ABDICATION.
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proofs of ferocity, must assuredly have been known by his people. Suddenly, either to amuse himself by testing the long-suffering of the Russians, or under the influence of Christian remorse (for he affected a respect for holy things: and hypocrisy itself may at times feel a sentiment of devotion, since grace, that manna of the soul, will at intervals fall upon the blackest hearts, until death shall have consummated their reprobation): whether, then, under the influence of Christian penitence, fear, caprice, lassitude, or artifice, he one day laid down his sceptre, or rather his axe, and cast his crown upon the earth. Then, and then only, during the whole eourse of his long reign, did the empire rise; the nation, menaced with deliverance, started from its sleep; the Russians, until then dumb witnesses, passive instruments of so many horrors, recovered their voice; and that voice of a people, which pretends to be the voice of God, was suddenly lifted up to deplore the loss of such a tyrant! Perhaps they doubted his good faith, and feared his vengeance in case of their accepting his feigned abdication; it may be their love for the prince had its source in the terror inspired by the tyrant. The Russians have refined upon fear by giving it love for a mask.
Moscow was menaced by invasion (the penitent had well chosen his time); anarchy was feared; in other words, the Russians foresaw they should be no longer able to protect themselves from liberty,— they would be exposed .to think and to will by and for themselves — to show themselves men, and what was worse, citizens. The prospect that would have given happiness to any other people, drove these to despair. p 5
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In short, enervated, bewildered, and dismayed, Russia threw herself at the feet of Ivan, whom she dreaded less than she distrusted herself, and entreated this indispensable master to pick up his crown and bloody sceptre, asking, as the only favour, that he would again put on her neck the iron yoke which she will never be tired of bearing.
If this was humility, it went too far, even for Christianity ; if it was cowardice, it was unpardonable ; if it was patriotism, it was impious. Religion humbles, slavery debases; there is the difference between them that there is between sanctity and brutality. The Russians make a virtue of sacrificing every thing to the weal of the empire. Detestable empire, whose existence may not be perpetuated without the sacrifice of human dignity ! Blinded by then' monarchical idolatry, on their knees before the political idols of their own hands, the Russians, including those of our own century as well as those of Ivan's, forget that a respect for justice, a cultivation of truth, is more important to mankind, not excepting the Slavonians, than the fate of Russia. In this act I imagine that I again see the intervention of a supernatural power. I ask myself, what can be the future reserved by Providence for a community which pays such a price for the prolongation of its existence ? I have too often occasion to remark that a new Roman empire is brooding in Russia under the ashes of the old Greek stock. Fear alone does not inspire so much patience. A passion actuates the Russians in a manner that no people have experienced since the time of the Romans — that passion is ambition; an ambition powerful enough to induce
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them to sacrifice all—absolutely all—to its cravings. It was this sovereign law which attached a nation to an Ivan IV.: — a tiger for our God rather than the annihilation of our Empire. Such was the Russian policy under the reign which made Russia, and during which the forbearance of the victims horrifies me much more than the frenzy of the tyrant. It horrifies me because I see it perpetuated, however modified by circumstances; and because, even at this day, it would produce similar effects under a similar reign, if the earth were destined to give birth twice to an Ivan IV. Let us wonder, then, at this unique picture in history : the Russians, with the courage and the baseness of the men who desire to possess the earth, weeping at the feet of Ivan to move him to continue their governor,—him who would have made all government hateful to any people not intoxicated with the fanatical presentiment of their coming glory !
All swore — the great, the little, the boyards, the tradespeople, the castes, and the individuals; in a word. all the nation swore with tears, to submit to every thing, provided they might not be abandoned to themselves. This height of misfortune was the only reverse which the Russians, in their ignoble patriotism, could not muster courage to encounter, seeing that the inevitable disorder that would have been the result might have destroyed their empire of slaves. Ignominy carried to this point approaches the sublime: it is of the nature of virtue; it perpetuates the state; — but such a state! —the means dishonour the end.
The wild beast, touched with compassion, took pity on the herd on which he had so long preyed; p 6
324IVAN EESmiES HIS CKOWN.
he promised to continue to decimate them; he re-assumed his power without any concessions, — on the contrary, with absurd conditions, all in advantage of his pride and fury, although they were to be accepted as favours by this people, as enthusiastic in slavery as others arc fanatical in liberty, — this people, imbrued in its own blood, and which wished to be killed in order to amuse its master, who grew uneasy and trembled whenever he ceased to murder.
From this period may be dated the organisation of a tyranny so methodical and yet so violent, that the annals of the human race present nothing that can be compared to it; seeing that there was as much insanity in submitting to it as in exercising it. Prince and nation at this moment were smitten with frenzy, and the effects of the fit continue yet to operate.
The mighty Kremlin, with all its associations, its iron gates, its mysterious subterranean passages, its inaccessible ramparts soaring into heaven, appeared too weak a refuge to the insensate monarch, who sought to destroy the half of his people that he might govern the other half in security. In his horrid heart an inexplicable terror — for it had no apparent motive—united itself to an atrocity without object; the most disgraceful fear pleaded for the most blind ferocity. A new Nebuchadnezzar — the king changed into a cowardly tiger.
He first retired into a strong palace near the Kremlin, and afterwards
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chose a guard, consisting of a thousand men, whom he called the elect—
Karamsin thus describes Ivan IV. in the year 1565, nineteen years after his coronation:—
' This prince was tall and well-made ; he had broad shoulders and breast, muscular arms, beautiful hair, long
