NOTES
Maxim Gorki on Lenin
Maxim Gorki, whose whole life has been a struggle for the Russian Revolution, finds himself disillusioned at the tyranny of the Bolševik chiefs. Early in February his quarrel with Lenin reached a head, as the result of an article containing the following home truths:— “Lenin,” he wrote, seeks to introduce in Russia the Socialist régime à la Nećaiev” [the famous Nihilist conspirator of the seventies]—” in other words, to let the train run at full steam through the marshes. Fancying themselves to be veritable Napoleons, the Lenins, great and small, are going mad and completing the process of the destruction of Russia. Certainly Lenin is a man of extraordinary force. For 25 years on end he has kept in the front ranks of those struggling for the triumph of the Socialist idea. He is a man of genius, possessing all the qualities of a leader, and he does not know the meaning of morality. Certainly, like a real grand seigneur, Lenin despises the complicated life of the masses, of which he knows nothing at all. He has never lived in close contact with the people; and through books he has not succeeded in understanding the masses. But it is just this fact that makes him capable of rousing into fury the lowest instincts of the working classes. I believe it to be absolutely impossible, with present conditions and the material which we have, to create a Socialist State. But why not try? What does the grand seigneur Lenin risk, by forcing the people to make this experiment? The risk only exists for these masses whom Lenin despises. . . .”
“Those who live in glass houses. . . .”
The recently founded London organ of the Polish National Democrats, Tygodnik Polski, in its issue of 11 March, has contrived to combine its attacks upon rival Polish groups with a peculiarly gross insinuation against The New Europe and our collaborator “N,” who, we are informed, is a kindred spirit of Bronstein (i.e., Trotski), Rosenfeld, Apfelbaum and Sobelson of the Russian Revolution. ‘N’ is expressing the same ideas as Vigo in Le Bonnet Rouge and Laudau in La Tranchée Républicaine.” The best answer to this stupid charge is “N.’s” exposure of German Eastern policy in our present number. As for The New Europe itself, we are really not afraid of our readers suspecting us of Germanophil tendencies. Nor are we disposed to accept correction at the hands of the individuals whose chief military supporters in Russia, after loud professions of loyalty to the Allied cause and violent denunciation of all who dared to disagree with them, have, not many weeks ago, joined hands with the advancing German armies. We would merely remind Messrs. Dmowski, Kozicki, Sobanski, and their friends of the “Polish National Committee,” that if they wish to impress public opinion in this country they will do well to avoid methods of political controversy and political tactics which savour all too strongly of Warsaw at the height of the Tsarist régime.
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