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1795 A reaction sets in in Geneva. The insurrection at Stäfa
is suppressed.
1797 Bonaparte incorporates the Italian bailiwicks of the
Valtellina with the Cisalpine Republic. La Harpe calls on
the Directory to protect the liberties of Vaud against the
oppression of Bern.

The Helvetic Republic

1798 French troops in response occupy Mülhausen, Bienne,

and part of the lands of the prince-bishop of Bâle.
Insurgents open the prison of Chillon. Another French
army enters Vaud and the Lemanic Republic is
proclaimed there. The French occupy Fribourg and
Solothurn; defeat the Bernese after fierce fighting at
Neueneck; take Bern, the stronghold of the aristocratic
party, and pillage the treasury. The Revolution triumphs
over the Confederation. By order of the Directory, the
Helvetic Republic, one and indivisible, is proclaimed.
Peter Ochs of Bâle supplies a constitution. Ten of the
thirteen members of the old confederation accept the
new government. Twenty-three “cantons,” or
administrative districts, are created. The forest districts
rebel. Their resistance, headed by Alois Reding, of
Schwyz, is put down after desperate conflicts at
Schindellegi, Morgarten, and at Rothenthurm. An
insurrection of the mountaineers of Upper Valais against
the French is bloodily repressed. The French put down
an insurrection in Nidwald with great bloodshed. (The
days of terror of Nidwald end.)
1799 Zurich, the forest cantons, and Rhætia become the
scene of the struggle of the Austrian and Russians
against the French in the wars of the Coalition.

THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

1802 Strife between the centralists and the federalists.
Bonaparte withdraws the French troops. The Helvetian
government is driven from Bern. Bonaparte convenes
Swiss statesmen at Paris in the consulta, and acts as
mediator. The Frickthal, the last Austrian possession in
Switzerland, is given to the Helvetic Republic by
Bonaparte.

The Confederation of Nineteen Cantons

1803 Napoleon’s Act of Mediation is made the constitution of

“Switzerland.” This name for the first time is used as the
official name of the country. The thirteen members of the
old confederation are set up again and six new cantons
are added. There are to be no more privileged classes
or subject lands. Switzerland enjoys ten years of peace
and prosperity.
1804 Insurrection breaks out at Horgen in the canton Zurich.
1806 Neuchâtel is given to Marshal Berthier.
1810 Valais, which has been a separate republic, is made
into the French department of the Simplon. The Swiss
Society of the Public Good is founded. Pestalozzi and
Fellenberg work out an educational system.
1813 Austrian and Russian troops, supported by the
reactionary party, enter Switzerland; the diet abolishes
the constitution of 1803.
1814 “The long diet” at Zurich attempts to adjust party
differences. Bern heads a party anxious to restore the
old order. Zurich and the majority stand out for the
nineteen cantons of Napoleon. The allies enter
Switzerland.

