V. I. Lenin

On Ascending A High Mountain; The Harm Of
Despondency; The Utility Of Trade; Attitude Towards The
Mensheviks, Etc. [1]

I

By Way Of Example

Let us picture to ourselves a man ascending a very high, steep
and hitherto unexplored mountain. Let us assume that he has
overcome unprecedented difficulties and dangers and has
succeeded in reaching a much higher point than any of his
predecessors, but still has not reached the summit. He finds
himself in a position where it is not only difficult and
dangerous to proceed in the direction and along the path he has
chosen, but positively impossible. He is forced to turn back,
descend, seek another path, longer, perhaps, but one that will
enable him to reach the summit. The descent from the height that
no one before him has reached proves, perhaps, to be more
dangerous and difficult for our imaginary traveller than the
ascent—it is easier to slip; it is not so easy to choose a
foothold; there is not that exhilaration that one feels in going
upwards, straight to the goal, etc. One has to tie a rope round
oneself, spend hours with all alpenstock to cut footholds or a
projection to which the rope could be tied firmly; one has to
move at a snail’s pace, and move downwards, descend, away
from the goal; and one does not know where this extremely
dangerous and painful descent will end, or whether there is a
fairly safe detour by which one can ascend more boldly, more
quickly and more directly to the summit.

It would hardly be natural to suppose that a man who had climbed
to such an unprecedented height but found himself in such a
position did not have his moments of despondency. In all
probability these moments would be more numerous, more frequent
and harder to bear if he heard the voices of those below, who,
through a telescope and from a safe distance, are watching his
dangerous descent, which cannot even be described as what the
Smena Vekh [2] people call “ascending with the brakes on"; brakes presuppose a well designed and tested
vehicle, a well-prepared road and previously tested appliances. In this case, however, there is no vehicle, no road,
absolutely nothing that had been tested beforehand.

The voices from below ring with malicious joy. They do not
conceal it; they chuckle gleefully and shout: “He’ll fall in a minute! Serve him right, the lunatic!” Others
try to conceal their malicious glee and behave mostly like Judas
Golovlyov. [3] They moan and raise their eyes to heaven in sorrow, as if to say: “It grieves us sorely to
see our fears justified! But did not we, who have spent all our
lives working out a judicious plan for scaling this mountain,
demand that the ascent be postponed until our plan was complete?
And if we so vehemently protested against taking this path,
which this lunatic is now abandoning (look, look, he has turned
back! He is descending! A single step is taking him hours of
preparation! And yet we were roundly abused when time and again
we demanded moderation and caution!), if we so fervently
censured this lunatic and warned everybody against imitating and
helping him, we did so entirely because of our devotion to the
great plan to scale this mountain, and in order to prevent this
great plan from being generally discredited!”

Happily, in the circumstances we have described, our imaginary
traveller cannot hear the voices of these people who are
“true friends” of the idea of ascent; if he did, they would probably nauseate him. And nausea, it is said, does
not help one to keep a clear head and a firm step, particularly
at high altitudes.

II

Without Metaphors

An analogy is not proof. Every analogy is lame. These are
incontrovertible and common truths; but it would do no harm to
recall them in order to see the limits of every analogy more
clearly.

Russia’s proletariat rose to a gigantic height in its revolution, not only when it is compared with 1789 and 1793, but
also when compared with 1871. We must take stock of what we have
done and what we have not as dispassionately, as clearly and as
concretely as possible. If we do that we shall be able to keep
clear heads. We shall not suffer from nausea, illusions, or
despondency.

We wound up the bourgeois-democratic revolution more thoroughly
than had ever been done before anywhere in the world. That is a
great gain, and no power on earth can deprive us of it.

We accomplished the task of getting out of the most reactionary
imperialist war in a revolutionary way. That, too, is a gain no
power on earth can deprive us of; it is a gain which is all the
more valuable for the reason that reactionary imperialist
massacres are inevitable in the not distant future if capitalism
continues to exist; and the people of the twentieth century will
not be so easily satisfied with a second edition of the
“Basle Manifesto”, with which the renegades, the heroes of the Second and the Two-and-a-Half Internationals,
fooled themselves and the workers in 1912 and 1914-18.

