"I resolved to study Socialism with all my power. In the year 1878 I came from Philadelphia to Chicago, and took pains to eke out my existence here in Chicago, and believed that it would be an easier task to live here, than in Philadelphia, where I had previously in vain exerted my powers to live. I found that, that also was in vain. There was no difference for a proletariat, whether he lived in New York, or Philadelphia, or Chicago. * * * To make further investigations I tried to buy, from the money that I and my family earned, scientific books on those questions. I bought the works of Ferdinand Lassalle, Karl Marx and Henry George. After investigating these works I recognized these reasons why a proletariat could not exist, even in this country, as free as it is. I thought about the means by which that could be corrected. They praised to me this country where every man and every working man had a right to go to the ballot-box and choose his own officers. I scarcely believed that any citizen of the United States could have meant so honestly and well as I, when I turned my attention to politics, and took part in them. But even in this regard of freedom of the ballot-box I found myself mistaken. I learned to see that the working man was not free in his opinion, that he was not free in vote. It was in vain that the Socialistic party took pains in former times, honest pains, to elect honest officers. After a few vain attempts I found that it was impossible for a working man to free himself by means of the ballot-box, and to secure those things which were necessary for his existence. * * * In this city corruption even entered the ranks of the Social Democracy. I also obtained the conviction that through those men who put themselves over us as leaders, and occupied themselves with compromises, this was brought about, and then I left the ranks of the Social Democracy and gave myself over to the International which was then organizing; and what these men wanted, and what these men through their exertions sought to bring about was nothing more or less than the conviction that the freeing of the ruling classes could only be brought about by force, as have all revolutions been throughout history. This conviction, before I went over to those people, was obtained through study of the history of all lands. The history of all lands showed me that all advantages in a political, in a religious, and in a material direction, were always obtained only by the use of force; and if I confine myself to the history of this country where I am convicted, I take into consideration that the first immigrants into this country and the first colonists, only freed themselves by force from the power of England. I