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

268THE VPERYOD FACTIONThe Vperyod group has published in Paris a “symposiumof articles on current questions” entitled Vperyod. Togetherwith Comrade Sazhin’s 111 pamphlet (On the Question ofthe Regeneration of the Party), which was “published byprivate donation” and is obtainable through the editors ofthe symposium Vperyod, and the separate leaflet issuedover the signature of the Vperyod group and the platformof this group, the Party has now more than sufficient materialby which to judge the Vperyodists.The platform of the Vperyodists is characterised by thefollowing three features. Firstly: of all the groups andfactions within our Party it has been the first to give prominenceto philosophy and that under cover of a pseudonym.“Proletarian culture”, “proletarian philosophy”—these arethe words used in the platform. They are a pseudonym forMachism, i.e., a defence of philosophical idealism undervarious garbs (empirio-criticism, empirio-monism, etc.).Secondly: in the political sphere the group has declaredotzovism “a legitimate shade of opinion” and reported thatsome otzovists, members of this group, disagreed with thedefinition of the Party’s tasks in regard to the State Duma.The definition itself given in the Vperyod platform is sounclear and confused that it can only be described as anadaptation to the otzovist ideology. Thirdly, and lastly,the platform emphatically condemned factionalism anddemanded the unification of factions, their coalition intoone party.And so we have as a result—if we begin from the end—one very good aspiration and two screens on the part ofvery bad ideological and political trends which stand for abreak with Marxism and the subordination of the proletariat