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 from the point of view of a class, from the point of view of the 
 struggle of the proletariat. To abandon this point of view is to move 
 away from historical materialism, just as to adopt it leads directly 
 into the thick of the struggle of the proletariat. 
  
 Historical materialism grows out of the €immediate, natural€ 
 life-principle of the proletariat; it means the acquisition of total 
 knowledge of reality from this one point of view. But it does not follow 
 from this that this knowledge or this methodological attitude is the 
 inherent or natural possession of the proletariat as a class (let alone 
 of proletarian individuals). On the contrary. It is true that the 
 proletariat is the conscious subject of total social reality. But the 
 conscious subject is not defined here as in Kant, where €subject€ is 
 defined as that which can never be an object. The €subject€ here is not 
 a detached spectator of the process. The proletariat is more than just 
 the active and passive part of this process: the rise and evolution of 
 its knowledge and its actual rise and evolution in the course of history 
 are just the two different sides of the same real process. It is not 
 simply the case that the working class arose in the course of 
 spontaneous, unconscious actions born of immediate, direct despair (the 
 Luddite destruction of machines can serve as a primitive illustration of 
 this), and then advanced gradually through incessant social struggle to 
 the point where it €formed itself into a class.€ But it is no less true 
 that proletarian consciousness of social reality, of its own class 
 situation, of its own historical vocation and the materialist view of 
 history are all products of this self-same process of evolution which 
 historical materialism understands adequately and for what it really is 
 for the first time in history. 
  
 Thus the Marxist method is equally as much the product of class warfare 
 as any other political or economic product. In the same way, the 
 evolution of the proletariat reflects the inner structure of the society 
 which it was the first to understand. €Its result, therefore, appears 
 just as constantly presupposed by it as its presuppositions appear as 
 its results.€ [37] The idea of totality which we have come to recognise 
 as the presupposition necessary to comprehend reality is the product of 
 history in a double sense. 
  
 First, historical materialism became a formal, objective possibility 
 only because economic factors created the proletariat, because the 
 proletariat did emerge (i.e. at a particular stage of historical 
 development), and because the subject and object of the knowledge of 
 social reality were transformed. Second, this formal possibility became 
 a real one only in the course of the evolution of the proletariat. If 
 the meaning of history is to be found in the process of history itself 
 and not, as formerly, in a transcendental, mythological or ethical 
 meaning foisted on to recalcitrant material, this presupposes a 
 proletariat with a relatively advanced awareness of its own position, 
 i.e. a relatively advanced proletariat, and, therefore, a long preceding 
 period of evolution. The path taken by this evolution leads from utopia 
 to the knowledge of reality; from transcendental goals fixed by the 
 first great leaders of the workers€ movement to the clear perception by 
 the Commune of 1871 that the working-class has €no ideals to realise€, 
 but wishes only €to liberate the elements of the new society.€ It is the 
 path leading from the €class opposed to capitalism€ to the class €for 
 itself.€ 
  
 Seen in this light the revisionist separation of movement and ultimate 
 goal represents a regression to the most primitive stage of the 
 working-class movement. For the ultimate goal is not a €state of the 
 future€ awaiting the proletariat somewhere independent of the movement 
 and the path leading up to it. It is not a condition which can be 
 happily forgotten in the stress of daily life and recalled only in 
 Sunday sermons as a stirring contrast to workaday cares. Nor is it a 
 €duty€, an €idea€ designed to regulate the €real€ process. The ultimate 
 goal is rather that relation to the totality (to the whole of society 
 seen as a process), through which every aspect of the struggle acquires 
 its revolutionary significance. This relation informs every aspect in 
 its simple and sober ordinariness, but only consciousness makes it real 
 and so confers reality on the day-to-day struggle by manifesting its 
 relation to the whole. Thus it elevates mere existence to reality. Do 
 not let us forget either that every attempt to rescue the €ultimate 
 goal€ or the €essence€ of the proletariat from every impure contact with 
 € capitalist- existence leads ultimately to the same remoteness from 
 reality, from €practical, critical activity€ and to the same relapse 
 into the utopian dualism of subject and object, of theory and practice 
 to which Revisionism has succumbed. [38] 
  
 The practical danger of every such dualism shows itself in the loss of 
 any directive for action. As soon as you abandon the ground of reality 
 that has been conquered and reconquered by dialectical materialism, as 
 soon as you decide to remain on the €natural€ ground of existence, of 
 the empirical in its stark, naked brutality, you create a gulf between 
 the subject of an action and the milieu of the €facts€ in which the 
 action unfolds so that they stand opposed to each other as harsh, 
 irreconcilable principles. It then becomes impossible to impose the 
 subjective will, wish or decision upon the facts or to discover in them 
 any directive for action. A situation in which the €facts€ speak out 
 unmistakably for or against a definite course of action has never 
 existed, and neither can or will exist. The more conscientiously the 
 facts are explored € in their isolation, i.e. in their unmediated 
 relations € the less compellingly will they point in any one direction. 
 It is self-evident that a merely subjective decision will be shattered 
 by the pressure of uncomprehended facts acting automatically €according 
 to laws€. 
  
 Thus dialectical materialism is seen to offer the only approach to 
 reality which can give action a direction. The self-knowledge, both 
 subjective and objective, of the proletariat at a given point in its 
 evolution is at the same time knowledge of the stage of development 
 achieved by the whole society. The facts no longer appear strange when 
 they are comprehended in their coherent reality, in the relation of all 
 partial aspects to their inherent, but hitherto unelucidated roots in 
 the whole: we then perceive the tendencies which strive towards the 
 centre of reality, to what we are wont to call the ultimate goal. This 
 ultimate goal is not an abstract ideal opposed to the process, but an 
 aspect of truth and reality. It is the concrete meaning of each stage 
 reached and an integral part of the concrete moment. Because of this, to 
 comprehend it is to recognise the direction taken (unconsciously) by 
 events and tendencies towards the totality. It is to know the direction 
 that determines concretely the correct course of action at any given 
 moment € in terms of the interest of the total process, viz. the 
 emancipation of the proletariat. 
  
 However, the evolution of society constantly heightens the tension 
 between the partial aspects and the whole. Just because the inherent 
 meaning of reality shines forth with an ever more resplendent light, the 
  
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 --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05 
  * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)