We have created a Soviet type of state and by that we have
ushered in a new era in world history, the era of the political
rule of the proletariat, which is to supersede the era of
bourgeois rule. Nobody can deprive us of this, either, although
the Soviet type of state will have the finishing touches put to
it only with the aid of the practical experience of the working
class of several countries.

But we have not finished building even the foundations of
socialist economy and the hostile powers of moribund capitalism
can still deprive us of that. We must clearly appreciate this
and frankly admit it; for there is nothing more dangerous than
illusions (and vertigo, particularly at high altitudes). And
there is absolutely nothing terrible, nothing that should give
legitimate grounds for the slightest despondency, in admitting
this bitter truth; for we have always urged and reiterated the
elementary truth of Marxism—that the joint efforts of the
workers of several advanced countries are needed for the victory
of socialism. We are still alone and in a backward country, a
country that was ruined more than others, but we have accomplished a great deal. More than that—we have
preserved intact the army of the revolutionary proletarian
forces; we have preserved its manoeuvring ability; we have kept
clear heads and can soberly calculate where, when and how far to
retreat (in order to leap further forward); where, when and how
to set to work to alter what has remained unfinished. Those
Communists are doomed who imagine that it is possible to finish
such an epoch-making undertaking as completing the foundations
of socialist economy (particularly in a small-peasant country)
without making mistakes, without retreats, without numerous
alterations to what is unfinished or wrongly done. Communists
who have no illusions, who do not give way to despondency, and
who preserve their strength and flexibility “to begin from
the beginning “ over and over again in approaching an extremely difficult task, are not doomed (and in all probability
will not perish).

And still less permissible is it for us to give way to the
slightest degree of despondency; we have still less grounds for
doing so because, notwithstanding the ruin, poverty, backwardness and starvation prevailing in our country, in the
economics that prepare the way for socialism we have begun to make progress , while side by side with us, all
over the world, countries which are more advanced, and a
thousand times wealthier and militarily stronger than we are,
are still retrogressing in their own vaunted, familiar, capitalist economic field, in which they have worked
for centuries.

III

Catching Foxes; Levi And Serrati

The following is said to be the most reliable method of catching
foxes. The fox that is being tracked is surrounded at a certain
distance with a rope which is set at a little height from the
snow-covered ground and to which are attached little red
flags. Fearing this obvious]y artificial human device, the fox
will emerge only if and where an opening is allowed in this
fence of flags; and the hunter waits for it at this opening. One
would think that caution would be the most marked trait of an
animal that is hunted by everybody.

But it turns out that in this case, too, “virtue unduly
prolonged” is a fault. The fox is caught precisely because
it is over-cautious.

I must confess to a mistake I made at the Third Congress of the
Communist International also as a result of over-caution. At
that Congress I was on the extreme Right flank. I am convinced
that it was the only correct stand to take, for a very large
(and influential) group of delegates, headed by many German,
Hungarian and Italian comrades, occupied an inordinately
“Left” and incorrectly Left position, and far too often, instead of soberly weighing up the situation that was not
very favourable for immediate and direct revolutionary action,
they vigorously indulged in the waving of little red flags. Out
of caution and a desire to prevent this undoubtedly wrong
deviation towards Leftism from giving a false direction to the
whole tactics of the Communist International, I did all I could
to defend Levi. I suggested that perhaps he had lost his head (I
did not deny that he had lost his head) because he had been very
frightened by the mistakes of the Lefts; and I argued that there
had been cases of Communists who had lost their heads “finding” them again afterwards. Even while
admitting, under pressure of the Lefts, that Levi was a
Menshevik, I said that such an admission did not settle the
question. For example, the whole history of the fifteen years of
struggle between the Mensheviks and the Bolsheviks in Russia
(1903-17) proves, as the three Russian revolutions also prove,
that, in general, the Mensheviks were absolutely wrong and that
they were, in fact, agents of the bourgeoisie in the working-class movement. This fact is incontrovertible. But this
incontrovertible fact does not eliminate the other fact that in
individual cases the Mensheviks were right and the
Bolsheviks wrong, as, for example, on the question of boycotting
the Stolypin Duma in 1907.

