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Revolutionary realism tries to draw the maximum advantage from every situation – that is what makes it revolutionary – but at the same time it does not permit us to set ourselves fantastic aims – that is what makes it realistic.

Leon Trotsky

Not believing in force is the same as not believing in gravity.
LEON TROTSKY

Believe Force Gravity
If you cannot convince a Fascist, acquaint his head with the pavement.
LEON TROTSKY

Convince Head Yourself
You are pitiful isolated individuals; you are bankrupts; your role is played out. Go where you belong from now on – into the dustbin of history!
LEON TROTSKY

History Individual Isolate Yourself
Under all conditions, well-organized violence seems to him the shortest distance between two points.
LEON TROTSKY

Condition Distance Organization Point Violence
Old age is the most unexpected of all things that happen to a man.
LEON TROTSKY

Age Expectation Man Old
The Soviet Union needs thinking and critical friends, such as are capable not only of singing hymns in the hours of success, but of not shrinking in the hour of defeat and danger.
LEON TROTSKY

Capable Criticism Dangerous Defeat Thinking
To overthrow the power of the bourgeoisie and to establish the power of the proletariat in one country still does not signify the full victory of Socialism.
LEON TROTSKY

Establishment Power Socialism Victory
The history of a revolution is for us first of all a history of the forcible entrance of the masses into the realm of rulership over their own destiny.
LEON TROTSKY

Destiny Entrance Force History Revolution Rule
The revenge of history is more powerful than the revenge of the most powerful General Secretary.
LEON TROTSKY

History Powerful Revenge Secretary
The depth and strength of a human character are defined by its moral reserves. People reveal themselves completely only when they are thrown out of the customary conditions of their life, for only then do they have to fall back on their reserves.
LEON TROTSKY

Condition Custom Depth Moral Reserve Strength
Communism needs democracy like the human body needs oxygen.
LEON TROTSKY

Communism Democracy Need Oxygen
England is nothing but the last ward of the European madhouse, and quite possibly it will prove to be the ward for particularly violent cases.
LEON TROTSKY

Particular Possible Quite Violence
The revolution has its own laws: in the period of its culmination it pushes the most highly developed, determined and far-seeing stratum of the revolutionary class to the most advanced positions.
LEON TROTSKY

Development Law Position Revolution
I emphasized the significance of revolutionary strategy.
LEON TROTSKY

Revolution Significance Strategy
The task of the proletariat is to create a still more powerful fatherland with a far greater power of resistance, the Republican United States of Europe, as the foundation of the United States of the World.
LEON TROTSKY

Creation Foundation Powerful World
The theory of the permanent revolution, in contradiction to the theory of socialism in one country, was recognized by the entire Bolshevik party during the period from 1917 to 1923.
LEON TROTSKY

Contradiction Permanent Recognition Revolution Theory

Revolutionary realism tries to draw the maximum advantage from every situation – that is what makes it revolutionary – but at the same time it does not permit us to set ourselves fantastic aims – that is what makes it realistic.

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Revolutionary realism tries to draw the maximum advantage from every situation – that is what makes it revolutionary – but at the same time it does not permit us to set ourselves fantastic aims – that is what makes it realistic.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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