Vladimir Lenin
Icons Versus Cannons,
Phrases Versus Capital
The Note of the Provisional Government on [bringing the] war to a victorious
finish has aroused indignation even among those who nourished illusory hopes for
a possible renunciation of annexations on the part of the government of
capitalists. The newspapers that have been acting as mouthpieces of this
petty-bourgeois policy of illusory hopes are today either mumbling in dismay,
like Rabochaya Gazeta, or are trying to turn this indignation against
individuals.
Novaya Zhizn writes: "There is no place in the govern ment of democratic Russia
for a champion of the interests of international capital! We are sure the Soviet
of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies will act promptly in taking the most
energetic measures towards rendering Mr. Milyukov harmless." And Dyelo Naroda
expresses the same piece of philistine wisdom in the following words. Milyukov's
Note, it says, "tries to reduce to nought a statement of the greatest
international importance approved by the entire cabinet'.
Icons versus cannons. Phrases versus capital. The government's statement
renouncing annexations was a piece of utterly worthless diplomatic verbiage,
which might deceive an ignorant muzhik, but could not "confuse" the leaders of
the petty-bourgeois Social-Democratic and Socialist-Revolutionary parties, the
writers of Novaya Zhizn and Dyelo Naroda, unless they were willing to be
deceived. What empty phrases are these about there being "no place in the
government of democratic Russia for a champion of the interests of international
capital!" Educated people ought to be ashamed of themselves, writing such
nonsense.
The whole Provisional Government is a government of the capitalist class. It is
a matter of class, not of persons. To attack Milyukov personally, to demand,
directly or indirectly, his dismissal, is a silly comedy, for no change of
personalities can change anything so long as the classes in power are unchanged.
To draw a line between the "democracy" of Russia, Britain, France, etc., and the
championing of capital is to sink to the level, of the economic and political
wisdom of a Gapon.
It is pardonable for ignorant muzhiks to demand of the capitalist a "promise"
that he "live righteously" and not capitalistically, that he should not
"champion the interests of capital". But for the leaders of the Petrograd
Soviet, for the writers of Novaya Zhiznand and Dyelo Naroda to adopt such
methods means to nourish the illusory hopes which the people place in the
capitalists, hopes that are most harmful and ruinous to the cause of freedom, to
the cause of the revolution.
Written: ~ April 20, 1917
First Published: Pravda No. 37, April 21, 1917
Transcription/Markup: David Walters and Brian Basgen
Online Version: Lenin Internet Archive (marxists.org) 1999
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