The League of Twenty-two States

1815 The Swiss diet accepts the decisions of the congress
of Vienna and a new constitution, the Federal Pact, is
adopted. The league of States (Staatenbund) is made to
include twenty-two members. The sovereign rights of
each canton are recognised. The federal diet exercises
supreme sovereignty only in purely national concerns.
The great powers at the congress of Vienna guarantee
the neutrality of Switzerland. Switzerland is freed from
subserviency to France. New aristocracies make
themselves felt.
1817 Switzerland becomes a party to the Holy Alliance.
1819 The Helvetic Society again takes up political reforms.
1823 Freedom of the press is restricted under influence of
the great powers. Intellectual reaction and ultra-
montanism become noticeable and cause dissensions.
1830 The July revolution in Paris finds an echo in
Switzerland. Twelve cantons reform their constitutions in
a democratic sense. Popular demonstrations at the
assembly of Uster.
1831 The aristocracy of Bern submits to liberal reforms.
1832 The cantons Zurich, Bern, Lucerne, Solothurn, St. Gall,
Aargau, and Thurgau agree to united action looking
toward reform (Siebener Concordat). They are opposed
by the reactionary cantons, Uri, Schwyz, Unterwalden,
Valais, and Neuchâtel which form the league of Sarnen
(Sarner Bund).
1833 Bâle is divided into a rural (Baselland) and an urban
(Baselstadt) half-canton because of the desire of the
rural population for proportional representation in the
Diet.
1834 Political refugees to Switzerland increase to such an
extent that measures are taken by the diet to prevent
abuse of the privilege of asylum.
1835 Religious tumults in Aargau.
1836 Difficulties with France over tariff regulations. Religious
tumults in the Bernese Jura.
1838 The Society of the Grütli is founded at Geneva.
1839 Reaction in Zurich against radicals and freethinkers.
(Strauss’ Life of Jesus).
1840 Clericals revolt against the radicals in Aargau.
1841 They are put down. Eight monasteries in Aargau are
suppressed. The quarrel provokes disputes in the diet.
1843 The diet effects a compromise in the religious quarrel
in Aargau by which four instead of eight of the
monasteries are suppressed. The seven Catholic
cantons, Uri, Schwyz, Unterwalden, Lucerne, Zug,
Fribourg, and Valais hereupon form a separate league,
the Sonderbund.
1844 The Sonderbund declares for the reopening of all the
monasteries in Aargau. The clericals in Lucerne, the
Vorort, give high posts to Jesuits. Parties of free-lances
attempt to capture the city.
1845 The attack on Lucerne is renewed but is unsuccessful.
The radicals gain control in Zurich.
1846 The radicals become the majority in Bern and Geneva.
1847 The radicals get a majority in St. Gall. The diet in which
the radicals are now in the majority declares the
Sonderbund contrary to the Federal Pact. The diet
resolves to revise the pact and asks the cantons to
expel the Jesuits. The attempt to enforce the decree
leads to the Sonderbund War. This is quickly ended by
the defeat of the rebellious Catholic cantons at Gislikon,
largely because of the good generalship of Dufour.

Switzerland as a Federal State

1848 A new constitution is accepted by the majority of the
cantons. Switzerland becomes a federal state
(Bundesstaat). A central government is organised
consisting of a council of states (Ständerath), a national
council (National Rath) and a federal council or
executive (Bundesrath). German, French, and Italian
are recognised as national languages. Bern is chosen
the national capital.
1855 The federal polytechnic school is opened at Zurich.
Improvements in the educational system are introduced.
1856 A royalist conspiracy in Neuchâtel is put down and
causes a dispute between Switzerland and the king of
Prussia, the overlord of Neuchâtel.
1857 Neuchâtel is definitely ceded to Switzerland.
1859 Switzerland posts troops on the Italian frontier to
preserve neutrality in the Italian War and puts an end to
foreign enlistments.
1860 The Swiss government protests against the cession of
Nice and Savoy to France.
1861 French troops occupy the Valée de Dappes.
1862 The question of the frontiers in the Valée de Dappes is
arranged with France by mutual cession of territory.
1864 The convention of Geneva introduces humanitarian
reforms in warfare. Election riots at Geneva lead to
bloodshed.
1865 International social science congress meets at Bern.
1866 Restrictions on religious liberty of Jesuits, etc., are
removed. An attempt is made to revise the constitution
in a democratic sense but fails.
1867 An international congress of workmen is held at
Lausanne.
1869 The construction of the St. Gotthard tunnel is decided
upon.
1871 Switzerland shelters French refugees of the Franco-
German War though insisting on the maintenance of
neutrality. The growth in power of the “old Catholics”
causes disturbances in western Switzerland (the
struggle against Ultramontanism). The Alabama
Arbitration Commission meets in Geneva.
1872 An attempt at revision of the constitution is defeated by
a small majority.
1873 Abbé Mermillod, appointed by the pope “apostolic
vicar” of Geneva, is banished from Switzerland. The see
of Bishop Lachat of Bâle is suppressed by several
cantons because he upholds the doctrine of papal
infallibility.

