Page:Vladimir Ilyich Lenin - Lessons of the Revolution (1918).djvu/44

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was obnoxious, and the initiative of the revolutionary masses loomed up as something majestic, powerful, invincible.

Let those who are weak of faith learn by, this historic example. Shame upon those who say, «We have no apparatus with which to replace the old one, which invariably supports the bourgeoisie»; for we have such an apparatus—the Soviets. Fear not the initiative and independent action of the masses, have confidence in the revolutionary organizations of the masses, and in all departments of the State you will behold the force, the magnificence, the invincibility of the workmen and peasants, which they showed in their enthusiastic solidarity against the Kornilov attempt.

Distrust of the masses, fear of their initiative, fear of their independence, trembling at their revolutionary energy instead of enthusiastically and unreservedly supporting it—this was the greatest sin of the Essers and Mensheviks. Here can be found the very root of their irresolution, their vaccillation their endless and endlessly fruitless attempts to pour new wine into the bottles of the old bureaucratic apparatus.

Read the history of the democratization of the Russian army in the Russian revolution of 1917, the history of Tchernov’s Ministry, the history of the «ruling» Palchinsky, the history of Pechekhonov's resignation—you will find at every step the most instructive substantiation of this fact. The