Eight months have elapsed since the Third Congress of the
Communist International. Obviously, our controversy with the
Lefts is now outdated; events have settled it. It has been
proved that I was wrong about Levi, because he has definitely
shown that he took the Menshevik path not accidentally, not
temporarily, not by “going too far” in combating the very dangerous mistakes of the Lefts, but deliberately and
permanently, because of his very nature.

Instead of honestly admitting that it was necessary for him to
appeal for readmission to the party after the Third Congress of
the Communist International, as every person who had temporarily
lost his head when irritated by some mistakes committed by the
Lefts should have done, Levi began to play sly tricks on the
party, to try to put a spoke in its wheel, i.e., actually he
began to serve those agents of the bourgeoisie, the Second and
the Two-and-a-Half Internationals. Of course, the German
Communists were quite right when they retaliated to this
recently by expelling several more gentlemen from their party,
those who were found to be secretly helping Paul Levi in this
noble occupation.

The development of the German and Italian Communist Parties
since the Third Congress of the Comintern has shown that the
mistakes committed by the Lefts at that Congress have been noted
and are being rectified—little by little, slowly, but steadily; the decisions of the Third Congress of the Communist
International are being loyally carried out. The process of
transforming the old type of European parliamentary party—which in fact is reformist and only slightly tinted
with revolutionary colours—into a new type of party, into a genuinely revolutionary, genuinely Communist
Party, is an extremely arduous one. This is demonstrated most
clearly, perhaps, by the example of France. The process of
changing the type of Party work in everyday life, of getting it out of the humdrum channel; the process of converting
the Party into the vanguard of the revolutionary proletariat
without permitting it to become divorced from the masses, but,
on the contrary, by linking it more and more closely with them,
imbuing them with revolutionary consciousness and rousing them
for the revolutionary struggle, is a very difficult, but most
important one. If the European Communists do not take advantage
of the intervals (probably very short) between the periods of
particularly acute revolutionary battles—such as took place in many capitalist countries of Europe and America in 1921
and the beginning of 1922—for the purpose of bringing about this fundamental, internal, profound reorganisation of the
whole structure of their Parties and of their work, they will be
committing the gravest of crimes. Fortunately, there is no
reason to fear this. The quiet, steady, calm, not very rapid,
but profound work of creating genuine Communist Parties, genuine
revolutionary vanguards of the proletariat, has begun and is
proceeding in Europe and America.

Political lessons taken even from the observation of such a
trivial thing as catching foxes prove to be useful. On the one
hand, excessive caution leads to mistakes. On the other hand, it
must not be forgotten that if we give way to mere “sentiment” or indulge in the waving of little red
flags instead of soberly weighing up the situation, we may
commit irreparable mistakes; we may perish where there is
absolutely no need to, although the difficulties are great.

Paul Levi now wants to get into the good graces of the bourgeoisie—and, consequently , of its agents, the
Second and the Two-and-a-Half Internationals—by republishing precisely those writings of Rosa Luxemburg in which
she was wrong. We shall reply to this by quoting two lines from
a good old Russian fable [4] : “Eagles may at times fly lower than hens, but hens can never rise to the
height of eagles.” Rosa Luxemburg was mistaken on the question of the independence of Poland; she was mistaken in 1903
in her appraisal of Menshevism; she was mistaken on the theory
of the accumulation of capital; she was mistaken in July 1914,
when, together with Plekhanov, Vandervelde, Kautsky and others,
she advocated unity between the Bolsheviks and Mensheviks; she
was mistaken in what she wrote in prison in 1918 (she corrected
most of these mistakes at the end of 1918 and the beginning of
1919 after she was released). But in spite of her mistakes she
was—and remains for us—an eagle. And not only will
Communists all over the world cherish her memory, but her
biography and her complete works (the publication of which the German Communists are inordinately delaying, which can
only be partly excused by the tremendous losses they are
suffering in their severe struggle) will serve as useful manuals
for training many generations of Communists all over the
world. “Since August 4, 1914, [5] German
Social-Democracy has been a stinking corpse"—this statement will make Rosa Luxemburg’s name famous in the
history of the international working class movement. And, of
course, in the backyard of the working-class movement, among the
dung heaps, hens like Paul Levi, Scheidemann, Kautsky and all
that fraternity will cackle over the mistakes committed by the
great Communist. To every man his own.

