Chapter 80: REVOLUTION
INTRODUCTION
MOST of the words commonly used as synonyms for “revolution,” such as “insurrection,” “uprising,” “rebellion,” or “civil war,” carry the connotation of violence and the use of armed force. Most of the great revolutions in western history which come readily to mind—those in the city-states and empires of the ancient world, the Peasants’ Revolt in Germany in the 15th century, the rebellion led by Cromwell in 17th century England, the American and French Revolutions in the 18th century, the Russian and the Spanish Revolutions in our own time—have been affairs of bloodshed. Yet neither in political theory nor in historic fact does revolution always involve the use of force or the resort to violence.
Thucydides describes both violent and non-violent revolutions in the alternations of democracy and oligarchy in the constitution of the Greek city-states. In England, the Great Rebellion which, by civil war, succeeds in beheading one Stuart king, is followed by the Bloodless Revolution of 1688 which, without any war at all, unseats another. Some of the revolutions in the European states in the middle years of the 19th century are accompanied by barricades and fighting. Some, however, like the revolutions accomplished by the Reform Bills in England or by constitutional amendments in the United States, are fundamental changes in government effected by due process of law, by peaceful shifts in the distribution of political power.
A revolution may involve action in defiance of the law and yet be prosecuted without violence on the part of the revolutionists, as in the case of the rebellion which Gandhi led against British rule in India by the method of civil disobedience. The use of armed force may not, however, be the only technique of revolutionary violence. “Revolutions are effected in two ways,” according to Aristotle, “by force and by fraud.” Though fraud does no physical violence, it does violence to the will of those who are deceived. In some cases when fraud is used, “the citizens are deceived into acquiescing in a change of government, and afterwards,” Aristotle observes, “they are held in subjection against their will.” In other cases, they may subsequently be persuaded and their allegiance and good will won. But as Machiavelli’s later consideration of these two techniques of seizing power indicates, the choice between force and fraud is one of expediency rather than of principle. He recommends guile as an alternative to force, with force held in reserve should cunning fail. Both methods, however, employ the strategy of warfare.
As opposed to both force and fraud, and even to the method of civil disobedience, which acts outside the law or in violation of it, the writers of The Federalist conceive the possibility of a revolutionary process which is at once peaceful and legal. It is precisely because they think that the Constitution of the United States affords the opportunity for achieving political change by constitutional amendment that they defend the clause which guarantees “to every State in this Union a republican form of government,” and promises to protect each of them, upon application to the federal government, “against domestic violence.” To the objection that such a guaranty may involve “an officious interference in the domestic concerns of the members,” Hamilton replies: “It could be no impediment to reforms of the State constitutions by a majority of the people in a legal and peaceable mode. This right would remain undiminished. The guaranty could only operate against changes to be effected by violence. Towards the prevention of calamities of this kind, too many checks cannot be provided.”
In another of the Federalist papers, Madison considers the possibility of “an insurrection pervading all the States, and comprising a superiority of the entire force, though not a constitutional right.” He thinks such a case beyond “the compass of human remedies.” It is enough if the Constitution “diminishes the risk of a calamity for which no possible constitution can provide a cure.” Nor does “a conflagration through a whole nation, or through a very large proportion of it, proceeding either from weighty causes of discontent given by the government or from the contagion of some violent popular paroxysm” seem to Hamilton to “fall within any ordinary rules of calculation.” In his estimation, “no form of government can always either avoid or control” such revolutions. But, he adds, “where the whole power of the government is in the hands of the people, there is the less pretence for the use of violent remedies in partial or occasional distempers of the State.”
WHEN ARISTOTLE THINKS of revolutions as taking place without violence, he does not have in mind the strictly modern device of constitutional amendment. Political change, he suggests, may be the result of accidents rather than of planned actions. “Political revolutions,” he writes, sometimes “spring from a disproportionate increase in any part of the state. … And this disproportion may sometimes happen by accident, as at Tarentum, from a defeat in which many of the notables were slain in a battle with the Iapygians just after the Persian War, the constitutional government in consequence becoming a democracy.” Or “when the rich grow numerous or properties increase, the form of government changes into an oligarchy or a government of families.”
On the other hand, to writers like Hobbes and Locke, revolution means war and is inseparable from violence. Those who “deny the authority of the Commonwealth”—apart from which, according to Hobbes, men live in a state of war—by renouncing their subjection to the Sovereign, “relapse into the condition of war commonly called Rebellion. . . . For rebellion is but war renewed.” Unlike bees and ants, the peace of whose societies is never threatened by rebellion, there are “amongst men … very many that think themselves wiser, and abler to govern the public, better than the rest; and these strive to reform and innovate, one this way, another that way; and thereby bring it into distraction and civil war.”
Locke’s principle seems to be that “whoever uses force without right—as everyone does in society who does it without law—puts himself into a state of war with those against whom he so uses it.” Having entered into society “and introduced laws for the preservation of property, peace and unity amongst themselves,” men who “set up force again in opposition to the laws, do rebellare—that is, bring back again the state of war—and are properly rebels.”
Aquinas also seems to align revolution (which he calls “sedition”) with war and strife, though he thinks it differs from them in two respects: “First, because war and strife denote actual aggression on either side, whereas sedition may be said to denote either actual aggression or the preparation for such aggression. . . . Secondly, they differ in that war is, properly speaking, carried on against external foes, being as it were between one people and another, whereas strife is between one individual and another, while sedition, in its proper sense, is between the mutually dissentient parts of one people, as when one part of the state rises in tumult against another part.”
THOUGH THE WORD “revolution” may be used in both senses, it nevertheless seems to be the case that traditional discussions of the causes and prevention of revolution, theories of revolutionary strategy and tactics, and the great issue of the right of rebellion all seem to contemplate the resort to, or at least the threat of, force to gain an end. This also seems to be implied in the popular conception of the difference between revolution and evolution.
The contrast between revolution and evolution may explain why the note of violence, disorder, or disruption colors the idea of revolution. The word “evolution” usually signifies change which is gradual and which tends in one direction rather than another, that direction being for the most part toward a progressive development of changes already accomplished. Revolution is abrupt. Revolutions can occur in either direction, against the tide as well as with it. As action and reaction can be equal and opposite in physical motion, so in social change revolution and counter-revolution can aim in opposite directions. In either case, whether revolution reverses the direction of change or precipitates a radical transformation toward which things are moving too slowly, revolution seems to involve overthrowing the established order rather than developing its latent tendencies.
It is in this sense that the revolutionist is a radical. He may also be a reactionary in the sense that the radical change he is willing to use force to achieve, is a return to some earlier condition rather than one which, in the judgment of his opponents, is in the line of progress or evolution. But whether reactionary or progressive the revolutionist is never conservative. If the established order does not submit readily to the radical change which a revolutionary person or party seeks, or if it resists, it must be forced to yield. The revolutionist can be reluctant to use force, but he can never forswear it entirely.
This seems to be the sense in which Marx and Engels conceive the program of the Communist Manifesto as a revolutionary program. Their conception of a revolutionary class or party is not, however, limited to the proletariat in their struggle against the bourgeoisie. They apply it to the bourgeoisie, not in the contemporary world when the established order of capitalism makes the bourgeoisie conservative or reactionary, but in the 18th century when the bourgeoisie overthrew the landed aristocracy.
“The bourgeoisie,” they write, “historically has played a most revolutionary part. … The French revolution, for example, abolished feudal property in favor of bourgeois property.” And again: “When Christian ideas succumbed in the 18th century to the rationalist ideas, feudal society fought its death-battle with the then revolutionary bourgeoisie.” That the French Revolution represents the struggle not between the propertied and the propertyless classes, but between two propertied classes—the bourgeoisie and the aristocrats—seems evident to Marx in the fact that “during the very first storms of the revolution, the French Bourgeoisie dared to take away from the workers the right of association just acquired.”
NO LESS THAN THE Communist Manifesto, the American Declaration of Independence is a revolutionary document. Its signers are prepared to use force to overthrow the established order which, in their view, has worked grievous iniquities and injustices upon the colonies. But in the Marxist view the rebellion of the colonists, unlike the French Revolution, is political rather than economic, even if it has economic as well as political motivations. This distinction between economic and political revolution seems to be peculiarly modern.
It is not that the ancients—Thucydides, Plato, and Aristotle, for example—fail to recognize the “class war,” which is paramount for Marx. They observe (as is indicated in the chapter on OLIGARCHY) the struggle between the rich and the poor for control of the state. They know that the opponents, in the frequent and violent revolutions which disturbed the Greek city-states, are the oligarchs and the democrats—the men of great property and the men of little or none.
The revolt of the Helots in Sparta is the exceptional case of a rebellion of slaves against their masters. For the most part, the struggle is between free men belonging to different economic classes. The oligarchical and democratic revolutions which these classes in society foment are political in the sense of seeking to change the constitution rather than the economic system itself, even though the constitutional changes may have economic as well as political effects. “In the opinion of some,” Aristotle reports, “the regulation of property is the chief point of all, that being the question upon which all revolutions turn.”
Aristotle is willing to admit that “the equalization of property” may “prevent the citizens from quarrelling,” but he does not think that economic injustice is the only cause of revolution, or economic justice its absolute cure. “The avarice of mankind,” he writes, “is insatiable; at one time two obols was pay enough; but now, when this sum has become customary, men always want more and more without end; for it is of the nature of desire not to be satisfied, and most men live only for the gratification of it. The beginning of reform,” in his opinion, “is not so much to equalize property as to train the nobler sorts of natures not to desire more, and to prevent the lower from getting more; that is to say, they must be kept down, but not ill-treated.” Such a reform would hardly cure the evil of chattel slavery. That requires a revolution which effects the equalization of political status, not the equalization of property.
If a rebellion of slaves in the ancient world had succeeded in abolishing the institution of slavery, it would have been, in the modern view, an economic as well as a political revolution, for it would have radically altered the mode of production. It is in this sense that what Adam Smith describes as the change from an agrarian to a manufacturing economy, is strictly an economic revolution, though it is Marx, not Smith, who gives currency to the word “revolution” as used in this sense. It is exemplified in our common understanding of the phrase “the industrial revolution” which refers to the radical change in an economy based on manufactures, when mass production by machines in factories replaces the system of production by workers using their own tools in their own homes.
“In manufacture,” writes Marx, “the revolution in the mode of production begins with labor-power; in modern industry it begins with the instruments of labor. Our first inquiry then is, how the instruments of labor are converted from tools into machines, or what is the difference between a machine and the implements of a handicraft?” But for Marx the meaning of economic revolution is not limited to radical changes in the physical conditions of production. Such changes necessarily involve equally radical changes in the social relationships of economic classes, and in their possession of political power. In the Manifesto, “the modern bourgeoisie” is said to be “itself the product of a long course of development, of a series of revolutions in the modes of production and exchange.” The bourgeoisie, in turn, “cannot exist without constantly revolutionizing the instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production, and with them the whole relations of society.”
