Now, to combat and reduce power, to
put it in its proper place in society, it is of no use to change
the holders of power or introduce some variation into its
workings: an agricultural and industrial combination must be
found by means of which power, today the ruler of society, shall
become its slave. Have you the secret of that combination?
But what do I say? That is precisely the thing to which you do
not consent. As you cannot conceive of society without
hierarchy, you have made yourselves the apostles of authority;
worshippers of power, you think only of strengthening it and
muzzling liberty; your favorite maxim is that the welfare of the
people must be achieved in spite of the people; instead of
proceeding to social reform by the extermination of power and
politics, you insist on a reconstruction of power and politics.
Then, by a series of contradictions which prove your sincerity,
but the illusory character of which is well known to the real
friends of power, the aristocrats and monarchists, your
competitors, you promise us, in the name of power, economy in
expenditures, an equitable assessment of taxes, protection to
labor, gratuitous education, universal suffrage, and all the
utopias repugnant to authority and property.
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