Switzerland under the Constitution of 1874

1874 A new constitution, a revision of that of 1848, is

accepted by the people. The referendum hereby
becomes a part of the machinery of the federal
government as it had already been part of that of most
of the cantons. The new constitution increases
centralisation in the government. The international
postal congress meets at Bern and lays the foundation
for the international postal union.
1876 Religious and political differences cause an armed
encounter in Ticino.
1877 A law regulating the working hours in factories is
passed, marking an advance in labour legislation.
1878 James Fazy, noted statesman, dies.
1879 Legislation puts an end to dissensions over the
financeering of the St. Gotthard railway.
1882 The St. Gotthard railway is opened.
1883 Mermillod is appointed bishop of Lausanne.
1884 Bishop Lachat is made apostolic vicar of Ticino. An
international conference is held at Bern to secure the
protection of copyright.
1887 Alcohol is made a state monopoly.
1888 The creation of a see at Lugano excites the opposition
of the radicals. An important law for the protection of
patents is passed.
1889 Bismarck’s spy Wohlgemuth is expelled. Germany
protests. Difficulties arising out of the Swiss custom of
granting political asylum are settled.
1890 Religious riot at Ticino. The principal compulsory
insurance against sickness and accident is accepted by
popular vote.
1891 The federal constitution is amended so that fifty
thousand citizens by the “initiative” can compel the
federal authorities to prepare and submit to the people
any reform in the constitution demanded by the
petitioners. The establishment of a state or federal bank
is approved by the people. The purchase of the Central
Railway by the confederation is rejected by popular
vote.
1893 The killing of animals in Jewish fashion is prohibited by
exercise of the initiative.
1894 An attempt by the initiative to secure the adoption for
the government of a socialist scheme to provide
employment fails.
1896 A National exhibition is held at Geneva. Labour riots
directed against the employment of Italians cause many
of these to leave Zurich. The eighteenth international
congress on copyright meets at Bern and takes steps
for copyright reform in Germany and Great Britain.
1897 The national council adopts a bill authorising the
confederation to purchase the five principal railroads
when the terms of the concessions expire. The
proposals of the government as to a federal bank are
rejected by the people. An international congress for the
protection of labor is held at Zurich. It votes in favor of
the prohibition of Sunday labor, except under special
conditions for the restriction of unhealthful trades and
night-work, for the betterment of the conditions of
employment for women and for a working day of eight
hours by legal enactment.
1898 The government authorises the construction of the
Simplon tunnel. The people vote for the unification of
the cantonal laws civil and criminal into a set of federal
codes. The principle of the purchase by the
confederation of the principal railroads is approved by
popular vote. The empress Elizabeth of Austria is
assassinated by an Italian anarchist in Geneva.
Expulsion of anarchists follows.
1899 The scheme for the establishment of the “double
initiative” is launched. The law for the compulsory
insurance of working men against sickness and accident
is passed by the legislature.
1900 This proposal, however, is rejected by the people by a
large majority. The proposals for proportional
representation in the national council and for the
election of the federal council by the people (the “double
initiative”) are rejected by popular vote.

THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

1901 On representation of the Turkish government the

federal council suppresses publications of the party of
Young Turkey criticising the sultan for the Armenian
massacres. Public opinion condemning the action of the
 council as a violation of the right of asylum finds
expression in many places. Anti-Russian
demonstrations are made at Geneva and Bern by
socialists. The socialist movement gains in strength.
1902 Difficulties with Italy over the publication in an anarchist
organ at Geneva of an article reflecting on the murdered
king Humbert causes the temporary withdrawal of the
diplomatic representatives of the two countries. A
general strike in Geneva leads to disturbances which
are put down by troops. The federal council issues a
decree suppressing such religious congregations or
orders as have not been authorised by law. The radical
democratic majority in the national council is
considerably strengthened.
1903 A new protective tariff is adopted by popular vote. The
Zionist congress at Bâle votes to investigate Great
Britain’s offer of land in East Africa for Jewish
colonisation.

