. And the
more they searched the luminous soul of the word, the more fascinating
it seemed to them.

"Comrade," said they.

And they felt that this word had come to unite the whole world, to lift
all men up to the summits of liberty and bind them with new ties, the
strong ties of mutual respect, respect for the liberties of others in
the name of one's own liberty.

When this word had engraved itself upon the hearts of the slaves, they
ceased to be slaves; and one day they announced their transformation to
the city in this great human formula:

I WILL NOT.

Then life was suspended, for it is they who are the motor force of life,
they and no other. The water supply stopped, the fire went out, the city
was plunged in darkness. The masters began to tremble like children.
Fear invaded the hearts of the oppressors. Suffocating in the fumes of
their own dejection, disconcerted and terrified by the strength of the
revolt, they dissimulated the rage which they felt against it.

The phantom of Famine rose up before them, and their children wailed
plaintively in the darkness. The houses and the temples, enveloped in
shadow, melted into an inanimate chaos of iron and stone; a menacing
silence filled the streets with a clamminess as of death; life ceased,
for the force which created it had become conscious of itself; and
enslaved humanity had found the magic and invincible word to express its
will; it had enfranchised itself from the yoke; with its own eyes it had
seen its might,--the might of the creator.

These days were days of anguish to the rulers, to those who considered
themselves the masters of life; each night was as long as thousands of
nights, so thick was the gloom, so timidly shone the few fires scattered
through the city. And then the monster city, created by the centuries,
gorged with human blood, showed itself in all its shameful weakness; it
was but a pitiable mass of stone and wood. The blind windows of the
houses looked upon the street with a cold and sullen air, and out on the
highway marched with valiant step the real masters of life. They, too,
were hungry, more than the others perhaps; but they were used to it, and
the suffering of their bodies was not so sharp as the suffering of the
old masters of life; it did not extinguish the fire in their souls. They
glowed with the consciousness of their own strength, the presentiment of
victory sparkled in their eyes. They went about in the streets of the
city