I had not yet rid myself of metaphysical
abstractions, and my Socialism was only instinctive. He,
though younger than I, was already an atheist, an
instructed materialist, a well-considered Socialist. It
was just at this time that he elaborated the first foundations
of his present system. We saw each other fairly
often, for I respected him much for his learning and his
passionate and serious devotion (always mixed, however,
with personal vanity) to the cause of the proletariat,
and I sought eagerly his conversation, which was always
instructive and clever, when it was not inspired by a
paltry hate, which, alas! happened only too often. But
there was never any frank intimacy between as. Our
temperaments would not suffer it. He called me a
sentimental idealist, and he was right; I called him a
vain man, perfidious and crafty, and I also was right.
Bakunin never succeeded in staying long in one
place without incurring the enmity of the authorities.
In November, 1847, as the result of a speech
praising the Polish rising of 1830, he was expelled
from France at the request of the Russian Embassy,
which, in order to rob him of public sympathy, spread
the unfounded report that he had been an agent of
the Russian Government, but was no longer wanted
because he had gone too far.
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