NICOLAI LENIN
of our revolution. You have seen his work, you have watched it as closely as I. You know the part played by Lenin in the July days of 1917. For him the question of the necessity of the seizure of power by the proletariat had been settled from the first moment of our present revolution, and the question was only about the choice of a suitable opportunity. In the July days our entire central committee was opposed to the immediate seizure of power. Lenin was of the same opinion. But when on July 16, the wave of popular revolt rose high, Lenin became alert, and here, upstairs, in the refreshment room of the Taurida Palace, a small conference took place at which Trotsky, Lenin, and myself were present. Lenin laughingly asked us. "Shall we not attempt now?" and he added: "No, it would not do to assume power now, as nothing will come out of it, the soldiers at the front being largely on the other side and would come and massacre the Petrograd workers." As a matter of fact, you will remember in those July days Kerensky did succeed in bringing over soldiers from the front against us. What became ripe two or three months later was still immature in July, and the capture of power at that time might have been fatal. Lenin realised this before everybody else. At any rate, Lenin never hesitated for a moment on the question as to whether the proletariat, in our revolution, ought to seize the reins of power, or not, All his hesitations turned round the question as to whether it could not be done earlier.
You know how things developed subsequently. We passed through a time when it seemed that everything was lost. Comrade Lenin for a moment even doubted whether the Soviets, corrupted by the compromise-mongers, could play a decisive part, and he gave out the watchword that we might perhaps have to seize power without the Soviets. But he never for a moment doubted that sooner or later the power would be in our hands, and that it was necessary to hurl the Mensheviks and the Socialist Revolutionaries to the ground.
At first, during the July days, we could not realise what was occuring. One night, on July 16th, Comrade Lenin alone came into the editorial offices of the "Pravda" to hand over a manuscript. Half an hour afterwards,
— 41 —
