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A JOURNEY FROM ST. PETERSBURG by
Alexander Radischev Trans
Leo Weiner from A. Radischev, A
Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow (Cambridge, Mass.:
Harvard University Press, 1958), pp. 4-7, 9-19, 46-48.
158-60,164-71,187-90,201-10,239-41,248-49. Radischev
(1749-1802) is often called the father of the Russian intelligentsia.
Dedicating his work to a friend, he wrote: "I looked about me-- my
heart was troubled by the sufferings of humanity." His famous book,
suppressed by the censor until 1905, is today a Russian classic. He was
the first to raise his voice on behalf of causes which generations of
the intelligentsia after him continued to plead. Like Uncle Tom's Cabin,
the Journey
is an abolitionist tract. Aleksandr
Nikolaevich Radischev was born in Moscow on August 20/31, 1749, three
days after Goethe, six years after Jefferson, ten
years before the younger Pitt. Until he was eight years old, he lived
on his father's estate at Verkhnee
Oblyazovo in what
was then Saratov
province (now in Penza oblast), some three hundred miles
north of present day Stalingrad, two hundred miles south of Kazan, and
one hundred miles west of the Volga River. His father was a
well-educated gentleman who seems to have been liked and trusted both
by his own peasants and by the gentry of his district. His peasants
protected him during the Pugachev
Rebellion, when many peasants were only too happy to murder
their proprietors. In 1787 he was elected marshall
of the gentry of his district, Kuznetsk, in Saratov province. 262 From
1757 to 1762, between the ages of eight and thirteen, Radischev lived
in Moscow with his mother's relatives, the Argamakov
family. The head of the Argamakov
family was the curator of the newly founded Moscow University, and
their home was always full of teachers and students. From 1762 to 1766
Radischev was in the Corps des Pages in St. Petersburg, where he may
have acquired some of his intense dislike for the Court Service. He was
in St. Petersburg in 1765 when Mikhaylo
Vasil'evich Lomonosov, the Russian
Benjamin Franklin, died there. Lomonosov,
a very different sort of man from most of those at court, embodied many
of the qualities Radischev most admired, and to him Radischev devoted
the last chapter of his Journey.
In
1766 Radischev was one of twelve Russians sent by the government to
study at the University of Leipzig. Among his fellow students at
Leipzig were Aleksey Mikhaylovich
Kutuzov, to whom the Journey
was dedicated; Pyotr
Ivanovich Chelishchev,
who figures, prominently in the Journey;
Matvey Kirilovich Rubanovsky, whose niece
Radischev later married; Fyodor Vasil'evich
Ushakov, whose
biography Radischev later wrote, telling particularly about their years
at the University; and Goethe. Like Goethe, Radischev particularly
enjoyed Professor Christian Furchtegott
Gellert's lectures
on poetry and rhetoric, and Professor Ernst Platner's
lectures in philosophy and physiology. The Russian students had been
sent "to study the Latin, German, French, and. if possible, Slavonic
languages,… moral
philosophy, history, but particularly natural and international law, as
well as the law of the Roman Empire. Each one is free to study the
other sciences as he wishes." Accordingly Radischev studied
many of the French philosophers, not only Montesquieu, Voltaire, and
Rousseau, but the now less well-known
Bayle, Fenelon, Helvetius, Mably,
and Raynal. In
1771 Radischev returned to Russia and entered the Civil Service as a
clerk of the Senate. He was transferred to the Military Service, to the
staff of General Bruce, in 1773. In this same year, when he was
twenty-four, he published his first book: a translation, with
introduction and notes, of Mably's Observations sur l’histoire de la Grece.
What I have seen of this translation is a very fair rendering of the
original, not slavishly literal, but certainly close to Mably's meaning. Perhaps the
most striking passage in the work is one in which Radischev renders Mably's word "despotisme" by the Russian word "samoderzhavstvo," which means
"autocracy." The Russian government at this time, and down to 1917,
officially called itself an autocracy. In one of his numerous notes,
Radischev comments at length on this word. "Autocracy," he says, “is
the state of affairs most repugnant to human nature.... The injustice
of the sovereign gives the people, who are his judges, the same or an
even greater right over him than the law gives him to judge criminals.
The sovereign is the first citizen of the people's commonwealth.” 263 In
1775, the war with Turkey won and the Pugachev Rebellion suppressed,
Radischev received his honorable discharge with the rank of second
major. He married Anna Vasil'evna
Rubanovskaya, with
whom he was very happy until her death in 1783. In 1777 their first
child, Vasily, was
born, and Radischev went back into the Civil Service, in the Department
of Commerce. He had a successful career in the Service, was promoted in
1780, 1782, 1784, and finally, in 1790, became Chief of the St.
Petersburg Custom House. He won honor as well as rank, being made a
Knight of the Order of St. Vladimir in 1785. When
he resigned from the Service in 1775, Radischev made a journey from St.
