LENIN ON ORGANIZATION 
his friends the economist workers of Ivanovo-Voz- 
enesensk. He writes: 
“It is a bad thing when the crowd is mute and 
unenlightened, and when the movement does not 
proceed from the depths. For instance: the stu- 
dents of a university town leave for the holidays 
or go home for the summer, and the movement 
at once comes to a standstill. Can an organiza- 
tion which is pushed on from outside be a real 
force? It has still not learnt to walk, it is still 
in leading strings. So it is everywhere. The 
students go off, and everything comes to a stand- 
still. The best of the cream is removed, and the 
milk turns sour. The ‘committee’ is arrested, 
and until a new one can be formed everything 
comes to a halt. Indeed, one never knows what 
sort of committee will be set up next—it may be 
quite different from the old one. The first 
preached one thing, the second may preach the 
very opposite. The sequence between yesterday 
and tomorrow is broken, the experience of the 
past does not enlighten the future. And all this 
comes about because roots have not been struck 
in the depths, in the crowd, because there are not 
a hundred fools at work, but ten wise men. Ten 
wise men can be caught up at a snap; but if the 
organization embraces the masses everything 
proceeds from the masses and nobody, however 
zealous, can stop the cause.” (Page 63). 
The facts are described correctly. Here we have 
a fairly good picture of our amateurish methods. 
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