Page:Lenin - The Soviets at Work (1919).pdf/48

46 and humiliation into which we have been thrown. The clearer we understand this, the firmer, the more hardened and inflexible will become our will for liberation, our desire to arise anew from enslavement to independence, our firm determination to see at all costs, that Russia shall cease to be poor and weak, that she may become truly powerful and prosperous.

She can become such, for we still have left sufficient expanse and natural resources to supply all and everyone, if not with abundance, at least with sufficient means of subsistence. We have the material in the natural resources, in the supply of human energy, and in the splendid impetus which the creative spirit of the people received through the great revolution, to create a really mighty and abundant Russia.

Russia will become such, provided she frees herself of all dejection and phrase-mongering; provided she strains her every nerve and every muscle; provided she comes to understand that salvation is possible only on the road of the international Socialist revolution, which we have chosen. To move forward along this road, not becoming dejected in case of defeats; to lay, stone after stone, the firm foundation of a Socialist society; to work tirelessly to create discipline and self-discipline; to strengthen everywhere organization, order, efficiency, the harmonious cooperation of all the people's forces, state accounting and control over production and distribution of products-such is the road towards the creation of military power and Socialist power.

It is unworthy of a true Socialist, if badly defeated, either to deny that fact or to become despondent. It is not true that we have no way out and that we can only choose between a "disgraceful" death (from the standpoint of a feudal knight), which an oppressive peace is, and a "glorious" death in a hopeless battle. It is not true that we have betrayed our ideals or our friends when we signed