University of Northern Iowa

Primitive Simplicity
Author(s): Lloyd S. Bryce
Source: The North American Review, Vol. 145, No. 372 (Nov., 1887), pp. 545-552
Published by: University of Northern Iowa
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25101339
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North American Review

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 " PRIMITIVE SIMPLICITY;
Ik the course of a conversation with one of the condemned
Chicago anarchists, a gentleman who was induced by sympathy
to visit their prison is said to have related the following little
story :
Visitor : " An uncle of mine had a good-sized farm once, with a considerable
amount of waste land attached. Being a kindly old man, and widely known
throughout the country, he was constantly subjected to all sorts of demands on his
charity. One day a party of tramps came along, who asked for shelter, and, after
taking as many into his house as it would hold, he stowed the rest away in his
barn."
Anarchist: " Ant charget 'em nuthin' for their lotgins?"
Visitor : " No, not a cent, and moreover he fed them with the best that he
had."
Anarchist : (Shrewdly) " I guess it vasn't long before some more of their
frents came smellin' along that same road, vas it ?"
Visitor : "It was not ; a fresh batch, strangely enough, arrived the very next
day. As all the buildings were full, however, the old man told them they might
go down to the waste land and build themselves shanties, and he would feed them
all as well as he could."
Anarchist.: " Mein Got, he was a ferry remarkable man. After that I guess
he couldn't keep dem off mit a club."
Visitor : "He could scarcely have done so had he tried, for they continued
to arrive in greater numbers every day. Because the best land, however, soon got
taken up, and the sugar for the coffee would no longer go round, the last comers
got very angry. They swore at the old man and abused him frightfully. They
even proceeded to smash the windows in his house, and, not satisfied with that,
they tried to burn down his barns, and would attack his hired men whenever they
could catch them alone about the place."
Anarchist: " They vas a mean, dirty pack. If I liad been dot old man I'd
haf fired them all out."
Visitor: " That is just what the old man was at last compelled todo."
Anarchist: " Goot! But vot koint of peoples vos these, anyhow ?"
Visitor: '* Well, I don't wish to be personal, but it is supposed they were
friends of yours."
Anarchist (Confusedly) : " Got in Himmel, frents of mine ! But hold on, vot
did you say the name of dot uncle of yours vas ?"
Visitor : "I didn't say, but down in the country where he lives he usually
goes by the name of * Uncle Sam.' "

The doctrines of the Anarchist would seem scarcely worthy of

notice were it not that they are gradually superseding all other

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546 THE NORTH AMERICAN REVIEW.

forms of Communism, and are attracting, by their radical nature,

large numbers of even educated people in Europe. These are the
tenets of the Nihilist, and for this faith pure women, talented
men, and even children mount the gallows in Russia, or willingly
suffer exile to the frozen steppes of Siberia. The Russian, the
Bohemian, and the Pole come to these shores, if not permeated,
at least tainted with the poison of Nihilism, and we have seen the
terrible effects of these teachings amongst the unfortunate seven
with whom this little sketch opens.
Has the madness of these people any counterpart in history, or
is it a rank growth special to our day ? Amongst early Christians,
and indeed in all primitive religions, we find the idea of a reju
venation through destruction held as an article of faith :
Dies irae, dies ilia,
Solvet sseclum in favilla.

"The idea of palingenesis," says Laveleye, "arose from the

problem of evil. The just suffer, the wicked triumph. The be
lief that the world, fundamentally bad, must perish in flames in
order to make way for a new heaven, is found in all religions/'
" In Mazdeism, the successive cycles of the development of hu
manity on earth end in a general conflagration, followed by a
universal renewal." "In the Wolospa of the Eddas, the palin
genesis is conceived almost exactly as in our Gospels ; " while in
the deluge of Noah we find the same belief, though the purifica
tion is through another element.
" The revolutionists of our time," continues Laveleye, speak
ing of the anarchists, "reproduce the same train of reason
ing." The only difference is that our Nihilists, for the most part
denying the existence of a Deity, have to take the matter of de
struction into their own hands.
Nevertheless, Anarchism has an intermediate stage in inter
nationalism, and to understand the former we must take a glance
at the last. Internationalism seems to owe its birth to trades
unionism, and got its first start, if not its name, from the Inter
national Exhibition of London in 1862, while Poland, Italy,
France, Germany, and England, we are told, raised the munifi
cent sum of three pounds sterling to carry along the movement.
By gradual stages Marx's theories of a laxity of federal ties came
to mean a " collectivity" of the human family, like the Hauscom