PART XXI

THE HISTORY OF RUSSIA

 BASED CHIEFLY UPON THE FOLLOWING AUTHORITIES

R. BELL, R. N. BESTUZHEV-RIUMIN, V. A. BILBASOV, A.

BRÜCKNER, A. DE
HAXTHAUSEN, E. HERMANN, N. M. KARAMZIN, W. K. KELLY, N.
I.
KOSTOMAROV, M. KOVALEVSKI, A. LEROY-BEAULIEU, P.
MÉRIMÉE, NESTOR,
A. RAMBAUD, T. SCHIEMANN, J. H. SCHNITZLER, A. A.
SCHUMAKR, N. K.
SHILDER, G. M. SOLOVIEV, P. STRAHL, N. TURGENIEV, D. M.
WALLACE

TOGETHER WITH A STUDY OF

THE INTELLECTUAL DEVELOPMENT OF RUSSIA

BY

S. RAPPOPORT

WITH ADDITIONAL CITATIONS FROM

ALEXANDER II, A. ALISON, R. N. BAIN, T. VON BERNHARDI, A. J.

BEVERIDGE,
CATHERINE II, A. P. DE CUSTINE, T. DELORD, J. ECKHARDT, A.
DE
FERRAND, I. GOLIKOV, P. DE LA GORCE, R. GOSSIP, A. N.
 KUROPATKIN,
LEO, M. LÉVESQUE, C. A. DE LOUVILLE, H. MARTIN,
MAURICIUS,
A. MIKHAILOVSKI-DANILEVSKI, H. NORMAN, PROCOPIUS, C. C.
DE RULHIÈRE,
F. SCHLOSSER, P. DE SÉGUR, P. SHCHEBALSKI, F. H. SKRINE,
STORCK, H. TYRRELL, VOLTAIRE