According to Marx and Engels, “each step in the development of the bourgeoisie was accompanied by a corresponding political advance of that class. An oppressed class under the sway of the feudal nobility, an armed and self-governing association in the mediaeval commune… afterwards in the period of manufacture proper, serving either the semi-feudal or the absolute monarchy as a counterpoise against the nobility … the bourgeoisie has at last, since the establishment of Modern Industry and of the world-market, conquered for itself in the modern representative State, exclusive political sway.”
ON THE QUESTION whether economic revolutions, in their social and political aspects, require violence, the writers of the Manifesto seem to be unambiguous—at least so far as the communist program is concerned. Since “the Communist revolution is the most radical rupture with traditional property-relations,” and “involves the most radical rupture with traditional ideas,” it can hardly be expected to occur without open warfare, no less violent than the earlier struggle of the bourgeoisie against the aristocrats. Standing “face to face with the bourgeoisie today, the proletariat alone is a really revolutionary class,” in whose development Marx and Engels see the transition from a “more or less veiled civil war, raging within existing society, up to the point where that war breaks out into open revolution, and where the violent overthrow of the bourgeoisie lays the foundation for the sway of the proletariat.”
It is precisely on the use of force that the Manifesto distinguishes between communism and socialism, especially the “utopian” variety of the latter. The Socialists “reject all political, and especially all revolutionary action; they wish to attain their ends by peaceful means, and endeavor by small experiments, necessarily doomed to failure, and by the force of example, to pave the way for the new social Gospel. . . . They, therefore, endeavor, and that consistently, to deaden the class struggle and to reconcile the class antagonisms.” Communist strategy, on the contrary, everywhere supports “every revolutionary movement against the existing social and political order of things. … The Communists disdain to conceal their views and aims. They openly declare that their ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions.”
Though fundamentally economic, the communist revolution cannot help having political effects. “Political power,” according to Marx and Engels, “is merely the organized power of one class for oppressing another.” This applies to the proletariat’s conquest of power. Yet they also seem to think that the dictatorship of the proletariat is only a temporary phase in the communist revolution. “If the proletariat during its contest with the bourgeoisie is compelled, by the force of circumstances, to organize itself as a class; if, by means of a revolution, it makes itself the ruling class, and, as such, sweeps away by force the old conditions of production, then it will, along with these conditions, have swept away the conditions for the existence of class antagonisms, and of classes generally, and will thereby have abolished its own supremacy as a class.” In aiming at the economically classless society, with the consequent transformation of the state, the communist program seems to conceive its revolution as abolishing the possibility of or need for any further revolutions, peaceful or violent, economic or political.
IN ADDITION to the issues raised by the economic theory and history which underlie revolutionary communism, there is the debatable question whether an economically classless society means the withering away of the state, or at least such changes in political institutions that revolution would cease to be possible or necessary. Even a hypothetical consideration of this question seems to call for attention to the various ways in which political revolutions take place. With the advent of the “classless society,” no opportunity would remain, at least in theory, for the type of revolution in which one ruling class replaces another. But in such a society it is still conceivable that the equivalent of a palace revolution might substitute one ruling individual for another—by the old-fashioned methods of assassination or usurpation.
For Aristotle, however, all revolutions which produce a change from one form of government to another also involve the replacement of one ruling class by another. He distinguishes between such revolutions as affect the constitution, “when men seek to change from an existing form into some other, for example, from democracy into oligarchy, or from oligarchy into democracy,” and those revolutions which do not affect the constitution, when men, “without disturbing the form of government, whether oligarchy or monarchy or any other, try to get the administration into their own hands.” To these two types of revolution Aristotle adds a third, which “may be directed against only a portion of the constitution, e.g., the establishment or overthrow of a particular office; as at Sparta, it is said that Lysander attempted to overthrow the monarchy, and king Pausanias, the ephoralty.”
Conceivably, any of these political changes might be accomplished without violence. In modern constitutional states, the basic principle of constitutions can be changed from oligarchy to democracy by amendments or legal reforms which extend the franchise. The structure of the government, as to its offices or their organization, can be changed by some form of peaceful plebiscite. As the Federalists point out, the polls provide a “natural cure for an ill-administration in a popular or representative constitution,” namely, a change of men. But such changes of government in the ancient city-states, even when constitutional, appear to Aristotle to be revolutionary in the double sense of involving violence, or the threat of it, and of being radical transformations of the polity. What is true of constitutional changes in ancient republics is also true of monarchies and tyrannies, both ancient and modern.
When absolute power is concentrated in the hands of one man, his subjects are necessarily without juridical means for redressing their grievances by changing the occupant of the throne, much less for abolishing the monarchy entirely in favor of self-government. Machiavelli’s advice to the prince on safeguarding his power against usurping rivals or rebellious subjects, seems to be written against the background of force and fraud as the normal methods of changing rulers or modes of rule. They are the very same methods which the prince in power must employ to maintain his position.
“There are two ways of contesting,” Machiavelli writes, “the one by law, the other by force; the first method is proper to men, the second to beasts; but because the first is frequently not sufficient, it is necessary to have recourse to the second. Therefore it is necessary for a prince to understand how to avail himself of the beast and the man. . . . Being compelled knowingly to adopt the beast, [a prince] ought to choose the fox and the lion; because the lion cannot defend himself against snares and the fox cannot defend himself against wolves.” It follows, according to Machiavelli, that the prince seldom can be, though he should always try to appear to be, “merciful, faithful, humane, religious, upright. … A prince, especially a new one, cannot observe all those things for which men are esteemed, being often forced, in order to maintain the state, to act contrary to fidelity, friendship, humanity, and religion.”
The stories of oriental despotism told by Herodotus, the account of the Caesars given by Tacitus and Gibbon, the chronicle of the English monarchy in the historical plays of Shakespeare, all seem to indicate that crowns seldom change heads without bloodshed. Machiavelli’s rules for the prince do not greatly enlarge upon Aristotle’s description of “the arts by which the tyrant preserves his power.” Even when Aristotle proposes, as an alternative method, that the tyrant can try to be benevolent, he adds the Machiavellian suggestion that the tyrant should at least “appear to act” like a good king.
The tyrant, Aristotle writes, “should lop off those who are too high. He must put to death men of spirit. … He must be on his guard against anything which is likely to inspire either courage or confidence among his subjects. He must prohibit literary assemblies or other meetings for discussion, and he must take every means to prevent people from knowing one another.” After enumerating many similar practices which he calls “Persian and barbaric arts,” Aristotle concludes that “there is no wickedness too great for the tyrant” if he is to maintain himself in power.
These matters are more fully discussed in the chapter on TYRANNY. In our present consideration of the types of revolution, we must note one other political change which usually involves the widespread turbulence of civil war. That is the rebellion of subject peoples against their imperial masters. Unlike civil uprisings, which seek to overthrow governments or effect a change in the ruling classes or persons, these wars of rebellion seek to liberate one people from another or to establish the independence of colonies at the expense of empire.
Still another type of insurrection aims at the dissolution of the state itself. What Rousseau deals with in theory as the degeneration of the state into anarchy by the repudiation of the social contract, calls to mind no historic examples; but the few historic instances of “wars of secession” certainly illustrate the point. They aim to dissolve a federal state by severing ties of union which have something like a contractual character.
The distinction between these types of civil war may be clear in theory, yet difficult to apply to historic cases. Which sort of insurrection—a rebellion of colonies or a secession of states—does the Declaration of Independence announce? A theory current among American political writers in 1775 suggests that the thirteen colonies claimed the status of self-governing dominions in a confederacy united under the British crown. On this theory, does the principle stated in the Declaration—that it is sometimes “necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them”—cover the secession of the Southern states from the American union, as well as the revolt of the American states from Great Britain, or the British Commonwealth of nations? Questions of fact are involved, of course, in any comparison of the Revolutionary War of 1776 and the war between the states in 1861; but the question of principle turns on the whole issue of whether revolution is a matter of might or right.
THE RIGHT OF REVOLUTION does not seem to be a central consideration in ancient political theory. The ancient discussion of revolutions appears to be more concerned with their causes, their methods, and their prevention. This does not mean that the ancients treat revolutions entirely as contests for power. On the contrary, Aristotle declares that “the universal and chief cause of the revolutionary impulse” is “the desire of equality, when men think that they are equal to others who have more than themselves; or, again, the desire of inequality and superiority, when conceiving themselves to be superior they think that they have not more but the same or less than their inferiors—pretensions which may or may not be just.”
Nevertheless, Aristotle’s elaborate treatise on revolution in the fifth book of his Politics deals alike with revolutions that spring from real and from fancied injustices. The object of his inquiry seems to be “what modes of destruction apply to particular states, and out of what and into what they mostly change; also what are the modes of preservation in states generally, or in a particular state, and by what means each state may be best preserved”—not how revolution can be justified or why rebellion is the crime of treason or the folly of anarchy. Such questions seem to come to the foreground in modern political theory, though they also have a certain prominence in mediaeval teaching.
Aquinas, for example, holds that sedition is “a special kind of sin” because it is “opposed to a special kind of good, namely, the unity and peace of a people.” He qualifies this, however, in the case of an uprising against tyranny, even if it involves civil strife. Since in his view “a tyrannical government is not just, because it is directed, not to the common good but to the private good of the ruler… there is no sedition in disturbing a government of this kind, unless indeed the tyrant’s rule be disturbed so inordinately that his subjects suffer greater harm from the consequent disturbance than from the tyrant’s government. Indeed,” Aquinas writes, “it is the tyrant rather who is guilty of sedition, since he encourages discord and sedition among his subjects, that he may lord over them more securely.”
Holding that “the end of government is the good of mankind,” Locke asks, in a similar vein, which is better: “that the people should be always exposed to the boundless will of tyranny, or that the rulers should be sometimes liable to be opposed when they grow exorbitant in the use of their power, and employ it for the destruction and not the preservation of the property of their people”? Since “force is to be opposed to nothing but unjust and unlawful force,” Locke argues that a king may be resisted when he exceeds his authority or prerogative and uses his power unlawfully. Since such a king “has dethroned himself, and put himself in a state of war with his people, what shall hinder them from prosecuting him who is no king, as they would any other man who has put himself into a state of war with them?”
The right to resist a tyrant, or a king turned despot, may lead to regicide, but this seems no different to Locke from the punishment of any other criminal. “He who may resist must be allowed to strike”; and furthermore, Locke continues, “he has a right, when he prevails, to punish the offender, both for the breach of the peace, and all the evils that followed upon it.” Rousseau is even less hesitant to condone tyrannicide. “The contract of government is so completely dissolved by despotism,” writes Rousseau, “that the despot is master only so long as he remains the strongest; as soon as he can be expelled, he has no right to complain of violence. The popular insurrection that ends in the death or deposition of a Sultan is as lawful an act as those by which he disposed, the day before, of the life and fortunes of his subjects. As he was maintained by force alone, it is force alone that overthrows him.”