Petersburg to Verkhnee Oblyazovo to ask his parents'
blessing for his marriage. On the way, he traveled through some of the
country ravaged by the Pugachev Rebellion in the past two years. When
he reached home, he was told how his father’s peasants had helped his
father hide out safely in the woods and had disguised his younger
brothers and sisters as peasant children while Pugachev's men were near
their estate. But he also heard of things that had happened to many
another landlord less
enlightened and less generous to the peasants than his father. In the Journey
Radischev, referring more than once to the Pugachev Rebellion, warns
his fellow serf-owners, in vivid and striking language, that a far
worse and more terrible rebellion awaits them. Only by prompt and
substantial reforms --above all, by freeing the serfs-- can they hope
to avert revolution…. Radischev
worked at the Journey
intermittently over the course of ten years, beginning part of it as
early as 1780. One of his own footnotes, which refers
to the death of the Austrian Emperor Joseph II, must have been written
after February 20, 1790. Part of the chapter “Podberez'e”
was written no later than 1782, while another chapter, “Torzhok,” contains a reference
to “the late Frederick II, King of Prussia” who died in 1786. There are
only two brief references to the French Revolution, which in any case
was only in its early stages by the time the Journey was
published; in May 1790. Russia had been at war with Turkey since 1787
and with Sweden since 1788, a fact which should be kept in mind when
reading Radischev’s account of a sale of serfs as recruits for the
army, and his particular rejoicing at Russian victories over the Turks
in earlier wars. Much
the greater part of his book, however, was written by 1788. It would
have been better for Radischev had he published it then, before the
French Revolution had gotten under way at all. It had not yet gone very
far by 1790, but it had gone far enough to frighten Catherine II, to
make her expect to see its poisonous, subversive contagion everywhere.
“The purpose of this book,” she wrote in her Notes on the Journey “is clear
on every page: its author, infected and full of the French madness, is
trying in every possible way to break down respect for authority and
for the authorities, to stir up in the people indignation against their
superiors and against the government.” In one of his two brief
references to the French Revolution, Radischev had simply listed Mirabeau,
along with Demosthenes, Cicero, Pitt, Burke, and Fox, as a great orator
to whom Lomonosov was
comparable. The Empress was furious at Radischev’s "praise of Mirabeau,
who deserves not once but many times over to be hanged….” At
the end of the book was the usual imprimatur, the statement that it was
printed "With the permission of the Department of Public Morals." The Empress, noting this, said:
“This is probably a lie, or else carelessness.” It was actually
carelessness. Radischev had submitted the manuscript to the censor, who
had cut out substantial parts of it. But Radischev had nevertheless
printed it all, on his own press. He then submitted the whole thing to
the police, who gave it their official stamp of approval without
reading it again. It never occurred to them that anyone would dare to
print anything they had cut out. 264 Radischev
had printed the Journey
anonymously, but it was a very simple matter for the Empress to
discover who had written it. Frank, straightforward, outspoken,
Radischev had none of the instincts of a revolutionary. In 1789 he had
dedicated his Life of
Fyodor Vasil'evich Ushakov
to Aleksey Mikhaylovich
Kutuzov, whom he addressed as “my best beloved friend.”
In 1790 he dedicated the Journey “To A.M.K., My Best
Beloved Friend,” using exactly the same words. He went on to say:
“Everything my mind and heart may wish to produce shall be dedicated to
you, my comrade.” Radischev and Kutuzov were both well known in St.
Petersburg, and Catherine herself had sent them off as comrades to the
University of Leipzig. They had been good friends ever since. If this
were not enough, the author of the Journey
calls himself an inhabitant of St. Petersburg and later speaks of
walking down the customs pier and looking at the ships, with more than
a mere layman's knowledge of the ships and their cargoes. It was
earlier in this very year 1790 that the Empress had made Radischev
Chief of the St. Petersburg Custom House. If it be objected that an
editor with nothing else to do might notice such details in a book, but
that an Empress with two wars to fight and a fair-sized country to
govern would hardly have time, the editor must ruefully reply that the
Empress found time to write ten closely printed pages of notes on the Journey, and that
she noticed some things in it which he had missed. The
Empress's private secretary, Aleksandr
Vasil'evich Khrapovitsky, noted in his diary
that “She was graciously pleased to say that he [Radischev] was a
rebel, worse than Pugachev.” On June 30/July 11, 1790, Radischev was
arrested and imprisoned in the Fortress of St. Peter and St. Paul. On
July 24/ August 4, he was condemned to death. Ten days later, Russia
and Sweden made peace in the Treaty of Verela.
In honor of the peace, the Empress, on September 4/15, mercifully
commuted Radischev’s sentence to banishment for ten years to Ilimsk in eastern Siberia, some
three hundred miles north of Irkutsk and forty-five hundred miles east
of St. Petersburg. She
also deprived him of his status as a member of the gentry, of his rank
in the service, and of his order of knighthood. But she did not
confiscate his property, and she permitted him to travel without
wearing fetters, after the first day…. Less
than a month after the commutation of Radischev's sentence, Count Semyon Romanovich
Vorontsov, the
Russian ambassador to England, wrote a letter to his brother, Count Aleksandr Romanovich Vorolltsov, President of the
Commerce Collegium, Radischev's superior officer in the service and
lifelong friend. The ambassador wrote from Richmond, England, on
October 1/12, 1790: “The condemnation of poor Radischev hurts me
deeply. What a sentence and what a commutation for a mere blunder! What
will they do for a crime or for a real revolt? Ten years of Siberia is
worse than death for a man who has children from whom he must part, or
whom he will deprive of an education and a chance to enter the service
if he takes them with him. It makes one shudder.” But now, in time of
trouble, Radischev was very fortunate in his family and friends. His
brother, a government official in Archangel, took care of his two elder
sons. His deceased wife's sister, Elizaveta
Vasil'evna Rubanovskaya, took care of his
youngest son and his only daughter, and with them followed him into
exile. In 1791 she married him, and they had three children in Siberia.; two girls and a boy.
