Leon Trotsky

"Power corrupts most thoroughly those who believe they exercise it for the good of others."

"Gratitude is owed not to those who grant us crumbs but to those who fight for our right to the whole bread."

"Creativity flourishes not in the palace but in the struggle of ordinary people."

"The monk who withdraws from the world is complicit in the suffering he refuses to witness."

"Health of a society is measured not by the luxury of the few but the dignity of the many."

"Money is congealed labor; to understand money is to understand exploitation."

"Peace is not the absence of struggle but the triumph of justice."

"Nature will outlast our foolishness if we do not destroy ourselves first."

"The love of one's class is nobler than the sentiment of one's family when the two conflict."

"Inspiration comes to those prepared by study and discipline to receive it."

"The most important thing for us is the Ukrainian question. The fate of the revolution itself depends on it."

"Dialectics cannot be learned like grammar. It is a living method of thought."

"The revolution betrayed is the revolution that lost its internationalist character."

"Art is not a mirror held up to reality but a hammer with which to shape it."

"Without a correct theory, we cannot have correct practice."

"The function of the bureaucracy is to transform itself into a new ruling class."

"Literature and art must become weapons of the socialist revolution."

"Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel."

"The real axis of history is being forged in the depths of the working class."

"To face reality squarely; not to sit on the fence; to be decisive."

"The permanent revolution theory teaches that the democratic tasks of the backward nations can be completed only under the direction of the proletariat."

"Comfort and luxury do not matter. What matters is the revolution."

"The national bourgeoisie betrays the colonial peoples to imperialism."

"Idealism and realism must be united in revolutionary practice."

"The intellectuals without the working class are merely dilettantes."

"Time is the only absolute category. All else is relative."

"Old ideas give way slowly; for they are held by hands that are loth to let them go."

"The culture of the revolution must be proletarian in character and international in scope."

"Slanderers and cowards always attack from behind with lies and innuendo."

"The revolutionary is not motivated by compassion but by the logic of history."