CHAPTER XLIX
There was a moment of tense silence.
“And is that all?” said a mocking voice from the middle of the hall.
“That’s all,” said Prokop, disgusted.
“It is not all,” Daimon stood up. “Comrade Krakatit assumed that the delegates would be good enough to understand”
“Oho!” there resounded from the middle of the hall.
“Yes. Delegate Mezierski must have patience and let me finish. Comrade Krakatit has graphically explained to us that it is necessary,” and Daimon’s voice again was like the screeching of a bird, “that it is necessary to inaugurate a revolution without paying attention to the theory of stages; a levelling and disruptive evolution in the course of which humanity will release the highest which is hidden within. Man must explode to release everything. Society must explode to find the highest good within itself. You here have spent years in disputing the question of the highest good of humanity. Comrade Krakatit has shown us that it is sufficient to cause humanity to explode in order for it to flame up higher than you have wished it to in your debates. And we must not bother about what is destroyed by the explosion. I say that Comrade Krakatit is right.”
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