197 Quotes by Leon Trotsky

  • Author Leon Trotsky
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    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, people react differently, but to a red-hot iron, alike. As a steam-hammer converts a sphere and a cube alike into sheet metal, so under the blow of too great and inexorable events resistances are smashed and the boundaries of “individuality” lost.

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  • Author Leon Trotsky
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    In a country where the sole employer is the State, opposition means death by slow starvation. The old principle: who does not work shall not eat, has been replaced by a new one: who does not obey shall not eat.

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  • Author Leon Trotsky
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    In the meantime, the first characteristic of a really revolutionary party is -- to be able to look reality in the face.

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  • Author Leon Trotsky
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    A program of "disarmament," while imperialist antagonisms survive, is the most pernicious of fictions. Even if it were realized by way of general agreement - an obviously fantastic assumption!- that would by no meansprevent a new war. The imperialists do not make war because there are armaments; on the contrary, they forgearms when they need to fight.

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  • Author Leon Trotsky
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    A means can be justified only by its end. But the end in its turn needs to be justified.

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