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 " primitive simplicity:' 547
munionen, or groups of family communities in Servia and Croa
tia, where bands of men and women are seen working together in
the fields to the music of the guzla. Surely a most charming
picture, though what " the guzla" may mean I can only trust to
my imagination.
Briefly, the aim and ultimate object of internationalism was to
draw all nations into one vast trades union, but that the seeds of
disruption were sown from the very start is shown by Hepworth
Dixon in his secret " History of the Internationale," where he
well describes the differences on the subject of nationality that
sprang up.
" I want," says the Frenchman, " to lay down true principles
and to found a society in which eternal justice shall reign." "As
for me," replies the Englishman, with stolid obtuseness, " I care
only for better wages and the nine-hour bill."
" What a sorry beast is this John Bull," mutters the French
man," raising his hands with a gesture of acute despair. "No
ideas, no syntheses, no imagination. He will never light the
torch and lead the world. Sacre Dieu /"
Now the transition of Internationalism into Nihilism is just
here. The Nihilists, seeing the utter absurdity of having one
state manage the conflicting interests of the world, thought to
improve matters by having no management. Internationalism
would have one state for all, the Anarchist would have no state
for any, and if you look into it closely you will see that the last
follows naturally from the first. For how could one government
serve all the countries of the world, even as to the question
of the location of its capital ? There would have to be a
head centre somewhere, and which capital city should have
this privilege ? A capital fixed immutably in England might
cause jealousy to America, and if New Guinea agreed to enter
any such federation it would probably be only on the terms
that the seat of empire should occasionally be within her
domains. Would Ireland, having at last gained her Parlia
ment, suffer the seat of empire to be again transferred to London,
or would France submit to having it in Berlin ? Oh, says Marx,
there would be government but no seat. This is equivalent to
saying that the government would be on its legs ; and most likely,
in order not to give offense, it would have to make good use of
its legs in its earnest efforts to suit all countries, all climates, all

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548 THE NORTH AMERICAN REVIEW.
religions, by timely visits. One great principle would be illus
trated by such a government at all events ; namely, the principle
of perpetual motion. It would indeed bear a striking resemblance
to the government of one of the South American Republics, to
which I have heard my uncle, the late John L. Stephens, was
accredited as Minister. After three years of energetic pursuit he
could never catch up with that government, and was obliged to
return with his credentials in his pocket.
But, says the Internationalist, again ready to meet this new
difficulty, the government I propose would be an amorphous one,
made up of amorphous or formless communes ; that is, a govern
ment having no arms, no seat, and no legs. If it has no legs
this certainly settles the question about its rapid progress. But
it seems to me that a government without a seat, without arms,
and without legs, would have a pretty hard time of it in enforcing
its decrees, and would be only too likely to suffer the disrespect
ful treatment an india rubber humpty-dumpty meets that is
kicked over the floor by the playful child.
Let me quote a few extracts from the pen of Jules Nos
tag, if only to show that the reductio ad absurdum is the best
way to treat such absurdities: " Fatherland," says he, "is a
phrase, a folly, that has only served for penning up human cattle
in inclosures, where they maybe shorn and bled." "Nations are
brothers." "Nations, countries, are no longer more than
words." "Nationality, the result of birth, is an evil."
Or let us look into the frenzied utterances of some of our own
Anarchists. " The stars and stripes are only fit for prison suits
for officials, much better the red flag of universal brotherhood."
" Presidents are but unvarnished kings who keep alive the curse
of nationality." " Open your eyes," " down with despots," " away
with tyrants." Can there be any greater display of insanity than
this ? So far from national boundaries being a curse they have
produced the very qualties we hold most dear in humanity. Ri
valry between nations has been the spur that has urged all nations
forward and has placed them to-day above where they were one
thousand years ago. Would America be as great but for her for
mer rivalry with England ? Our victories first inspired us with
a feeling of self-reliance, and on self-reliance our prosperity has
been built. Would Germany, without France as a rival, be as
great as she is ? Without emulation mankind goes backward ;

