II. If once men are convinced that justice commands the change, then will "despotism fall of itself by its very uselessness."[202] The State and property disappear, law is transformed, and the new condition of things begins.
"The Revolution does not act after the fashion of the old governmental, aristocratic, or dynastic principle. It is Right, the balance of forces, equality. It has no conquests to pursue, no nations to reduce to servitude, no frontiers to defend, no fortresses to build, no armies to feed, no laurels to pluck, no preponderance to maintain. The might of its economic institutions, the gratuitousness of its credit, the brilliancy of its thought, are its sufficient means for converting the universe."[203] "The Revolution has for allies all who suffer oppression and exploitation; let it appear, and the universe stretches its arms to it."[204]
"I want the peaceable revolution. I want you to make the very institutions which I charge you to abolish, and the principles of law which you will have to complete, serve toward the realization of my wishes, so that the new society shall appear as the spontaneous, natural, and necessary development of the old, and that the Revolution, while abrogating the old order of things, shall nevertheless be the progress of that order."[205] "When the people, once enlightened regarding its true interests, declares its will not to reform the government but to revolutionize society,"[206] then "the dissolution of government in the economic organism"[207] will follow in a way about which one can at present only make guesses.[208]
FOOTNOTES:
[125] Not (as stated by Diehl vol. 2 p. 116, Zenker p. 61) 1852.
[126] Proudhon "Propriété" p. 295 [212. Bracketed references under Proudhon are to the collected edition of his "Œuvres complètes," Paris, 1866-83.—The passage quoted above is probably the first case in history where anybody called himself an Anarchist, though the word had long been in use as a term of reproach for enemies].
[127] Pr. "Justice" 1. 182-3 [1. 224-5].
[128] Pr. "Justice" 1. 184-5 [1. 227].
[129] Ib. 1. 73 [132? but there he says must be, not is].
[130] Ib. 1. 185 [1. 228].