Those who say that “it may occasion civil wars or intestine broils, to tell the people they are absolved from obedience when illegal attempts are made upon their liberties or properties … may as well say upon the same ground,” in Locke’s opinion, “that honest men may not oppose robbers and pirates because this may occasion disorder or bloodshed.” Nor does Locke think that the right to resist injustice means that governments will be overthrown “upon every little mismanagement in public affairs. Great mistakes in the ruling part,” he writes, “many wrong and inconvenient laws, and all the slips of human frailty will be borne by the people without mutiny or murmur. But if a long train of abuses, prevarications, and artifices, all tending the same way, make the design visible to the people … it is not to be wondered that they should then rouse themselves and endeavor to put the rule into such hands which may secure to them the ends for which government was at first erected.”
Hence, to those who say that his revolutionary principle “lays a perpetual foundation for disorder,” Locke replies that it will never operate until “the inconvenience is so great that the majority feel it, and are weary of it, and find it necessary to have it amended.” Rebellions will occur only when the majority feel that “their laws, and with them their estates, liberties, and lives are in danger, and perhaps their religion too,” and so will exercise their natural right to resist, with force if necessary, the illegal force used against them. But strictly, it is not the people who rebel; rather it is they who put down the sedition of the tyrant.
AGAINST SUCH REVOLUTIONARY sentiments or principles Hobbes, Kant, and Hegel seem to take a stand, though in each case they place some qualification on their denial of a right of resistance or rebellion. Hobbes, for example, denies the right of men to change their form of government, or of subjects to resist their Sovereign, except for the sake of self-preservation. When men covenant to form a commonwealth, they are bound, Hobbes says, to uphold the actions and judgments of the Sovereign they have created; they “cannot lawfully make a new covenant amongst themselves, to be obedient to any other… without his permission. . . . They that are subjects to a monarch, cannot without his leave cast off monarchy, and return to the confusion of a disunited multitude.”
Furthermore, “because every subject is by this institution, author of all the actions and judgments of the Sovereign instituted, it follows,” according to Hobbes,” that whatsoever he doeth, it can be no injury to any of his subjects; nor ought he to be by any of them accused of injustice.” Yet “every subject has liberty in all those things, the right whereof cannot by covenant be transferred,” such as the right of a man to defend his own body, “to resist those that assault him,” or to have access to “food, air, medicine, or any other thing without which he cannot live.”
Kant disallows rebellion as a matter of right, unless resistance is required to fulfill a moral duty outside the sphere of public right. “‘Obey the authority which has power over you’ (in everything which is not opposed to morality) is a Categorical Imperative.” Hence, though a juridical constitution “may be vitiated by great defects and coarse errors, it is nevertheless absolutely unallowable and punishable to resist it.”
Since, in his view, public right is founded on the institution of “a sovereign will, uniting all particular wills by one law,” Kant argues that “to allow a right of resistance to this sovereignty, and to limit its power, is a contradiction.” It should be remembered also that for Kant the only legitimate form of government is a republic, resting on the foundation of popular sovereignty. Kant is not considering resistance to tyrannical or despotic power which lacks all juridical authority.
A similar qualification appears in Hegel’s distinction between the rebellion of a conquered people and revolution in a well-organized state. Only the latter action is a crime, for only the latter situation corresponds to the Idea of the state—fully realized, for Hegel, only in a constitutional monarchy, never in a despotism or tyranny. “A rebellion in a province conquered by war,” he says, “is a different thing from a rising in a well-organized state. It is not against their prince that the conquered are in rebellion, and they are committing no crime against the state, because their connexion with their master is not a connexion within the Idea, or one within the inner necessity of the constitution. In such a case, there is only a contract, no political tie.”
With such qualifications on their position, those who disfavor revolution or deny its basis in right may not be completely opposed to those who apparently think rebellions can be justified. There may be qualifications on the other side too. Aquinas, for example, justifies sedition, not against any government or ruler, but only against tyranny. The signers of the Declaration of Independence speak of a right to alter or abolish “any form of government,” but the writers of the Federalist papers do not seem equally willing to acknowledge a right to overthrow the Constitution of the United States.
OUTLINE OF TOPICS
- The nature of revolution 1a. The issue concerning violent and peaceful means for accomplishing social, political, or economic change 1b. The definition of treason or sedition: the revolutionist as a treasonable conspirator 1c. Revolution and counter-revolution: civil strife distinguished from war between states
- The nature of political revolutions 2a. Change in the form of government or constitution 2b. Change in the persons holding power: deposition, assassination, usurpation 2c. Change in the extent of the state or empire: dissolution, secession, liberation, federation
- The process of political revolution 3a. The aims of political revolution: the seizure of power; the attainment of liberty, justice, equality 3b. Ways of retaining power and combatting revolution 3c. The causes and effects of revolution under different forms of government (1) Revolution in monarchies (2) Revolutions in republics: aristocracies, oligarchies, and democracies (3) Rebellion against tyranny and despotism
- The nature of economic revolutions 4a. Change in the condition of the oppressed or exploited: the emancipation of slaves, serfs, proletariat 4b. Change in the economic order: modification or overthrow of a system of production and distribution
- The strategy of economic revolution 5a. Revolution as an expression of the class struggle: rich and poor, nobles and commons, owners and workers 5b. The organization of a revolutionary class: the bourgeoisie and the proletariat as revolutionary classes in relation to different economic systems 5c. The classless society as the goal of economic revolution: the transformation of the state
- The justice of revolution 6a. The right of rebellion: the circumstances justifying civil disobedience or violent insurrection 6b. The right to abrogate the social contract or to secede from a federation
- Empire and revolution: the justification of colonial rebellion and the defense of imperialism
REFERENCES
To find the passages cited, use the numbers in heavy type, which are the volume and page numbers of the passages referred to. For example, in 4 Homer: Iliad, BK II [265-283] 12d, the number 4 is the number of the volume in the set; the number 12d indicates that the passage is in section d of page 12.
Page Sections: When the text is printed in one column, the letters a and b refer to the upper and lower halves of the page. For example, in 53 James: Psychology, 116a-119b, the passage begins in the upper half of page 116 and ends in the lower half of page 119. When the text is printed in two columns, the letters a and b refer to the upper and lower halves of the left-hand side of the page, the letters c and d to the upper and lower halves of the right-hand side of the page. For example, in 7 PLATO: Symposium, 163b-164c, the passage begins in the lower half of the left-hand side of page 163 and ends in the upper half of the right-hand side of page 164.
Author’s Divisions: One or more of the main divisions of a work (such as PART, BK, CH, SECT) are sometimes included in the reference; line numbers, in brackets, are given in certain cases; e.g., Iliad, BK II [265-283] 12d.
Bible References: The references are to book, chapter, and verse. When the King James and Douay versions differ in title of books or in the numbering of chapters or verses, the King James version is cited first and the Douay, indicated by a (D), follows; e.g., OLD TESTAMENT: Nehemiah, 7:45—(D) II Esdras, 7:46.