As for Serrati, he is like a bad egg, which bursts with a loud
noise and with an exceptionally—pungent smell. Is it not
too rich to get carried at “his” congress a resolution that declares readiness to submit to the decision of
the Congress of the Communist International, then to send old
Lazzari to the Congress, and finally, to cheat the workers as
brazenly as a horse-coper? The Italian Communists who are
training a real party of the revolutionary proletariat in Italy
will now be able to give the working masses an object lesson in
political chicanery and Menshevism. The useful, repelling effect
of this will not be felt immediately, not without many repeated
object lessons, but it will be felt. The victory of the Italian
Communists is assured if they do not isolate themselves from the
masses, if they do not lose patience in the hard work of
exposing all of Serrati’s chicanery to rank-and-file workers in a practical way, if they do not yield to the very
easy and very dangerous temptation to say “minus a ” whenever Serrati says “a”, if
they steadily train the masses to adopt a revolutionary world
outlook and prepare them for revolutionary action, if they also
take practical advantage of the practical and magnificent
(although costly) object lessons of fascism.

Levi and Serrati are not characteristic in themselves; they are
characteristic of the modern type of the extreme Left wing of
petty-bourgeois democracy, of the camp of the “other side”, the camp of the international capitalists, the camp
that is against us. The whole of “their” camp, from
Gompers to Serrati, are gloating, exulting, or else shedding
crocodile tears over our retreat, our “descent”, our
New Economic Policy. Let them gloat, let them perform their
clownish antics. To every man his own. But we shall not harbour
any illusions or give way to despondency. If we are not afraid
of admitting our mistakes, not afraid of making repeated efforts
to rectify them—we shall reach the very summit. The cause
of the international bloc from Gompers to Serrati is doomed.

Endnotes

[1] This article was
not completed.

[2] Smena Vekh— the title of a collection of articles published
in Prague in 1921, and then the name of a journal published in
Paris from October 1921 to March 1922. It was the mouthpiece of
advocates of a socio-political trend that emerged among White
émigré intellectuals in 1921 and was supported by part of the old, bourgeois intelligentsia that did not emigrate
for various reasons.

A certain revival of capitalist elements in Soviet Russia
following the implementation of the New Economic Policy served
as the social foundation for this trend. When its adherents saw
that foreign military intervention could not overthrow Soviet
rule they began advocating co-operation with the Soviet
government, hoping for a bourgeois regeneration of the Soviet
state. They regarded the New Economic Policy as an evolution of
Soviet rule towards the restoration of capitalism. Some of them
were prepared loyally to co-operate with the Soviet government
and promote the country’s economic rejuvenation. Subsequently, most of them openly sided with the
counter-revolution.

A characteristic of this trend is given by Lenin in this volume
(see pp. 285-86).

[3] Judas Golovlyov— a landowner and main personage of
M. Y. Saltykov-Shchedrin’s The Golovlyov Family.
He was called Judas for his bigotry, hypocrisy and callousness. The name Judas Golovlyov has become a synonym for
these negative traits.

[4] This is a reference
to the fable The Eagle and the Hens by Ivan Krylov.

[5]
In the Reichstag on August 4, 1914, the Social-Democratic
faction voted with the bourgeois representatives in favour of
granting the imperial government war credits amounting to 5,000
million marks, thereby approving Wilhelm II’s imperialist
policy. .