Transcribed from the 1910 Mills and Boon edition , email
by
JACK LONDON
“History warns us that it is the customary fate of new truths tobegin as heresies and to end as superstitions.”
Huxley.
MILLS & BOON, LIMITED
49 RUPERT STREET
LONDON, W.1
Copyright in the United States ofAmerica, 1910, by The Macmillan Company.
Contents:
Revolution
The Somnambulists
The Dignity of Dollars
Goliah
The Golden Poppy
The Shrinkage of the Planet
The House Beautiful
The Gold Hunters of the North
Fomá Gordyéeff
These Bones shall Rise Again
The Other Animals
The Yellow Peril
What Life Means to Me
“The present is enough for common souls,
Who, never looking forward, are indeed
Mere clay, wherein the footprints of their age
Are petrified for ever.”
I received a letter the other day. It was from a man inArizona. It began, “Dear Comrade.” It ended,“Yours for the Revolution.” I replied to the letter, andmy letter began, “Dear Comrade.” It ended, “Yoursfor the Revolution.” In the United States there are 400,000men, of men and women nearly 1,000,000, who begin their letters “DearComrade,” and end them “Yours for the Revolution.” In Germany there are 3,000,000 men who begin their letters “DearComrade” and end them “Yours for the Revolution”; inFrance, 1,000,000 men; in Austria, 800,000 men; in Belgium, 300,000 men; inItaly, 250,000 men; in England, 100,000 men; in Switzerland, 100,000 men;in Denmark, 55,000 men; in Sweden, 50,000 men; in Holland, 40,000 men; inSpain, 30,000 men—comrades all, and revolutionists.
These are numbers which dwarf the grand armies of Napoleon andXerxes. But they are numbers not of conquest and maintenance of theestablished order, but of conquest and revolution. They compose, whenthe roll is called, an army of 7,000,000 men, who, in accordance with theconditions of to-day, are fighting with all their might for the conquest ofthe wealth of the world and for the complete overthrow of existingsociety.
There has never been anything like this revolution in the history of theworld. There is nothing analogous between it and the AmericanRevolution or the French Revolution. It is unique, colossal. Other revolutions compare with it as asteroids compare with the sun. It is alone of its kind, the first world-revolution in a world whosehistory is replete with revolutions. And not only this, for it is thefirst organized movement of men to become a world movement, limited only bythe limits of the planet.
This revolution is unlike all other revolutions in many respects. It is not sporadic. It is not a flame of popular discontent, arisingin a day and dying down in a day. It is older than the presentgeneration. It has a history and traditions, and a martyr-roll onlyless extensive possibly than the martyr-roll of Christianity. It hasalso a literature a myriad times more imposing, scientific, and scholarlythan the literature of any previous revolution.
They call themselves “comrades,” these men, comrades in thesocialist revolution. Nor is the word empty and meaningless, coinedof mere lip service. It knits men together as brothers, as men shouldbe knit together who stand shoulder to shoulder under the red banner ofrevolt. This red banner, by the way, symbolizes the brotherhood ofman, and does not symbolize the incendiarism that instantly connects itselfwith the red banner in the affrighted bou