During his years in London, some members of the Anarchist community there used Anarchism as a justification for taking things from the keeper of a small shop without paying for them, and justifying their actions with supposedly Anarchist doctrine. The shop keeper asked Kropotkin for help in solving the problems created by both the theft and the rationalizations. Kropotkin's response was this essay, published as a pamphlet.

The essay is based on the ideas put forth in Mutual Aid and later developed in his Ethics. The essay is at once a perfect introduction to Kropotkin's, and in some ways a summary of it - much better than his more often cited article on Anarchism written for the Encyclopedia Britannica, where he tried to present other Anarchist positions fairly, though he did not agree with all of them.

This essay is as relevant today as it was 100 years ago. Some Anarchists still use doctrinal excuses that betray basic Anarchist principals. Kropotkin's analysis is based in natural and basic human urges, in no way tainted by false notions of morality, promulgated by conquerors of all sorts. He rejects both account-book morality (I'll be a good little boy, so I'll be rewarded), or philanthropy (I'll be good to show my superiority). Instead he points out the satisfactions and joy of "sowing life around you" by giving yourself as fully as possible to your fellows to be one with them, equal and sharing, and hence free in that equality and common life. This essay is the ideal place to start reading Kropotkin. The Spunk Archive includes the complete Mutual Aid, and you can get to The Anarchist Archive's electronic reprint of Ethics, as well as other works by Kropotkin.