Count Aleksandr Vorontsov proved to be a
faithful friend, sending money, books, and news, and using his
influence to make things easier for the exile. It was Vorontsov who prevailed upon the
Empress to allow Radischev to travel to Siberia unfettered, and who
persuaded the governor of Ilimsk
to let Radischev go off on long walks and hunting trips…. 265 Fortunately
for Radischev, the Empress Catherine II died, November 6/ 17 1796. Her
son and successor, the Emperor Paul, had been treated abominably by his
mother and hated everything that she had done. Accordingly, on November
23/December 4, 1796, Paul issued an Imperial rescript permitting
Radischev to leave Siberia and to live on his estate in European
Russia, where “conduct and correspondence” would be “under observation”
by the governor of the province. Radischev therefore went to live on
his estate of Nemtsovo,
near Maloyaroslavets in
Kaluga province, some seventy-five miles southwest of Moscow, where he
arrived in June 1797. His wife had died on the way back from Siberia,
but in January 1798 Radischev and all his children-- four sons and
three daughters-- set off for Verrkhnee
Oblyazovo to see
his parents. He stayed with them for a whole year, returned to Nemtsovo in 1799, and remained
there until 1801….. The
Emperor Paul was assassinated on March 11/23, 1801. Four days later,
Emperor Alexander I freed Radischev from being “under observation” and
restored to him his status as one of the gentry, his rank in the
service, and his order of knighthood. On August 6/ 1801, on the
recommendation of Count Aleksandr
Vorontsov,
Radischev was appointed a member of the Commission on Revision of the
Laws. Four years earlier, the Emperor Paul, at his coronation, had
issued one new law of whose purpose Radischev had heartily approved. On
April 5/16, 1797, Paul had forbidden that peasants be required to work
more than three days a week on their master’s land. Radischev, in the
Journey, had particularly attacked landlords who required their
peasants to give all their time to work on their master's land and
allowed them no time to work their own. Now Radischev hoped that under
the reputedly more liberal Emperor Alexander I it would be possible to
take further steps to protect the peasants…. Two
statements made by Radischev as a member of the Commission have been
preserved. The Commission debated at length the question of
recommending a change in the law regulating the compensation to be paid
to a serf owner whose serf had been unintentionally killed. The
Commission, including Radischev, finally recommended a substantial
increase in the amount of compensation. But Radischev also sent to the
Senate his own supplementary “minority report,” in which he said that
if a serf were killed, money should be paid, not to his owner, but to
his parents, wife, or children. Although he approved of the increase in
compensation, he wrote that “the value of human blood cannot be
measured in terms of money.” Again, Radischev disagreed with the rest
of the Commission as to the proper methods of trying persons accused of
blasphemy, acts of rebellion, murder, robbery, and other capital
offenses. The Commission recommended that the law should remain as it
was, and specifically, that such accused persons should neither be
permitted to challenge their judges nor be given a list of the charges
against them. Radischev, in a dissenting opinion worthy of Holmes or
Brandeis, held that in every such trial the accused should be allowed
to choose someone to defend him, and that if he could find no one, the
court itself must provide someone to defend him; that the accused
should have the right to challenge his judges; and that no one should
be condemned to death by less than a two-thirds majority of the judges…. 266 In
short, Radischev had very high hopes for reform, but he was deeply
discouraged and depressed by the attitude of the other members of the
Commission, especially the chairman, Count Zavadovsky.
One of the best Russian authorities on Radischev, Professor Borozdin, accepted as "very
probably correct" Pushkin's account of Radischev’s death. Pushkin said
that the Emperor Alexander I ordered Radischev to set forth his ideas
on certain questions of government. Poor Radischev, carried away by the
subject,
“remembered the old days and, in a
project presented to the government, revealed his old opinions. Count Z[avadovsky] was astonished at the
youthfulness of his gray hairs and said to him in friendly reproof:
‘Eh, Aleksandr
Nikolaevich, do you still want to talk the same old nonsense? Or didn't
you have enough of Siberia?" In these words Radischev saw a threat.
