When people speak of ideas that revolutionise society, they do
but express the fact, that within the old society, the elements
of a new one have been created, and that the dissolution of the
old ideas keeps even pace with the dissolution of the old
conditions of existence.
When the ancient world was in its last throes, the ancient
religions were overcome by Christianity. When Christian ideas
succumbed in the 18th century to rationalist ideas, feudal
society fought its death battle with the then revolutionary
bourgeoisie. The ideas of religious liberty and freedom of
conscience merely gave expression to the sway of free competition
within the domain of knowledge.
"Undoubtedly," it will be said, "religious, moral, philosophical
and juridical ideas have been modified in the course of
historical development. But religion, morality philosophy,
political science, and law, constantly survived this change."
"There are, besides, eternal truths, such as Freedom, Justice,
etc. that are common to all states of society. But Communism
abolishes eternal truths, it abolishes all religion, and all
morality, instead of constituting them on a new basis; it
therefore
acts in contradiction to all past historical experience."
What does this accusation reduce itself to? The history of all
past society has consisted in the development of class
antagonisms,
antagonisms that assumed different forms at different epochs.
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