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 ? PRIMITIVE SIMPLICITY: 549
and so far from being pens for their people's slaughter, boundary
lines of nations are the hedges of their sanctity, the bulwarks of
their traditions, and inspire as they protect their art, their litera
ture, their science, and their song.
Is there an American that does not take pride in his country ?
Is there any one so besotted as not to recognize what practical
results have been attained by this very pride ? To show the world
what we could do, has made us what we are, and the plow, the
printing press, and the steam engine have been more than the
sword the instruments of our advance. Arbitration daily tends
to fix the sword the firmer in the scabbard ; but the same old
emulation remains, nerving our horses on foreign race tracks to
no less honorable efforts than in following the bugle call, and
causing the mastership of the ocean to be contended for by pleasure
boats instead of being bled and battled for by grim old Ironsides
of war. This is the true internationalism ; the internationalism
of friendly contest with rivalry minus blood. God preserve me
from any other sort of internationalism, particularly from that
tasteless, spiceless, flabby, hodge-podge that would merge me with
a Zulu and would reduce all distinctive flavor till you couldn't
tell a Yankee from a Hottentot.
Bakunin's conception of internationalism has come to revolu
tionize the old. Bakunin would destroy government and civiliza
tion itself in order that a new condition of society might spring
up on their ruins. In short, Bakunin is the political father of Mr.
August Spies. Chaos, according to Mr. Spies, must be had
recourse to before anything desirable can be obtained. All that
modern civilization has taught us, all we hold most dear,?religion,
science, family, marriage, and our laws,?must be destroyed in
order that a return should be had to primitive simplicity as a basis
for a new beginning. Rousseau had, indeed, the same idea, only
it was confined to theory, and uttered rather as a lament than as
an argument. " Science, art, and literature, are they not the
agents of demoralization ?" he asks, and what is " civilization but
the source of all evils ?" " In that case," replied Voltaire, "we must
return to the woods and go down on all fours." This is exactly
what Bakunin would have us do.
But suppose we did go back to the primitive simplicity of all
fours, would our condition be improved ? Primitive simplicity,
by doing away with wealth, certainly diminishes inequality between

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 550 THE NORTH AMERICAN REVIEW.

the rich and the poor, but leaves a harsher form of inequality, i.e.,
that between the weak and the strong. In early times, in the
sweet simplicity of primitive society, the weaker were not only
driven to the wall, were not only made slaves of by the stronger,
but were also, what is worse, very frequently eaten.
If Bakunin had really lived in the times he deems so perfect,
unless he had been possessed of a stout arm, he would simply
have been clubbed on the head by some brawnier savage, and
served up for lunch. In primitive, or at least in barbaric society,
the lines of caste are strictly drawn. There are cup-bearers, fly
catchers and ticklers, umbrella carriers, and any one familiar with
Polynesian history will remember the Kahili-porters that walked
before the chief. Instead of courtiers, these are slaves ; and to have
a combination of strength and cunning is to be king. Indeed, the
very word king is derived from "can." Unless the anarchist
were king, he would have no liberty at all. For a word against
the ruler he would suffer the extreme penalty of the law. And
to that very civilization which he would destroy, he owes his im
munity in vaporing as he does.
I once heard of a gentleman who had gained quite a reputation
as a chess player by accidentally kicking the table when he found
himself getting worsted, hoping that the next game would go
more in his favor. This is the exact position of the anarchist as
regards his desire to kick. But how, in the name of all the seven
wonders, is he going to kick over the wide and strong table on
which our civilization reposes ? We are not all pawns, nor are the
supports on which we rely fragile or of wood. Blowing up a few
policemen in Chicago, or even the carriage in which a Czar drives,
won't destroy civilization.
Bakunin, in his Revolutionary Catechism, says the "revolu
tionist is a man under a vow ; he must be entirely absorbed in one
single interest, one single thought, one single passion?destruction
of society." That is all very well as far as it goes, but to succeed
in destroying society you must have a vast organization?an or
ganization compared with which your anarchist societies are as
naught. Trained armies must be employed, equipped, and thor
oughly disciplined. Would it not be hard to maintain this disci
pline when the object that called these armies into being was to
destroy discipline ? Every country all over the world would have
to be thoroughly overrun and subjugated by these bands, even to

