To Build A Castle

A quote from Vladimir Bukovsky's 1977 auto-biographical account of Krushev's Russia and the The Krushev Thaw and his sufferance under the iron curtain for basic human-rights entitled; To Build a Castle: My Life as a Dissenter. (Viking Press NY, 1979)

A people, nation, class, party, or simply crowd cannot go
beyond a certain limit in a crisis: the instinct of self preservation proves too
strong. They can sacrifice a part in the hope of saving the rest, they can break
up into smaller groups and seek salvation that way. But this is their
downfall.
To be alone is an enormous responsibility. With his back
to the wall a man understands: "I am th people, I am the nation, I am the class,
and there is nothing at all." He cannot sacrifice part of himself, cannot split
himself up or divide into parts and still live. There is nowhere for him to
retreat to, and the instinct of self-preservation drives him to extremes - he
prefers physical death to spiritual death.
And an astonishing thing happens. In fighting to preserve
his integrity he is simultaneously fighting for his people, his class, his
party. It is such individuals who win the right for their comminuties to live -
even, perhaps, if they are not thingking of it at the time.
"Why should I do it?" asks each man in the crowd. "I can
do nothing alone"
And they are all lost.
"If I don't do it, who will?" asks the man with his back
to the wall.
And everyone is saved.
That is how man begins building his
castle.