The greater number of these schools are closed, in part,
it would seem, from lack of personnel, and in part from fear of
counter-revolutionary propaganda. The result is that, though those
schools which they have created are good and organized on modern
lines, on the whole there would seem to be less diffusion of child
education than before. In this, as in most other departments, the
Bolsheviks show themselves loath to attempt anything which cannot be
done on a large scale and impregnated with Communist doctrine. It goes
without saying that Communist doctrine is taught in schools, as
Christianity has been taught hitherto, moreover the Communist teachers
show bitter hostility to other teachers who do not accept the
doctrine. At the children's entertainment alluded to above, the dances
and poems performed had nearly all some close relation to Communism,
and a teacher addressed the children for something like an hour and a
half on the duties of Communists and the errors of Anarchism.
This teaching of Communism, however necessary it may appear for the
building of the Communist state of the future, does seem to me to be
an evil in that it is done emotionally and fanatically, with an appeal
to hate and militant ardour rather than to constructive reason. It
binds the free intellect and destroys initiative. An industrial state
needs not only obedient and patient workers and artists, it needs also
men and women with initiative in scientific research.
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