Symbols: The abbreviation “esp” calls the reader’s attention to one or more especially relevant parts of a whole reference; “passim” signifies that the topic is discussed intermittently rather than continuously in the work or passage cited.
For additional information concerning the style of the references, see the Explanation of Reference Style; for general guidance in the use of The Great Ideas, consult the Preface.
1. The nature of revolution
1a. The issue concerning violent and peaceful means for accomplishing social, political, or economic change
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War, BK III, 436c-438b
- 7 PLATO: Apology 200a-212a,c esp 203c / Crito, 216d-219a,c / Statesman, 600d-601c / Seventh Letter, 804a-b
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK II, CH 10 [1272a2-16] 468d-469a; BK IV, CH 5 [1292b11-22] 492a; BK V, CH 3 [1303a14-24] 504c-d; CH 4 [1304b8-17] 506b
- 14 PLUTARCH: Lycurgus, 34b-d / Lysander-Sulla, 387b,d-388a / Cleomenes, 660b-661a / Tiberius Gracchus, 674c-681a,c
- 20 AQUINAS: Summa Theologica, PART I-II, Q 97, AA 1-2 236a-237b
- 21 DANTE: Divine Comedy, HELL, XXVIII 41b-43a
- 23 MACHIAVELLI: Prince, CH VI, 9b-c
- 23 HOBBES: Leviathan, PART II, 154b-c
- 25 MONTAIGNE: Essays, 47a-51a; 318c-319b; 462c-465c
- 30 BACON: Novum Organum, BK I, APH 90 124d-125a
- 31 DESCARTES: Discourse, PART II, 45b-46a
- 35 LOCKE: Civil Government, CH XVIII, SECT 203-210 72a-73c; CH XIX, SECT 225-239 77a-81b
- 38 ROUSSEAU: Inequality, 361c-362a
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 292b-d
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 575a-576a
- 42 KANT: Science of Right, 439a-441d esp 441b-c; 450d-451a; 457d-458a,c
- 43 DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE: [1-25] 1b; [96-108] 3a
- 43 CONSTITUTION OF THE U.S.: ARTICLE V 16c
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 1, 29a-b; NUMBER 21, 78d-79b
- 43 MILL: Representative Government, 344a-c
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of Right, ADDITIONS, 176 147c-d / Philosophy of History, PART II, 280b-281b; PART III, 307b-308a; PART IV, 321d-322a; 364a-c
- 50 MARX-ENGELS: Communist Manifesto, 416b-d; 432b-434d
- 51 TOLSTOY: War and Peace, BK VI, 244d-245c; EPILOGUE I, 668a-669d
- 52 DOSTOEVSKY: Brothers Karamazov, BK VI, 165c
- 54 FREUD: New Introductory Lectures, 870a-871a; 883d-884c
1b. The definition of treason or sedition: the revolutionist as a treasonable conspirator
- 6 HERODOTUS: History, BK VI, 186a-d
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War, BK I, 381a-384a; BK VI, 519c-520d; 525b-d; 532d-534c; BK VIII, 574d-576c; 579d-581c
- 7 PLATO: Republic, BK V, 367c-d
- 14 PLUTARCH: Solon, 71d / Poplicola, 81d / Alcibiades 155b,d-174d / Alcibiades-Coriolanus 193a-195a,c / Cicero, 708a-713a / Marcus Brutus 802b,d-824a,c
- 18 AUGUSTINE: City of God, BK XIX, CH 12, 517c-d
- 20 AQUINAS: Summa Theologica, PART II-II, Q 42 583c-584d
- 21 DANTE: Divine Comedy, HELL, XXXIV [28-69] 51c-52a
- 23 HOBBES: Leviathan, PART I, 77c; PART II, 121d-122b; 146a-b; 147c; 153c
- 26 SHAKESPEARE: 2nd Henry VI, ACT II, SC III [170-227] 39b-40a; ACT III, SC III [86-108] 45c-d; ACT III, SC I [1-281] 47a-50a; ACT IV, SC I [129-200] 59a-d / Richard II, ACT III, SC III [140-171] 334b-c; ACT IV, SC I [113-149] 342c-343a / 1st Henry IV, ACT V, SC I [1-25] 462b-c; SC V 466a-d / 2nd Henry IV, ACT I, SC I [187-209] 470a-b / Henry V, ACT II, PROLOGUE [19-31] 537c; SC II [79-181] 540a-541a / Julius Caesar 568a-596a,c esp ACT I, SC III [101-130] 573c-d, ACT II, SC I [10-34] 574c-d, [162-183] 576b, ACT III, SC I [164-176] 582b
- 35 LOCKE: Toleration, 14d / Civil Government, CH XIX, SECT 226-229 77a-78a
- 36 SWIFT: Gulliver, PART I, 33a-38a; PART III, 114b-115b
- 38 MONTESQUIEU: Spirit of Laws, BK XII, 88a-90c
- 38 ROUSSEAU: Social Contract, BK II, 398d
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 251d; 474c-475a; 525d-526b
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 93c; 473b-d; 587b-588a
- 42 KANT: Science of Right, 439a-441d; 450d-451a
- 43 CONSTITUTION OF THE U.S.: ARTICLE III, SECT 3 15d-16a; AMENDMENTS, XIV, SECT 2-4 18d-19a
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 43, 140c-d; NUMBER 69, 208c-d; NUMBER 74, 222b-d
- 43 MILL: Liberty, 274b,d [fn 1]
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of Right, ADDITIONS, 172 146c-d
- 47 GOETHE: Faust, PART II [4812-4830] 119b-120a; [10242-10284] 249b-250b
- 51 TOLSTOY: War and Peace, BK VII, 338c-d; BK XI, 483b-484a; 505a-511b; EPILOGUE I, 668a-669d
1c. Revolution and counter-revolution: civil strife distinguished from war between states
- 6 HERODOTUS: History, BK III, 102d-107c; BK V, 172c-174b; BK VIII, 260b-c
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War, BK I, 355a-b; BK III, 434c-438c; BK IV, 459a-c; 463a-465c; BK V, 482d-483a; BK VIII, 575c-576c; 577b-d; 579c-583c; 585d-586b; 587a-589a; 590a-c
- 7 PLATO: Laws, BK I, 641c-643a / Seventh Letter, 806d-807b
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK V, CH 4 [1304b18-39] 505d-506a / Athenian Constitution, CH 14-19 558d-561d; CH 29-41 566b-572a
- 14 PLUTARCH: Pompey, 533a-c / Caesar, 598b-d / Otho, 875b-d
- 15 TACITUS: Histories, BK III, 261d-262a
- 18 AUGUSTINE: City of God, BK XIX, CH 7 515a-c
- 20 AQUINAS: Summa Theologica, PART II-II, Q 42, A 1, ANS 583c-584b
- 23 MACHIAVELLI: Prince, CH XIX, 26b-d; CH XX, 31b-c
- 23 HOBBES: Leviathan, PART I, 85d-86a; PART II, 99d-100a; 114b-c; 147c
- 24 RABELAIS: Gargantua and Pantagruel, BK I, 54a-c
- 25 MONTAIGNE: Essays, 331a; 470a-b; 504c-506a
- 26 SHAKESPEARE: 1st Henry VI, ACT II, SC IV-ACT III, SC I 11b-16b; ACT IV, SC I [182-194] 21d / 2nd Henry VI 33a-68d esp ACT I, SC I [180-259] 35c-36b / 3rd Henry VI 69a-104d esp ACT I, SC I 69a-72d / Richard III 105a-148a,c esp ACT V, SC V [16-41] 148a,c / 1st Henry IV, ACT I, SC I 434b,d-435c / Julius Caesar, ACT III, SC I [253-275] 583b
- 35 LOCKE: Civil Government, CH XIII, SECT 155 60d-61a; CH XIX, SECT 224-243 76d-81d esp SECT 224-230 76d-78c
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 48d-49a; 113b; 437d
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 474a; 594b-595b
- 43 DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE: 1a-3b esp [80-94] 2b-3a
- 43 CONSTITUTION OF THE U.S.: ARTICLE IV, SECT 4 16b-c
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 16 66c-68d; NUMBER 28 96c-98b; NUMBER 29, 99b-101a; NUMBER 43, 141a-142d; NUMBER 46, 152a-153a
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of History, PART III, 297a-d
- 50 MARX-ENGELS: Communist Manifesto, 424d; 428a-b
2. The nature of political revolutions
2a. Change in the form of government or constitution
- OLD TESTAMENT: I Samuel, 8—(D) I Kings, 8
- 6 HERODOTUS: History, BK I, 14a-c; BK III, 107c-108d; BK V, 167a-b; 171c-172c; 177d-180a; BK VI, 193b-c
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War, BK III, 391c-d; BK VIII, 575c-576c; 577b-d; 579c-583c; 585d-586b; 587a-589a; 590a-c
- 7 PLATO: Republic, BK VIII, 401c-d; BK VIII, 403a-404a; 405c-406a; 408b-409b; 411d-414b / Seventh Letter, 800b
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK II, CH 12 [1273b36-1274a22] 470c-d; BK III, CH 3 [1276a35-b16] 473b-c; BK IV, CH 5 [1292b11-22] 492a; BK V, CH 1 [1301b4-26] 502d-503a; CH 3 [1303a14-24] 504c-d; CH 4 [1304b8-18] 506b; CH 12 [1316a1-27] 518d-519d / Athenian Constitution, CH 1-41 553a-572a passim, esp CH 5 554d-555a, CH 14-19 558d-561d, CH 29 566b-d, CH 33-34 568b-569a, CH 38 570a-c
- 14 PLUTARCH: Lycurgus, 32d-35d / Solon, 68d-71d / Timoleon 195a-213d esp 205d-207a / Lysander 354b,d-368a,c esp 359c-361a / Pompey 499a-538a,c / Caesar 577a-604d / Cato the Younger 620a-648a,c / Cleomenes, 657a-663c / Dion 781b,d-802a,c
- 15 TACITUS: Annals, BK I, 1a-2a; 3a-b; 6a-b
- 23 MACHIAVELLI: Prince, CH XXVI 36b-37d
- 23 HOBBES: Leviathan, PART II, 150b-151a; 154b-c
- 25 MONTAIGNE: Essays, 47a-51a; 462c-465c; 504c-506a
- 35 LOCKE: Civil Government, CH XIII, SECT 149 59b-d; SECT 155 60d-61a; CH XIX 73d-81d passim
- 38 MONTESQUIEU: Spirit of Laws, BK VIII, 51a-53d; BK XI, 76c-78a
- 38 ROUSSEAU: Social Contract, BK III, 418a-420a; 424a-d
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 24b,d-28b; 50b-51d; 153c-156a; 622d-623c
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 73b-74d; 202a-d; 217a-219a; 561c-565a; 574b-582c esp 575a-577d
- 42 KANT: Science of Right, 438d-441d; 450d-452a
- 43 DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE: [1-25] 1a-b
- 43 CONSTITUTION OF THE U.S.: ARTICLE IV, SECT 4 16b-c
