Marxism demands of us the most precise, objectively verifiable accounting of the correlation of classes and the concrete peculiarities of each historical moment. We Bolsheviks have always striven to be faithful to this requirement, which is unconditionally binding from the point of view of any scientific grounding of policy.

"Our doctrine is not a dogma, but a guide to action"{80} – thus Marx and Engels always spoke, rightly mocking the memorization and simple repetition of "formulas," which at best can only outline general tasks, necessarily modified by the concrete economic and political situation of each particular period of the historical process.

What then are the precisely established, objective facts by which the party of the revolutionary proletariat must be guided now in determining its tasks and forms of action?

Both in my first "Letter from Afar" ("The First Stage of the First Revolution"), published in *Pravda*, nos. 14 and 15 of March 21 and 22, 1917, and in my theses, I define "the peculiarity of the present moment in Russia" as a period of transition from the first stage of the revolution to the second. And therefore the fundamental slogan, the "task of the day" at this moment, I consider to be: "workers, you have displayed wonders of proletarian, popular heroism in the civil war against tsarism, you must display wonders of proletarian and universal popular organization in order to prepare your victory in the second stage of the revolution" (*Pravda*, no. 15)[26].

What then does the first stage consist of?

In the transfer of state power to the bourgeoisie.

Before the February-March revolution of 1917, state power in Russia was in the hands of one old class, namely: the serf-owning, aristocratic, landowning class, headed by Nicholas Romanov.

After this revolution, power is in the hands of another, new class, namely: the bourgeoisie.

The transfer of state power from the hands of one class to the hands of another class is the first, chief, fundamental sign of a revolution both in the strictly scientific and in the practically political sense of this concept.

To that extent the bourgeois or bourgeois-democratic revolution in Russia is completed.

Here we hear the noise of objectors, those who readily call themselves "old Bolsheviks": did we not always say that the bourgeois-democratic revolution is completed only by the "revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry"? has the agrarian revolution, also bourgeois-democratic, ended? is it not a fact, on the contrary, that it has not yet begun?

I reply: the Bolshevik slogans and ideas are in general fully confirmed by history, but concretely affairs have developed differently than could have been expected (by anyone), more originally, more peculiarly, more variegated.

To ignore, to forget this fact would be to resemble those "old Bolsheviks" who have more than once played a sad role in the history of our party, senselessly repeating a memorized formula instead of studying the peculiarity of new, living reality.

The "revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry" has already been realized[27] in the Russian revolution, for this "formula" foresees only the correlation of classes, not the concrete political institution realizing this correlation, this cooperation. The "Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies" – here you have it, the already realized "revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry."

This formula is already obsolete. Life has brought it out of the realm of formulas into the realm of reality, clothed it in flesh and blood, made it concrete and thereby modified it.

On the agenda now is a different, new task: the split between the proletarian (anti-defencist, internationalist, "communist," standing for the transition to the commune) elements within this dictatorship and the elements of the small-holding peasant or petty bourgeois character (Tsereteli, Tsereteli, Steklov, Socialist-Revolutionaries and so on and so forth—revolutionary defensists, opponents of the movement toward the commune, supporters of "support" for the bourgeoisie and the bourgeois government).

Whoever speaks now only of the "revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry" has lagged behind life, and has thereby in fact gone over to the petty bourgeoisie against proletarian class struggle; such a one should be consigned to the archive of pre-revolutionary Bolshevik rarities (one might call it: the archive of the "old Bolsheviks").

The revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry has already been realized, but in an extraordinarily original way, with a series of supremely important modifications. I shall speak of these separately, in one of the following letters. For now it is necessary to assimilate the incontrovertible truth that a Marxist must take account of living life, the precise facts of reality, and not continue to cling to the theory of yesterday, which, like every theory, at best merely outlines the fundamental, the general, merely approximates to grasping the complexity of life.

"Theory, my friend, is grey, but green forever is the tree of life"{81}.