Distressed and terrified, he went home, remembered the friend of his
youth, the student at Leipzig [probably Fyodor Vasil'evich
Ushakov] who had
first suggested to him the thought of suicide ... and took poison. He
had foreseen his end long before and had prophesied it himself! The
Journey
is full of Radischev's view of suicide. In one place he advised his
sons: "If there is no refuge left on earth for your virtue, if, driven
to extremes, you find no sanctuary from oppression, then remember that
you are a man, call to mind your greatness, and seize the crown of
bliss which they are trying to take from you. Die. As a legacy I leave
you the words of the dying Cato. When he had committed suicide, Cato
had said: “Now I am my own master.” And so, on September 12/24, 1802,
Radischev became his own master…. A JOURNEY FROM ST. PETERSBURG TO
MOSCOW LYUBANI
I
suppose it is all the same to you whether I traveled in winter or in
summer. Maybe both in winter and in summer. It is not unusual for
travelers to set out in sleighs and to return in carriages. In summer,
the corduroy road tortured my body; I climbed out of the carriage and
went on foot. While I had been lying back in the carriage, my thoughts
had turned to the immeasurable vastness of the world. By spiritually
leaving the earth I thought I might more easily bear the jolting of the
carriage. But spiritual exercises do not always distract us from our
physical selves; and so, to save my body, I got out and walked. A few
steps from the road I saw a peasant ploughing a field. The weather was
hot. I looked at my watch. It was twenty minutes before one. I had set
out on Saturday. It was now Sunday. The ploughing peasant, of course,
belonged to a landed proprietor, who would not let him pay a
commutation tax [obrok]. The peasant was
ploughing very carefully. The field, of course, was not part of his
master's land. He turned the plough with astonishing ease. “God
help you,” I said, walking up to the ploughman, who, without stopping,
was finishing the furrow he had started. “God help you,” I repeated. “Thank
you, sir,” the ploughman said to me, shaking the earth off the
ploughshare and transferring it to a new furrow. “You
must be a Dissenter, since you plough on a Sunday.” “No,
sir, I make the true sign of the cross,” he said, showing me the three
fingers together. “And God is merciful and does not bid us starve to
death, so long as we have strength and a family.” 267 “Have
you no time to work during the week, then, and can you not have any
rest on Sundays, in the hottest part of the day, at that?” “In
a week, sir, there are six days, and we go six times a week to work on
the master's fields; in the evening, if the weather is good, we haul to
the master’s house the hay that is left in the woods; and on holidays
the women and girls go walking in the woods, looking for mushrooms and
berries. God grant,” he continued, making the sign of the cross, “that
it rains this evening. If you have peasants of your own, sir, they are
praying to God for the same thing.” “My
friend, I have no peasants, and so nobody curses me. Do you have a
large family?” “Three
sons and three daughters. The eldest is nine years old.” “But
how do you manage to get food enough, if you have only the holidays
free?” “Not
only the holidays: the nights are ours, too. If a fellow isn't lazy, he
won't starve to death. You see, one horse is resting; and when this one
gets tired, I'll take the other; so the work gets done.” “Do
you work the same way for your master?” “No,
Sir, it would be a sin to work the same way. On his fields there are a
hundred hands for one mouth, while I have two for seven mouths: you can
figure it out for yourself. No matter how hard you work for the master,
no one will thank you for it. The master will not pay our head tax;
but, though he doesn't pay it, he doesn't demand one sheep, one hen, or
any linen or butter the less. The peasants are much better off where
the landlord lets them pay a commutation tax without the interference
of the steward. It is true that sometimes even good masters take more
than three rubles a man; but even that's better than having to work on
the master's fields. Nowadays it's getting to be the custom to let
villages to tenants, as they call it. But we call it putting our heads
in a noose. A landless tenant skins us peasants alive; even the best
ones don't leave us any time for ourselves. In the winter he won't let
us do any carting of goods and won't let us go into town to work; all
our work has to be for him, because he pays our head tax. It is an
invention of the Devil to turn your peasants over to work for a
stranger. You can make a complaint against a bad steward, but to whom
can you complain against a bad tenant?” “My
friend, you are mistaken; the laws forbid them to torture people.” “Torture?
That's true; but all the same, sir, you would not want to be in my
hide.” Meanwhile
the ploughman hitched up the other horse to the plough and bade me
goodbye as he began a new furrow. The words of this peasant awakened in
me a multitude of thoughts. I thought especially of the inequality of
treatment within the peasant class. I compared the crown peasants with
the manorial peasants. They both live in villages; but the former pay a
fixed sum, while the latter must be prepared to pay whatever their
master demands. The former are judged by their equals; the latter are
dead to the law, except, perhaps, in criminal cases. A member of
society becomes known to the government protecting him, only when he
breaks the social bonds, when he becomes a criminal! This thought made
my blood boil. Tremble,
cruelhearted
landlord! on the brow of
each of your peasants I see your condemnation written …. 268 VYSHNY
VOLOCHOK The
story of a certain landed proprietor proves that man for the sake of
his personal advantage forgets humanity towards his fellow man, and
that to find an example of hard-heartedness we need not go to far-off
countries nor seek miracles through thrice nine lands; they take place
before our eyes in our own country. A
certain man who, as they say in the vernacular, did not make his mark
in the government service, or who did not wish to make it there, left
the capital, acquired a small village of one or two hundred souls, and
determined to make his living by agriculture. He did not apply himself
to the plough but intended most vigorously to make all possible use of
the natural strength of his peasants by applying them to the
cultivation of the land. To this end he thought it the surest method to
make his peasants resemble tools that have neither will nor impulse;
and to a certain extent he actually made them like the soldiers of the
present time who are commanded in a mass, who move to battle in a mass,
and who count for nothing when acting singly. To attain his end he took
away from his peasants the small allotment of plough land and the hay
meadows which noblemen usually give them for their bare maintenance, as
a recompense for all the forced labor which they demand from them. In a
word, this nobleman forced all his peasants and their wives and
children to work every day of the year for him. Lest they should
starve, he doled out to them a definite quantity of bread, known by the
name of monthly doles. Those who had no families received no doles, but
dined according to the Lacedaemonian custom, together, at the manor,
receiving thin cabbage soup on meat days, and on fast days bread and kvas, to fill their
stomachs. If there was any real meat, it was only in Easter Week. These
serfs also received clothing befitting their condition. Their winter
boots, that is, bast
shoes, they made for themselves; leggings they received from their
master; while in summer they went barefooted. Naturally these serfs had
no cows, horses, ewes, or rams. Their master did not withhold from
these serfs the permission, but the means to have them. Whoever was a
little better off and ate sparingly, kept a few chickens, which the
master sometimes took for himself, paying for them as he pleased. With
such an arrangement it is not surprising that agriculture in Mr. So and
So's village was
in a flourishing condition. Where the crops were a failure elsewhere,
his grain showed a fourfold return; when others had a good crop, his
grain had a tenfold return or better. In a short time he added to his
two hundred souls another two hundred as victims of his greed, and,
proceeding with them just as with the first, he increased his holdings
year after year, thus multiplying the number of those groaning in his
fields. Now he counts them by the thousand and is praised as a famous
agriculturist. Barbarian!
