and their wills
are mutually equal and neither has any right to lord it over the
other. We cannot find two suitable men. They must be two men who are
so free from all national, economic, political and religious
conditions, from sex and personal peculiarities that nothing remains
of either of them but the mere concept "man" and then they are
entirely equal. They are therefore two fully-equipped ghosts conjured
up by that very Herr Duehring who particularly ridicules and denounces
"spiritistic" movements. These two phantoms must of course do all that
their wizard wants of them and so their united productions are a
matter of complete indifference to the rest of the world.

Now let us follow Herr Duehring's axiomatic utterances a little
further. These two men cannot make positive demands upon each other.
The one who does so and enforces his demand thereupon performs an
unjust act, and with this idea as a foundation Herr Duehring explains
the injustice, the tyranny, the servitude, in short all the evil
happenings of history up to the present time. Now Rousseau has in the
work above mentioned proved the contrary just as axiomatically, by
means of two men. A. cannot forcibly enslave B. except by putting B.
in a place where he cannot do without A. This is far too materialistic
an idea for Herr Duehring. He has accordingly put the same matter
somewhat differently. Two shipwrecked men being by themselves on an
island form a society. Their wills are, theoretically speaking,
entirely equal and this is acknowledged by both. But in reality the
inequality is tremendous. A. is resolute and energetic, B. inert,
irresolute and slack. A. is sharp, B. is stupid. How long will it be
before A. imposes his will upon B., first by taking the upper hand,
and keeping it habitually, under the pretence that B.'s submission is
voluntary. Whether the form of voluntariness continues or force is
resorted to slavery still is slavery. Voluntary entering into a state
of slavery lasted all through the Middle Ages in Germany up to the
Thirty Years War. When serfdom was abolished in Prussia after the
defeats of 1806 and 1807 and with it the duty of the nobility to take
care of their subjects in need, sickness and old age the peasants
thereupon petitioned to be allowed to remain in slavery--for who would
care for them when they were in trouble? The concept of the two men is
just as applicable to inequality and slavery as it is to equality and
mutual aid, an