 | The Law of Violence and the Law of Love — PrefaceBy Leo Tolstoy (1908) |
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| The Law of Violence and the Law of Love — PrefaceBy Leo Tolstoy (1908) |
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Father of Christian Anarchism
: In 1861, during the second of his European tours, Tolstoy met with Proudhon, with whom he exchanged ideas. Inspired by the encounter, Tolstoy returned to Yasnaya Polyana to found thirteen schools that were the first attempt to implement a practical model of libertarian education. (From: Anarchy Archives.)
• "You are surprised that soldiers are taught that it is right to kill people in certain cases and in war, while in the books admitted to be holy by those who so teach, there is nothing like such a permission..." (From: "Letter to a Non-Commissioned Officer," by Leo Tol....)
• "The Government and all those of the upper classes near the Government who live by other people's work, need some means of dominating the workers, and find this means in the control of the army. Defense against foreign enemies is only an excuse. The German Government frightens its subjects about the Russians and the French; the French Government, frightens its people about the Germans; the Russian Government frightens its people about the French and the Germans; and that is the way with all Governments. But neither Germans nor Russians nor Frenchmen desire to fight their neighbors or other people; but, living in peace, they dread war more than anything else in the world." (From: "Letter to a Non-Commissioned Officer," by Leo Tol....)
• "Only by recognizing the land as just such an article of common possession as the sun and air will you be able, without bias and justly, to establish the ownership of land among all men, according to any of the existing projects or according to some new project composed or chosen by you in common." (From: "To the Working People," by Leo Tolstoy, Yasnaya P....)
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Preface
‘And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hates the light, neither comes to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that does truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.’ (John, III, 19–21)
‘There is no greater unhappiness than when a person starts to fear the truth lest it denounce him.’ (Pascal)
The glory of the good lies in their consciences and not in the mouths of other people.
I write what I am writing simply because, knowing the only thing that can free the people of the Christian world from the terrible physical sufferings, and more importantly, from the spiritual corruption into which they are submerging themselves ever deeper, I, as I stand on the edge of the grave, cannot be silent.
It must be apparent to all thinking people of our times, not only to the Russian people, but to all the Christian nations of the world, that with the continually increasing hardship of the poor and luxuriant living of the rich, with the struggle of all against all, revolutionaries against governments, governments against revolutionaries, enslaved nationalities against their oppressors, struggles between States, between East and West, together with the progressive development of armaments devouring the strength of the people with its refinement and depravity, this sort of life cannot continue, and that if the life of the Christian peoples does not change it will inevitably become ever more wretched.
This is clear to most people but, unfortunately, they frequently fail to see the cause of this disastrous situation and are still less able to see the means of salvation. A number of very different circumstances are given as the cause, and the most varied means of salvation are suggested. And yet there is only one cause and one means of salvation.
The reason behind this disastrous condition of the Christian nations is the absence among them of a higher understanding of the meaning of life, of a faith common to all, and the guidance for conduct that follows from it.
The cure for this calamitous situation is neither fantastic nor artificial, but extremely natural. It lies in the people of Christendom adopting the superior understanding of life that was revealed to them nineteen centuries ago and which is still relevant to the present age, together with the guidance for conduct that flows from it: in other words the Christian teaching in its true meaning.
(Source: Translated from Russian by EarthlyFireFlies and Wikisource.)
From : Wikisource.org
Father of Christian Anarchism
: In 1861, during the second of his European tours, Tolstoy met with Proudhon, with whom he exchanged ideas. Inspired by the encounter, Tolstoy returned to Yasnaya Polyana to found thirteen schools that were the first attempt to implement a practical model of libertarian education. (From: Anarchy Archives.)
• "You are surprised that soldiers are taught that it is right to kill people in certain cases and in war, while in the books admitted to be holy by those who so teach, there is nothing like such a permission..." (From: "Letter to a Non-Commissioned Officer," by Leo Tol....)
• "There are people (we ourselves are such) who realize that our Government is very bad, and who struggle against it." (From: "A Letter to Russian Liberals," by Leo Tolstoy, Au....)
• "...the dissemination of the truth in a society based on coercion was always hindered in one and the same manner, namely, those in power, feeling that the recognition of this truth would undermine their position, consciously or sometimes unconsciously perverted it by explanations and additions quite foreign to it, and also opposed it by open violence." (From: "A Letter to a Hindu: The Subjection of India- Its....)
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Preface
