"Olaf Stapledon - Light and the Darkness" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stapledon Olaf)

spirit and the old ideal of endless progress, the effective aim of this society was merely to maintain itself in stability and comfort.
This was no satisfying ideal for the young. Those young people who were not cowed by the authority of their elders were flung
into violent opposition to the whole social order and ideology of the Republic. They were thus very susceptible to the propaganda
of Russian imperial communism, which under the old heart-stirring slogans of the Revolution was now making its supreme effort
to dominate the world, and was able to offer great opportunities of enterprise and courage to its swarms of vigorous but uncritical
young.

The fall of India dismayed the middle-aged North American community. When at last the Soviet dictatorship picked a quarrel
with it, internal dissensions made resistance impossible. The regime of the middle-aged collapsed. The youthful minority seized
power and welcomed the Russian aerial armada. The Hammer and Sickle, formerly the most heartening emblem of the will for
the light, but now sadly debased, was displayed on the Capitol.

The whole double American continent now fell under the control of Russia, and with it Australia and New Zealand. In Southern
and Central Africa, meanwhile, the Black populations, after a series of abortive and bloody rebellions, had at last overthrown




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Darkness and the Light




their white masters, avenging themselves for centuries of oppression by perpetrating the greatest massacre of history. If the
Negroes had been politically experienced they might now have become one of the most formidable states in the world, for the
inland water power of their continent was immense. Even under European domination this had been to a large extent exploited,
but vast resources remained to be tapped. Unfortunately the Black populations had been so long inservitude that they were
incapable of organizing themselves and their country efficiently. The Negro states which emerged in Africa were soon at
loggerheads with one another. When foreign oppression had been abolished, unity of purpose ceased; and the condition of Africa
was one of constant petty wars and civil wars. Little by little however, Russian imperialism, profiting by Negro disunity, annexed
the whole of Africa.

iii. RUSSIA AND CHINA

One power alone in all the world now remained to be brought within the Russian grasp, and this was potentially the greatest
power of all, namely China. It was in the relations between Russia and China that the discrepancy in my experience first became
evident, and the two parallel histories of mankind emerged. Since these two great peoples bulk so largely in my story, I shall
dwell for a while on the forces which had moulded them.

The first Russian revolution, under Lenin, had been mainly a groping but sincere expression of the will for true community, and
also an act of vengeance against a cruel and inefficient master class. When the leaders of the Revolution had established their
power they proceeded to remake the whole economy of Russia for the benefit of the workers. Foreign hostility, however, forced
them to sacrifice much to military necessity. Not only the physical but also the mental prosperity of the population suffered. What
should have become a population of freely inquiring, critical, and responsible minds became instead a mentally- regimented
population, prone to mob enthusiasm and contempt for unorthodoxy. Danger favoured the dictatorship of one man and the
dominance of a disciplined and militarized party. The will for true community tended more and more to degenerate into the
passion for conformity within the herd and for triumph over the herd's enemies.

For a long while, for many decades or possibly a few centuries, the struggle between the light and the darkness in Russia