Before leaving this subject, John, there is still another difficulty to be considered: if the Socialist State proposes to pay for the property it seizes, where is the money to come from for even an inadequate scheme of compensation? Do you think that the new State would be content to assume the additional burden imposed by such a debt as would be represented by all these obligations? No matter how extortionate the new methods of taxation might be, if they stop short of relative confiscation, it would take many decades to extinguish this liability. Is it not more likely that history would repeat itself, and that the story of the French Revolution would be repeated in the new Co-operative Commonwealth? In France, in the days of the Revolution, there was compensation for the expropriated in the beginning, but this speedily resolved itself into expropriation without indemnity. Nor must it be forgotten that, whatever provisions might be made, the State would be bound by its principles to prevent those whom it compensated from investing their funds, or engaging in business competition; transferring their money or bonds, or bequeathing their possessions to others; for, if this were not done, compensation would prove to be the means of re-establishing the very system which Socialism seeks to destroy. CHAPTER XIV THE REVOLUTION My dear John, You will meet many Socialists who will tell you that the Marxist creed anticipates that no force will be required in bringing about the change from capitalism to collectivism--no violence, no bloodshed. If anybody attempts to make you believe that the Socialist purpose is a peaceful one, refer him to “The Communist Manifesto,” which was drafted by Marx and Engels, and terminates with these words: “The Communists do not seek to conceal their views and aims. They declare openly that their purpose can be obtained only by violent overthrow of all existing arrangements of society. Let the ruling classes tremble at a communistic revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose in it but their chains; they have a world to win.” If you are still told, as I have been, that such language was used by the founders of Socialism, not because they meant to incite violence, but simply to arouse the interests of the worker in their propaganda, call your Socialist’s attention to the transactions of The Hague Congress in 1872, when Marx declared: “In most countries of Europe violence must be the lever of our social reform. We must finally have recourse to violence, in order to establish the rule of labor.... The revolution must be universal, and we find a conspicuous example in the Commune of Paris, which has failed because in other capitals--Berlin and Madrid--a simultaneous revolutionary movement did not break out in connection with this mighty upheaval of the proletariat of Paris.”