You do not deserve to bear the name of citizen: What good does it do
the country that every year a few thousand more bushels of grain are
grown, if those who produce it are valued on a par with the ox whose
job it is to break the heavy furrow? Or do we think our citizens happy
because our granaries are full and their stomachs empty? Or because one
man blesses the government, rather than thousands? The wealth of this
bloodsucker does not belong to him. It has been acquired by robbery and
deserves severe punishment according to law. Yet there are people who,
looking at the rich fields of this hangman, cite him as an example of
perfection in agriculture. And you wish to be called merciful, and you
bear the name of guardians of the public good!
Instead of encouraging such violence, which you
regard as the source of the country's wealth, direct your humane
vengeance against this enemy of society. Destroy the tools of his
agriculture, burn his barns, silos, and granaries, and scatter their
ashes over the fields where he practiced his tortures; stigmatize him
as a robber of the people, so that everyone who sees him may not only
despise him but shun his approach to avoid infection from his example. 269 TORZHOK
Everyone
in our country is now permitted to own and operate a printing press,
and the time has passed when they were afraid to grant this permission
to private individuals, and when, because in free printing offices
false statements might be printed, they renounced the general good and
this useful institution. Now anybody may have the tools of printing,
but that which may be printed is still under watch and ward. The
censorship has become the nursemaid of reason, wit, imagination, of everything great
and enlightened. But where there are nurses, there are babies and
leading strings, which often lead to crooked legs; where there are
guardians, there are minors and immature minds unable to take care of
themselves. If there are always to be nurses and guardians, then the
child will walk with leading strings for a long time and will grow up
to be a cripple…. Having recognized the usefulness of printing, the
government has made it open to all; having further recognized that
control of thought might invalidate its good intention in granting
freedom to set up presses, it turned over the censorship or inspection
of printed works to the Department of Public Morals. Its duty in this matter can only
he the prohibition of the sale of objectionable works. But even this
censorship is superfluous. A single stupid official in the Department
of Public Morals may do the greatest harm to enlightenment and may for
years hold back the progress of reason: he may prohibit a useful
discovery, a new idea, and may rob everyone of something great. Here is
an example on a small scale. A translation of a novel is brought to the
Department of Public Morals for its imprimatur. The translator,
following the author, in speaking of love calls it “the tricky god.”
The censor in uniform and in the fullness of piety strikes out the
expression, saying, “It is improper to call a divinity tricky.” He who
does not understand should not interfere. If you want fresh air, remove
the smoky brazier; if you want light, remove that which obscures it; if
you do not want the child to be timid, throw the rod out of the school.
In a house where whips and sticks are in fashion, the servants are
drunkards, thieves, and worse. They
tell of a censor of this sort who would not permit any works to be
published in which God was mentioned, saying. “I have no business with
Him." If in any work the popular customs of this or that foreign
country were criticized, he considered this inadmissible, saying,
“Russia has a treaty of friendship with that country.” If a prince or
count was mentioned anywhere, he did not permit that to be printed,
saying. “That is a personal allusion for we have princes and counts
among our distinguished personages.” Let
anyone print anything that enters his head. If anyone finds himself
insulted in print, let him get his redress at law. I am not speaking in
jest. Words are not always deeds, thoughts are not crimes. These are
the rules in the Instruction for a New Code of Laws. But an offense in
words or in print is always an offense. Under the law no one is allowed
to libel another, and everyone has the right to bring suit. But if one
tells the truth about another, that cannot, according to the law, be
considered a libel. What harm can there be if books 270 are
printed without a police stamp? Not only will there be no harm; there
will be an advantage, an advantage from the first to the last, from the
least to the greatest, from the Tsar to the last citizen… The
dissenters from the revealed religion have so far done more harm in
Russia than those who do not acknowledge the existence of God, the
atheists. There are not many of the latter among us, because few among
us are concerned about metaphysics. The atheist errs in metaphysics;
the dissenter in crossing himself with only two fingers. Dissenters or raskol'niki
is our name for all those Russians who in any manner depart from the
common doctrine of the Greek Church. There are many of them in Russia;
hence they are allowed to hold divine services. But why should not
every aberration be
permitted to be out in the open? The more open it is, the quicker it
will break down. Persecutions have only made martyrs; cruelty has been
the support of the Christian religion itself. The consequences of
schisms are sometimes harmful. Prohibit them. They are propagated by
example. Destroy the example. A printed book will not cause a raskol'nik
to throw himself into
the fire, but a moving example will. To prohibit foolishness is to
encourage it. Give it free rein; everyone will see what is foolish and
what is wise. What is prohibited is coveted. We are all Eve's children.