Whoever poses the question of the "completion" of the bourgeois revolution in the old way sacrifices living Marxism to the dead letter.

In the old way it comes out: after the dominion of the bourgeoisie can and must come the dominion of the proletariat and peasantry, their dictatorship.

But in living life it has come out differently: there has emerged an extraordinarily original, new, unprecedented interweaving of both. There exists simultaneously, together, at one and the same time both the dominion of the bourgeoisie (the government of Lvov and Guchkov) and the revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry, voluntarily handing power over to the bourgeoisie, voluntarily transforming itself into its appendage.

For it is impossible to forget that in fact in Petrograd power is in the hands of workers and soldiers; the new government does not and cannot use violence against them, for there is neither police, nor a separate army standing apart from the people, nor a bureaucracy standing all-mightily above the people. This is a fact. It is precisely such a fact as is characteristic of a state of the type of the Paris Commune. This fact does not fit into the old schemas. One must be able to adapt schemas to life, not repeat words that have become meaningless about the "dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry" in general.

Let us approach the question from another side, to illuminate it better.

A Marxist must not depart from the exact ground of analysis of class relations. The bourgeoisie is in power. But does not the mass of peasants also constitute a bourgeoisie of a different stratum, a different kind, a different character? How does it follow that this stratum cannot come to power, "completing" the bourgeois-democratic revolution? Why is this impossible?

Thus the old Bolsheviks often reason.

I reply – this is entirely possible. But a Marxist in assessing the moment must proceed not from the possible, but from the actual.

Reality shows us the fact that freely elected soldiers' and peasants' deputies freely enter the second, secondary government, freely supplement, develop, and complete it. And equally freely they hand over power to the bourgeoisie – a phenomenon which does not at all "violate" the theory of Marxism, for we have always known and repeatedly pointed out that the bourgeoisie maintains itself not only by violence, but also by the unconsciousness, routine, downtroddenness, and disorganization of the masses.

And so in the face of this reality of today it is positively ridiculous to turn away from the fact and talk about "possibilities."

It is possible that the peasantry will take all the land and all the power. I not only do not forget this possibility, I do not limit my outlook to today alone, but I directly and precisely formulate the agrarian program taking into account a new phenomenon: a deeper split between agricultural laborers and the poorest peasants with peasant proprietors.

But another possibility is also possible: it is possible that the peasants will listen to the advice of the petty bourgeois Socialist-Revolutionary party, which has succumbed to the influence of the bourgeoisie, has gone over to defencism, counseling them to wait until the Constituent Assembly, although even now a date for its convocation has not been set![28]

It is possible that the peasants will preserve, will continue their bargain with the bourgeoisie, a bargain concluded by them now through the mediation of the Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies not only formally, but in fact.

Various things are possible. It would be the profoundest error to forget about the agrarian movement and the agrarian program. But it would be just as much an error to forget reality, which shows us the fact of agreement – or, using a more precise, less juridical, more economico-classist expression – the fact of class cooperation between the bourgeoisie and the peasantry.

When this fact ceases to be a fact, when the peasantry separates itself from the bourgeoisie, takes the land against it, takes power against it, – then this will be a new stage of the bourgeois-democratic revolution, and it will be spoken of separately.

A Marxist who, in view of the possibility of such a future stage, forgets his duties now, when the peasantry is in agreement with the bourgeoisie, would have transformed himself into a petty bourgeois. For he would in fact be preaching to the proletariat confidence in the petty bourgeoisie ("it, this petty bourgeoisie, this peasantry, should separate itself from the bourgeoisie even within the bounds of the bourgeois-democratic revolution"). He, in view of the "possibility" of a pleasant and sweet future, when the peasantry will not be the tail of the bourgeoisie, when the Socialist-Revolutionaries, Tsereteli, Tsereteli, Steklovs will not be appendages of the bourgeois government, – he, in view of the "possibility" of a pleasant future, would forget about the unpleasant present, when the peasantry for now still remains the tail of the bourgeoisie, when the S.R.'s and Mensheviks for now still do not exit from the role of appendages of the bourgeois government, opposition to "His Majesty"{82} Lvov.