Copyright, 1904,
By HENRY SMITH WILLIAMS.
All rights reserved
 RUSSIA
INTRODUCTION
THE INTELLECTUAL DEVELOPMENT OF RUSSIA
Written Specially for the Present Work
By DR. A. S. RAPPOPORT
School of Oriental Languages, Paris
“Russia evolves very slowly, like an empire that is not of yesterday
and that has ample time before it,” is one of Nietzsche’s remarks
before his reason had hopelessly gone adrift in the vast ocean of
insanity. This remark of the German poet-philosopher is true enough.
What Nietzsche, however, did not know or did not say is that one can
hardly speak of any evolution, as far as general civilisation,
intellectual culture, and development are concerned, of Russia as a
whole. Only a small minority, the so-called intelligentia, has evolved
intellectually, not Russia itself. Here lies the fundamental difference
between Russia and the rest of Europe.
There is a vast gulf, ever broadening, between the Russian
intelligentia and the muyiks. Thought and culture, nay even
civilisation, seem to be limited to a select few. The bulk of the people
has not only failed to advance from a state in which it was surprised
by Jenghiz Khan, but it has actually retrograded to a more savage
condition. Revolutions have passed over their heads without in the
least affecting them. “The Russian masses,” says Leroy-Beaulieu
(The Empire of the Czars), “have not felt the breath of either the
Renaissance, or the Reformation, or the Revolution. All that has
been done in Europe or America for the last four centuries, since the
time of Columbus and Luther, Washington and Mirabeau, is, as far
as Russia is concerned, non-existent.”
The people never think, or at least have not yet left that crude
state of barbarism which precedes the dawn of civilisation; the first
rays of thought have scarcely tinted with orient hues the dark horizon
of ignorance and superstition of the Russian population; the great
events have failed to stir its mental inertia. I am, however, far from
maintaining that the fault lies with the nature and national character
of the people. The rich nature, the subtle spirit of the Slav, his power
of adaptation and imitation make him not only accessible to western
civilisation and culture but also capable of producing something
which bears the impress of the peculiarity of the Slavonic genius.
The intelligentia is now giving ample proof corroborating this
statement. The Russian intelligentia has passed the phases of
growing and changing and doubting and has reached a condition of
maturity, asserting its manhood and right. Before examining the
intellectual development of the Russian intelligentia and the point it
has reached, as compared with western Europe, we must try to find
out the causes that first produced that gulf between the few and the
many, and the circumstances that were instrumental in widening it.
It is a mistake to imagine that the very first foundations of Russian
intellectual development were laid by Peter the Great and that
Russia, although behind western Europe in culture and civilisation, is
still in her youthful vigour and freshness and will soon overtake the
old world. There was a time, at the beginning of the eleventh century,
when the Slavonic countries under the rule of the Norman
conquerors were on the same level of civilisation as western Europe.
The foundations were laid before the Norman invasion and very
frequent were the relations between this people in the east and
those in the north of Europe. Long before the ninth century, Kiev was
known to the inhabitants of Scandinavia. Many a jarl sought refuge
there and many a merchant ship found its way to the shores of
Russia. On the road along which the commercial connection
between the East Sea and Byzantium developed were situated the
towns of Smolensk, Tchernigov, Pereiaslavl (cf. V. der Brüggen, Wie
Russland Europaisch Wurde, p. 22). When the Norman princes, the
warags as they were called by the Slavonic nations, conquered
these towns and subdued one tribe after the other, the already
existing civilisation developed rapidly under the protection of the new
rulers. Forth from Byzantium and Greece, from Italy, Poland, and
Germany, with which countries the descendants of Rurik kept up a
connection, western influence came to the north. Learned monks
came from Byzantium, architects, artisans, and merchants from
Greece, Italy and Germany, and were instrumental in spreading the
languages, customs and ideas of the west. Not only did the kniazi
(princes) of Kiev build churches and edifices after the model of
Greek and Italian art, but they established schools to which Vladimir
compelled his nobles and boyars to send their children. The
commercial relations with the west and the south were very vivid and
frequent, and on the market places of Kiev and Novgorod a motley
crowd of Normans and Slavs, Hungarians, Greeks, Venetians,
Germans, Arabs, and Jews were to be seen.
The intellectual culture of the time had not yet, one must admit,
penetrated the masses of the Slavonic tribes. Yet the Normans, as
the propagators of culture, speedily and easily merged into one with
the conquered tribes, much easier perhaps than the Normans who
came with William the Conqueror amalgamated with Britons and
Saxons in England. Had the Tatar invasion not taken place, it is
highly probable that the intellectual development of Russia would
have followed the same lines as that of western Europe. The
commercial and intellectual relations with the rest of Europe, so
eagerly sought after and cultivated by the Norman princes, would
have continued and brought the Slav countries in increasingly closer
contact with the west and under the influence of all the currents that
were destined to traverse Europe later on. The Renaissance and the
revival of learning which shed their light upon the dark mediæval age
(and only a few rays of which found their way to Russia by way of
Poland at a much later period) would have made themselves felt in
Russia. This was, however, not to happen. The Mongolian invasion
had actually cut off Russia from Europe, and brought it under the
