s of the People's party, the _Narodniki_. The book gave Lenine an
assured position among the intellectual leaders of the movement, and was
regarded as a conclusive defense of the position of the Plechanov group, to
which Lenine belonged. Since his overthrow of the Kerensky regime, and his
attempt to establish a new kind of social state in Russia, Lenine has been
frequently confronted by his own earlier reasoning by those who believe his
position to be contrary to the true Marxian position.

From 1903 to 1906 Lenine's views developed farther and farther away from
those of his great teacher, George Plechanov. His position in the period of
the First Duma can best be stated, perhaps, in opposition to the position
of Plechanov and the Mensheviki. Accepting the Marxian theory of historical
development, Plechanov and his followers believed that Russia must pass
through a phase of capitalist development before there could be a
social--as distinguished from a merely political--revolution. Certainly
they believed, an intensive development of industry, bringing into
existence a strong capitalist class, on the one hand, and a strong
proletariat, on the other hand, must precede any attempt to create a Social
Democratic state. They believed, furthermore, that a political revolution,
creating a democratic constitutional system of government, must come before
the social revolution could be achieved. They accepted the traditional
Marxian view that the achievement of this political revolution must be
mainly the task of the bourgeoisie, and that the proletariat, and
especially the Socialists, should co-operate with the enlightened
bourgeoisie in attaining that political revolution without which there
could never be a Socialist commonwealth.

Plechanov was not blind to the dangers of compromise which must be faced in
basing the policy of a movement of the masses upon this reasoning. He
argued, however, that there was no choice in the matter at all; that the
iron law of historical inevitability and necessity determined the matter.
He pointed out that the bourgeoisie, represented by the Constitutional
Democrats in the political struggle, were compelled to wage relentless war
upon Absolutism, the abolition of which was as absolutely essential to the
realization of their class aims as it was to the realization of the class
aims of the proletariat. Hence, in this struggle, the capitalist class, as
yet too weak to accomplish the overthrow of auto