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 " PRIMITIVE SIMPLICITY.9' 551
those as inaccessible as Abyssinia ; otherwise a new phase of the
old civilization might radiate therefrom. Who would command
these expeditions ? How would they be fed, not so much during
the devastation as afterwards, when all was destroyed ? Not only
houses, cathedrals, monuments, but knowledge also, would have
to be extirpated. The knowledge of how to make machinery, that
competitor, that rival of human labor; the knowledge of how to
make arms and gunpowder, that, at present, keep labor in subju
gation ; the knowledge of how to run printing presses, that now
lyingly teach men that whatever now is at least is necessary if not
morally right. All this must be destroyed, with every evidence
that it once existed. Indeed, Bakunin loudly declaims against
all information. " Give no thought to this useless knowledge, in
the name of which men try to tie your hands," he says in his
(iParoles addressees aux ?tudiants." Again, "Ignorance is
holy and wholesome," "The student must leave the schools."
Granted this knowledge were destroyed ; however, memories of
this knowledge would exist. Indeed, memories are germs that lie
hid for generations to burst on the most unexpected occasion
into life. With dead men alone would memories be safe ? There
fore, to make a thorough extirpation we must destroy the workers
themselves in all these various branches, and further submit to a
long interregnum of chaos in order to allow time to bury in
oblivion the memories of any chance survivor, and so to prevent
his communicating to any one else the secrets of a tyrannical
past.
But suppose that one of those distant communities should
have refused to permit everything within its boundaries destroyed
?some powerful, pig-headed, pig-tailed nation like the Chinese, for
instance, that could rally some 350,000,000 people to its defense?
France withstood the power of combined Europe in the last great
revolution. Why might not China beat off all the hordes of
anarchy in this second revolution ? Then this nation, waiting
till you had reduced yourselves through anarchy to the primitive
conditions which you had craved, till you were luxuriating, as it
were, in the sweet simplicity of ignorance, this nation, pig-tailed
and pig-headed as they are, naturally resenting, as pig-headed peo
ple will, the good that you had intended doing them, would swoop
down upon you. Having relaxed into barbarism, being meta
phorically on " all fours," you would be unable to resist them ;

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552 THE NORTH AMERICAN REVIEW.
and having voluntarily destroyed even the recollection of gun
powder, you would probably scamper off at the first discharge of
their artillery on all fours into the woods. They would, how
ever, in all likelihood, capture you and lead you. off to be sold,
your sons into slavery, your daughters into harems, and yourself
to some enterprising showman, who would probably exhibit you
for the poor old fool that you were.
Such is the whole course of history ; the weaker nation goes
to the wall, aboriginal peoples give place to others a little more
advanced, and if civilization were destroyed your condition would
infallibly be worse than it is at present. But allow me to reas
sure society ; allow me to raise it from the depths of despair into
which the horrors I have drawn will probably have plunged it.
Society is not to be destroyed. It is not possible to destroy it,
and its grand onward sweep will be no more affected by Bakunin
and his company of anarchists than the waters of the Mississippi
by a chorus of hysterical frogs croaking on the bank.
Lloyd S. Bbyce.

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