Tatar influence. The Norman civilisation, which was in a nascent
state, was crushed; the threads connecting Russia with Europe were
cut off. The wave of Mongolian invasion had inundated the flat land
situated between Europe and Asia, carried away and destroyed
every vestige of western influence. Kiev, Moscow, Tver, Riazan,
Tchernigov, and Smolensk were conquered by the hordes of the
Great Khan, who from his seat somewhere in the heart of China or in
the centre of Asia sent down his generals and tax collectors.
 Hundreds of thousands of Mongols came to Russia, mixed with
the Slavs, and influenced habits, customs, civilisation, social life,
administration and even language. The influence was a very far-
reaching and deep one; Mongolism has penetrated Russian life to a
much higher degree than a Russian would care to admit or western
Europeans have realised. Greater and greater became the gulf
between the Russian and the Romance and Teutonic worlds. But
that gulf might have been bridged over and Russia might have been
saved, when the dawn of better and happier days broke in, by
another power: the influence of the church. Here again, however,
owing to circumstances, this in many respects civilising agent was
powerless.
In spite of all the reproaches hurled at the church, it must be
admitted that it had all the education in its hands. In Russia,
however, the case was different. From the very beginning, ever since
Christianity was introduced, ever since Vladimir had accepted
baptism in Kiev, the Russian people as Christians were divided into
two distinct groups. Whilst the enthusiastic adherents of the new
religion endeavoured to introduce the piety of Byzantium, the mass
of the people, although nominally Christian, remained heathen in
reality and has remained so up to the present. This was due to two
reasons. Vladimir had accepted the Greek form of worship with its
asceticism. Asceticism and monasticism, a retirement from the world,
became the Christian ideal. This ideal was too high, too unattainable
and too foreign for reality and for daily life, whilst on the other hand
the perfect Christians considered the life of the world as sinful and
dangerous. Thus the clergy sought retirement in cloisters and
monasteries and the mass, whilst accepting the ceremonies of
Byzantium, had learned nothing of its ethical teachings. The gulf thus
arising between clergy and people was also due to another reason.
The first members of the clergy were Greeks, monks coming from
Byzantium, who spoke a language incomprehensible to the Slavs.
The Russian bishops, who gradually took the place of the learned
eastern monks, and who could communicate with the people, were
still too ignorant themselves. And then suddenly the Tatar invasion
came. Connection with Byzantium was cut off. The influx of the
Greek clergy and Byzantine learning had ceased too early, before
the Russians had had time to acquire some amount of knowledge to
replace it. Thus whilst the intellectual development of the mass took
place very slowly, the intellectual level of the clergy sank rapidly. The
consequence was that when the Russian clergy met the people they
were both on the same intellectual level, the priests had nothing to
teach and had no prestige. This also explains, psychologically, the
origin of so many religious sects in Russia. Having no respect and
no admiration for the ignorant priest, addicted to drink, the peasant
goes his own way when he suddenly feels a craving for religious
ideals.
Thus the Mongolian invasion had cut off Russia from Europe and
whilst the latter was passing through the phases of transition,
approaching slowly but gradually the times of light and learning,
Russia stood still. The Europe of the Renaissance was not a creatio
ex nihilo. It was the result of a slow process of development. The
barbarians who had built their realms on the ruins of the ancient
worlds, Hellas and Rome, had taken over the classical heritage left
to them after the disappearance of the Roman Empire. Rude and
barbarous, however, these new conquerors had no understanding
for the value of the heritage and destroyed many of its richest
treasures. Worlds of intellectual culture were lost. But slowly the age
of understanding dawned and the former barbarians brought forth
many of the treasures which they had relegated to the lumber-room,
added many of their own, and blended them into one whole. The
result was the Græco-Roman, Romance, and Teutonic civilisation.
Crusades, Arabian civilisation passing by way of Spain,
scholasticism, Reformation, Renaissance, revival of learning, the
discovery of new worlds, the spread of commerce, scientific
inventions and discoveries, stimulating the desire for learning and
creating impulses in every new direction—all these new and stirring
events were so many phases through which European society and
European life passed before they reached the state of modern
development. Many were the streams and cross-currents that
traversed Europe separately before they united and continued the
more rapid advance of a new life and civilisation. All this was lacking
in Russia. Russia missed during its Mongolian period, the time of
general transition. None of the forces which, although invisibly, were
steadily furrowing the European soil and preparing it for the influx of
fresh air and new light, were at work in Russia. The phase of
transition had not yet commenced. That period of constant change,
of mingled decadence and spiritual growth, that ceaseless blending
of the old and the new, unnoticed at the time but clearly
distinguished from the distance of later ages, was lacking in Russia.
There was no pope, no powerful church, and consequently no
Reformation and no spirit of individualism—no feudalism, no knights,
no Crusades and no acquaintance with foreign lands, no spread of
commerce, and no widening of the mental horizon of the people.
There were no learned monks copying Greek and Latin manuscripts,
paving the way for scholasticism and modern thought. There was
even no language in which the treasures of the ancient world could
