Collected Works of V. I. Lenin - Vol. 3 - From Marx to Mao

626
V. I. LENIN
touch on the subject of migration in other parts of my book.
Maybe my views on this subject are wrong, but Mr. Skvortsov
does absolutely nothing to correct or to supplement
them; he tota]ly obscures the issue with his stern rebukes.
Further, my remarks give Mr. Skvortsov grounds for concluding
that the “commodity fetishist believes in the miraculous
power of his fetish now” (sic!). Now, that is truly “crushing”!
But do you deny that I am right, most respected Mr.
Critic? Why not share your factual considerations with
the public and examine the data of at least one uyezd? That
would be so natural for a person who makes a special study
of Zemstvo statistics! And I take the liberty of holding this
view, in spite of Mr. Skvortsov’s terrible words (fetishism,
miraculous power), which—does anyone doubt it?—are
enough to frighten anybody.*
and supercilious attitude towards the “conclusions” of this writer
who is known in Marxist literature as the author of two books and as
a contributor to magazines, only reveals his own conceit.
* My words: “Before capitalism appeared, agriculture in Russia
was the business of the gentry, a lord’s hobby for some, and a duty,
an obligation for others” (313), in Mr. Skvortsov’s opinion “indicate
that a whole social formation, the feudal mode of production, was
merely a lord’s hobby.” No, Mr. Skvortsov, they do not “indicate”
this at all, for I pointed out elsewhere that “feudal economy was a
definite, regular and complete system” (192), and here I merely
described one of the features of this system. That landlord economy
contained an element of the “lord’s hobby” can easily be seen by anyone
who remembers the “Oblomovs of the feudal or bondage-suffering
countryside” (218); and it is borne out by the Zemstvo statisticians who
invented the expression “lord’s hobby” (213),—it is proved even by
the data on a certain period in the development of the agriculturalmachinery
industry in Russia: the attempts of landlords simply to
import both workers and machines from abroad (193), which (219)
were nothing but a “lord’s hobby.”—“When and where the transformation
by capitalism of the lord of the manor [votchinnik]” (Mr.
P. S. is wrong in thinking that this category is applicable only to the
period “prior to the rise of serfdom”; it is also applicable to the period
of serfdom) “and of the dependent peasant into industrialists was
completed Mr. Ilyin does not, unfortunately, tell us.” (2293) I speak
of this in chapters II and III, and particularly IV, of my book, where
I deal precisely with the transformation of agriculture into commercial
and industrial enterprise. Very possibly, what I say about this
process requires supplementing and correcting, I have no doubt that
any serious and well-informed critic could do this; but Mr. Skvortsov,
unfortunately, has utterly obscured the issue by simply voicing stern
rebukes. That’s hardly enough!