May Monthly Reading: Voluntary Slavery and Military Refusal
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I. From “Voluntary Slavery”
A Composition by the French Writer Boétie of the Mid-Sixteenth Century
It is reasonable to love virtue, to respect heroic deeds, to acknowledge good wherever we receive it, and even to deprive ourselves of comfort for the glory and benefit of someone we love and who deserves it: thus, if the inhabitants of a country found a person who showed them great wisdom to protect them, great courage to defend them, and great care to govern them, and if as a result they became accustomed to obeying him so as to grant him certain advantages, I do not think this was unreasonable.
But, my God! What shall we call it when we see a great number of people not only obeying but serving, not only submitting but groveling before one man, and groveling so that they have nothing of their own: neither property, nor children, nor even life itself, which they consider their own, and they endure robberies and cruelties not from an army, not from barbarians, but from one man, and not from a Hercules or Samson, but from a man who is for the most part the most cowardly and effeminate of the entire nation. What shall we call this?
Shall we say that such people are cowards? If two, three, four did not defend themselves against one, it would be strange but still possible, and one could say it was from lack of courage; but if a hundred thousand people, a hundred thousand villages, a million people do not attack the one from whom they all suffer, being his slaves—what shall we call this? Is it cowardice?
In all vices there is a certain limit: two can be afraid of one, even of ten; but a thousand, but a million, but a thousand villages—if they do not defend themselves against one, then this is not cowardice, it cannot go this far; just as courage cannot go so far that one man takes a fortress, attacks an army, and conquers a state. So what is this ugly vice, not even deserving the name of cowardice, a vice for which no sufficiently vile name can be found, which is contrary to nature and which the tongue refuses to name?
We marvel at the courage that freedom inspires in those who defend it. But what happens in all countries with all people every day—namely, that one man rules over a hundred thousand villages and deprives them of freedom—who would believe this if he only heard it and did not see it? And if it could be seen only in foreign and distant lands, who would not think that this was invention rather than truth? After all, that one man who oppresses everyone need not be defeated, need not be defended against; he is always defeated, if only the people would not consent to slavery. There is no need to take anything from him; one need only give him nothing. The country need do nothing, if only it does nothing against itself, and the people will be free. So the peoples themselves give themselves over to the power of sovereigns; they need only stop being slaves, and they will be free. The peoples themselves give themselves over to slavery, they cut their own throats. A people that can be free gives up its own freedom, puts the yoke on its own neck, not only consents to its oppression but seeks it. If it cost the people something to regain their freedom and they did not seek it—this most precious thing natural to man, distinguishing man from beast—I could understand that they might prefer the safety and comfort of life to the struggle for freedom. But if to obtain freedom one need only desire it, can there be a people in the world that would consider it bought too dearly when it can be acquired by desire alone? A person can through a single desire regain a good that should be redeemed at the price of one’s blood, and which, when lost, makes life torment and death salvation—and does not desire this.
As a fire from a single spark grows large and keeps strengthening the more fuel it finds, but goes out by itself if no fuel is added, destroying itself and ceasing to be fire; in the same way rulers, the more they plunder, the more they demand, the more they ruin and destroy, the more they are given and served, the more they grow stronger, becoming greedier for the destruction of all; whereas if nothing is given them, if they are not obeyed, then without struggle, without battle, they become naked and nothing, become nothing at all, just as a tree that has no sap or nourishment becomes a dry and dead branch.
Bold people do not fear danger in order to acquire the good they desire; the wise do not shrink from toil. Even if cowards cannot bear suffering and attain the good, they do not aspire to it because of their cowardice, but the desire to have it remains in them. This desire belongs to both the wise and the foolish, the brave and the cowards. All of them desire to acquire those things that will make them happy and content; only one of them, I do not know why, people do not desire—namely, freedom, which constitutes such a great good that as soon as it is lost, all other calamities follow, and even those goods that remain after its loss lose their taste and charm. And this great good, which people would receive as soon as they desired it, they do not wish to acquire, as if only because it is too easy.
