p Great people do not appear by chance but by historical necessity, when the corresponding objective conditions are ripe. Outstanding political figures, leaders of the people, come to the fore in a period of radical revolutionary changes in society, very great political actions and popular uprisings. Men of genius appear in science most often when production requires some great scientific discovery. Great artists, as a rule, display their talent at the most significant turning points in history. Moreover, a talented person will go down in history only if his talent, character and intellect are needed by society at a given stage of its development.

p Many names are recorded in history, but far from all of them were really great. There were men who acted contrary to historical necessity and sought to set the clock back. These men, by expressing the interests of reactionary classes, inevitably suffered defeat together with the evil cause they championed.

p A man can be truly great only if he dedicates his life and energies to society’s progress, if he, without sparing any effort, works for the new, the progressive, and tirelessly helps the advanced classes of society to introduce a progressive social system.

p Why is an outstanding personality capable of accomplishing such great and difficult tasks? What is the source of his strength?

p An outstanding personality’s strength lies above all in the strength of the progressive social movement which he champions and leads. A great man is great because he understands the objective course of the historical process, sees the requirements of society’s development and knows how to satisfy these requirements, how to improve social life. An outstanding personality is strong because he serves the interests of the advanced classes, the people, and therefore enjoys their trust and support.

p The personal qualities of a great man are of no small importance. Only a man endowed with uncommon abilities and personal qualities—great intellect, inexhaustible energy, resolution and bravery—can cope with the tasks history sets him. The fuller the personal qualities of a great man correspond to social needs, the more notable and important is his role in history.

p The leaders of the proletariat and all the working people, Marx, Engels and Lenin, were outstanding personalities who left a deep imprint on history. They were leaders of a qualitatively new type, splendid theoreticians and organisers of the greatest movement of the people, the revolutionary movement of the proletariat. They had resolution and bravery, unshakable inner conviction in the justice of the communist cause, love for the people and hatred for their enemies. They were closely bound up with the people, taught them and in turn learned from the people, generalising their rich revolutionary experience.

p The great cause initiated by them is being successfully continued by their disciples and followers, prominent leaders of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the other fraternal Communist and Workers’ parties who are heading the most powerful movement of our age, the people’s movement towards communism.

p Marxism-Leninism recognises the big part played by outstanding personalities in history; at the same time it is incompatible with the personality cult, the blind worship of a great man allegedly endowed with superhuman ability to make history at his own will. The personality cult runs counter to socialist ideology and seriously harms the communist movement. Marx, Engels and Lenin always opposed the personality cult and exaggeration of the role of individual leaders as well as showering praise and flattery on them. The founders of Marxism-Leninism held that only collective leadership ensures the revolutionary movement’s success.

p The personality cult is harmful because it belittles both the people’s role as makers of history and the role of the Communist Party and its central bodies as the collective leader of the people. It fetters the development of the Party’s ideological life and the creative energies of the people, and accustoms them to passively waiting for orders 238 from above. The personality cult and the consequent violations of the Leninist norms of Party and state life, of socialist law and democracy are deeply alien to the democratic nature of socialism which is characterised by sovereignty of the people, and not by the omnipotence of one individual. That was why the CPSU condemned the personality cult and resolutely liquidated its consequences.

p While resolutely condemning the personality cult, Marxism-Leninism holds that it would be wrong and harmful to confuse it with the authority of leaders. Lenin wrote that “the working class, which all over the world is waging a hard and persistent struggle for complete emancipation, needs authorities.”  [238•*  Marxism-Leninism calls for safeguarding the authority of leaders devoted to the people and to the Party, who dedicate all their knowledge and energies, their rich experience to the great cause of communism.

All historical development shows that however great an individual is, he is incapable of determining the course of history. It is the people who make history and social revolutions and produce all the material and spiritual wealth of mankind.