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 14, 62a-d; NUMBER 21, 78d-79b; NUMBER 43, 141a-142d; 143b-144a; NUMBER 49-50 159b-162c
- 43 MILL: Liberty, 267d-268b / Representative Government, 327b,d-332d; 350c-353b
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of Right, PART III, par 258, 81a-b; ADDITIONS, 166 145b-c / Philosophy of History, INTRO, 203b-206a,c; PART III, 294c-295a; 300c-301c; PART IV, 355d-357a; 364a-c
- 50 MARX-ENGELS: Communist Manifesto, 424c-d
- 51 TOLSTOY: War and Peace, BK VI, 238c-243d; 260a-262a; EPILOGUE I, 668a-669d
2b. Change in the persons holding power: deposition, assassination, usurpation
- OLD TESTAMENT: Judges, 9 / II Samuel, 15-18—(D) II Kings, 15-18 / I Kings, 12:1-25; 16:8-20—(D) III Kings, 12:1-25; 16:8-20 / II Kings, 8:7-15; 9:1-10:11; 11:1-16; 12:19-21; 14:17-21; 15:8-10,13-14,23-26,30; 21:18-26—(D) IV Kings, 8:7-15; 9:1-10:11; 11:1-16; 12:19-21; 14:17-21; 15:8-10,13-14,23-26,30; 21:18-26 / II Chronicles, 10; 23—(D) II Paralipomenon, 10; 23
- 5 AESCHYLUS: Prometheus Bound [199-243] 42b-c
- 5 ARISTOPHANES: Ecclesiazusae 615a-628d esp [1-570] 615a-621b
- 6 HERODOTUS: History, BK I, 2c-3d; 12b-13b; BK II, 84a-86a; BK III, 120b-c; BK V, 164d-165a; 171c-172c; 177d-180a; 182a
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War, BK VI, 523c-524d
- 7 PLATO: Seventh Letter, 813d-814c
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK II, CH 10 [1272b2-10] 468d-469a; BK V, CH 1 [1301b4-13] 502d; CH 10 [1311a28-1312a39] 513c-514d; BK VII, CH 14 [1333b28-38] 538c-d
- 14 PLUTARCH: Poplicola, 77a-81c / Caius Marius, 344c-354a,c / Sulla, 369a-374a; 382a-387a,c / Crassus, 440a-445d / Sertorius, 469a-470d / Pompey 499a-538a,c / Caesar 577a-604d / Cato the Younger 620a-648a,c / Tiberius Gracchus, 678b-d / Cicero, 708a-713b / Antony, 749c-755c / Marcus Brutus 802b,d-824a,c esp 803d-811a / Galba 859a-869d / Otho 869b,d-876d
- 15 TACITUS: Annals, BK XI, 102d-103a; BK XII, 112a-113b; BK XV, 169a-176b / Histories, BK I-III 189a-266a
- 18 AUGUSTINE: City of God, BK III, CH 15-16 176d-178d
- 23 MACHIAVELLI: Prince, CH VIII 12d-14c; CH IX, 15d-16a
- 23 HOBBES: Leviathan, PART I, 78b; PART II, 152b-c; 159a-c
- 26 SHAKESPEARE: 1st Henry VI, ACT II, SC V [33-129] 13b-14a / 2nd Henry VI, ACT I, SC I [151-259] 35b-36b; ACT III, SC II 43c-44c; ACT III, SC I 47a-51a / 3rd Henry VI 69a-104d / Richard III 105a-148a,c / Richard II 320a-351d / 1st Henry IV 434a-466d / 2nd Henry IV 467a-502d esp ACT IV, SC I 487b-489d / Julius Caesar 568a-596a,c esp ACT II, SC I [10-191] 574c-576c, ACT III, SC I 580b-583c
- 27 SHAKESPEARE: Macbeth 284a-310d esp ACT IV, SC III 303b-306b / Tempest, ACT I, SC II [16-148] 525b-526d; ACT II, SC I [270-296] 534c-d; ACT V, SC I [71-79] 545c
- 35 LOCKE: Civil Government, CH XVII 70c-71a; CH XIX 73d-81d passim
- 36 SWIFT: Gulliver, PART III, 80b
- 38 ROUSSEAU: Inequality, 361c-362a / Social Contract, BK III, 419a-c; 424a-d; BK IV, 432c-433a; 438a-b
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 33d-49a passim, esp 39c-d, 41d-42a,c, 44b-c; 56a-61a esp 56b-c, 60c-61a; 63b-64a; 69a-79a passim, esp 69a-b, 70a-c, 76a, 78c; 111b-113a; 114b,d-115b; 128a,c; 159b,d-178d passim; 386a-387d; 436a-438a; 489d-491a; 515b-518a
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 113c-117b; 161a-194d passim, esp 166a-167d, 189a-194d; 428a; 472b-476b
- 42 KANT: Science of Right, 440a-441b
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 16, 68a-c; NUMBER 20, 77b-c; NUMBER 21, 78d-79b; NUMBER 26, 93c-94d; NUMBER 28 96c-98b; NUMBER 29, 99b-101a; NUMBER 33, 108b-109a; NUMBER 38, 124b-125a; NUMBER 44, 146c-d; NUMBER 46, 152a-153a; NUMBER 48, 157b-c
- 43 MILL: Liberty, 268d; 274b,d [fn 1]
- 44 BOSWELL: Johnson, 195c-d
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of History, PART III, 294c-295a; 300c-301c; PART IV, 359a
- 51 TOLSTOY: War and Peace, BK I, 8d-9a
2c. Change in the extent of the state or empire: dissolution, secession, liberation, federation
- OLD TESTAMENT: Judges, 3:14-4:24; 6; 10:1-11:33; 13:1-5,24-25; 14-16 / II Chronicles, 10-11—(D) II Paralipomenon, 10-11 / Jeremiah, 41—(D) Jeremias, 41
- APOCRYPHA: I Maccabees, 1-9 passim—(D) OT, I Machabees, 1-9 passim / II Maccabees, 6-13 passim—(D) OT, II Machabees, 6-13 passim
- 6 HERODOTUS: History, BK III, 121c-123c; BK V 160a-185a,c passim; BK VI, 186a-191c
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War 349a-593a,c
- 14 PLUTARCH: Theseus, 9a-d / Romulus, 20c-28a / Agesilaus 480b,d-499a,c
- 15 TACITUS: Annals, BK I, 17c-d; 18c-20b; BK III, 54d-56b; BK IV, 76a-77c; 82d-83b; BK XI, 116d-117d; BK XIV, 149a-151b / Histories, BK IV, 269b-277d esp 269d-270b; 283b-292b; BK V, 297a-302a
- 23 MACHIAVELLI: Prince, CH XXVI 36b-37d
- 23 HOBBES: Leviathan, PART II, 152d-153a
- 35 LOCKE: Civil Government, CH VIII, SECT 113-118 51b-52c; CH XIX, SECT 211 73d-74a
- 38 MONTESQUIEU: Spirit of Laws, BK VIII, 57b-c; BK IX, 59b
- 38 ROUSSEAU: Social Contract, BK III, 403a-404a
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 144d-146a; 521a-b
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 218c-219a; 439d-451c passim; 465a-466a; 577b-c
- 43 DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE: 1a-3b
- 43 ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION: 5a-9d esp XI 9a
- 43 CONSTITUTION OF THE U.S.: ARTICLE IV, SECT 3 16b; AMENDMENTS, XIV, SECT 2-4 18d-19a
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 15-16 62d-68d; NUMBER 58, 181d-182a
- 43 MILL: Representative Government, 428b-430a
3. The process of political revolution
3a. The aims of political revolution: the seizure of power; the attainment of liberty, justice, equality
- 5 ARISTOPHANES: Lysistrata [476-597] 588d-591a / Ecclesiazusae [173-240] 617a-c
- 6 HERODOTUS: History, BK I, 29d-30c; BK V, 175b
- 7 PLATO: Seventh Letter, 800d; 813d-814c
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK II, CH 7 461d-463c esp [1266a31-b14] 461d-462b; CH 10 [1272a28-b16] 468c-469a; BK V, CH 1-4 502a-506b; CH 12 [1316a1-27] 518d-519d / Athenian Constitution, CH 2 553a-c; CH 5 554d-555a
- 14 PLUTARCH: Timoleon 195a-213d esp 205d-207a / Pelopidas, 233d-237b / Agis 648b,d-656d / Cleomenes, 657a-663c / Tiberius Gracchus 671b,d-681a,c esp 678b-d / Caius Gracchus 681b,d-689a,c / Dion 781b,d-802a,c / Marcus Brutus 802b,d-824a,c esp 811b-d, 813d
- 15 TACITUS: Annals, BK I, 4a-d; 6b-7a; 10d-11b; BK IV, 76a; 82d-83a; BK VI, 89c; BK XI, 104a-c; BK XII, 112a-b; 117c-d; BK XIV, 149a-b; BK XV, 169b; 174b-d / Histories, BK I, 191a-b; 195a-c; 198d-199c; 203b-c; BK II, 215d-216b; 224d-225a; 233d-235c; BK IV, 269c-270b; 290a-c
- 23 MACHIAVELLI: Prince, CH XXVI 36b-37d
- 23 HOBBES: Leviathan, PART II, 114b-115a
- 26 SHAKESPEARE: Julius Caesar 568a-596a,c esp ACT I, SC II [101-130] 573c-d, ACT II, SC I [10-34] 574c-d, [162-183] 576b, ACT III, SC I [164-176] 582b
- 35 LOCKE: Toleration, 18c-21c / Civil Government, CH XIV, SECT 166-168 63d-64c; CH XVII-XIX 71a-81d passim
- 36 SWIFT: Gulliver, PART III, 80b
- 38 MONTESQUIEU: Spirit of Laws, BK V, 29a; BK VIII, 54b-c
- 38 ROUSSEAU: Inequality, 361a-362a / Social Contract, BK II, 402c-d; BK III, 418a-419c
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 29c-d; 35a; 44b-47a esp 44c-45a, 45d-46a; 48d-49a; 73b-c
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 216d-217b; 574b-575d
- 43 DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE: 1a-3b
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 45, 147d-148b
- 43 MILL: Liberty, 267d-268b
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of History, PART III, 299c-301c; PART IV, 364a-c
- 47 GOETHE: Faust, PART II [10242-10284] 249b-250b
- 51 TOLSTOY: War and Peace, BK I, 9d-10b; EPILOGUE I, 666c-669d; EPILOGUE II, 680b-684a
- 52 DOSTOEVSKY: Brothers Karamazov, BK V, 127b-137c passim, esp 131a-c, 133c-134d
3b. Ways of retaining power and combatting revolution
- OLD TESTAMENT: Exodus, 1:7-22
- APOCRYPHA: I Maccabees, 1:41-64; 10:22-46—(D) OT, I Machabees, 1:43-67; 10:22-46
- 5 ARISTOPHANES: Wasps [652-724] 515c-516d
- 6 HERODOTUS: History, BK I, 21b; 35c-36a; BK III, 99a-b; 106a-c; 118b; 123c; BK IV, 148a-b; BK V, 164a-c; 166c-d; 172c-174b; 178a-180a; BK VII, 243b-c
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War, BK III, 425a-428d; BK V, 491b-c
- 7 PLATO: Seventh Letter, 806d-807b; 811b-813d
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK II, CH 7 461d-463c; CH 11 [1273b17-24] 470b; BK III, CH 13 [1284a3-34] 482a-483a; BK V, CH 3 [1302b15-20] 504a; CH 8-9 509d-512d; CH 11 515d-518c; BK VI, CH 5-6 523b-524c
- 14 PLUTARCH: Romulus, 27c-28d / Poplicola, 80d-81c / Camillus, 119a-121a,c / Pericles, 124a-130b / Coriolanus, 176b-184c / Agesilaus, 482a-484a; 489b-c; 495a-b / Pompey, 521a-b / Caesar, 580b / Cato the Younger, 636c-d / Agis 648b,d-656d / Tiberius Gracchus 671b,d-681a,c / Caius Gracchus 681b,d-689a,c / Cicero, 708a-713b / Marcus Brutus, 809b-811a
