XIV
ANARCHISM
Syndicalism has much in common with Socialism but the very intensity of its emphasis carries it beyond what is organic in the socialist movement. The student is never sure in whose presence he stands—that of the Anarchist or that of the Socialist.
Syndicalism now comes with a new dialect.[1] There is much mocking of "reason" and much deification of impulse and feeling. There are the familiar warnings against the "law" and institutions. If these are rigid, violence may offer the only road to "freedom." We are put on our guard against too much reflection. This may lead to submission which is the slave's vice. So easy is it to reason ourselves into smooth acquiescence with ruling economic and social powers—ambition, desire of wealth, all that may place us among the flesh-pots and separate us from the human mass, that the Devil gets easy possession of our souls. But "feling, nobly kindled into enthusiasm saves us from these servilities." Thus the new morality is to be free from all "calculating reflection." Think of a "calculating soldier." Think of his reflecting about his pay in front of the enemy! No, it is spontaneity
- ↑ This dialect is strikingly like much in that powerful anarchist book Stirners' Der Einzige und sein Eigenthum, especially in that part of the volume dealing with the "power" of the individual.
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