be communicated to the Slavs. Few people could write, few even
count properly.
There were no schools and the attempts to establish some such
institutions during the seventeenth century failed. A school was
founded at Moscow under Alexis, but here only a foreign language or
two were taught. Its aim was to train translators for the government.
There was no art, nor technical science. There were no medical
men. The two or three foreign practitioners were considered as
sorcerers.
Towards the end of the seventeenth century therefore Russia had
absolutely no culture of her own. All that the Normans had
established had been wiped out. The Byzantine influence had no
effect. And when after a struggle extending over three centuries the
czardom of Moscow had thrown off the shackles of the Great Khan,
liberated itself from thraldom and laid the foundations of the great
empire of Russia, it had only established, on the ruins of the old
Mongolian, a new state which was Mongolian and Tatar in its
essence and spirit, in its customs and institutions, and had little or
nothing in common with the rest of Europe.
Moscow was the inheritor of Mongolism, the Czar was spiritually,
and even physically, a descendant of Mongol princes. Ivan IV
married a Mongolian princess, his son married a sister of the Mongol
Godunov. They had actually taken over the inheritance of the khans
of Kiptchak. It was in this barren soil that Peter sowed the seed of
European culture. What happened?
Peter was undoubtedly great and deserves this title. He was one
of the great makers of history. But though great in his plans, great in
what he wished to accomplish, he was not great in what he really
attained. He only saw the superficiality of European civilisation. He
introduced it like some foreign product, like some fashionable article,
like some exotic plant, without first asking whether the national soil
was propitious for its cultivation. He, at the utmost, created a hot-
house atmosphere where his plants could vegetate, and they
remained what they originally were: exotic. He failed to see that
civilisation is the product of a long process of evolution, the natural
product of the social and national conditions, drawing its life and sap
from the inner forces of the people. Instead of making use of these
inner forces of his people, he endeavoured to introduce civilisation
by his power of will. He only had an eye for the effects but not for the
causes that were working as the hidden springs.
In France, in England, in Germany, in all western Europe,
civilisation, the moral and intellectual evolution, was a natural
phenomenon, the effect of previous causes. In Russia, civilisation
was the outcome of a sudden revolution, the slavish, reluctant and
half-hearted compliance with the commands of an individual will. The
former was natural, the latter artificial. An evolution is a slow change,
an unconscious and imperceptible process, finding a state prepared
for innovation, a soil, furrowed and fertile, ready to receive the seed
and to bring forth fruit. A revolution, on the other hand, is a radical,
sudden change which seldom succeeds and, in most cases, calls
forth reactions. In Western Europe there was, as we have see
above, a time of transition from the barbarous to the civilised state.
The morning of the Renaissance had dawned upon mediæval
Europe and tinted with orient colours the sombre sky. The first rays
appeared on the horizon of the Italian poets, dissipating the
darkness here and there. The sun gradually rose higher and higher,
penetrated the houses of the people and woke them (who had been
lulled to sleep by the mysterious whisperings of superstition) from
their prolonged slumbers. They awoke, opened their windows and
allowed the light of the morning to penetrate into their dark abodes.
Not so in Russia. There the people were suddenly awakened,
dragged out from the utter darkness, without any transition, into the
broad midday of an artificial light. They opened their eyes, but the
light was too strong, too glaring; so they shut them again. Peter
wanted to jump over three centuries and catch up with Europe. He
established a fleet without Russian sailors, an administration with
foreign administrators, an academy of science in a land without
elementary schools. He began a race with Europe but his people
could not follow him. He borrowed everything from Europe and
instead of giving his people a chance to develop naturally and freely,
he crushed the spirit of independence and introduced a knout
civilisation. Everything had to be done by order. He forced his people
to swallow Europeanism. The bulk of his subjects, however, could
not digest it. The consequence was that they could not follow the
few, and remained far behind them. The gulf therefore between the
few, who form the present intelligentia, and the great mass—a gulf
which was but narrow towards the end of the sixteenth century when
by way of Poland and Livonia a glimpse of the western sun
penetrated into Russia—suddenly widened considerably. Thus the
origin of the striking phenomenon which Russia offers in her
intellectually high developed intelligentia and her uneducated,
ignorant masses is to be sought in Russia’s past, in the absence of a
period of transition, and in Peter’s misunderstanding the process of
European civilisation, in his admiration for the effects, but utter
ignorance of the causes that brought about these effects.
There is, however, yet another factor—a factor which, whilst
accounting for the existence of an intelligentia, or a coterie of
intellectuals, and of an utterly ignorant mass, will also throw some
light upon the intellectual development of this very intelligentia and
explain the reasons which compelled it to choose certain channels
by which it sends forth the currents of its thoughts. This factor is the
despotic government of the czars. If Russia’s unhappy past and
Peter’s good intentions but great blunders produced the present
state of intellectual development in that country, the government of
the Reformer’s successors has done its very best to preserve this
condition.