“It is well to be discontented, to have a heart hot with hatred of injustice, but it is also well to have a hopeful spirit, and to appreciate all manifestations of social activity, organized and unorganized, that indicate the stirring of the human conscience under capitalism.”

Penned in 1908, these words by Irish republican leader and Marxist revolutionary James Connolly leap forth from the past, incisive and pointedly true. Writing for the Harp — the newspaper of the Irish Socialist Federation, which he edited — Connolly took square aim at the “decrepitude and imbecility” of capitalism, championing a “proper hatred” of the degrading conditions under which people lived and suffered.

Over a century later, Connolly’s fervently internationalist strain of socialism has never resonated more. As we teeter on a new global depression, in the midst of a pandemic and climate emergency, while protests against racial injustice rage across America, his words continue to expose the unholy mess of capitalism and its inherent contradictions. Looking back at his writings, it’s almost as if he were writing for today.