ns, I must sacrifice my
independence to him who possesses these contrivances and machines. You
may work here, he will tell me, but only under the condition that you
will deliver up the products of your labor to me, that I may trade with
and make profit on them.

The one without possessions has no choice. He may appeal to the
declaration of human rights; he may point to his political rights, the
equality before the law, before God and the archangels--if he wants to
eat, drink, dress and have a home he must choose such work as the
conditions of the industrial mercantile or agricultural plants impose
upon him.

Through organized opposition the workingmen can somewhat improve this
condition; by the help of trade unions they can regulate the hours of
work and hinder the reduction of wages to a level too low for mere
living. The trade unions are a necessity for the workingmen, a bulwark
against which the most unbearable demands of the class of possessors
rebound; but a complete freeing of labor--be it of an intellectual or of
a physical nature--can be brought about only through the abolition of
wage work and the right of private ownership of land and the sources of
maintenance and nourishment of mankind. There are heart-rending cries
over the blasphemous opinion that property is not as holy a thing as its
possessors would like to make it. They declare that possessions must not
be less protected than human life, for they are necessary foundations of
society. The case is represented as though everybody were highly
interested in the maintenance of the right of private property, whereas
conditions are such that non-possession is the normal condition of most
people.

Because few possess everything, therefore the many possess nothing. So
far as possession can be considered as an oppressive measure in the
hands of a few, it is a monopoly. Set in a paradox it would read: The
abolition of property will free the people from homelessness and
non-possession. In fact, this will happen when the earth with its
treasures shall cease to be an object of trade for usurers; when it
shall vouchsafe to all a home and a livelihood. Then not only the bent
bodies will straighten; the intellect free itself as might the bound
Prometheus rid himself of his fetters and leave the rock to which he is
chained, but we shall look back on the institutions of force, the state,
the hangman, et al, as ghosts of an anxious fantasy.

In free unions the trades