almost impossible, and where men are in a mood of fierce despair very inimical to industrial construction.  If Communism is to have a fair chance, it must be inaugurated in a prosperous country.  But a prosperous country will not be readily moved by the arguments of hatred and universal upheaval which are employed by the Third International.  It is necessary, in appealing to a prosperous country, to lay stress on hope rather than despair, and to show how the transition can be effected without a calamitous loss of prosperity.  All this requires less violence and subversiveness, more patience and constructive propaganda, less appeal to the armed might of a determined minority.

The attitude of uncompromising heroism is attractive, and appeals especially to the dramatic instinct.  But the purpose of the serious revolutionary is not personal heroism, nor martyrdom, but the creation of a happier world.  Those who have the happiness of the world at heart will shrink from attitudes and the facile hysteria of “no parley with the enemy.”  They will not embark upon enterprises, however arduous and austere, which are likely to involve the martyrdom of their country and the discrediting of their ideals.  It is by slower and less showy methods that the new world must be built:  by industrial efforts after self-government, by proletarian training in technique and business administration, by careful study of the international situation, by a prolonged and devoted propaganda of ideas rather than tactics, especially among the wage-earners of the United States.  It is not true that no gradual approaches to Communism are possible:  self-government in industry is an important instance to the contrary.  It is not true that any isolated European country, or even the whole of the Continent in unison, can, after the exhaustion produced by the war, introduce a successful form of Communism at the present moment, owing to the hostility and economic supremacy of America.  To find fault with those who urge these considerations, or to accuse them of faint-heartedness, is mere sentimental self-indulgence, sacrificing the good we can do to the satisfaction of our own emotions.

Even under present conditions in Russia, it is possible still to feel the inspiration of the essential spirit of Communism, the spirit of creative hope, seeking to sweep away the incumbrances of injustice and tyranny and rapacity which obstruct the growth of the human spirit, to replace individual competition by collective action, the relation of master and slave by free co-operation.  This hope has helped the best of the Communists to bear the harsh years through which Russia has been passing, and has become an inspiration to the world.  The hope is not chimerical, but it can only be realized through a more patient labour, a more objective study of facts, and above all a longer propaganda, to make the necessity of the transition obvious to the great majority of wage-earners.  Russian Communism may