But
in prohibiting freedom of the press; timid governments are not afraid
of blasphemy, but of criticism of themselves. He
who in moments of madness does not spare God, will not in moments of
lucidity and reason spare unjust power. He who does not fear the
thunders of the Almighty laughs at the gallows. Hence freedom of
thought is terrifying to governments. The freethinker who has been
stirred to his depths will stretch forth his audacious but mighty and
fearless arm against the idol of power, will tear off its mask and
veil, and lay bare its true character. Everyone will see its feet of
clay; everyone will withdraw the support which he had given it; power
will return to its source; the idol will fall. But if power is not
seated in the fog of contending opinions, if its throne is founded on
sincerity and true love of the common weal, will it not rather be
strengthened when its foundation is revealed? And will not the true
lover be loved more truly? Mutuality is a natural sentiment, and this
instinct is deeply implanted in our nature. A solid and firm building
needs only its own foundation; it has no need of supports and
buttresses. Only when it is weakened by old age does it have need of
lateral support. Let the government he honest and its leaders free from
hypocrisy; then all the spittle and vomit will return their stench upon
him who has belched them forth; but the truth will always remain pure
and immaculate. He whose words incite to revolt (in deference to the
government, let us so denominate all firm utterances which are based on
truth but opposed to the ruling powers) is just as much a fool as he
who blasphemes God. Let the government proceed on its appointed path;
then it will not be troubled by the empty sound of calumny, even as the
Lord of Hosts is not disturbed by blasphemy. But woe to it if in its
lust for power it offends against truth. Then even a thought shakes its
foundations; a word of truth will destroy it; a manly act will scatter
it to the winds. A
personal attack, if it is unjustly offensive, is a libel. A personal
attack which states the truth is as admissible as truth itself. If a
blinded judge judges unjustly, and a defender of innocence publicizes
his unjust decision and shows up his wiles and injustice, that will be
a personal attack, 271 but
one that is permissible if he calls him a venal, false, stupid judge,
that is a personal attack, it is admissible. But if he begins to call
him dirty names and slanders him with offensive words such as one hears
in the marketplace, that is a personal attack, but it is offensive and
inadmissible. But it is not the business of the government to defend
the judge, even though he may have been criticized unjustly. Not the
judge, but the person offended, should appear as plaintiff in this
case. Let the judge justify himself, before the world and before those
who appointed him, by his deeds alone. Thus one must judge of a
personal attack. It deserves punishment, but in print it will do more
good than harm. If everything were in order, if decisions were always
rendered in accordance with the law, if the law were founded truth, and
all oppression were barred then perhaps, and only then, a personal
attack might be injurious to the state. I
will close with this: the censorship what is printed belongs properly
to society, which gives the author a laurel wreath or uses his sheets
for wrapping paper. Just so, it is the public that gives approval to a
theatrical production, and not the director of the theater. Similarly,
the censor can give neither glory nor dishonor to the publication of a
work. The curtain rises, and everyone eagerly watches the performance.
If they like it, they applaud; if not, they stamp and hiss. Leave what
is stupid to the judgment of public opinion; stupidity will find a
thousand censors. The most vigilant police cannot check worthless ideas
as well as a disgusted public. They will be heard just once; then they
will die, never to rise again. But once we have recognized the
uselessness of the censorship, or, rather, its harmfulness in the realm
of knowledge, we must also recognize the vast and boundless, usefulness
of freedom of the press…. MEDNOE
Twice
every week the whole Russian Empire is notified that N.N. or B.B. is
unable or unwilling to pay what he has borrowed or taken or what is
demanded of him. The borrowed money has been spent in gambling,
traveling, carousing, eating, drinking, etc.--or has been given away,
lost in fire or water, or N.N. or RB. has
in some other way gone into debt or incurred an obligation. Whatever
the circumstances, the same story is published in the newspapers. It
runs like this: "At ten o'clock this morning, by order of the County
Court, or the Municipal Magistrate, will be sold at public auction the
real estate of Captain 272 There
are always a lot of customers for a bargain. The day and hour of the
auction have come. Prospective buyers are gathering. In the hall where
it is to take place,
those who are condemned to be sold stand immovable. An old man,
seventy-five years of age, leaning on an elmwood
cane, is anxious to find out into whose hands fate will deliver him,
and who will close his eyes. He had been with his master's father in
the Crimean Campaign under Field Marshal Munnich.
In the Battle of Frankfurt he had carried his wounded master on his
shoulders from the field. On returning home he had become the tutor of
his young master. In childhood he had saved him from drowning, for,
jumping after him into the river into which he had fallen from a ferry,
he had saved him at the risk of his own life. In youth he had ransomed
him from prison, whither
he had been cast for debts incurred while he was a subaltern of the
Guards. The old woman, his wife, is eighty years of age. She had been the wet-nurse of the young
master's mother; later she became his nurse and had the supervision of
the house up to the very hour when she was brought out to this auction.
