2 NOVEMBER 1956, Page 7

kHRUSHCHEV, BULGANIN and the rest really ought to have studied

Lenin a little more closely. 'What, generally speaking, are the symptoms of a revolutionary situation?' Lenin once asked himself* and decided 1. when it is impossible for the ruling class to maintain their rule in an unchanged form; when there is . . . a crisis in the policy of the ruling class which causes fissures, through which the discontent and indignation of the oppressed masses burst forth; 2. when the want and sufferings of the oppressed classes have become more acute than usual; 3. when as a consequence of the above causes there is a considerable increase in the activities of the masses who in /nave time quietly allow themselves to be robbed but * LENIN : Selected Works (1915 edition), vol. v, p. 174.

t Collected Works (4th Russian edition), vol. iv, pp. 351-2. who in turbulent times are drawn both by circumstances of the crisis . . . into independent historical action. . . Revolution only arises.' Lenin continued, 'out of such a situation when, to the above mentioned objective changes. a subjective change is added, namely, the ability of the revolu- tionary class to carry out revolutionary mass actions strong enough to break the old government which never, not even in a period of crisis, "falls" if it has not been "dropped."'