That the Soviets had been right in fearing retention of the army by the Bourgeoisie was proved again and again, by Kerensky, Kornilov, Kaledin, Alexeiev, Dutov, at subsequent periods of the revolution, each one in turn basing his resistance to the Soviets on some part of the army which had been kept from the contagion of free political expression.
Then began the long struggle of the summer. The Soviets, in which the moderates who desired to keep the government as a sort of executive organ, mistrusting their own abilities, were in a majority, exerted all their influence on the government in the direction of peace. The government made its representations to the Allies, but, at any rate at first, gambled in the future, and pretended that things were not so bad, and that Russia could still take an active part in the war. There was a decisive moment when Miliukov wrote a note to the Allies calculated to lull them to believe that the changes in Russia meant nothing, and that Russia stood by her old claims. The soldiers and people poured into the streets in protest, and that lie had to be publicly withdrawn.
Already there was serious opposition to the moderate party in the Soviets from the Bolsheviks, who urged that coalition with the bourgeoisie was merely postponing peace, and bringing starvation and disaster nearer. The Moderates proposed a Stockholm Canference, at which the Socialist groups of all countries should meet and try to come to a common understanding. This was opposed by the Allied Governments and by the Bolsheviks on the ground that the German majority Socialists would be the agents of the German Government. One deadlock followed another. Each successive deadlock strengthened the party of the Bolsheviks, who held that the Provisional Government was an incubus, and that all authority should belong to the Soviets, as indeed, in internal affairs, it actually did belong.
The Bolshevik leaders, Lenin and Trotzky, had come from exile in western countries not merely to take their share in a Russian Revolution, but to use Russia in kindling the World Revolution. They called for peace, but peace, for them, was not an end in itself. They could say, with Christ, that they brought not peace but a sword. For they hoped that in stirring the working classes of the world to demand
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