Poor, unhappy people, senseless nations, stubborn in your evil, blind to your own good, you allow the best part of your income to be taken from you, your fields and homes to be plundered; you live so that you can say that nothing belongs to you. And all these disasters and ruin come not from enemies but from an enemy whom you yourselves create, for whom you courageously go to war, for whose greatness you do not refuse to go to your death. He who thus rules over you has only two eyes, two hands, one body, and has nothing that the most insignificant man from among the countless number of your brothers does not have; the advantage he has over you is only that right which you give him to destroy you. Where would he get so many eyes to watch over you, if you did not give them to him? How would he have so many hands to strike you, if he did not take them from you? Or where would he get the feet with which he tramples your villages—where does he get them, if they are not yours? Where would he get power over you, if you did not give it to him? How could he attack you, if you were not in league with him? What could he do to you if you were not concealers of the thief who robs you, accomplices of the murderer who kills you, if you were not traitors to yourselves? You sow so that he may destroy your crops, you fill and furnish your houses for his plunder; you raise your children so that he may lead them to his wars, to the slaughter, so that he may make them executors of his lusts and his vengeance; you wear yourselves out in labor so that he may enjoy pleasures and wallow in dirty and vile delights; you weaken yourselves so as to make him stronger and so that he may keep you on a leash. And from these horrors, which animals would not endure, you can free yourselves if you wish—not just to free yourselves, but merely to wish it. Resolve no longer to serve, and you are free. I do not want you to fight him, to attack him, but only to stop supporting him, and you will see that, like an enormous statue from which the foundation has been removed, he will fall from his own weight and shatter into pieces.
—Étienne de La Boétie
II. My Refusal of Military Service
Letter of the Military Doctor A. Škarvan, Who Refused Military Service in 1894
Dear Senior Physician!
I should have communicated to you orally what I am writing, but I use the pen because I fear that in person I might do this insufficiently clearly and calmly.
I have decided not to return to my military duties, have decided to cease being a soldier, and consequently I will neither wear a military uniform nor perform hospital service, which is in essence the same military service.
I refuse this because it contradicts my convictions, my way of thinking, my knowledge, my religious feeling. I am a Christian and, as such, cannot contribute to militarism by word or deed. Until now I did this because I did not have sufficient spiritual strength to stand alone against such a mighty force as the military organization represents. Now my decision has strengthened, and this happened not in some pathetic moment, but is the consistent result of my thoughts and strivings over several years.
It is clear to me how stupid, sinful, and ridiculous my intention must appear to a military court. I also know that for this I will have to suffer severe punishment—that the authorities will keep me in prison as long as they please.
But I give myself over to a power that is higher than all of mighty Europe. I wish to bring my life into accord with the demands of one truth alone, that is, the eternal, single, divine truth. This truth commands me to no longer bend my neck under that universal slavish yoke of militarism which all governments now impose on mankind.
That a military doctor should pursue, as they say and write, more humane and noble goals—I consider this untrue, because he, like other military men, is nothing other than a will-less tool, existing to do correctly, well, and consistently what regulations require, namely to take care that the army can perform its crude, inhumane work as long as possible.
That is all I have to say. I ask that you preserve this letter so that it may be transmitted to the court, since I will hardly have anything to add to what has been said in it.
I will await your instructions at my quarters in the “Kronen Kaserne.”
—Dr. A. Škarvan
Why It Is Impossible to Serve as a Military Doctor
Besides this letter, A. Škarvan expressed in the following article the reasons why he found it impossible to serve as a military doctor.
Many are struck by the fact that I refused to continue military service as a doctor. Many allow that refusal of combat service is still understandable, since the purpose of the combat soldier undoubtedly consists in learning to kill and, if the command requires it, in actually committing murder.
“But,” people ask, “how can a military doctor refuse his service, whose title and duty consist not at all in killing people but, on the contrary, in giving aid to the sick and suffering, and consequently—in doing deeds of humanity, deeds of mercy?”
“The activity of a doctor,” such people add, “is in itself a Christian activity, and therefore one who abandons this activity deserves, even from a moral point of view, condemnation rather than sympathy.”
And people, with the general tendency not to examine the real state of affairs, willingly accept such reasoning, considering the question settled, and put it aside to think about it no more. I have had to hear such objections not only from military people but equally from civilians, not only from materialists but even from people undoubtedly religious. This very thing was expressed to me even by some Nazarenes—people who have understood the sinfulness of military service, who refuse it, and who for this conviction have spent their entire youth in prisons and die there.
