A Welcome and a Warning.

DEAR MR. TUCKER, - I am very much obliged with Liberty. I can give it no higher praise than to say it is as good, and no better than, I expected from you. Barring the doctrine it teaches, - some of them, - I have not a criticism to make nor an improvement to suggest. The "heading" - a point about which I claim to be a judge - is striking and artistic, and you are quite right in calling it "a real work of art." I am glad you have chosen the word "L i b e r t y" - with every letter standing alone - for your title; it is decidedly suggestive of "individual sovereignty." By the way, one criticism: why have you connected the letters of the word at the head of the second page? You ought not to be inconsistent. You believe that every man - and woman too - can stand alone, and that he or she ought to be let to stand alone. You don't want any social ties or guarantees. Though I should think that the very pronouns "he" and "she" ought to convince you that the two sexes cannot stand alone. And if the two sexes cannot be independent of each other, much less can they, individually or collectively, be independent of that large entity we call "society."

I welcome your paper with congratulations and sincerity. At last we have a frank, honest, outspoken, and aggressive advocate of egoistic liberty. Now we shall know what "An-archism" (with or without the hyphen, and in the truest sense of the word) means. You have thrown down your gauntlet in the face of society, including Mrs. Grundy and Mr. Grundy and all the little Grundys. And you have thrown it down especially in the face of the Socialists. That is good. We shall not be slow in taking it up. Socialists of all kinds - and you know there are many kinds - will go for you. They will neither ask nor give quarter. It is true, we have a common enemy. Our great battle is not with each other, but with the gross tyranny called - falsely - "society" to-day. But I recognize that we have to whip you, "body, soul, and breeches," before we shall be fairly ready to show an unbroken front to our and your more powerful enemy.

In your first number you have defined the State. You have made of it a great Tyrant. We will show you an individual that is composed of all individuals; an individual that is indivisible, immortal, and supreme.

But I must stop. You have hoisted the banner of Egoistic Liberty. You spell the word with disconnected letters. It means An-archy.

We will meet you with the flag of "Freedom," and we will write the word with a running hand. It will be Social Freedom - Society.

Au revoir W.G.H. SMART
Mattapan, Mass., Aug. 9, 1881.