I Die, As I Have Lived, A

Miss Goldman Is A Communist; I Am An Individualist. She Wishes To Destroy The Right Of Property, I Wish To Assert It. I Make My War Upon Privilege And Authority, Whereby The Right Of Property, The True Right In That Which Is Proper To The Individual, Is Annihilated. She Believes That Co-operation Would Entirely Supplant Competition; I Hold That Competition In One Form Or Another Will Always Exist, And That It Is Highly Desirable It Should.

What I Say Is, That The Real Non-resistants Can Believe In Direct Action Only, Never In Political Action. For The Basis Of All Political Action Is Coercion; Even When The State Does Good Things, It Finally Rests On A Club, A Gun, Or A Prison, For Its Power To Carry Them Through.

The Question Of Souls Is Old—we Demand Our Bodies, Now. We Are Tired Of Promises, God Is Deaf, And His Church Is Our Worst Enemy.

Government Is As Unreal, As Intangible, As Unapproachable As God. Try It, If You Don't Believe It. Seek Through The Legislative Halls Of America And Find, If You Can, The Government. In The End You Will Be Doomed To Confer With The Agent, As Before.

Years! Years, Ye Shall Mix With Me! Ye Shall Grow A Part Of The Laughing Sea; Of The Moaning Heart Of The Glittered Wave Of The Sun-gleam's Dart In The Ocean-grave. Fair, Cold, And Faithless Wert Thou, My Own! For That I Love Thy Heart Of Stone! From The Heights Above To The Depths Below, Where Dread Things Move, There Is Naught Can Show A Life So Trustless! Proud Be Thy Crown! Ruthless, Like None, Save The Sea, Alone!