Religious Fanaticism of the Bolsheviks

New Zealand Tablet, 17 November 1921, Page 11

Religious Fanaticism of the Bolsheviks

As Revealed by Bertrand Russell

At the very moment, practically, when the "recognition" of the Soviet Government by Great Britain has been granted, there is evident a growing disillusion among England's revolutionary intellectuals concerning the spiritual value of Bolshevism. Henri Barbusse, the French leader of the Clarte group (also in sympathy with the Soviets) wrote: "Let us have the boldness of truth, let us have the courage to burn, if it is necessary, that which we once adored." Hon. Bertrand Russell, who recently "went Bolshevik," and then visited Russia withthough not a member of —the British Labor Mission, is now evidently following this advice of his French confrere. In a series of impartial and arresting articles in the London Nation, the distinguished English philosopher gives a straightforward account of his impressions of Bolshevist Russia. His report is enough to dampen the ardor of the most impartial defender of Bolshevism -in Western Europe or America. It is not the industrial basis of the Soviets that is critised by Bertrand Russell. It is rather the lack of "psychological imagination," since Bolshevism attributes everything in politics to purely Material causes. Life in modern Russia, he says, is in many ways contrary to instinct. If? the Bolsheviks ultimately fall, it will be "because there comes a point at which men feel that amusement and ease are worth more than all other goods put together. Bertrand Russell's conclusions are the result, not merely of observation and investigation of -life under Bolshevist dictatorship, but of meeting and questioning Lenin and Trotzky, Sverdlov, and other leaders, including Maxim Gorky. Of the typical Communist or Bolshevik Mr. Russell writes: "He is not pursuing personal ends, but aiming at the creation of a new social order. The same motives, however, which make him austere make him also ruthless. Marx has taught that Communism is fatally predestined to come about; this fits in with the Oriental traits in the Russian character, and produces a state of mind not unlike that of the early successors of Mahomet. Opposition is crushed without mercy, and without shrinking from the methods of the Tsarist police, many of whom are still employed at their old work. Since all evils are clue to private property, the evils of the Bolshevik regime while it has to fight private property will authomatieally cease as soon as it has succeeded. ' ( "These views are the familiar consequences of fanatical belief. To an English mind they reinforce the conviction upon which English life has been based ever since 1688, that kindliness and tolerance are worth all the creeds in

the world—a view which, it is true, we do not apply to ' other nations or to subject races." ;'.'■'"■ The most typical example of this new Marxian fanatic- \ ism Bertrand Russell found in Lenin himself. Lenin laughed a great deal—"at first his laugh seems merely friendly and jolly, but gradually I came to feel it rather v '■-.. grim." The materialist conception of history, Mr. Russell felt, is Lenin's life-blood. "He resembles a professor in his desire to have the theory understood and in his fury with those" who misunderstand or disagree, as also in his , love of expounding. I got the impression that he despises . ' a great many people and is an intellectual aristocrat:' Lenin, to this impartial and even sympathetic observer, was the true type of religious fanatic, "too opinionated and narrowly orthodox." - "His strength comes, I imagine from his honesty, courage, and unwavering faith—religious faith in the Marx- '* ian gospel, which takes the place of the Christian martyr's hopes of Paradise, except that it is less egotistical. He has as little love of liberty as the Christians who suffered under Diocletian, and retaliated when they acquired power Perhaps love of liberty Is incompatible with wholehearted belief in a panacea' for all human ills. If so, I cannot s but rejoice in the sceptical temper of the Western world-. I went to Russia believing myself a Communist; but contact with those who have no doubts has intensified a thousandfold my own doubts, not only of Communism, but of 'iv every creed so firmly held that for its sake men ar willing to inflict widespread misery." ✓ Trotzky made a more favorable impression on the great English philosopher, from the point of view of intelligence and personality, though not of character. This may have been because "his vanity was even, greater than his love of power." In striking contrast to the Bolshevist leaders was the tragic figure of Maxim Gorky, with whom Bertrand Russell had a short interview in Petrograd: "He was in bed, apparently dying and obviously heartbroken. He begged me, in anything I might say about Russia, always to emphasise what Russia has suffered. He supports the Government—as I should do, if I were a Russian—not because he thinks it faultless but because the possible alternatives are worse. One felt in him a love of the Russian people which makes their present martyrdom almost unbearable, and prevents the' fanatical faith by which the pure Marxians are upheld. I felt him the most loveable, and to me the most sympathetic, of all the Russians I saw. I wished for more knowledge of his outlook, but he spoke with difficulty and was constantly interrupted by terrible fits of coughing, so I could not stay. All the intellectuals whom I meta class who have suffered terribly—expressed their gratitude to him for what he has clone on their behalf. The materialistic conception of history is all very well, but some care for the higher things of civilisation is a relief. The Bolsheviks are sometimes said to have done great things for art, but I could not discover that they had done more than preserve something of what existed before. When I questioned one of them on the, subject, he grew impatient, and said: ' We-haven't time for a new art, any more than for a new. religion.' Unavoidably, the atmosphere is one in which art cannot flourish, because art is anarchic and resistant to organisation. Gorky has done all that one man .could to preserve the intellectual and artistic life of Russia. But he is dying, and perhaps it is dying too." These spiritual evils are in no sense due, in the opinion of Mr. Russell, to the blockade against Soviet Russia. He admits the whole of the Bolshevist indictment of bourgeois capitalism. Heuwas a convinced Communist before he went to Russia, whefre he was a guest of honor, and made "to feel like the/Prince Of Wales." But, after carefully weighing the Bolshevist beliefs, he finds himself definitely and strongly opposed to them : "My objection is not that\apitalism is less bad than the Bolsheviks believe, but that Socialism is less good, at any rate in the form which can be brought about by war. ' The evils of war, especially of civil war, are certain and very great; the gains to .be achieved by victory are proble- -~ matical. In the course of a desperate struggle, the heritage of civilisation is likely to be lost, while hatred, suspicion * . and cruelty become normal in the relations of human beings. In order to succeed in war, a concentration of power is necessary, and from concentration of power the very same ';

evils flow as from capitalist concentration of wealth. For these reasons chiefly, I cannot support any movement which aims at world revolution. The damage to civilisation done by revolution in one country may be repaired. by the influence of another in which there lias been no revolution; but in a universal cataclysm civilisation might go under for a thousand years. But while I cannot advocate world revolution, I cannot escape from the conclusion that the governments of the leading capitalist countries are doing everything to bring it about. Abuse of our power against Germany, Russia, and India (to say nothing of any other countries) may well bring about our downfall and produce those very evils which the enemies of Bolshevism most dread. . . "Experience of power is inevitably altering communist theories, and men who control a vast governmental machine can hardly have quite the same outlook on life as they had when they were hunted fugitives. If the Bolsheviki remain in power, it may be assumed that their communism will fade, and that they will increasingly resemble any other Asiatic governmentfor example, our own Government in India." These conclusions, however, were not in agreement with most of- the members of the British Labor Mission, who went to Russia as ardent Marxians and returned as such. At an overcrowded meeting held in the Albert Hall, London, under the auspices of George Lansbury's Daily Herald, the prevailing sentiment was almost fanatically Bolshevistic. It is worthy of note, however, that through the mission a message was sent to the British workers from Prince,/Kropotkin, in which that veteran revolutionist not merely protested against foreign interference in Russia but also criticised "the.attempt to build up a Communist Republic on the lines of strongly centralised State Communism, under the iroiv rule of the dictatorship of a party."— Current 'Opinion.