# Quote — Leon Trotsky, Terrorism and Communism

> The road to socialism lies through a period of the highest possible intensification of the principle of the state … Just as a lamp, before going out, shoots up in a brilliant flame, so the state, before disappearing, assumes the form of the dictatorship of the proletariat, i.e., the most ruthless form of state, which embraces the life of the citizens authoritatively in every direction.

- Author: [Leon Trotsky](https://www.leafyquotes.com/leon-trotsky.md)
- Book: [Terrorism and Communism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/leon-trotsky/terrorism-and-communism.md)
- Page: 177
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Leon_Trotsky#Terrorism_and_Communism_(1920)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/leon-trotsky/terrorism-and-communism/the-road-to-socialism

## More from this book

> In a revolutionary period, the party which has been thrown from power, which does not reconcile itself with the stability of the ruling class, and which proves this by its desperate struggle against the latter, cannot be terrorized by the threat of imprisonment, as it does not believe in its duration. It is just this simple but decisive fact that explains the widespread recourse to shooting in a civil war.

p. 55 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/leon-trotsky/terrorism-and-communism/in-a-revolutionary.md)

> Repression for the attainment of economic ends is a necessary weapon of the socialist dictatorship.

p. 153 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/leon-trotsky/terrorism-and-communism/repression-for-the.md)

> It could and must, be explained that in the civil war we destroyed the White Guards in order that they should not destroy the workers. Consequently, our problem is not the destruction of human life, but its preservation. But as we have to struggle for the preservation of human life with arms in our hands, it leads to the destruction of human life - a puzzle the dialectical secret of which was explained by old Hegel, without reckoning other still more ancient sages.

p. 53 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/leon-trotsky/terrorism-and-communism/it-could-and.md)