The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1928-02-16
4 The Letter of A. Joffe

my opinion the right to say that
throughout my conscious life | have
been true to my philosophy, that is
to say that l have lived my life pur-
posefully, because have lived it in
fighting for the good of mankind.
Even the years of Imprisonment
/, and penal servitude, during which a
man is separated from the immediate
participation in the fight and work
for humanity, cannot be deducted
from the number of purposeful years
of his existence, since they served, as
years of self-culti9ation and self -edu-
cation, for the improvement of later
work, so that they too can be counted
to the years of work in the service
of mankind, i.e., to the purposefully
spent years of mans life. In this
sense of the word, believe l can
safely affirm that have not spent
single day of my life purposelessly
Now, however, the moment is OBJ
viously approaching in which my life
will lose its sense and in which shall
consequently be faced with the duty
of retiring therefrom, that is to say
of ending my existence.
Already for some years past, the
present leaders of our Party-in
keeping with their general policy of
not giving the members of the Oppo-
| sition any work-have refrained from
employing me on any work, either
in the Party or on the Soviets, of
such character or extent as would
enable me to exploit my abilities to
their maximum degree of utility. For
the last twelvemonth, as you know,
the Political Bureau has removed me,
as an Oppositionalist, from all Party
or Soviet activity.
Had Been Inactive.
On the other hand, partly perhaps
as result Of my illness and partly
for reasons that you will know better
than / do, have for the past year
taken hardly any part in the prac-
tical oppositional struggle or in the
work or the Opposition,
After great struggles with myself
and with extreme reluctance I turned
to that realm of work, to which I
had hoped to have recource only when
completely invaded, and devoted my
self wholly and entirely to scientific,
pedagogic, and literary matters. Hard
as l found this at first, / gradually
penetrated deeper into this work and
began to hope that even in this con-
nection my life would find that nee
essary inner usefulness of which
spoke above and which, according to
my standpoint, can alone justify my
life.
But my state of health grew worse
and worse.
Around the goth of September I
was, for reasons unbeknown to me
invited by the Medical Commission of
the Central Committee to consulta-
ton of specialists. The commission
diagnosed an active tuberculous pro-
cess of both lungs, myocarditis Tin
Illumination Of the cardiac nuscles),
chronic inflammation Of the bladder,
chronic inflammation of the intes-
tines and appendix, and chronic poly
neuritis. The examining professors
told me categorically that my condi-
ton was much worse than / had i'm
agined, and that I could not even hope
to resume my courses at the high
schools Il. Moscow State University
and Institute for Oriental Research)
indeed that it would be much more
reasonable to give. up all such ac-
tivity.
Furthermore, l was to remain no
longer at Moscow and ought not to
delay single hour in getting treat
ment, but should go abroad at once to
a suitable sanatorium. Since, how
ever, such journey could not be
effected in the space of one or two
days, certain treatment in the poly
clinic of the Kremlin was prescribed
for me in the interim. In answer to
my direct question as to what pros
poets Of recovery / had abroad and
whether ! could possibly be cured In