Collected Works of V. I. Lenin - Vol. 16 - From Marx to Mao

174V. I. LENINof the Russian revolution, for the defeat of Finland’s freedomis a defeat of the Russian revolution.Our Russian liberal bourgeoisie is also being exposednow—over and over again—in all its pusillanimity andspinelessness. The Cadets, of course, are against the persecutionof Finland. They will certainly not vote with theOctobrists. But was it not they who did most of all to underminethe sympathy of the “public” for that direct revolutionarystruggle, those “tactics” of October and Decemberwhich alone made possible the birth of Finland’s freedom?—enabled it to hold out for more than four years now? Was itnot the Cadets who rallied the Russian bourgeois intelligentsiato repudiate this struggle and these tactics? Was it notthe Cadets who did their utmost to rouse nationalistfeelings and sentiments throughout Russian educated “society”?How right the Social-Democratic resolution (of December1908) was in saying that the Cadets by their nationalistagitation were in fact rendering a service to tsarism and noone else 88 The “opposition” which the Cadets wanted toshow the autocracy over Russia’s diplomatic reverses in theBalkans proved—as was only to be expected—a miserable,unprincipled, lackey-like opposition, which flattered theBlack Hundreds, whetted the appetites of the Black Hundreds,and reproved the Black-Hundred tsar because he, theBlack-Hundred tsar, was not strong enough.So now, most “humane” gentlemen of the Cadet Party,reap what you have sown. You have convinced tsarism thatit is weak in its stand for “national” interests; now tsarismis showing you its strength in nationalist persecution of anon-Russian race. Your nationalism, neo-Slavism, etc., hada selfish bourgeois essence of a narrow class nature wrappedin high-sounding liberal phrases. The phrases have remainedphrases, while the essence has furthered the misanthropicpolicy of the autocracy.Thus it has always been, and always will be, with liberalphrases. They merely screen the narrow egotism and brutalviolence of the bourgeoisie; they are only artificial flowersfestooning the peoples’ chains; they only stupefy the mindsof the people, preventing them from recognising their realenemy.