- 15 TACITUS: Annals, BK I, 2c-3a; 6d-15a; 21b-22b; BK II, 29b-d; 32d-33d; 35c-d; 38c-d; BK III, 58d-59a; BK IV, 68b-69c; 82a-b; BK XIV, 155b-156a; BK XV, 168a-c; 170d-176b / Histories, BK I, 192d-193a; 196d-198c; 200c-201b; 208b-c; 209d-210b; BK II, 222b-c; BK IV, 280c-281a
- 23 MACHIAVELLI: Prince, CH III, 3c-5a; CH V 8a-c; CH VI, 9b-10a; CH VII, 11b-c; CH VIII-X, 14a-16d; CH XV-XX 22b-31c
- 24 RABELAIS: Gargantua and Pantagruel, BK III, 131b,d-133b
- 25 MONTAIGNE: Essays, 51a-55d; 324c-326b esp 326a-b
- 26 SHAKESPEARE: 3rd Henry VI, ACT II, SC VI [1-30] 83b-c; ACT IV, SC VIII 96c-97c / Richard II, ACT III, SC IV [29-66] 340c-d / 2nd Henry IV, ACT IV, SC V [178-225] 496b-d
- 29 CERVANTES: Don Quixote, PART I, 40d
- 30 BACON: Advancement of Learning, 78a-d
- 35 LOCKE: Toleration, 19a-d / Civil Government, CH XIX, SECT 218 75a-b; SECT 226 77a-b
- 36 SWIFT: Gulliver, PART I, 37a-b; PART III, 102b-103a
- 38 ROUSSEAU: Political Economy, 372a-377b / Social Contract, BK III, 424a-d; BK IV, 432b-433a
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 14d-18b; 42b,d-43b; 50b-d; 501d-503a; 522c-523a,c; 525d-526c; 624c
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 216c-d
- 43 CONSTITUTION OF THE U.S.: ARTICLE IV, SECT 4 16b-c
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 10, 49c-51b passim; NUMBER 21, 78d-79b; NUMBER 25, 90a-91d; NUMBER 28 96c-98b; NUMBER 43, 141a-142d; NUMBER 46, 152a-153a; NUMBER 55, 174c-d
- 43 MILL: Representative Government, 366a-c; 425b-426b
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of History, PART I, 226d-227b; PART II, 263b-d; 276d-277a
- 51 TOLSTOY: War and Peace, EPILOGUE I, 668a-669d
3c. The causes and effects of revolution under different forms of government
- OLD TESTAMENT: I Samuel, 7:15-8:5—(D) I Kings, 7:15-8:5
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War, BK III, 427d-428d; 436d-438b
- 7 PLATO: Republic, BK VIII 401d-416a / Seventh Letter, 801b-c
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK II, CH 6 [1265b10-12] 461a; CH 7 [1266a37-1267a16] 462a-d; BK IV, CH 11 [1295b35-1296a12] 496a-b; BK V 502a-519d
- 15 TACITUS: Histories, BK II, 224d-225a; BK III, 261b-262a; BK IV, 266b-c
- 23 HOBBES: Leviathan, PART I, 77a; 78c-d: 82b-d; PART II, 102d-103a; 103c-104d; 112b-d; 114d-115a; 116c-d; 121a-122b; 148c-153a; 159a-c; PART III, 240a-b; PART IV, 273a-c
- 27 SHAKESPEARE: Troilus and Cressida, ACT I, SC III [78-138] 109a-c
- 30 BACON: Advancement of Learning, 78a-d
- 36 SWIFT: Gulliver, PART III, 102b-103a
- 38 MONTESQUIEU: Spirit of Laws, BK VIII, 51a-54b; 57b-c; BK XV, 112c-114a
- 38 ROUSSEAU: Inequality, 361a-362a / Social Contract, BK III, 402b-d; 404c-d; BK III, 418a-420a
- 39 SMITH: Wealth of Nations, BK IV, 239a-240b; 262a-d; 269d-271a; BK V, 308b-c
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 48d-49a; 436a-c
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 559c-560d
- 42 KANT: Science of Right, 439a-441d
- 43 DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE: 1a-3b
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 27, 95b-c; 96b; NUMBER 48, 157b-c
- 43 MILL: Liberty, 321b-c
- 44 BOSWELL: Johnson, 195c-d
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of History, PART IV, 364a-c
- 50 MARX-ENGELS: Communist Manifesto, 423b-425b
3c(1) Revolution in monarchies
- 6 HERODOTUS: History, BK I, 21b; 24a-b; BK II, 84a-d; 85b-c; BK III, 107c-108c; 118b; BK IV, 138a-c; 148a
- 7 PLATO: Laws, BK III, 667c-672a esp 667c-d, 670c-672a
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK V, CH 10 [1310a39]-CH 11 [1313b33] 512d-516a
- 14 PLUTARCH: Lycurgus, 35c-d; 47a-48a / Agesilaus, 482a-485b / Demetrius, 732a-c
- 15 TACITUS: Histories, BK I, 190a-191a; 192d-193a; 193c-194a; 195c-198c; 201a-b; 208b-c; 209d-210b; 210d-212d; BK IV, 266b-c
- 18 AUGUSTINE: City of God, BK III, CH 15 176d-178a
- 23 MACHIAVELLI: Prince, CH IV 7a-8a; CH VI, 9b-d; CH VIII-IX, 14a-16a; CH XV-XX 22b-31c
- 23 HOBBES: Leviathan, PART II, 108d-109a; 148d-149b; 150c-151a; 153a-156c; 159a-c; PART IV, 273a-c
- 26 SHAKESPEARE: 1st Henry VI 1a-32a,c esp ACT III, SC IV 11b-12d, ACT IV, SC I [30-113] 20a-21a / 2nd Henry VI 33a-68d esp ACT I, SC I 33b,d-36b / 3rd Henry VI 69a-104d esp ACT I, SC I 69a-72d / Richard III 105a-148a,c esp ACT V, SC V [15-41] 148a,c / Richard II, ACT IV, SC I [107-149] 342c-343a / 1st Henry IV, ACT IV, SC III 459b-460b; ACT V, SC I [30-120] 461b-462a / 2nd Henry IV, ACT IV, SC I 487b-489d
- 35 LOCKE: Civil Government, CH XIV, SECT 166-168 63d-64c; CH XVIII-XIX 71a-81d passim
- 36 SWIFT: Gulliver, PART III, 102b-103a
- 38 MONTESQUIEU: Spirit of Laws, BK V, 25d-26c; BK VII, 45c-46a; BK VIII, 53a-54a; 56d-57a; BK XI, 77b-78a; BK XXV, 212a-b
- 38 ROUSSEAU: Social Contract, BK III, 419b-c
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 68b,d-69a
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 48, 157b-c
- 43 MILL: Liberty, 267d-268b
- 44 BOSWELL: Johnson, 120a-c
- 51 TOLSTOY: War and Peace, BK VI, 238c-243d; 260a-262a; EPILOGUE I, 668a-669d
3c(2) Revolutions in republics: aristocracies, oligarchies, and democracies
- 6 HERODOTUS: History, BK VI, 202d-203b
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War, BK III, 434c-438c esp 436d-438b; BK IV, 459a-c; 463a-465c; 466a-469b; BK V, 482d-483a; 502d-504b esp 503d-504b; BK VI, 519c-520d; 533a-c; BK VIII, 574d-590c esp 575c-576c, 577b-d, 579c-583c, 585d-586b, 587a-589a, 590a-c
- 7 PLATO: Republic, BK VIII, 402a-413d / Laws, BK IX, 744c-d / Seventh Letter, 806d-807b
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK II, CH 9 [1270b7-34] 466d-467a; CH 11 [1273b17-24] 470b; CH 12 [1273b36-1274a22] 470c-d; BK III, CH 13 [1284a3-34] 482a-483a; CH 15 [1286b12-16] 485a; BK IV, CH 5 [1292b11-22] 492a; BK V, CH 1 [1302a8-16] 503b; CH 3 [1302b21-1303a24] 504a-d; [1303b5-18] 505a; CH 4 [1304a18-29] 505d-506a; CH 5-9 506b-512d; CH 12 [1316a19-b27] 519a-d; BK VI, CH 5-6 523b-524c / Athenian Constitution, CH 1-41 553a-572a passim, esp CH 5 554d-555a, CH 29 566b-d, CH 33-34 568b-569a, CH 38 570a-c
- 14 PLUTARCH: Theseus, 13a-14c / Lycurgus, 35c-d; 47a-48a / Lycurgus-Numa 61b,d-64a,c / Solon, 68d-70d; 75c-76d / Themistocles, 96b-c / Camillus, 117c-121a,c / Coriolanus, 176b-184c / Lysander, 361a-368a,c / Crassus, 444d-445d / Pompey, 521c-d; 525a-b; 533a-c / Caesar, 581d-582a; 588c-589a; 590d-591a / Cato the Younger, 631b-c; 636c-d / Agis 648b,d-656d / Cleomenes, 657a-663c / Tiberius Gracchus 671b,d-681a,c esp 680b-d / Caius Gracchus 681b,d-689a,c / Cicero, 708a-b / Antony, 750a-b
- 15 TACITUS: Annals, BK I, 1a-2a; 3a-b; BK VI, 97b-c / Histories, BK II, 224d-225a
- 23 HOBBES: Leviathan, PART II, 105c-106b; 149a-b; 152c
- 38 MONTESQUIEU: Spirit of Laws, BK II, 6c-7b; BK III, 10c-11a; BK V, 21d-22b; 23a-25a; BK VII, 44d-45b; BK VIII, 51a-53a; BK X, 64a-b; BK XII, 91c-92b; BK XV, 114c-115b
- 38 ROUSSEAU: Social Contract, BK III, 411b-c; 418c-419b
- 39 SMITH: Wealth of Nations, BK V, 308b-c; 420b-c
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 1, 30b; NUMBER 9-10 47a-53a; NUMBER 15-16 62d-68d; NUMBER 17-20, 70a-78b; NUMBER 21, 78d-79b; NUMBER 25, 90a-91d; NUMBER 27, 95b-c; NUMBER 29, 99b-101a; NUMBER 38, 124b-125a; NUMBER 43, 141a-142d; NUMBER 46, 152a-153a; NUMBER 48, 157b-c; NUMBER 58, 181b-182a; NUMBER 60, 184b-d; NUMBER 63, 194b-195b
- 43 MILL: Representative Government, 329b-330c; 350c-351d; 366a-367b
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of History, PART II, 276d-277a; 278d-279b; PART III, 300a-301c; PART IV, 355d-357a; 364a-c
- 50 MARX-ENGELS: Communist Manifesto, 423d-424b; 429c-430b; 432b-d
3c(3) Rebellion against tyranny and despotism
- OLD TESTAMENT: I Kings, 12:1-25—(D) III Kings, 12:1-25 / II Chronicles, 10—(D) II Paralipomenon, 10
- APOCRYPHA: I Maccabees, 1:1-2:44—(D) OT, I Machabees, 1:1-2:44 / II Maccabees, 6:1-11; 8:1-4—(D) OT, II Machabees, 6:1-11; 8:1-4
- 6 HERODOTUS: History, BK I, 21b; 24a-b; BK IV, 148a; BK V, 170c-172c; 178a-180a; BK VI, 187b-c
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War, BK VI, 523c-524c
- 7 PLATO: Republic, BK VIII-IX, 411d-420d
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK V, CH 4 [1304b30-38] 506a; CH 10 [1310a39]-CH 12 [1315b39] 512d-518d; CH 12 [1316a25-35] 519b / Athenian Constitution, CH 14-19 558d-561d
- 14 PLUTARCH: Galba, 859a-c
- 15 TACITUS: Annals, BK I, 1a-4d; BK IV, 82a-b; BK XI, 102d-103a; BK XII, 112a-b; BK XV, 169a-176b / Histories, BK I, 200d; 202c-205a; BK II, 234b-235a
