(To THE EDITOR or THE "SPECTATOR"]
But,—While agreeing with your remarks on the right attitude towards Russia, I think you might have gone on to point out what an immense benefit Lenin and his associates have con- ferred on the civilized world by giving a practical large-scale demonstration of the working and the results of Socialism. It may be that their demonstration has saved this and other countries from equally disastrous experiments, and Socialists _generally recognize that the Russian object-lesson is a principal obstacle to their propaganda—so much so that the more intel- ligent of them have recently busied themselves in denouncing and repudiating the Russian tyranny, whose advent they so cordially welcomed.
This being so, it would be undesirable, even if it were possible, to destroy the Socialist state by external force. It should be allowed to collapse by its own inherent rottenness, or to revert by natural stages to a condition of prosperity based on the honourable recognition of obligations and of the rights of property. One or other of these events must ulti- mately occur—and the sooner the better for suffering humanity—and either will bring the demonstration to a fitting conclusion, to remain as a permanent warning to mankind. Any attempt at interference from outside, besides being futile, as you have so well shown, would serve the purpose of those who would argue that Socialism might have succeeded but for capitalistic intervention.—I am, Sir, 4190., EDWARD P. HERBERT.
Burrasall, 149 Barlow Moor Road, West Didsbury.
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