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 upon and rekindling the ashes of distrust. The awakened mistrust and hostility made themselves felt in the sequel as a nightmare during the whole course of the Revolution. In this way there was sown in November the seed of the April débâcle. The Party Congress, which met a few weeks after the general strike, felt that already the crest of the revolutionary wave was beginning to fall under the influence of various cross winds. The delegates present at the conference had been elected during the spring, when conditions were quite different. About half of these delegates seemed to be more or less favourable to Revolution; the other half was opposed to it. We Centrists wanted, above everything, to keep the party together, and we "succeeded." In the joint resolution there was no statement either for or against Revolution, but in its place the spirit of the old class struggle manifested itself; also a whole crowd of unmeaning reforms were demanded by the bourgeoisie, and an appeal to arms was made to the workers, not, however, for a revolutionary offensive, but for the defence that had become necessary.

For the moment the necessity for defence had become the most important question, as the bourgeoisie, seeing that for the time being it had escaped the danger of revolution, was now consciously preparing for the attack. The bourgeois newspapers openly conducted a fierce campaign against Social-Democracy, and with more secrecy the bourgeoisie got ready for war, procured arms, drilled and put the bourgeois army, on a footing, and despatehed agents abroad on urgent missions. The workers' guard also drilled, and the party council even co-operated in this work. But the work went on lazily, without the necessary intensity and energy. Little revolutions were threatening here and there with their anarchic influences: at Abo a revolution of this kind broke out.

The work of Parliament was not, and could not be, anything than harmful to the working-class movement. All that it did was to bind together in a useless way all our forces which were necessary for the revolutionary struggle. It only served to deceive the masses and helped to mask what was coming, to close their eyes to bourgeois preparations, such preparations as the workers themselves ought to have made. When the Revolution had threatened to break out in