The hypothetical man we have in mind would resemble the sweet Louis Blanc, the saccharine Kautskyite, but in no way a revolutionary Marxist.

But does not there threaten us the danger of falling into subjectivism, into the desire to "skip over" the uncompleted – not yet exhausted peasant movement – bourgeois-democratic revolution to a socialist revolution?

If I had said: "without a tsar, but a workers' government"{83} – this danger would threaten me. But I said not this, I said something different. I said that there can be no other government in Russia (apart from the bourgeois one) except the Soviets of workers, agricultural laborers, soldiers, and peasants' deputies. I said that power can now pass in Russia from Guchkov and Lvov only to these Soviets, and in them precisely the peasantry predominates, soldiers predominate, the petty bourgeoisie predominates, speaking in scientific, Marxist terms, using not everyday, not philistine, not professional, but class characterization.

I have absolutely insured myself in my theses against any skipping over the not-exhausted peasant or generally petty bourgeois movement, against any play at "seizure of power" by a workers' government, against any kind of Blanquist adventure whatsoever, for I directly pointed to the experience of the Paris Commune. And this experience, as is known and as Marx showed in detail in 1871 and Engels in 1891{84}, completely excluded Blanquism, completely assured direct, immediate, unconditional dominion of the majority and the activity of the masses only to the extent of the conscious action of the majority itself.

I reduced the matter in the theses with complete precision to the struggle for influence within the Soviets of workers, agricultural laborers, peasants, and soldiers' deputies. In order to leave not the shadow of doubt on this score, I twice emphasized in the theses the necessity for patient, persistent, "adapting itself to the practical needs of the masses" work of "explanation."

Ignorant people or renegades of Marxism, like Mr. Plekhanov and so on, can cry out about anarchism, Blanquism, and so forth. Whoever wishes to think and learn cannot fail to understand that Blanquism is the seizure of power by a minority, while the Soviets of workers and so forth' deputies are manifestly the direct and immediate organization of the majority of the people. Work, reduced to the struggle for influence within such Soviets, cannot, positively cannot slide into the bog of Blanquism. And it cannot slide into the bog of anarchism, for anarchism is the negation of the necessity of the state and state power for the epoch of transition from the dominion of the bourgeoisie to the dominion of the proletariat. And I, with a clarity that excludes any possibility of misunderstanding, defend the necessity of the state for this epoch, but, in accordance with Marx and the experience of the Paris Commune, not the usual parliamentary-bourgeois state, but a state without a standing army, without a police opposing the people, without a bureaucracy standing above the people.

If Mr. Plekhanov cries out with all his might in his "*Unity*" about anarchism, then this only once again proves his break with Marxism. To my challenge in *Pravda* (no. 26) to tell what Marx and Engels taught about the state in 1871, 1872, 1875{29}, Mr. Plekhanov will have to and will answer by silence on the substance of the question and by outcries in the spirit of embittered bourgeoisie.

The former Marxist Mr. Plekhanov has completely failed to understand the Marxist teachings on the state. Incidentally, the seeds of this misunderstanding are also visible in his German brochure on anarchism{85}.

Let us now see how Comrade Yu. Kamenev in note no. 27 of *Pravda* formulates his "disagreements" with my theses and the views set forth above. This will help us clarify them more precisely.

"As regards Comrade Lenin's general schema," writes Comrade Kamenev, "it appears to us unacceptable, inasmuch as it proceeds from the recognition that the bourgeois-democratic revolution is completed and is calculated on the immediate transformation of this revolution into a socialist one..."

Here are two major errors.

