The levers on which it exerts pressure are obsessions and a...

The levers on which it exerts pressure are obsessions and a sense of having been deprived and cheated. The publicity that the various schools make and the points which they emphasize to mobilize people differ in accordance with the outlook of these schools on society and history.

Similarly they have divergent views about the scope of their mission and about the morality and immorality of the use of force, in propagating and enforcing their doctrines in accordance with their particular outlook on the evolution of history and the development of man. Certain schools, such as Christianity, maintain that as far as human beings are concerned only peaceful preaching conforms to the rules of morality.

They consider the use of force in any form and under any circumstances to be immoral. That is why the Christian faith teaches that if anyone slaps you on your right cheek, offer your left cheek also, and if anyone seizes your forehead, surrender your cap also. On the contrary certain other schools such as that of Nietzsche are of the opinion that it is only the use of force that is moral, because man's greatest virtue lies in his power, and the most courageous man is equal to the highest man.

From Nietzsche's point of view Christianity is tantamount to servility, weakness and humility, and is the main cause of the stagnation of humanity. Some other schools hold that although morality depends on power and force, yet the use of force is not morally good in every case. From the view-point of Marxism the force that an exploiter uses against the exploited is immoral, because it is used to maintain the status quo, and therefore it is a factor of stagnation.

But the force which the exploited uses against the exploiter is moral, for it is used to revolutionize society and to push it to a higher stage. In other words, in the eternal conflict prevailing in society, one of the two parties fighting against each other, performs the role of the thesis and the other that of the anti-thesis.

The force that performs the role of the thesis, being reactionary is immoral, and the force that performs the role of the antithesis, being revolutionary and evolutionary, is moral. But the same force which is moral at one stage may become immoral at a subsequent stage when it plays a negative and reactionary role against some other force which is revolutionary. As such morality is a relative term. What is moral at one stage may become immoral at another higher stage.