[Socialism As It Is by William English Walling]@TWC D-Link bookSocialism As It Is CHAPTER I 16/19
_The Worker_ of Brisbane, Australia, says: "The complicated complaint from which society suffers can only be cured by the administration of _homeopathic_ doses.... Inculcate Socialism? Yes, but grab all you can to be going on with. Preach revolutionary thoughts? Yes, but rely on the ameliorative method....
The minds of men are of slow development, and we must be content, we fear, to accomplish our revolution piecemeal, bit by bit, till a point is come to when, by accumulative process, a series of small changes amounts to the Great Change.
The most important revolutions are those that happen quietly without anything particularly noticeable seeming to occur." What is a Great Change depends _entirely_, in the revolutionist's view, on how rapidly it is brought about, and "revolutionary thoughts" are empty abstractions unless accompanied by revolutionary methods.
Once it is assumed that there is plenty of time, the difference between the conservative and the radical disappears.
For even those who have the most to lose realize in these days the inevitability of "evolution." The radical is not he who looks forward to great changes after long periods of time, but he who will not tolerate unnecessary delay--who is unwilling to accept the so-called installments or ameliorations offered by the conservative and privileged (even when considerable) as being satisfactory or as necessarily contributing to his purpose at all.
<<Back Index Next>> D-Link book Top TWC mobile books
|