The World Significance of the Russian Revolution/Section 2
II. What is the Real Issue?
Whatever our previous opinions or lack of opinions about the obscure situation in Russia, we are compelled now to discover exactly what is at stake. What are the principles involved and what, in consequence, is our policy to be? It is notoriously hard to find a clear-cut issue in the world of thought and endeavour: there are too many people interested in confusing the issue. It is easy to prate of "the issue between Reaction and Progress." Such verbiage means nothing; every shallow tub-thumper calls his hackneyed catch-words "progressive," and seeks to make the flesh of his bétes noires' creep by calling them "reactionary!" "They are nothing," said Disraeli, "but words to mystify the millions. They mean nothing, they are nothing; they are phrases, not facts."