The absolute unpreparedness of the Russian people—eighty per cent is illiterate—to pass into a régime of democracy and social autonomy has facilitated the successes of the Bolsheviks, whose "ideas" or conceptions, as expressed in the programmes of Lenine, Trotzky, et al., consist in carrying "persuasion" to the majority of the ignorant masses. Such "ideas" are first of all that the "proletariat has not and must not have a country." "The issue of the World War is of interest to the proletariat only from the point of view of the possibility for them to take advantage of the general situation, doing everything in order to turn the war of the states into a war of classes."
The bastard Bolshevism of present-day Russia professes, furthermore, the conception formerly considered as purely anarchic that "the property of others does not exist"; theft and violence are the normal means of exchange; liberty of speech is non-existent; neither press liberty nor a free literary production exists, because the Bolsheviks are exercising a censorship more tyrannical than the ill-famed imperial censorship. Their methods of coercion are to bring about financial exhaustion by means of fines and indemnities; physical exhaustion by means of enforced labor and confiscation of food supplies, and moral exhaustion by removing the foundations upon which individual life is integrated, removing all dominant objects, such as desire for scientific or artistic creation, religious principle, or strong and lasting affections. It is not only the dictatorship of proletariat which the Bolsheviks are trying to establish but a dictatorship of tyranny, and they use every conceivable means, showing themselves especially rabid against the well-to-do classes, against the intellectuals, against capitalism and militarism.
The application of all this "programme" carries with it, as a first consequence, the complete dissolution of every state form, in the political sense as well as in the economic sense. The disorganization is complete; hunger, by which the masses see themselves threatened, increases the spread of every form of criminality and violence. The destruction of every sentiment of individual responsibility and the abolition of religious faith contribute to take away from the class of those who are better fitted to resist morally every obstacle and restraint in the choice of their actions. It is the "universal destruction," it is the madness of the après nous le déluge!
The position of the Jews, radically changed after the revolution of the spring of 1917, which gave them equal rights with the rest of the population of Russian origin and religion, has had its triumph in the recent manifestations of Bolshevism. In fact, besides Trotzky, whose real name is Braunstein, there is a high percentage of Jews among the mob leaders and dictators of the "soviet" (councils) by which every city is administered, forming in this way an infinite number of "small social republics" in every part of the vast Russian territory.
The words of one of the most profound connoisseurs of the Russian soul, Dostoievsky, words which, alas, are prophetic not only of the concrete facts, but also of the general dangers which threaten his country, portray the condition that has come to pass.
"Our people, in the immense majority, adapt themselves cheerfully to the hardest discipline, and it is the easiest thing in the world to drag them toward the most noble deeds or toward the most ignoble crimes. I tremble to think of what these good people are capable of doing if they are left, even for a moment, without discipline. Alas, side by side with them there are always some evil spirits, full of envy, thirsty of power, with their soul filled with selfish passions and bad instincts; it is they who always exercise a mysterious and nefarious influence on the Russian mobs. I had a striking example of this when the whole population of a prison, about four thousand persons, was supinely submitting to the will of one of these demons who took advantage of them. Nobody dared to murmur. The Russian needs an idol; he feels the need of bending, of being guided, of obeying. Free the Russian people of a leading power which they willingly followed and they will immediately create for themselves another dominator more obnoxious and nefarious. Let God preserve us when the crowd of the weak ones will follow under the power of the wicked ones. What a horrible spectacle we shall witness then! What atrocities! What useless slaughter! We shall see the country and religion betrayed; we shall see Russia fall the prey to external enemies; we shall see material servitude, the loss of all our acquisitions, the oblivion of all the affections. Let God save me from seeing this turning-point in Russian history!"
God saved him, but this mercy was not extended to us. We shall have to be witness of Russia groaning under the system of bloodless terror, but it will not be for long. In theory the Bolsheviks desire the same thing as the Socialists; in practice they want it plus revenge, that which has been the motivating characteristic of the Jew since time immemorial. Their power is founded in resources which I suspect are largely in America, and their agents have been granted citizenship and protection in practically every country of the world. So soon as the motives of their supporters then shall be widely known, and so soon as their monstrous practices shall be revealed to the whole world, this malignant exuberance that has developed upon the healthy growth of Liberalism and Socialism will be removed by a giant cautery wielded in a hand more powerful than that of Hercules.
A decree recently issued by the Bolsheviks of Vladimir, published in that official Soviet organ Izvestija, and now beginning to be widely published by European papers, will be relished by many in the U. S. A., where unquestionably the Bolsheviks have largely been financed.
"Every girl who has reached her eighteenth year is guaranteed by the local Commissary of Surveillance the full inviolability of her person.
"Any offender against an eighteen-year-old girl by using insulting language or attempting to ravish her is subject to the full rigors of the Revolutionary Tribunal.