Page:Karl Radek - The Development of Socialism from Science to Action.djvu/10

 account we can see that in the long period of quiet development which preceded the era of revolution only a few keen intellects were in a position to comprehend the theory of Communism so completely and clearly as when, during the revolutionary epoch of rising Capitalism, it was born in the brains of those children of the period of storm and stress, in the brains of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels.

In the epoch of quiet development the most diverse non-Communistic elements were mixed with Communism, and so under the name of Social Democracy, different substitutes for Communism were created which the international working class must discard if it wishes to be equal to its duty. It is the diluted and false Communism from which the living spirit has been purged, which makes it difficult for the workers to understand and take to heart the theories of the Russian Revolution. On that account, one of the first duties in the proletarian struggle for freedom is to free the teachings of Communism from all impurities. This can be done very easily if we learn to understand historically the development of the separate falsifications of Communism, if we learn to know the conditions under which they arose.

The theory of Marx, the outlines of which were created in the 50's of the preceding century, was not disseminated among wide circles until the 80's. When in the 60's and 70's the German working class movement was started under the leadership of Ferdinand Lassalle, the workers were not acquainted with a single one of Marx's writings. The ideas of Communism became familiar to them-through the small, inflammatory pamphlets of Lassalle, in which the theory of Communism, if not entirely falsified, was yet very peculiarly presented. Ferdinand Lassalle wanted to stir up the working class at a time when an epoch of capitalist prosperity had strengthened the counter-revolutionary forces in all Europe and made it possible for them to solve all the problems with which at the time they were confronted.