Property = Theft ~ Theft = Proper

[standvast]

WHAT IS
PROPERTY?
AN INQUIRY INTO THE PRINCIPLE OF
RIGHT AND OF GOVERNMENT
P. J. Proudhon 1809-1865

Quote:PROPERTY IS IMPOSSIBLE

DEMONSTRATION. AXIOM.

Property is the Right of Increase claimed by the Proprietor over
any thing which he has stamped as his own.

FIRST PROPOSITION.
Property is Impossible, because it demands Something for Nothing.

SECOND PROPOSITION.
Property is Impossible, because, wherever it exists, Production
costs more than it is worth.

THIRD PROPOSITION.
Property is Impossible, because, with a given Capital, Production
is proportional to Labor, not to Property.

FOURTH PROPOSITION.
Property is Impossible, because it is Homicide.

FIFTH PROPOSITION.
Property is Impossible, because, if it exists, Society devours itself.

Appendix to the Fifth Proposition.

SIXTH PROPOSITION.
Property is Impossible, because it is the Mother of Tyranny.

SEVENTH PROPOSITION.
Property is Impossible, because, in consuming its Receipts, it
loses them; in hoarding them, it nullifies them; and, in
using them as Capital, it turns them against Production.

EIGHTH PROPOSITION.
Property is Impossible, because its Power of Accumulation is
infinite, and is exercised only over Finite Quantities.

NINTH PROPOSITION
Property is Impossible, because it is powerless against Property.

TENTH PROPOSITION.
Property is Impossible, because it is the Negation of Equality.

WHAT IS
PROPERTY?
AN INQUIRY INTO THE PRINCIPLE OF
RIGHT AND OF GOVERNMENT

------------------------

The Philosophy of Misery

by Joseph-Pierre Proudhon

I.

If I follow the God-idea through its successive transformations,
I find that this idea is preeminently social: I mean by this that
it is much more a collective act of faith than an individual
conception. Now, how and under what circumstances is this act of
faith produced? This point it is important to determine.

From the moral and intellectual point of view, society, or the
collective man, is especially distinguished from the individual
by spontaneity of action,--in other words, instinct. While the
individual obeys, or imagines he obeys, only those motives of
which he is fully conscious, and upon which he can at will
decline or consent to act; while, in a word, he thinks himself
free, and all the freer when he knows that he is possessed of
keener reasoning faculties and larger information,--society is
governed by impulses which, at first blush, exhibit no
deliberation and design, but which gradually seem to be directed
by a superior power, existing outside of society, and pushing it
with irresistible might toward an unknown goal. The
establishment of monarchies and republics, caste-distinctions,
judicial institutions, etc., are so many manifestations of this
social spontaneity, to note the effects of which is much easier
than to point out its principle and show its cause. The whole
effort, even of those who, following Bossuet, Vico, Herder,
Hegel, have applied themselves to the philosophy of history, has
been hitherto to establish the presence of a providential destiny
presiding over all the movements of man. And I observe, in this
connection, that society never fails to evoke its genius previous
to action: as if it wished the powers above to ordain what its
own spontaneity has already resolved on. Lots, oracles,
sacrifices, popular acclamation, public prayers, are the
commonest forms of these tardy deliberations of society.

This mysterious faculty, wholly intuitive, and, so to speak,
super-social, scarcely or not at all perceptible in persons, but
which hovers over humanity like an inspiring genius, is the
primordial fact of all psychology.

Now, unlike other species of animals, which, like him, are
governed at the same time by individual desires and collective
impulses, man has the privilege of perceiving and designating to
his own mind the instinct or fatum which leads him; we shall see
later that he has also the power of foreseeing and even
influencing its decrees. And the first act of man, filled and
carried away with enthusiasm (of the divine breath), is to adore
the invisible Providence on which he feels that he depends, and
which he calls GOD,--that is, Life, Being, Spirit, or, simpler
still, Me; for all these words, in the ancient tongues, are
synonyms and homophones. "I am ME," God said to Abraham,
"and I covenant with THEE.".... And to Moses: "I am the Being.
Thou shalt say unto the children of Israel, `The Being hath sent
me unto you.'" These two words, the Being and Me, have in the
original language--the most religious that men have ever
spoken--the same characteristic.[1] Elsewhere, when Ie-hovah,
acting as law-giver through the instrumentality of Moses, attests
his eternity and swears by his own essence, he uses, as a form of
oath, _I_; or else, with redoubled force, _I_, THE BEING. Thus
the God of the Hebrews is the most personal and wilful of all the
gods, and none express better than he the intuition of humanity.


[1] Ie-hovah, and in composition Iah, the Being; Iao, ioupitur,
same meaning; ha-iah, Heb., he was; ei, Gr., he is, ei-nai, to
be; an-i, Heb., and in conjugation th-i, me; e-go, io, ich, i,
m-i, me, t-ibi, te, and all the personal pronouns in which the
vowels i, e, ei, oi, denote personality in general, and the
consonants, m or n, s or t, serve to indicate the number of the
person. For the rest, let who will dispute over these analogies;
I have no objections: at this depth, the science of the
philologist is but cloud and mystery. The important point to
which I wish to call attention is that the phonetic relation of
names seems to correspond to the metaphysical relation of ideas.

continued ;

The Philosophy of Misery