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LENIN ON ORGANIZATION

shape itself, nothing is easier than by demagogic methods to side-track the crowd, which will realize its error only ofter it has undergone the most bitter sufferings. The task of the moment for the Russian Social Democrats therefore, should be to conduct an obstinate struggle against "Svoboda" and the "Rabochie Delo" which have allowed themselves to sink to demagogy.[1]

"Ten wise men can be more easily caught than a hundred fools!" This wonderful truth (which the hundred fools will applaud) appears convincing only because in the very midst of the argument you have jumped from one question to another. You began by talking, and continued to talk, of catching a "committee," of catching an "organization," and now you jump to the question of striking the "roots" of the movement into the "depths." Our movement, of course, cannot be caught just because it has hundreds and hundreds of roots in the depths, but that is not the question. As far as "roots in the depths" are concerned we are "uncatchable" even now, in spite of our amateurishness; nevertheless, we all complain, and cannot but complain, of the ease with which the "organization" can be caught, with the result that continuity in the movement is made impossible. And if you make the

  1. ↑ Let it be stated that what we have here said regarding "pushing on from outside" and the other views of "Svoboda" on the subject of organization, applies just as much to all the economists, since they have either themselves preached and defended such views on organization, or have allowed themselves to be led astray by them.

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