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The circumstance that, apart from the events of what is comparatively a modern period, the great social upheavals of history have not taken place expressly in the name of freedom, although they have indisputably implied it, only proves that in this case we have to deal not with a mere word or idea, but with an actual force which is active and acting, without reference to our knowledge or consciousness of it. The recognition of individual freedom, and much more the endeavour to make it the only object of our life, are certainly of quite recent date. But these presuppose a certain amount of progress in the actual process of setting the individual free in his moral and political relationships, which is not to be found in the whole of antiquity, and still less in the middle ages.

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It is not possible to point to clearer traces of Anarchist influences in the numberless social religious revolutions of the close of the middle ages, without doing violence to history, although, as in all critical periods, even in that of the Reformation,—which certainly implied a serious revolt against authority,—there was no lack of isolated attempts to make the revolt against authority universal, and to abolish authority of every kind. We find, for instance, in the thirteenth century, a degenerate sect of the “Beghards,” who called themselves “Brothers and Sisters of the Free Spirit,” or were also called “Amalrikites,” after the name of their founder.[3] They preached not only community of goods but also of women, a perfect equality, and rejected every form of authority. Their Anarchist doctrines were, curiously enough, a consequence of their Pantheism. Since God is everything and everywhere, even in mankind, it follows that the will of man is also the will of God; therefore every limitation of man is objectionable, and every person has the right, indeed it is his duty, to obey his impulses. These views are said to have spread fairly widely over the east of France and part of Germany, and especially among the Beghards on the Rhine.[4] The “Brothers and Sisters of the Free Spirit” also appear during the Hussite wars under the name of “Adamites”; this name being given them because they declared the condition of Adam to be that of sinless innocence. Their enthusiasm for this happy state of nature went so far that they appeared in their assemblies, called “Paradises,” literally in Adamite costume, that is, quite naked.