Polemic on General Line of International ... - From Marx to Mao

volt in spite of them! without them, and march over theirheads towards revolution!” 1When the Second International’s brand of revisionism prevailedin many Parties in Europe, Lenin attached great significanceto the views of the French Communist Paul Golay.Golay said:Our adversaries talked loudly of the bankruptcy of Socialism.That is going a bit too fast. Still, who would dareto assert that they are entirely wrong? What is dying atpresent is not Socialism at all, but one variety of socialism, asugary socialism without the spirit of idealism and withoutpassion, with the ways of a paunchy official and of a substantialpaterfamilias, a socialism without boldness or fierce enthusiasm,a devotee of statistics with its nose buried infriendly agreements with capitalism, a socialism which ispreoccupied solely with reforms and which has sold its birthrightfor a mess of pottage, a socialism which in the eyesof the bourgeoisie is a throttle on the popular impatienceand an automatic brake on proletarian audacity. 2What a superb description! Lenin called it the honest voiceof a French Communist. People now ask: Is not modern revisionismprecisely the “variety of socialism” which is dying?They will soon hear the resounding ring of the honest voicesof innumerable Communists inside the Parties dominated byrevisionism.“A thousand sails pass by the shipwreck; ten thousandsaplings shoot up beyond the withered tree.” Bogus socialismis dying, whereas scientific socialism is bursting with youthfulvigour and is advancing in bigger strides than ever. Revolutionarysocialism with its vitality will overcome all difficultiesand obstacles and advance step by step towards victory untilit has won the whole world.1V. I. Lenin, “The Proletarian Revolution and the Renegade Kautsky”,Selected Works, Eng. ed., FLPH, Moscow, 1952, Vol. II, Part 2, p. 105.2The Socialism Which Is Dying and the Socialism Which Must BeReborn, Lausanne, 1915.412