MIA > Archive > Lassalle > Voices of Revolt
Written: As a speech in German, delivered September 26-28th, 1863.
Published in English: 1927.
Translated by: Jakob Altmeier (presumed).
Source: Voices of Revolt: Speeches of Ferdinand Lassalle. International Publishers, first edition, 1927, New York, USA. 94 pages.
Transcription and Markup: Bill Wright for marxists.org, February, 2023
My friends! For fourteen long years we had permitted the Liberal Party to go on . . . Practicing an unheard of self-denial, we had avoided everything, every initiative of our own, every demand of our own, that might have deprived this party of the appearance of being the party that controlled the masses of the people! But now, it must be clear to all the world that these fourteen years of unsuccessful waiting would necessarily be followed by fourteen hundred years of equally hopeless waiting, if we should go on letting this party have its way and pretending to be “the people”! It was now clear, at least to every thinking man, that these weaklings would never be able to cut a path for freedom! No consideration could now longer deter us; we now no longer even had a choice; the moment had come for us to come out and establish ourselves as that which we really always had been: an independent, separate party. Indeed, this had now become our bounden duty; we could no longer tolerate the appearance of belonging to a party which had descended to this abyss of shameful weakness! It was necessary for us to save our honor, to save the honor of the country.
For me this motive was so imperative that even if I had had to stand alone in my protest, I should nevertheless have always looked back upon it with pride and satisfaction. But I was not obliged to stand alone. It appeared once more that when one man has the courage to proclaim his principles, the echo from the breast of the people will answer him a thousandfold. Thousands and thousands have joined me in this protest; our organization itself is the result. In this alone we should have performed a great act. When later historians set down the sad history of these days, they will say: but at least there were men who came out in righteous wrath against this shame. Our act has prevented these historians from saying: And there was not one man in Germany who protested against such a disgrace!
The events that have come to pass since then have necessarily placed the limitless weakness of the Progressive Party[a] in even a brighter illumination than before. . . . I shall first remind you of the Rhenish Congress of delegates at Cologne and Rolandseck.[b] These were the Saturnalia of the German bourgeoisie. You should have been there to see. Not only in Cologne, but wherever the eye might look in Germany, wherever your glance encountered the news items of German newspapers — everywhere you could read, see and hear of festivals, preparations for festivals, portraits of delegates to festivals, etc. Can you imagine it? What were these remarkable persons celebrating? While the situation of the country was such that one should go about in sack-cloth and ashes, they are holding festivals! Festivals of the type inaugurated by the French after a victorious revolution, are celebrated in Germany after defeats. In order to escape the real struggle, they get up a dinner, at which the vanquished sing hymns of victory behind their wineglasses and roasts. In fact, this topsy-turvy state very closely resembles that of the Roman Saturnalia. In Rome, the slaves seated themselves at table and acted as if they were the masters; so, to-day, the vanquished sit down to a banquet and carry on as if they were the victors, in their pompous and tasteless toasts of victory. And, just as the Roman slaves proved by accepting the Saturnalia that they were willingly subjecting themselves to a whole year of slavery in exchange for this illusory freedom of one day, so our Progressives make clear to every man of understanding, by their illusory celebrations of victory, that they are willing to dispense with the real struggle and the real victory. When Spartacus and his men raised the banner of the slave insurrection in Rome in order to make free men of slaves, he was doing more than engaging in Saturnalian festivities. . . .
The secret of the strength of our Government has thus far been rooted in the rigid weakness of its adversaries. The reaction will always have an easy time in carrying off the victory if it deals, of course, with such opponents. . . . Nothing has been proved but the total incapacity of the Progressives for any political struggle. A party which cannot cover its most important position with its own corpses in order to defend it — such a party bears no promise of victory within it. Such a party knows no other course than to run away again at every new attack.
Such a party, such a press, do not even deserve an expression of regret when the lash of the Government resounds on their backs. He who has no ability at all to defend his hide, has no right to existence, does not deserve to live! . . .
What interest can we have in men who run away at every attack, in champions who face each new blow, not with their fists, but with their backsides? . . .
What other feelings may be aroused in us by such a spectacle than those of contempt and ridicule, of disgust, of scorn at such heroes? In fact, the higher and purer become the goals pursued by such men, the greater must be our contempt to find that not even such high goals can produce a more manly attitude in their bearers; and the sole slightly extenuating circumstances that may be found for the actions of the Progressives is actually precisely in the fact that in the last analysis their purposes really concern themselves only with affording somewhat more influence to a handful of persons. Such lamentably contemptible purposes can produce only a lamentably contemptible bearing; only a great idea, only enthusiasm for great goals can beget devotion, self-sacrifice, audacity!
—From Die Feste, die Presse, und der Frankfurter Abgeordnetentag.
[a] Fortschrittspartei (“Progressive Party,” also called Fortschrittsmänner, “Men of Progress”): A liberal party founded in Prussia in 1861 and predominant in the Prussian Diet until 1866, when the National Liberal Party was formed from it.
[b] Rolandseck: A village and watering-place on the left bank of the Rhine.
Last updated on 15 February 2023