During all the time of her service she had never wasted anything
belonging to her masters, had never considered her personal advantage,
never lied, and if she had ever annoyed them, she had done so by her
scrupulous honesty. The forty-year-old woman is a widow, the young
master's wet-nurse. To this very day she feels a
certain tenderness for him. Her blood flows in his veins.
She is his second mother, and he owes his life more to her than to his
natural mother. The latter had conceived him in lust and did not take
care of him in his childhood. His nurses had really brought him up.
They part from him as from a son. The eighteen year-old
girl is her daughter and the old man's granddaughter. Beast, monster,
outcast among men! Look at her, look at her crimson cheeks, at the
tears flowing from her beautiful eyes. When you could neither ensnare
her innocence with enticements and promises nor shake her steadfastness
with threats and punishments, did you not finally use deception, and,
having married her to the companion of your abominations, did you not
in his guise enjoy the pleasures she scorned to share with you? She
discovered your deception. Her bridegroom did not touch her couch
again, and since you were thus deprived of the object of your lust, you
employed force. Four evildoers, your henchmen, holding her arms and
legs-- let us not go on with this. On her brow is sorrow, in her eyes
despair. She is holding a little one, the lamentable fruit of deception
or violence, but the living image of his lascivious father. Having
given birth to him, she forgot his father's beastliness and her heart
began to feel a tenderness
for him. But now she fears that she may fall into the hands of another
like his father. The little one-- Thy son, barbarian, thy blood! Or do
you think that where there was no church rite, there was no obligation?
Or do you think that a blessing given at your command by a hired
preacher of the word of God has established their union? Or do you
think that a forced wedding in God's temple can be called marriage? The
Almighty hates compulsion; He rejoices at the wishes of the heart. They
alone are pure. Oh, how many acts of adultery and violation are
committed among us in the name of the Father of joys and the Comforter
of sorrows, in the presence of His witnesses, who are unworthy of their
calling! The lad of twenty-five, her wedded husband, the companion and
intimate of his master. Savagery and vengeance are in his eyes. He
repents the service he did his master. In his pocket is a knife; he
clutches it firmly; it is not difficult to guess his thought. A
hopeless fancy! You
will become the property of another. The master's hand, constantly
raised over his slave's head, will bend your neck to his every
pleasure. Hunger, cold, heat, punishment, everything will be against
you. Noble thoughts are foreign to your mind. You do not know how to
die. You will bow down and be a slave in spirit as in estate. And if
you should try to offer resistance, you would die a languishing death
in fetters. There is no judge between you. If your tormentor does not
wish to punish you himself, he will become your accuser. He will hand
you over to the governmental justice. Justice! Where the accused has
almost no chance to justify himself! Let us pass by the other
unfortunates who have been brought out for sale…. 273 GORODNYA
As
I drove into this village, my ears were assailed not by the melody of
verse, but by a heart-rending lament of women, children, and old men.
Getting out of my carriage, I sent it on to the post station, for I was
curious to learn the cause of the disturbance I had noticed in the
street. Going
up to one group of people, I learned that a levy of recruits was the
cause of the sobs and tears of the people crowded together there. From
many villages, both crown and manorial, those who were to be drafted
into the army had come together here. In one group an old woman fifty
years of age, holding the head of a lad of twenty, was sobbing. "My
dear child, to whose care are you committing me? To whom will you
entrust the home of your parents? Our fields will be overgrown with
grass, our hut with moss. I, your poor old mother, will have to wander
about begging. Who will warm my decrepit body when it is cold, who will
protect it from the heat? Who will give me food and drink? But all that
does not weigh so heavily upon my heart as this: who will close my eyes
when. I die? Who will receive my maternal blessing? Who will return my
body to our common mother, the moist earth? Who will come to remember
me at my grave? Your warm tears will not fall upon it; I shall not have
that consolation." Near
the old woman stood a grown-up girl. She, too, was sobbing. "Farewell,
friend of my heart; farewell, my shining sun. I, your betrothed, will
never know comfort or joy again. My friends will not envy me. The sun
will not rise for me in joy. You are leaving me to pine away, neither a
widow nor a wedded wife. If our inhuman village elders had only let us
get married, if you, my darling, could have slept but one short night
on my white breast. Perhaps God would have taken pity on me and given me a little son to
comfort me." The
lad said to them: "Stop weeping, stop rending my heart. Our Sovereign
calls us to service. The lot fell on me. It is the will of God. Those
not fated to die will live. Perhaps I will come home to you with the
regiment. I may even win rank and honors. Dear Mother, do not grieve.
Take care of my Praskov'yushka."
This recruit was drafted from an Economic village. (A village of serfs,
formerly belonging to a monastery. Since the secularization of monastic
lands by Peter III in 1762 these villages belonged to the state and
were administered by the Economic College.) From
another group standing nearby I heard altogether different words.
