“ In the meantime, the first characteristic of a really revolutionary party is -- to be able to look reality in the face. Leon Trotsky
“ Terror is a powerful means of policy and one would have to be a hypocrite not to understand this. Leon Trotsky
“ As a general rule, man strives to avoid labor. Love for work is not at all an inborn characteristic: it is created by economic pressure and social education. One may even say that man is a fairly lazy… Leon Trotsky
“ The principles of liberalism can have a real existence only in conjunction with a police system. Anarchism is an attempt to cleanse liberalism of the police. But just as pure oxygen is impossible to b… Leon Trotsky
“ Transcending class distinctions, the speaker [Stalin] portrays the relation between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat as a mere division of labor. The workers and soldiers achieve the revolution, Gu… Leon Trotsky
“ For the information of these “friends” who consider themselves called to defend against us the role of the Bolsheviks in the October Revolution, we give warning that our book teaches not how to love a… Leon Trotsky
“ The boycott of parliamentary institutions on the part of anarchists and semianarchists is dictated by a desire not to submit their weakness to a test on the part of the masses, thus preserving their r… Leon Trotsky
“ We seek to uncoverbehind the events changes in the collective consciousness. We reject wholesale references to the “spontaneity” of the movement, references which in most casesexplain nothing and teac… Leon Trotsky
“ Every historical form of society is in its foundation a form of organization of labor. While every previous form of society was an organization of labor in the interests of a minority, which organized… Leon Trotsky
“ Generally speaking, by the way, that is the moral of the opponents of violence in politics: they renounce violence when it comes to introducing changes in what already exists, but in defense of the ex… Leon Trotsky
“ The basis of bureaucratic rule is the poverty of society in objects of consumption, with the resulting struggle of each against all. When there is enough goods in a store, the purchasers can come when… Leon Trotsky
“ Let us not forget that revolutions are accomplished through people, although they be nameless. Materialism does not ignore the feeling, thinking, and acting man, but explains him. Leon Trotsky
“ Similar (of course, far from identical) irritations in similar conditions call out similar reflexes; the more powerful the irritation, the sooner it overcomes personal peculiarities. To a tickle, peop… Leon Trotsky
“ As long as human labor power, and, consequently, life itself, remain articles of sale and purchase, of exploitation and robbery, the principle of the “sacredness of human life” remains a shameful lie,… Leon Trotsky
