Page:My Further Disillusionment In Russia.djvu/201

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
AFTERWORD
175

No revolution can ever succeed as a factor of liberation unless the Means used to further it be identical in spirit and tendency with the Purposes to be achieved. Revolution is the negation of the existing, a violent protest against man's inhumanity to man with all the thousand and one slaveries it involves. It is the destroyer of dominant values upon which a complex system of injustice, oppression, and wrong has been built up by ignorance and brutality. It is the herald of New Values, ushering in a transformation of the basic relations of man to man, and of man to society. It is not a mere reformer, patching up some social evils; not a mere changer of forms and institutions; not only a re-distributor of social well-being. It is all that, yet more, much more. It is, first and foremost, the Transvaluator, the bearer of new values. It is the great Teacher of the New Ethics, inspiring mail with a new concept of life and its manifestations in social relationships. It is the mental and spiritual regenerator.

Its first ethical precept is the identity of means used and aims sought. The ultimate end of all revolutionary social change is to establish the sanctity of human life, the dignity of man, the right of every human being to liberty and well-