If The Capitalist, Aided By His Faithful Valet, The Government, Has Not By Means Of Law And Hunger, Succeeded

If the capitalist, aided by his faithful valet, the government, has not by means of law and hunger, succeeded in reducing the workman into actual bondage, it is because the latter has had his moments of revolt; it is because he struggled, at the price of nameless privations and numberless victims. It is with a stone or a torch in his hand, sometimes with a rifle at his shoulder, that he has torn from the vampire an infinitesimal portion of that which might have come to him from the scientific progress of the century. Every penny gained on wages, every liberty earned in the workshop is marked by the corpses of workmen; and if only the number of these victims could be counted, no one would dare talk to him about “progress” already gained.

- Peter Kropotkin, “The New Era” (1896)