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to leave it in the hands of the Czar to convoke the first representative assembly or to attempt to take the convocation of the assembly out of the hands of the old government. In so far as there was not, and could not be, the certainty that we were faced with an objective situation developing in a similar direction and as a similar pace the boycott ceased to be sound policy.
The Bolshevik boycott of "parliament" in 1905 enriched the revolutionary proletariat with highly valuable political experience, having shown that, by combining legal with illegal, parliamentary with non-parliamentary, forms of struggle, it may become necessary, and even essential, sometimes to be able to reject parliamentary forms. But to transfer this experience blindly, imitatively, uncritically, into different surroundings and different conditions is the greatest possible mistake. A small error easily corrected [1] was the boycott of the Duma by the Bolsheviks in 1906. Very serious and not at all easy to correct was the mistake of boycotting the Duma in 1907, 1908 and after, when a rapid rising of the revolutionary wave, resulting in an armed insurrection, could not be expected, and when, on the other hand, all the historical circumstances now strengthened by the bourgeois monarchy dictated the necessity of combining legal with illegal forms of work. Now, when we look back upon the complete historical period, whose connection with the following periods has fully revealed itself, it becomes particularly clear that the Bolsheviks would not have been able to preserve, certainly not to strengthen, develop and reinforce the stable nucleus of the revolutionary party of the proletariat in 1908-1914 if they had not succeeded in maintaining by a rigorous struggle, that it is obligatory to participate in the most reactionary parliament and in many other organizations bound by the most reactionary laws (Workmen's Insurance Societies, etc.).
In 1918 things did not go so far as to bring about a "split." The "left" Communists formed a separate group or "faction"
- ↑ What is said of individuals may be said, with necessary modifications, of politics and parties. The wise man is not he who makes no mistakes. There are not, and cannot be, such men. He is wise who makes slight mistakes and who is able to correct them easily and quickly.
