lyses the
ills of society, and portrays, with artist touch, the coming dawn of
humanity, founded on equality, brotherhood, and liberty."

William Reedy sees in Emma Goldman the "daughter of the dream, her
gospel a vision which is the vision of every truly great-souled man
and woman who has ever lived."

Cowards who fear the consequences of their deeds have coined the word
of philosophic Anarchism. Emma Goldman is too sincere, too defiant,
to seek safety behind such paltry pleas. She is an Anarchist, pure
and simple. She represents the idea of Anarchism as framed by Josiah
Warrn, Proudhon, Bakunin, Kropotkin, Tolstoy. Yet she also
understands the psychologic causes which induce a Caserio, a
Vaillant, a Bresci, a Berkman, or a Czolgosz to commit deeds of
violence. To the soldier in the social struggle it is a point of
honor to come in conflict with the powers of darkness and tyranny,
and Emma Goldman is proud to count among her best friends and
comrades men and women who bear the wounds and scars received in
battle.

In the words of Voltairine de Cleyre, characterizing Emma Goldman
after the latter's imprisonment in 1893: The spirit that animates
Emma Goldman is the only one which will emancipate the slave from his
slavery, the tyrant from his tyranny--the spirit which is willing to
dare and suffer.

HIPPOLYTE HAVEL.

New York, December, 1910.

PREFACE

Some twenty-one years ago I heard the first great Anarchist
speaker--the inimitable John Most. It seemed to me then, and for
many years after, that the spoken word hurled forth among the masses
with such wonderful eloquence, such enthusiasm and fire, could never
be erased from the human mind and soul. How could any one of all the
multitudes who flocked to Most's meetings escape his prophetic voice!
Surely they had but to hear him to throw off their old beliefs, and
see the truth and beauty of Anarchism!

My one great longing then was to be able to speak with the tongue of
John Most,--that I, too, might thus reach the masses. Oh, for the
naivety of Youth's enthusiasm! It is the time when the hardest thing
seems but child's play. It is the only period in life worth while.
Alas! This period is but of short duration. Like Spring, the STURM
UND DRANG period of the propagandist brings forth growth, frail and
delicate, to be matured or killed according to its powers of
resistance against a thousand vicissitudes.

My great faith in the wonder work