First. The question of the "completion" of the bourgeois-democratic revolution is posed incorrectly. This question has been given that abstract, simple, monochromatic, if one may so express it, formulation which does not correspond to objective reality. Whoever poses the question thus, whoever asks now: "is the bourgeois-democratic revolution completed" and only – deprives himself of the possibility of understanding the extraordinarily complex, at minimum "dichromatic" reality. This is in theory. And in practice – such a person surrenders helplessly to petty bourgeois revolutionism.

In fact. Reality shows us both the transfer of power to the bourgeoisie ("completed" bourgeois-democratic revolution of the usual type) and the existence alongside the present government of a secondary one, which represents the "revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry." This latter "also-government" itself has surrendered power to the bourgeoisie, itself has bound itself to the bourgeois government.

Is this reality encompassed by Comrade Kamenev's old-Bolshevik formula: "the bourgeois-democratic revolution is not completed"?

No, the formula is obsolete. It is good for nothing. It is dead. Efforts to resurrect it will be in vain.

Second. The practical question. It is unknown whether there can now be in Russia a separate "revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry," detached from the bourgeois government. One cannot base Marxist tactics on the unknown.

But if this can still happen, then the path to it is one and only one: immediate, decisive, irrevocable separation of the proletarian, communist elements of the movement from the petty bourgeois ones.

Why?

Because the entire petty bourgeoisie has turned not by chance, but of necessity, to chauvinism (= defencism), to "support" for the bourgeoisie, to dependence on it, to fear of getting along without it, and so forth and so on.

How can one "push" the petty bourgeoisie to power, if this petty bourgeoisie can now, but does not want to, take it?

Only by the separation of the proletarian, communist party, by proletarian class struggle, free from the cowardice of these petty bourgeois. Only the consolidation of proletarians, in deed and not just in words free from the influence of the petty bourgeoisie, is capable of making the ground beneath the petty bourgeoisie so "hot" that under certain conditions they will be forced to take power; it is not even excluded that Guchkov and Milyukov will be – again, under certain circumstances – for the all-powerfulness, for the sole power of Tsereteli, Tsereteli, the S.R.'s, Steklov, for they are after all "defensists"!

Whoever separates right now, immediately and irrevocably, the proletarian elements of the Soviets (that is, the proletarian, communist party) from the petty bourgeois ones, correctly expresses the interests of the movement in both possible scenarios: both in the case that Russia undergoes another particular, independent, not subordinate to the bourgeoisie "dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry," and in the case that the petty bourgeoisie is unable to tear itself away from the bourgeoisie and will eternally (that is, until socialism) vacillate between it and us.

Whoever is guided in his activity by only the simple formula "the bourgeois-democratic revolution is not completed," thereby takes upon himself something like a guarantee that the petty bourgeoisie is surely capable of independence from the bourgeoisie. Thereby such a person surrenders helplessly to the mercy of the petty bourgeoisie at the present moment.

In passing. Regarding the "formula" of the dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry, it is nonetheless worthwhile to recall that in "*Two Tactics*" (July 1905) I specially emphasized (p. 435 in "*Twelve Years*"):

"The revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry has, like everything in the world, a past and a future. Its past – autocracy, serfdom, monarchy, privileges... Its future – the struggle against private property, the struggle of the wage worker with the proprietor, the struggle for socialism..."{[30]}.

Comrade Kamenev's error lies in the fact that even in 1917 he looks only at the past of the revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry. But in reality its future has already begun for it, for the interests and policy of the wage worker and proprietor have in fact already diverged, and on such a supremely important question as "defencism," as the relation to the imperialist war.

And here I have arrived at the second error in Comrade Kamenev's argument cited above. He reproaches me for the fact that my schema is "calculated" on "the immediate transformation of this (bourgeois-democratic) revolution into a socialist one."

This is incorrect. Not only do I not "calculate" on "the immediate transformation" of our revolution into a socialist one, but I directly warn against this, I directly state in thesis no. 8: "... Not the 'introduction' of socialism, as our immediate task..."{[31]}.

