p.2..... It is being charged that class-conscious workers are not and cannot be patriotic. Is that true?

No, it is not true. Class-conscious workers not only can be patriotic but also they are really the best patriots.

A patriot is a person who loves his country. He is deeply interested in the welfare of his country.

Class-conscious workers display the greatest interest, and perform the greatest deeds, for the welfare of their country. In fact, they are more deeply interested in the welfare of their country than the various business and industrial magnates, who call themselves patriots only in order to increase their profits.

The nature of the patriotism of a business or industrial magnate is as follows:

He is under the false impression that his business establishment or factory is the whole country. For that reason he says: "Buy from me and you will be patroitic." That is nothing else but a pure mockery of patriotism.

The patriotism of a class-conscious worker is as follows: He desires that all this fellow countrymen possess equal opportunities to lead a decent life and he believes that such a situation can be brought about by Socialism. Therefore, he says: "Det us bring about a social order in which all commodities and means of production will belong to the whole country; then the country will enjoy the greatest prosperity."

That is real patriotism.

Therefore, whatever the workers do in that spirit it is being done for the benefit and welfare of the entire country. But the activities of the business and industrial magnates and their servants are confined solely for their own benefit, and not for the benefit of the country.

The workers are the real patriots; while the business and industrial magnates 3and their servants are only deceitful patriots. Their patriotism is hypocritical.

The love of one's country is a lofty feeling. But love alone without deeds is like a ringing cymbal. Business and industrial magnates say they love their country but they really love only their business institutions and their factories, because they devote all their activities only for increasing their own profits. Their love for their country is like a ringing cymbal.

The workers are reluctant to make a clattering noise about their love for their country, but all their activities are devoted entirely for the benefit of the whole country, and not merely for the benefit of a handful of individuals. The workers, naturally, do not love their exploiters, the business and industrial magnates, and struggle against them. But they do so only for the greater glory of their country; they seek to eradicate all exploitation within their country and turn it into a kingdom of happiness for all people. Their love for their country is supported by deeds, which lead the country towards a happy goal.

Business and industrial magnates do not have a goal for their country. They say their country will be a success when it will contain a large number of very prosperous exploiters of the masses. Therefore, they desire to make their own narrow goal as the goal of the whole country. They consider their own welfare as the welfare of the whole country. They are under the impression that they, and nobody else, constitute the country. Such is the understanding of selfish and narrow-minded individuals.

The intelligence of the workers is not so selfish and narrow. They understand that all the inhabitants constitute the country; all those who live in it. And they know that the country is not prosperous until all inhabitants not only a handful of individuals, are prosperous.

Class-conscious workers are the only real lovers of their country; they are the only real patriots.

Business and industrial magnates and their servants are hypocrites, who are hiding behind the mask of patriotism.

Their only desire is to stuff their pockets full of money. They are not real patriots, they are deceitful patriots.