Michael Bakunin (b. 1814, near Twer, in Russia; d. 1876, in Berne) lived and studied in Germany during the forties. In 1848 and 1849 he took part in the revolution, was arrested, then handed over to Russia and banished to Siberia, whence he escaped in 1856, afterwards living in various countries of Western Europe. He was an indifferent theorist, and contributed little to the enrichment of philosophical Anarchism, but he distinguished himself by his immense revolutionary activity and his capacity for sacrifice. The influence which he exercised sprang from his character. He had been acquainted with the Young Hegelians as well as with Marx, Engels, and Wilhelm Wolff since the beginning of the forties. Until the end of 1868 he acknowledged Marx as his intellectual leader, as is evident from the following letter which he addressed to Marx: "123, Montbrillant, Geneva, "December 22, 1868. "Serno has shown me the portion of your letter which concerns me. You ask him whether I am still your friend. Yes, more than ever, my dear Marx, for now I understand better than ever how truly right you are when you advance along the high road of economic revolution and invite us to follow, and when you set those below us who stray into the side-tracks either of national or exclusively political enterprises. I am now doing the same thing that you have been doing for more than twenty years. Since my solemn public leave-taking from the bourgeois of the Berne Congress, I no longer know any other society, any other milieu, than the world of the workers. Henceforth my country is the 'International,' of which you are one of the most illustrious founders. Yon see, my dear friend, that I am your disciple--and I am proud of it. That will be enough to make clear my attitude and my feelings toward you."--("Neue Zeit," 19th year, Vol. I., p. 6.) Nevertheless, this discipleship did not hinder Bakunin from secretly forming a separate organisation which contributed to the break-up of the International. Moreover, the International was only a kind of school for Socialist officers who had yet to create their armies, but it proved even more successful than Marx himself could have expected. The fundamental principles of Marxism ousted every other social revolutionary system which had made itself prominent within the working-class movement. VI. THE PARIS COMMUNE.