also  published  a  journal,  der  Vorbote,
and  attached  to  it  a  central  committee  whose  action  was  not
confined  to  Switzerland.
In  the  French-speaking  cantons  the  sections  grouped  themselves ­
  under  the  name  of  the  Fédération  de  la  Suisse  romande  ;
but  soon  the  contest  between  Marx  and  Bakunin  found  its
echo  among  them.  The  sections  of  the  Jura  pronounced  for