GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

THEORY OF COMMUNISM 703
laws ana to devise an educational system in accordance
with a strictly rational preconceived plan, that plan,
namely, which embodies the truths of the true philosophy*
The laws prescribe a way of life and the education pro*
vides a scale of values. In effect, law and education tell
the citizen what it is right to do and what wrong; what
it is good to value and what bad; what it is true to
believe, and what false. To the way of life and the scale
of values prescribed by the true philosophy, inculcated
by education and embodied in the laws, each member
of the society must conform.
(4) To ensure that they will conform willingly, both
Plato and Communism rely upon propaganda; for it is
as propaganda that the elaborate educational systems
of both States may justifiably be regarded. In the
communist State, as in Plato's, the young are trained from
their earliest years to revere the principles of the true
philosophy upon which the State is based, and to regard
all other philosophies with disfavour. Thus, they are taught
to dislike Capitalism, to despise the bourgeoisie and to dis-
trust Christianity. As Plato would have put it, they are
taught to revere the things which the city reveres and to
despise what the city despises. The use of education to
produce certain beliefs and to intulcate respect for certain
values is extended, in the case of the administrative class
who, like Plato's Guardians, receive a longer and more
intensive training in the principles of the true philosophy.
The communist administrator must be not only a good
Marxist in practice; he must also understand the principles
of Marxist theory. Like Plato's philosophers, he must know
not only what he ought to do and believe, but why he
should do what he ought to do and believe what he ought
to believe. He is required, that is to say, to grasp the
fundamental principles of the philosophy which guides his
administrative practice. Finally, like Plato's Guardians
he must be trained in such a way that he will have no
disposition to question the principles upon which the
State is grounded.