Page:The Spirit of Russia by T G Masaryk, volume 2.pdf/372

346 The subject was eagerly considered. It was natural that contemporaries, a number of whom participated personally in the events, should be interested in searching out the causes of the revolution. The question they usually asked was, whether and to what extent the revolution was socialistic, whether it was a working-class revolution, a peasant revolution, or a bourgeois revolution; and they wished to estimate the value of the revolution from the socialist outlook, to ascertain whether and to what extent it had advantaged or injured particular classes and above all the working class, whether and to what extent the revolution had favoured or hindered the attainment of the socialist goal. The discussion was instructive, but was somewhat confused. Participation on the part of the workers in its events does not make the revolution socialistic. The concepts, bourgeoisie, liberalism, intelligentsia, etc., have many meanings. No attempt was made to ascertain precisely how great a part the capitalists played in bringing about the revolution, side by side with, and after a certain point independently of, the great landowners; no attempt was made to determine when either of these two classes intervened, or when and why either of them ctased to participate. But it is equally difficult to ascertain the precise share of the Marxists and the social revolutionaries in the revolution.

I am not thinking solely of direct and active participation in the struggle. We are also concerned with the question how far the revolutionists received sympathetic help from various strata of the population. It is further necessary to examine what were the consequences of the revolution, what trend the movement took, and why.

Finally, the individual facts and the revolution as a whole