Is it not clear that a person calculating on the immediate transformation of our revolution into a socialist one could not have raised an objection to the immediate task of introducing socialism?

More than that. Even to introduce in Russia the "state-commune" (that is, a state organized on the model of the Paris Commune) one cannot do so "immediately," for this requires that the majority of deputies in all (or in the majority of) Soviets clearly understand all the wrongness and all the harm of the tactics and policy of the S.R.'s, Tsereteli, Tsereteli, Steklov and so forth. And I stated with perfect precision that I "calculate" in this sphere only on "patient" (is it necessary to be patient in order to obtain a change that can be implemented "immediately"?) explanation!

Comrade Kamenev has rather "impatiently" lashed out and repeated the bourgeois prejudice concerning the Paris Commune, as if it "immediately" wanted to introduce socialism. This is not so. The Commune, unfortunately, was too slow in introducing socialism. The real essence of the Commune is not where it is usually sought, but in the creation of a special type of state. And such a state has already been born in Russia, it is none other than the Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies!

Comrade Kamenev did not think carefully about the fact, the significance of the existing Soviets, their identity in type, in socio-political character with the state of the Commune, and, instead of studying the fact, began to talk about what I supposedly "calculate" as "immediate" future. The result was, unfortunately, a repetition of the method of many bourgeois: from the question of what the Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies are, whether they are higher in type than a parliamentary republic, more useful to the people, more democratic, more convenient for struggle, for example, against bread shortages, and so forth – from this vital, real question posed by life as the order of the day, attention is diverted aside, to an empty, supposedly scientific, in reality contentless, professorial-dead question about "calculation on immediate transformation."

An empty, falsely posed question. I "calculate" only on this, exclusively on this, that workers, soldiers, and peasants will cope better with the practical difficult questions about increasing bread production, about distributing it better, about better provisioning the soldiers and so forth and so on, than officials, than police.

I am deeply convinced that the Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies will sooner and better carry out the independence of the mass of the people in life than a parliamentary republic (comparison of both types of state in more detail in another letter). They will better, more practically, more reliably decide how one can make and what exactly one can make steps toward socialism. Control of the bank, the merger of all banks into one – this is not yet socialism, but a step toward socialism. Such steps today are being made by the junker and bourgeois in Germany against the people. Tomorrow, a Soviet of soldiers' and workers' deputies, if it has all state power in its hands, will be far better able to make such steps in favor of the people.

And what necessitates such steps?

Hunger. Disruption of the economy. A threatening collapse. The horrors of war. The horrors of the wounds inflicted by war on humanity.

Comrade Kamenev concludes his note with a statement that "in broad discussion he hopes to uphold his point of view, as the only possible one for a revolutionary Social-Democrat, inasmuch as he wants and must remain to the end a party of the revolutionary masses of the proletariat, and not transform itself into a group of communist propagandists."

It seems to me that in these words one sees a deeply erroneous assessment of the moment. Comrade Kamenev opposes a "party of the masses" to a "group of propagandists." But precisely now are the "masses" succumbing to the intoxication of "revolutionary" defencism. Is it not more seemly and for internationalists at such a moment to know how to oppose the "mass" intoxication, than to "want to remain" with the masses, that is, to succumb to the general fashion? Did we not see in all the warring European countries how chauvinists justified themselves by the desire to "remain with the masses"? Is it not necessary to be able for a certain time to be in the minority against "mass" intoxication? Is not the work of precisely propagandists right now the central point for the liberation of the proletarian line from "mass" defencist and petty bourgeois intoxication? It was precisely the fusion of the masses, both proletarian and non-proletarian, without distinction of class differences within the masses, that was one of the conditions for the defencist fashion. To speak with contempt of a "group of propagandists" of the proletarian line, perhaps, is not very becoming.

Written between April 8 and 13 (April 21 and 26), 1917.

Printed from the text of the pamphlet