The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1916-1920, 1919-08-03

of producing an ordered, stable and eff
fcient economic life. No one can read
the evidence which Mr.. Russell has pre-
scented here and arrive at any other con-
clusion. If our Bolsheviki. near Bolshe-
wiki and parlor revolutionists tell US that
they deplore the "regrettable excuses" in
Russia; that they believe that these can
be avoided in the United States, the one
effective reply to them is that it can be
demonstrated that the Bolshevist theory
is incapable Of realization in practice
except at the cost of the efficiency in
production and distribution already at
tanned. Here, in the economic field, as
well as in political and social culture,
Bolshevism-even if purged of its vile
excesses-is a retrogression and not
progression. 1t inescapably means a re-
turn to the ways of the dark and cruel
past from which emancipation was gained
by so much holy sacrifice.
Perhaps the most interesting part of
Mr.. Russen's book is his evaluation of the
character and motives of Lenine Right
ly, / think, he acqudts Lenine of the
charge of corruption which has so often
been levelled against him. That Lenine
took German money Mr. Russell does not
doubt. That he was aware that the Ger
mans hoped to profit from his intrigues
and agitation is quite certain These
things were in the nature of the eircum-
stances In which he found himself. Had
the circumstances been such that the
Allies would have benefited, had they
been in a position to profit from his in
trigues, he would have acted in precisely
the same way, taking their money and
trusting to his ability to trick them. But,
on the whole, Mr.. Russell seems rather
to ideaize Leninc True, he guardedly
directs attention to his infamous attack
upon Maria Spiradonova-an attack
which showed that underneath the cold
exterior polish of his cynical nature
there beats the heart of an unutterable
cad and craven coward to boot. Apart
from this revelation, the portrait Mr..
Russell gives us is that of man of great
intellectual gifts amounting to genius of
the very highest order.
I do not so conceive Lenine. I do not
find In his life history or in the whole
corpus of his economic and sociological
writings any warrant for this high esti-
mate. That he is man Of great talent,
possessing highly trained mind, his writ
ings clearly show. But they also show,
I think, that be is almost entirely void of
or inspiration. He has not q
creative mind. As thinker he is far
inferior to the master he SO cruelty be
trayed, George Pieehanov. His preemi-
hence m Russia IN this very chaotic
period is due less to Intellectual greatness
than to the absence from his makeup of
the customary moral restraints of civilized
man. In a still greater degree, perhaps,
it is due to the chaos of the time and to
the abnormal psychology of the Russian
people, in which superstition, ignorance,
terror and credulity are inextricably
mixed. In a nation of people Gained and
disciplined by even one generation Of
widely diffused education and eonstitu-
tional political action the mind of Lenine
would have been at a hopeless disad-
vantage IN contest with that of Plechanov.
That this is true, an examination of
Lenine's philosophical and tactical theories
will believe show. Marx wrete his Com
'ns''ist Manifesto in 1s47. By 1871 he had
come to regard much of it as obsolete and
would have let it quietly die, or withdrawn
it from circulation if he could have done
SO. What Marx would have thought to-
day after seventy-two years, we can only
conjecture. But we can be quite certain
that he would not have chung to the let