- 23 HOBBES: Leviathan, PART II, 150c-151a; PART IV, 273a-b; CONCLUSION, 280d
- 26 SHAKESPEARE: Richard III, ACT V, SC III [237-270] 146b-c / Julius Caesar 568a-596a,c esp ACT I, SC II [25-177] 569c-571a, [215-326] 571c-572c
- 27 SHAKESPEARE: Macbeth, ACT IV, SC III [1-49] 303b-304a
- 35 LOCKE: Civil Government, CH XIV, SECT 166-168 63d-64c; CH XVIII-XIX 71a-81d passim
- 38 MONTESQUIEU: Spirit of Laws, BK V, 25d-26c; 28b-29a; BK VIII, 54a-b; BK XIX, 137c-d; BK XXV, 212a-b; 214a,c
- 38 ROUSSEAU: Inequality, 361c-362a / Social Contract, BK II, 404c-d; BK III, 417b-c; 419b-c
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 29b-31a esp 29c-30a; 35c-39d; 42b,d-44c; 49a; 50b-51d; 56a-59a; 63a-64d; 68c; 71b-76b; 126d-127c; 246a; 652d-655c
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 113d-115a; 166a-167d; 464a-466b
- 43 DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE: 1a-3b
- 43 MILL: Liberty, 274b,d [fn 1] / Representative Government, 343b-344d
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of History, PART I, 230a-c
4. The nature of economic revolutions
4a. Change in the condition of the oppressed or exploited: the emancipation of slaves, serfs, proletariat
- OLD TESTAMENT: Exodus, 1-14 / Deuteronomy, 26:5-9 / Jeremiah, 34:8-17—(D) Jeremias, 34:8-17
- 6 HERODOTUS: History, BK IV, 124a-d
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War, BK III, 435b; BK IV, 467a-b; BK V, 482d-483a; 491b-c
- 7 PLATO: Laws, BK VI, 709d
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK II, CH 9 [1269a37-b7] 465c; CH 10 [1272b17-19] 469a; CH 12 [1273b36-1274a22] 470c-d; BK V, CH 11 [1315a32-39] 518b / Athenian Constitution, CH 2 553a-c; CH 5-6 554d-555c
- 14 PLUTARCH: Lycurgus, 36a-37c / Solon, 68d-70c / Agis 648b,d-656d / Cleomenes 657a-671d / Tiberius Gracchus 671b,d-681a,c / Caius Gracchus, 681b,d-689a,c
- 15 TACITUS: Annals, BK IV, 70c-d; BK XIII, 132a-c; 133c; BK XIV, 151d-152b
- 27 SHAKESPEARE: Coriolanus, ACT I, SC I [1-167] 351a-353a
- 38 MONTESQUIEU: Spirit of Laws, BK XV, 112c-113a; 114c-115b
- 39 SMITH: Wealth of Nations, BK III, 165b-175b
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 16d-17b; 144a-d; 505c; 509a; 628d
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 82a-b; 452c-453a,c
- 43 CONSTITUTION OF THE U.S.: ARTICLE I, SECT 9 [260-266] 13d; ARTICLE IV, SECT 2 [529-535] 16b; AMENDMENTS, XIII, SECT I-XIV, SECT I 18c-d
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 42, 137b-c
- 43 MILL: Representative Government, 332c; 339d-340c; 351d-352b
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of History, PART II, 276d-277a; PART III, 295d-296c; 307b-308a
- 50 MARX: Capital, 7b-d; 79d-80b [fn 4]; 131a-146c esp 131a, 134d, 137a, 138b-c, 141c, 146b-c; 231b-248d passim, esp 242d-244a, 248c-d; 295a-d; 364a-368b esp 367b-368b
- 50 MARX-ENGELS: Communist Manifesto, 415a-417a,c esp 416b-d; 419b,d; 422c-425b esp 423c-d, 424b-425a; 426b-c; 428d-429c
- 51 TOLSTOY: War and Peace, BK V, 211a-213a; 216c-d; BK VI, 235a
- 52 DOSTOEVSKY: Brothers Karamazov, BK VI, 165b-c
- 54 FREUD: Civilization and Its Discontents, 787d-788a / New Introductory Lectures, 883d-884c
4b. Change in the economic order: modification or overthrow of a system of production and distribution
- 5 ARISTOPHANES: Ecclesiazusae 615a-628d esp [553-729] 621b-623c / Plutus 629a-642d esp [415-618] 633d-636d
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War, BK I, 349b-d; 350d-351a; 352c
- 7 PLATO: Republic, BK II, 316c-319a; BK VIII, 404a; 405d-408a
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK I, CH 4 [1253b33-39] 447b-c; BK II, CH 5 458a-460a; CH 6 [1265a28-b25] 460c-461a; CH 7 461d-463c; BK III, CH 10 [1281a11-28] 478d-479a
- 14 PLUTARCH: Lycurgus, 36a-d
- 36 SWIFT: Gulliver, PART III, 104b-106b
- 39 SMITH: Wealth of Nations, BK I, 27b-37b; BK III, 165b-175b; 178d-179a
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 452c-453a,c
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 41, 135a-c
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of History, PART IV, 335a-336c
- 50 MARX: Capital, 80b-81a; 153b-d; 157a-188c esp 163a-c, 164a-165b, 176a-180d, 183b-184b, 187a-c; 205a-250c esp 218d-219a, 221c-223c, 226d-227d, 240c-241a; 290a-c; 308d-311b; 351a-c; 354a-378d esp 354a-355d, 377c-378d
- 50 MARX-ENGELS: Communist Manifesto, 416c-d; 419d-422c; 425c-427b; 428d-429c
- 54 FREUD: Civilization and Its Discontents, 787d-788a
5. The strategy of economic revolution
- 50 MARX-ENGELS: Communist Manifesto, 415c-416c; 417a,c; 425b-c; 428d-429b; 434a-d
5a. Revolution as an expression of the class struggle: rich and poor, nobles and commons, owners and workers
- 6 HERODOTUS: History, BK VI, 202c-203b; BK VII, 243b-c
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War, BK III, 423a-b; 434c-438c; BK IV, 463a-465c; BK V, 482d-483a; 503d-504b; BK VI, 524d-525d; BK VIII 564a-593a,c passim, esp 568d-569a, 575c-576c, 579c-583c, 587a-590c
- 7 PLATO: Republic, BK IV, 343d
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK II, CH 6 [1265b6-12] 461a; CH 7 461d-463c; CH 9 [1269a37-b7] 465c; BK V, CH 3 [1303a5-8] 505a; CH 4 [1304a18-b6] 505d-506a; CH 7 [1306a22-1307a2] 508c-d; CH 9 [1310a19-25] 512c; CH 10 [1310b9-15] 512d-513a; CH 12 [1316a39-b22] 519c-d / Athenian Constitution, CH 2 553a-c; CH 5 554d-555a
- 14 PLUTARCH: Solon, 68d-70c/ Pericles, 124a-130b esp 126d-127a / Coriolanus, 176b-184c / Agis 648b,d-656d / Cleomenes, 657a-663c / Tiberius Gracchus 671b,d-681a,c / Caius Gracchus 681b,d-689a,c / Cicero, 708a-713b
- 15 TACITUS: Histories, BK II, 224d-225a
- 26 SHAKESPEARE: 2nd Henry VI, ACT IV, SC II 57d-59d
- 27 SHAKESPEARE: Coriolanus, ACT I, SC I [1-47] 351a-d
- 38 MONTESQUIEU: Spirit of Laws, BK XI, 77b-79b
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 126d-127c; 144a-c
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 574b-582b passim, esp 575a-d, 578c-581a
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of History, PART II, 263b-d; 275b-276a; PART III, 295d-296c
- 50 MARX: Capital, 8d-9c; 113c; 131a-146c esp 131a, 134d, 137a, 138b-c, 141c, 146b-c; 209c-210c; 294b-295a
- 50 MARX-ENGELS: Communist Manifesto 415a-434d
- 51 TOLSTOY: War and Peace, BK X, 410c-421c
- 54 FREUD: New Introductory Lectures, 884a
5b. The organization of a revolutionary class: the bourgeoisie and the proletariat as revolutionary classes in relation to different economic systems
- 50 MARX: Capital, 9c; 354a-378d esp 356c-358a, 371d-372b, 378c, 378d-379b [fn 2]
- 50 MARX-ENGELS: Communist Manifesto, 416c-d; 419b,d-425b esp 419d-420c, 421d-422a, 422c, 423b-424b; 428d
5c. The classless society as the goal of economic revolution: the transformation of the state
- 50 MARX: Capital, 9c
- 50 MARX-ENGELS: Communist Manifesto, 416c-d; 424d-425b; 429b-c
6. The justice of revolution
6a. The right of rebellion: the circumstances justifying civil disobedience or violent insurrection
- 4 HOMER: Iliad, BK IX [50-64] 57c-d
- 5 SOPHOCLES: Antigone 131a-142d esp [441-470] 134d-135a
- 5 ARISTOPHANES: Lysistrata 583a-599a,c esp [476-597] 588d-591a
- 6 HERODOTUS: History, BK III, 103d-107c
- 7 PLATO: Apology, 210a-b / Crito, 216d-219a,c esp 216d-217d / Seventh Letter, 800c; 804a-b; 812d
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK II, CH 10 [1272a2-16] 468d-469a; BK V, CH 1 [1301a38-b2] 502b-c
- 14 PLUTARCH: Tiberius Gracchus 671b,d-681a,c esp 678b-d
- 15 TACITUS: Annals, BK I, 6b-7a; 10d-11d; BK XV, 174b-d / Histories, BK I, 198d-199c; 212a-b; BK II, 234b-d; BK IV, 290a-c
- 20 AQUINAS: Summa Theologica, PART I-II, Q 96, A 4 233a-d; PART II-II, Q 42, A 2, REP 3 584b-d
- 23 MACHIAVELLI: Prince, CH XXVI 36b-37d
- 23 HOBBES: Leviathan, PART I, 91b-92b passim; PART II, 101a-102c; 104b-d; 112b-c; 115a-116a; 153c; PART IV, 273a-b; CONCLUSION, 279d
- 25 MONTAIGNE: Essays, 47a-51a; 318c-319b; 462c-465c; 504c-506a
- 26 SHAKESPEARE: Richard III, ACT V, SC III [237-270] 146b-c / 1st Henry IV, ACT IV, SC III [52-105] 459d-460b / 2nd Henry IV, ACT I, SC I [187-215] 470a-b; ACT IV, SC I 487b-489d / Julius Caesar, ACT II, SC I [10-191] 574c-576c; ACT III, SC I [78-121] 581b-d
- 27 SHAKESPEARE: Macbeth, ACT IV, SC III 303b-306b
- 35 LOCKE: Toleration, 16d-17c / Civil Government, CH III, SECT 18 29b; CH XIII, SECT 149 59b-d; SECT 155 60d-61a; CH XIV, SECT 168 64b-c; CH XVI, SECT 176 66a-b; SECT 190-192 69b-d; SECT 196 70b-c; CH XVIII-XIX 71a-81d
- 38 MONTESQUIEU: Spirit of Laws, BK VIII, 54b-c
- 38 ROUSSEAU: Inequality, 361a-362a
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 71b-74a esp 73b-c; 144a-c
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 92d; 166a-167d; 473b-d
- 42 KANT: Science of Right, 439a-441d; 457a
- 43 DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE: 1a-3b
