r general expropriation and the annihilation of all powers,
are almost exclusively derived from Proudhon's, and at most go beyond
them only in so far as Bakunin does not recognise as obligatory that
coalescence of "productive" groups into a higher collective entity,
which Proudhon regarded as an organic society, but merely allows them
to remain as groups. If several such local groups wish to unite into a
larger association, this might be done, but no compulsion must thereby
be exercised upon individuals. The influence of Stirner, with whom
Bakunin was acquainted before 1840, must account for this. We
recognise Bakunin's theory best and most authentically from the
following extract, in which he comprises it in the programme of the
"Alliance de la Democratie Socialiste" of Geneva,[4] founded by
himself. It runs thus:

[4] Compare the chapter on "The Spread of Anarchy."

1. The alliance professes atheism; it aims at the abolition of
religious services; the replacement of belief by knowledge, and divine
by human justice; and the abolition of marriage as a political,
religious, judicial, and civic arrangement.

2. Before all it aims at the definite and complete abolition of all
classes, and the political, economic, and social equality of the
individual, of either sex; and to attain this end it demands, before
all, the abolition of inheritance, in order that for the future
usufruct may depend on what each produces, and that, in accordance
with the decision of the last Congress of Workmen at Brussels [in
1868], the land, the instruments of production, as well as all other
capital, can only be used by the workers, _i. e._, by the agricultural
and industrial communities.

3. It demands for all children of both sexes, from their birth
onwards, equality of the means of development, education, and
instruction in all stages of knowledge, industry, and art, with the
general object that this equality, at first only economic and social,
will ultimately result in producing more and more a greater natural
equality of individuals, by causing to disappear all those artificial
inequalities which are the historic products of a social organisation
which is as false as it is unjust.

4. As an enemy of all despotism, recognising no other form of policy
than Republicanism, and rejecting unconditionally every reactionary
alliance, it rejects all political action that does not aim directly
and immediately at the triumph of the cause of l