Russia in 1839 -Empire of the Czar: A Journey Through Eternal Russia

of the Slavonian annals. Their names shine out from the profound darkness of the age, like stars piercing the clouds of a stormy night. The very sound of these strange names excites the imagination and challenges curiosity. Rurick, 01eg, the Queen Olga, Saint Wladimir, Swiatopolk, and Monomaque, are personages whose characters no more resemble those of the heroes of the west than •lo their appellations.

' They have nothing of the chivalrous about them ; they are like the monarchs of Scripture ; the nation which they rendered great remained in the vicinity of Asia; ignorant of our romance, it preserved manners that were in a great measure patriarchal.

' The Russian nation was not formed in that brilliant school of good faith, by whose instructions chivalrous Europe had so well profited, that the word honour was for a long period synonymous with truth, and the гсога of honour had a sanctity which is still revered, even in France, where so many things have been forgotten.

' The noble influence of the Knights of the Cross

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78GREEK rOLICY Ш RUSSIA,

stopped, with that of Catholicism, in Poland. The Russians are warriors, but they fight under the principle of obedience, and with the object of gain; the Polish chevaliers fought for the pure love of glory; and thus, though these people spring from the same stock, and have still many points of resemblance, the events of history have separated them so widely that it will require a greater number of ages of Russian poliey to reunite them than it has required of religion and of social habitudes to part them asunder.

' Whilst Europe was slowly recovering from the efforts she had made during centuries to rescue the tomb of Christ from the unbelievers, Russia was paying tribute to the Mohammedans under TJsbeck, and at the same time drawing her arts and sciences, her manners, religion, and politics, as also her principles of craft and fraud, and her aversion to the Latin cross, from the Greek empire. If we reflect on all these civil, religious, and political influences, we shall no longer wonder at the little confidence that can be placed in the word of a Russian (it is the Russian prince who speaks), nor that the Russian character in general should bear the impress of that false Byzantine stamp which influences social life even under the empire of the Czars — worthy successors of the lieutenants of Bati.

' The unmitigated despotism that reigns over us established itself at the very period that servitude ceased in the rest of Europe. From the time of the invasion of the Mongols, the Slavonians, until then one of the freest peoj)le in the world, became slaves-: first to their conquerors, and afterwards to their own princes. Bondage was thenceforward established

NATURE OF AN AUTOCRACY.79

among them, not only as an existing state, but as a constituent principle of society. It has degraded the right of speech in Russia to such a point that it is no longer considered anything better than a snare: our government lives by lies, for truth is as terrible to the tyrant as to the slave. Thus, little as one speaks, in Russia, one always speaks too much, since in this country all discourse is the expression of religious or political hypocrisy.'

' Prince,' I replied, after having listened attentively to this long series of deductions, ' I will not believe you. It is enlightened to rise above national prejudices, and polite to deal gently with the prejudices of foreigners; but I have no more confidence in your concessions than I have in others' claims and pretensions.'

' In three months you will render me greater justice ; meanwhile, and as we are yet alone,' — he said this after looking round on all sides, — 'I will direct your attention to a leading point, I will present you with a key which will serve to explain every thing to you in the country you are about to visit.

' Think at each step you take among this Asiatic people that the chivalrous and Catholic influence has never obtained in their land; and not only have they never adopted it, they have withstood it also, with bitter animosity, during long wars with Lithuania, Poland, and the knights of the Teutonic order.'

' You make me proud of my discernment. I wrote lately to one of my friends that I conceived religious intolerance to be the secret spring of Russian policy.

' You anticipated clearly what you are going to see ; you can have no adequate idea of the intense intolerance of the Russians ; those whose minds are E 4

80POLITICS ANT) RELIGION IDENTICAL,

cultivated, and whom business brings into intercourse with western Europe, take the utmost pains to conceal the predominant national sentiment, which is the triumph of the Greek orthodoxy — with them synonymous with the policy of Russia.

' Without keeping this in view nothing can be explained either in our manners or our politics. You must not believe, for example, that the persecutions in Poland were the effect of the personal resentment of the Emperor: they were the result of a profound and deliberate calculation. These acts of cruelty are meritorious in the eyes of true believers; it is the Holy Spirit who so enlightens the sovereign as to elevate him above all human feelings ; and it is God who blesses him as the exeeutor of his high designs. By this manner of viewing things, judges and executioners become so much the greater saints as they are greater barbarians. Your legitimist journals little know what they are doing when they seek for allies. among schismatics. We shall see an European revolution before we shall see the Emperor of Russia acting in good faith with a Catholic power; the Protestants are at least open adversaries; besides, they will more readily reunite with the pope than the chief of the Russian autocracy; for the Protestants, having beheld all their creeds degenerate into systems, and their religions faith transformed into philosophic doubt, have nothing left but their sectarian pride to sacrifice to Rome ; whereas the Emperor possesses a real and positive spiritual power, which he will never voluntarily relinquish. Rome, and all that can be connected with the Romish church, has no more dangerous enemy than the autocrat of Moscow—visible

MILITARY SPIRIT IN RUSSIA.81

head of his own church; and I am astonished that Italian penetration has not discovered the danger that threatens you from that quarter. After this veracious picture, judge of the illusion with which the Legitimists of Paris niu`se their hopes.'

This conversation will give an idea of all the others. Whenever the subject became unpleasant to Muscovite

self-love, the prince Кbroke off, at least until

he was fully sure that no one overheard us.

The subjects of our discourse have made me reflect, and my reflections make me fear.

There is perhaps more to look forward to in this country, long depreciated by our modern thinkers, because appearing so far behind all others, than in those English colonies implanted on the American soil, and which are too higlily vaunted by the philosophers whose systems have developed the real democracy, with all its abuses, which now subsists.

If the military spirit which prevails in Russia has failed to produce anything analogous to our creed oi honour, or to invest its soldiers with the brilliant reputation which distinguishes ours, it should not therefore be said that the nation is less powerful. Honour is a human divinity, but in practical life duty outvalues even honour; though not so dazzling it is more sustained, and more capable of sustaining.

In my opinion the empire of the world is henceforth no longer to be committed to the turbulent, but to people of a patient spirit.* Europe, enlightened

* I must again request the reader, who would follow me throughout this work, to wait before forming an opinion of 3?ussia, until he shall have compared my different views made E 5