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 9, 47a-c; NUMBER 14, 62b-d; NUMBER 21, 78d-79b; NUMBER 26, 92a-94b; NUMBER 28 96c-98b; NUMBER 60, 184b-d
- 43 MILL: Liberty, 267d-268b; 274b,d [fn 1]
- 44 BOSWELL: Johnson, 120a-c; 195c-d; 219d-220a
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of History, PART IV, 342c-d; 364a-c
- 50 MARX-ENGELS: Communist Manifesto, 430a; 432b-c; 434d
- 51 TOLSTOY: War and Peace, BK I, 9d-10b; EPILOGUE I, 668a-669d; EPILOGUE II, 680b-684a
6b. The right to abrogate the social contract or to secede from a federation
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War, BK I, 358d-360c; BK III, 418d-419d
- 7 PLATO: Crito, 216d-219a,c esp 217c-218b / Laws, BK VI, 706b-c
- 23 HOBBES: Leviathan, PART I, 91a-92b; PART II, 101a-102a
- 35 LOCKE: Civil Government, CH VIII, SECT 95-99 46c-47c passim; SECT 113-122 51b-53c passim; CH XIX, SECT 211 73d-74a; SECT 243 81d
- 38 ROUSSEAU: Inequality, 358b-359a / Political Economy, 374a-b / Social Contract, BK III, 419a-b; 424d
- 42 KANT: Science of Right, 449d; 450d-451c
- 43 DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE: 1a-3b
- 43 ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION: XIII 9c
- 43 CONSTITUTION OF THE U.S.: AMENDMENTS, XIV 18d-19b
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 22, 84d-85a; NUMBER 43, 143b-144a; NUMBER 58, 181d-182a
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of Right, ADDITIONS, 172 146c-d
7. Empire and revolution: the justification of colonial rebellion and the defense of imperialism
- 6 HERODOTUS: History, BK I, 23a-31a; BK V-VI 160a-213a,c esp BK VI, 191a-d; BK IX, 307b-308a; 308d-310c
- 6 THUCYDIDES: Peloponnesian War, BK I, 358d-360c; 363a-b; 368a-d; 373d-374a; 378c-380a; BK II, 402d-404a; BK III, 418d-419d; 425a-428d; BK IV, 468a-469b; BK V, 504c-507c esp 505c, 506b-c; BK VI, 514b-d; 530d-531b; BK VIII 564a-593a,c passim
- 9 ARISTOTLE: Politics, BK II, CH 9 [1269a37-b7] 465c; [1271b1-6] 467d; CH 10 [1272b16-22] 469a; CH 11 [1273b17-24] 470b; CH 12 [1274a10-15] 470d; BK III, CH 13 [1284a36-b2] 482c; BK V, CH 3 [1303a25-b3] 504d-505a; CH 4 [1304b18-39] 505d-506a; CH 7 [1307b19-23] 509d; BK VII, CH 2 [1324b2-1325a15] 528c-529a; CH 14 [1333b11-1334a10] 538c-d / Athenian Constitution, CH 27, par 1-2 565a-b
- 14 PLUTARCH: Flamininus 302b,d-313a,c passim
- 15 TACITUS: Annals, BK I, 17c-d; BK IV, 76a; 82d-83a; BK XI, 117c-d; BK XIV, 149a-b / Histories, BK I, 191d-192a; BK IV, 269d-270b; 290a-d; BK V, 301c-d
- 18 AUGUSTINE: City of God, BK III, CH 14 175b-176d; BK IV, CH 3-4 190a-d; CH 15 196c-197a; BK V, CH 12, 216d-218a; BK XIX, CH 21, 524c-d
- 23 HOBBES: Leviathan, PART II, 110b-111a; CONCLUSION, 279d-281a
- 26 SHAKESPEARE: 1st Henry VI 1a-32a,c esp ACT I, SC I 1b,d-3c / 2nd Henry VI 33a-68d esp ACT I, SC I 33b,d-36b, ACT III, SC I [82-92] 47d-48a / 3rd Henry VI 69a-104d esp ACT III, SC II 88a-91b / Henry V 532a-567a,c esp ACT I, SC II 534a-537b, EPILOGUE 567c
- 27 SHAKESPEARE: Cymbeline, ACT III, SC I 463c-464c
- 35 LOCKE: Civil Government, CH XVI, SECT 176 66a-b; SECT 192 69c-d; SECT 196 70b-c; CH XIX, SECT 211 73d-74a
- 36 SWIFT: Gulliver, PART IV, 182b-183a
- 38 MONTESQUIEU: Spirit of Laws, BK X, 62b-63d
- 38 ROUSSEAU: Inequality, 355c-d / Social Contract, BK II, 402d-403a; 403d-404a
- 39 SMITH: Wealth of Nations, BK IV, 255a-279b passim
- 40 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 18a; 21c-23c; 71b-d; 144d-146a; 246a; 255c-d; 420b-422d esp 420b-d; 436c-438a; 449d-451a; 477b,d-491a esp 489d-491a; 521a-523a,c; 608b,d
- 41 GIBBON: Decline and Fall, 51a-54d passim; 216c-217b; 285a-c; 307a-c; 443b-444a; 464a-466b
- 42 KANT: Science of Right, 413d; 454a-455a; 456c-457a
- 43 DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE: 1a-3b
- 43 FEDERALIST: NUMBER 46, 152a-153a
- 43 MILL: Liberty, 272a / Representative Government, 339a-340d; 353c; 433b-442d
- 44 BOSWELL: Johnson, 179c
- 46 HEGEL: Philosophy of Right, ADDITIONS, 172 146c-d / Philosophy of History, PART I, 241d-242b; PART II, 281d-282a; PART III, 299c-301c; PART IV, 324d-326c
- 50 MARX: Capital, 379a-383d passim
- 51 TOLSTOY: War and Peace, BK X, 466b-d; BK XI, 498c-499a
CROSS-REFERENCES
For: The consideration of revolution as civil war, see OPPOSITION 5c; WAR AND PEACE 2a-2c. Other discussions relevant to the process of political change by violent or peaceful means, see CONSTITUTION 7-7a, 8-8b; GOVERNMENT 6; LAW 7d; LIBERTY 6b-6c; MONARCHY 5a-5b; PROGRESS 4a; SLAVERY 6c-6d; STATE 3g; TYRANNY 1c, 6-8. The cause and prevention of revolution under different forms of government, see ARISTOCRACY 3; CONSTITUTION 7, 7b; DEMOCRACY 7a; OLIGARCHY 3a-3b; TYRANNY 8. Other discussions relevant to economic change and to the strategy of economic revolution, see HISTORY 4a(2); LABOR 7c(3); LIBERTY 6b; OPPOSITION 5b; PROGRESS 3b; SLAVERY 3c; STATE 5d(2)-5e; WAR AND PEACE 2c; WEALTH 9h. The general problem of the right of rebellion or the right of secession, see JUSTICE 10b; LAW 6c; LIBERTY 6b; TYRANNY 3; and for the issue concerning anarchy and the condemnation of the rebel as an anarchist, see GOVERNMENT 1a; LIBERTY 1b; TYRANNY 3.
ADDITIONAL READINGS
Listed below are works not included in Great Books of the Western World, but relevant to the idea and topics with which this chapter deals. These works are divided into two groups: I. Works by authors represented in this collection. II. Works by authors not represented in this collection.
For the date, place, and other facts concerning the publication of the works cited, consult the Bibliography of Additional Readings which follows the last chapter of The Great Ideas.
I.
- MACHIAVELLI. The Discourses, BK III, CH 1-8
- —. Florentine History
- F. BACON. “Of Seditions and Troubles,” “Of Factions,” in Essays
- HOBBES. Philosophical Rudiments Concerning Government and Society, CH 12
- —. The Elements of Law, Natural and Politic, PART I, CH 8
- HUME. Of Passive Obedience
- ENGELS. The Peasant War in Germany
- —. Germany: Revolution and Counter-Revolution
- J. S. MILL. “A Few Observations on the French Revolution” in VOL I, “Vindication of the French Revolution of February 1848” in VOL I, Dissertations and Discussions
- —. Thoughts on Parliamentary Reform
- DOSTOEVSKY. The House of the Dead
- —. The Possessed
- MARX and ENGELS. The German Ideology, PART I
- MARX. The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte
- —. The Civil War in France
II.
- POLYBIUS. Histories, VOL I, BK VI
- SALLUST. The War with Catiline
- APPIAN. The Civil Wars
- LUTHER. Address to the German Nobility
- —. Against the Robbing and Murdering Hordes of Peasants
- —. Whether Soldiers, Too, Can Be Saved
- BODIN. The Six Bookes of a Commonweale, BK IV
- SPENSER. The Faerie Queene, BK V
- HOOKER. Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity
- DIGGES. Unlawfulness of Subjects Taking up Arms Against Their Soveraigne
- BENTHAM. A Fragment on Government, CH 1 (22-29)
- PAINE. Common Sense
- GODWIN. An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice, BK IV, CH 2
- BURKE. Reflections on the Revolution in France
- —. Letter to a Noble Lord
- —. Thoughts on the Prospect of a Regicide Peace
- BYRON. Prometheus
- SHELLEY. Prometheus Unbound
- T. CARLYLE. The French Revolution
- THOREAU. Civil Disobedience
- TOCQUEVILLE. L’ancien régime (Ancient Regime)
- PROUDHON. General Idea of the Revolution in the Nineteenth Century
- —. De la justice dans la révolution et dans l’Église
- DICKENS. A Tale of Two Cities
- COSTER. The Glorious Adventures of Tyl Ulenspiegel
- BAKUNIN. God and the State
- HUGO. Ninety-Three
- A. TOYNBEE. Lectures on the Industrial Revolution
- RITCHIE. Natural Rights, PART II, CH 11
- SHAW. The Revolutionist’s Handbook
- ANDREYEV. The Seven Who Were Hanged
- SOREL. Reflections on Violence
- LENIN. Collected Works, VOL XXI, Toward the Seizure of Power
- —. The State and Revolution
- T. E. LAWRENCE. Seven Pillars of Wisdom
- L. P. EDWARDS. The Natural History of Revolution
- BERDYAEV. Christianity and the Class War
- TROTSKY. Literature and Revolution
- —. The History of the Russian Revolution
- MARITAIN. Theonas, Conversations of a Sage, IX
- —. “On the Purification of Means,” in Freedom in the Modern World
- GORKY. Mother
- —. Forty Years—the Life of Clim Samghin, VOL II, The Magnet; VOL III, Other Fires; VOL IV, The Specter
- MALRAUX. Man’s Fate
- —. Man’s Hope
- BRINTON. The Anatomy of Revolution
- B. RUSSELL. Power, CH 7
- E. WILSON. To the Finland Station
- ORTEGA Y GASSET. The Revolt of the Masses
- —. Toward a Philosophy of History
- LASKI. Reflections on the Revolution of Our Time
- DIWAKAR. Satyagraha: The Power of Truth