V. I. Lenin

Source: ru:PSS/v46; en:MT;es:MT
Translated: machine translation (DeepSeek) from the Russian; AI-translated.

26. X.

I received your letter of 24. X. yesterday and am replying, as you request, by return.

I cannot send the letter on immediately: I do not send by post to the address I have, but only by chemical means, and I have no time to copy the letter in that way. Yesterday I wrote to the addressee* the gist of the letter, and hope to let him have the whole letter in the near future. Or perhaps you could copy it in an unbound book in chemical ink—then I will send it at once.

I will give you my sister’s address: she was not in Paris in September, so you were hardly there at the same time. I hope you dropped her a line yourself at the address I gave you?

Now to business.

Your letter to me makes a strange impression. If I leave out the information about addresses and deliveries, all that remains is reproaches—bare reproaches without any explanation of the substance. The reproaches even go as far as attempts at a gibe (“are you convinced that you did this for the benefit of the Russian working-class movement or for the benefit of Plekhanov?”)—but I, of course, shall not exchange gibes with you.

You reproach me for having “advised against” 57. You are very inaccurate in reporting my words. I remember well that I did not express myself categorically or unconditionally: “We find it difficult at the present moment to advise,” I wrote, i.e., I directly made our decision conditional on a preliminary clarification of the matter. What the clarification was to consist of is clear from my letter: it was necessary for us to get a full picture of whether a “turn” had really taken place in *Rabochaya Mysl* (as we had been informed and as we had the right to conclude from the fact that you approached Plekhanov with a proposal for participation) and what kind of turn it was.

On this, the fundamental and main question—not a word.

That we regard *Rabochaya Mysl* as an organ of a particular trend, with which we are in the most serious disagreement, you have known for a long time. In an organ of that trend, both I and the addressee of your long letter directly refused to participate several months ago, and it is understandable that, acting in this way ourselves, we could not but advise others to do the same.

But we were placed in a “difficulty” by the news of a “turn” in *Rabochaya Mysl*. A real turn could have substantially changed the matter. It is natural, therefore, that in my letter I first of all expressed the desire to learn all the details about the turn—and you did not reply to this with a single word.

However, perhaps you consider that the answer to my question about the turn is contained in your letter to a friend?* Perhaps, if you approached Plekhanov on behalf of the editorial board of *Rabochaya Mysl*—and your letter to a friend can be regarded as an authentic expression of the editorial board’s views? If so, I am inclined to draw the conclusion that there is no turn at all. If I am mistaken, I ask you to explain my error to me. The other day another close supporter of Plekhanov wrote to me about a turn in *Rabochaya Mysl*. But, being in correspondence with you, I

* G. V. Plekhanov. *Ed.*
* Apparently, Yu. O. Martov. *Ed.*

cannot, of course, believe these “rumours” about a turn, which are not confirmed by anything from your side.

I will again say it better straight out (even at the risk of incurring new reproaches)—being in full solidarity with my friend (to whom you are writing), I also endorse his words: “You and I will have to fight”—if there is no turn. And if there is, we must ascertain in full detail what exactly this turn is.

You write to my friend: “fight, if you are not ashamed.” He will, of course, answer you himself, but I will also ask permission to reply to this on my own behalf. There is nothing at all shameful in fighting—once matters have reached the point where disagreements have touched upon the most fundamental questions, where an atmosphere of mutual misunderstanding, mutual distrust, and complete discord has been created (I am not speaking only of *Rabochaya Mysl*: I am speaking of everything I have seen and heard, and moreover not so much here as at home), once a number of “splits” have already arisen on this basis.

To get rid of this stifling atmosphere, one can (and should) welcome even a furious storm, not just polemics in literature.

And there is no need to be so particularly afraid of struggle: struggle may perhaps cause irritation among a few individuals, but it will clear the air, define relations precisely and directly—define which disagreements are essential and which are secondary, define where people are who are really going a completely different road, and where are comrades in the party who differ on particulars.

You write that there were mistakes in *Rabochaya Mysl*. Of course, we all make mistakes. But how, without struggle, can one separate these particular mistakes from the trend that is clearly outlined in *Rabochaya Mysl* and reaches its culminating point in the *Credo*?* Without

* Note. For example, in your letter to a friend there is both a misunderstanding and an “economist” trend. You are right in emphasising that economic struggle is needed, that one must know how to use legal societies, that all kinds of responses are necessary, etc., that one should not turn one’s back on society. All this is legitimate and correct. And if you think that revolutionaries take a different view, that is a misunderstanding. Revolutionaries only say that all efforts must be made to ensure that legal societies, etc., do not separate the working-class movement from Social-Democracy and revolutionary political struggle, but, on the contrary, bind them together as closely and inseparably as possible. But in your letter there is not only no striving to bind them together, but a striving to separate them, i.e., there is “economism” or “Bernsteinism,” for example—in the statement: “The workers’ question in Russia, as it actually stands, has been posed for the first time by *Rabochaya Mysl*”—in the argument about legal struggle, etc.

I apologise if my reference to your letter to a friend displeases you: I only wanted to illustrate my thought.

struggle there can be no sorting out, and without sorting out there can be no successful forward movement, no durable unity. And those who are beginning the struggle at the present time are by no means destroying unity. Unity no longer exists, it has already been destroyed, destroyed along the whole line. Russian Marxism and Russian Social-Democracy are temples in ruins, and open, direct struggle is one of the necessary conditions for restoring unity.

Yes, restoring! Such “unity,” when we hide “economist” documents from comrades like a secret disease, when we take offence at the publication of what views are being preached under the flag of Social-Democracy—such “unity” is not worth a brass farthing, such “unity” is sheer cant,* it only leads to the deepening of the disease, to its becoming chronic and malignant. And that open, direct and honest struggle will cure this disease and create a truly united, vigorous and strong Social-Democracy—of this I have not a moment’s doubt.

Perhaps it is very inappropriate that in a letter to you I have to speak so often about struggle (literary struggle). But I think that our old friendship obliges us above all to complete frankness.

I shake your hand. Petroff

P.S. In about two weeks I will have another address: Herrn Philipp Rogner, Cigarrenhandlung. Neue Gasse, Nürnberg (only for letters and also in two en-

* - hypocrisy. *Ed.*

velopes). Please do not write any initials in letters—God knows whether the post here is entirely reliable.