They are pressing forward, here, there and everywhere, in all the zones that girdle the globe. Everywhere these awakening workers, these class-conscious proletarians, these hardy sons and daughters of honest toil are proclaiming the glad tidings of the coming emancipation, everywhere their hearts are attuned to the most sacred cause that ever challenged men and women to action in all the history of the world. Everywhere they are moving toward democracy and the dawn; marching toward the sunrise, their faces all aglow with the light of the coming day. These are the Socialists, the most zealous and enthusiastic crusaders the world has ever known. They are making history that will light up the horizon of coming generations, for their mission is the emancipation of the human race. They have been reviled; they have been ridiculed, persecuted, imprisoned and have suffered death, but they have been sufficient to themselves and their cause, and their final triumph is but a question of time.
What … happened … ?
This seems to still be happening, right? “Here, there and everywhere” … but without such fervour. Maybe there’s an eclipse or something, something to keep their faces from being “all aglow with the light of the coming day”. Maybe the moon of diversionary capitalism, graced with advertising, marketing and mass media, is blocking that light - or at least refracting it and making it harder for each “zealous and enthusiastic crusader” to see their ranks swelling.
But swell their ranks do, as each mind, each body, each family and each nation feels the wounds made against them by the continual abrasions of capitalism. The torments continue, but they only make the alarm clock ring more loudly to wake up the sleeping workers.
Kruschev is remembered for screaming “we will bury you” - but more to the point is that when capitalism builds itself on capital created by workers and then weakens and erodes the workers, its foundations, it will bury itself.
Meanwhile, tempus fugit …