The question arises: how can the opinion of the Nazarenes accord with the opinion of people of completely different views on war? And another question: is this opinion correct?
For me it is beyond doubt that the Nazarenes have fallen into a more subtle but essentially the same self-deception when they decided among themselves to go—if the authorities require it—into the medical corps, as they now do. In this lies the whole explanation.
To assert, however, that the service of a military doctor, and with it the service of a medical orderly, is not contrary to the spirit of Christ, that such service constitutes as it were a virtue—is a very crude error. The error lies in the fact that any work or occupation can be turned into the work of the devil (as the practice of many doctors proves); everything depends only on how the one doing a certain work relates to it. Therefore it is also untrue to assert that the occupation of a doctor is in general a noble occupation in itself. Besides this, the question is further confused by the fact that the vast majority of people relate to medical science superstitiously, not even suspecting how true is the saying of Faust: “Der Sinn der Medizin ist leicht zu fassen; du durchstudirst die grosse und die kleine Welt, um es am Ende gehn zu lassen, wie’s Gott gefällt.” (The meaning of medicine is easy to grasp: you study the great and small world only to leave everything in the end to God’s will.)
But the main thing that makes the service of a military doctor criminal is the close connection that exists between his activity and the killing of people—the true purpose of armies. This connection is hypocritically covered with the cloak of humanity and therefore is not so obvious to people. Nevertheless it exists, and anyone who wishes to see can see it, for it is very easy to lift this cloak, under which the same robber is hidden.
The military doctor examines soldiers, that is, decides who among the people is fit for cannon fodder and who is not; he examines those soldiers whom the authorities punish, that is, decides who can be locked in a dungeon, who can have chains put on, who can be deprived of food, and so on—consequently, he constantly aids inhuman, bestial violence against people.
But let us suppose even that he will not be forced to do any of this, and that besides conscientious treatment of sick soldiers he will engage in nothing else—even this would not in the least destroy the sinfulness of his activity, for one cannot help asking oneself, one cannot help seeing what goal is pursued by this treatment. The military doctor in any case represents a hireling for money, hired by an organized gang of murderers solely to watch over the health of people destined for slaughter and for the commission of murder.
And one cannot in this case fail to be conscious of what everyone knows—that to be an accomplice in any form whatsoever of an immoral, savage institution is shameful and degrading, whatever good name may be given to this work, whatever fine uniform may be worn for it, however many little gold crosses may be given for such service. After all, surely not one honest woman would agree for any amount of money to become a cook in a gang of robbers, although the preparation of food not only does not constitute a sin in itself but is a necessary and essential condition of human life. And what is the difference between robbers and armies? Only in the scale of the robbery.
It is time for all of us to understand that it is shameful and degrading to sell one’s knowledge to those who need it to more easily achieve their evil intentions!
It is time to understand that the slightest assistance in the violence-based works of government constitutes, for a person who wishes good for himself and others, a degradation of his own dignity and a great crime against the most elementary demands not only of love but even of simple humanity!
—A. Škarvan
Translator’s Notes:
- Étienne de La Boétie (1530-1563) wrote Discours de la servitude volontaire around 1548. The essay’s central insight—that tyranny depends on the cooperation of the oppressed—became foundational for Tolstoy’s teaching on non-resistance and later influenced Gandhi and Gene Sharp.
- Albert Škarvan (1869-1926) was a Slovak physician who served as a military doctor in the Austro-Hungarian army until his resignation in December 1894. After imprisonment, he visited Tolstoy at Yasnaya Polyana and became an important translator of Tolstoy’s works into Slovak.
- The quotation from Goethe’s Faust (Part I, “Night” scene) expresses disillusionment with the limits of medical knowledge.
- The reference to the Nazarenes (Nazareni) is to the Christian pacifist sect described in reading #64, who agreed to serve in medical corps as an alternative to combat duty. Škarvan argues this is still complicity with violence.
- These texts were censored from the original Circle of Reading because they advocated non-cooperation with military conscription.