Amidst them I saw a man of about thirty, of medium size, standing erect
and looking happily at the people around him. "The
Lord has heard my prayers," he said. "The tears of an unfortunate man
have reached the Comforter of all men. Now I shall at least know that
my lot may depend on my own good or bad behavior. Heretofore it
depended on the arbitrary whims of a woman. I am consoled by the
thought that hereafter I shall not be flogged without a fair trial!" 274 Having
gathered from what he said that he was a manorial serf, I was curious
to learn the cause of his unusual joy. To my question he replied: "Dear
sir, if a gallows were placed on one side of you and a deep river ran
on the other, and you, standing between these two perils, could not
possibly escape going either to the right or to the left, into the
noose or into the water: which would you choose? Which would sense and impulse make you prefer? I
think everyone would rather jump into the river, in the hope of
escaping from peril by swimming to the other shore. No one would
willingly investigate the strength of the noose by putting his neck
into it. This was my situation. A soldier's life is a hard one, but better than
the noose. Even that would be all right, if that were the end, but to
die a lingering death under the cudgel, under the cat-o'-nine-tails, in
chains, in a dungeon, naked, barefooted, hungry, thirsty, under
constant abuse-- my lord, although you look upon your peasants as your
property, often less regarded than cattle, yet, unfortunately, they are
not without feeling. You appear to be surprised to hear such words from
the lips of a peasant; but why, when you hear them, are you not
surprised at the cruelty of your brothers, the noblemen?" And
in very truth I had not expected such words from a man dressed in a
gray caftan and with his head shaven. But wishing to satisfy my
curiosity, I asked him to tell me how, being of such a low estate, he
had arrived at ideas which are frequently lacking in men improperly
said to be nobly born. "If
it will not tire you to hear my story, I will tell you: I was born in
slavery, the son of my master's former valet. How happy I am to think
that they will never again call me Van'ka
or any other offensive name, that they will never again call me like a
dog by whistling. My old master, a kindhearted, reasonable, and
virtuous man, who often lamented the fate of his slaves, wanted, on account of my father's
long service, to do something special for me; so he gave me the same
education as his son. There was hardly any difference between us,
except that the cloth of his coat was perhaps better. Whatever they
taught the young master, they taught me, too; our instruction was
exactly the same, and I can say without boasting that in many things I
did better than my young master. "'Vanyusha,' the old
master said to me, 'your happiness depends entirely on you. You have
more of an inclination for learning and morality than my son. He will
be rich by inheritance and will know no want, while you have known it
from birth. So try to be worthy of the pains I have taken for you.'
When my young master was in his seventeenth year, he and I were sent to
travel abroad with a tutor, who was told to look upon me as a traveling
companion, not a servant. As he sent me away, my old master said to me:
'I hope that you will return to give me and your parents
joy. You are a slave within the borders of this country, but beyond
them you are free. When you return, you will not find 275 "A
week after our arrival in Moscow, my master fell in love with a pretty
girl, but one who with her bodily beauty combined a very ugly soul and
a hard and cruel heart. Brought up in the conceit of her station, she
respected only external show, rank and wealth. In two months she became
my master's wife, and I became her slave. Until then I had not
experienced any change in my condition and had lived in my master's
house as his companion. Although he never gave me any orders, I
generally anticipated his wishes, as I was aware of his power and of my
position. Scarcely had the young mistress crossed the threshold of the
house, in which she was determined to rule, before I was made aware of
my hard lot. On the first evening after the wedding and all next day,
when I was introduced to her by her husband as his companion, she was
occupied with the usual cares of a bride; but in the evening, when a
fairly large company came to the table and sat down to the first supper
with the newly married pair, and I sat down in my usual place at the
lower end of the table, the new mistress said to her husband in a
fairly loud voice that if he wished her to sit at the table with the
guests, he must not permit any serfs to sit there. He looked at me and,
at her instance, sent word to me that I should leave the table and eat
my supper in my room. Imagine how deeply this humiliation hurt me! I
suppressed the tears that came to my eyes, and withdrew. I did not dare
to make my appearance the next day. They brought me my dinner and
supper without saying anything to me. And so it went on succeeding
days. One afternoon, a week after the wedding, the new mistress
inspected the house, and, after apportioning the duties and living
quarters to all the servants, entered my rooms also. They had been
furnished for me by my old master. I was not at home. I will not repeat
what she said there to ridicule me, but when I returned home, they gave
me her order, whereby I was sent down to a corner on the ground floor
with the unmarried servants, where my bed and my trunk, with my clothes
and linens, had already been placed; all my other things she had left
in my former rooms, in which she installed her serving maids. "What
took place in my soul when I heard this is easier to feel, if you can,
than to describe. But so as not to detain you with superfluous details:
my mistress, after taking control of the house and finding that I had
no aptitude for service, made me a lackey and decked me out in livery.
The least, imaginary remissness in my duties led to my ears being
boxed, beatings, and the cat-o'-nine-tails. O, my lord, it would have
been better if I had never been born! How many times did I complain
against my dead benefactor for having fostered a responsive soul in me. It would have been better for
me if I had grown up in ignorance and had never learned that I am a
man, equal to all others. Long, long ago I would have freed myself from
my hateful life, if I had not been held back by the prohibition of our
Supreme Judge. I determined to bear my lot patiently. And I endured not
only bodily wounds, but also those which she inflicted upon my soul.
But I almost broke my vow and cut short the miserable remains of my
woeful life as are-suit of a new blow to my soul. 276 "A
nephew of my mistress, a youngster of eighteen years, a sergeant of the
Guards, educated in the fashion of Moscow dandies, became enamored of a
chambermaid of his aunt's, and, having quickly won her ready favors,
made her a mother. Although he was usually quite unconcerned in his
amours, in this case he was somewhat embarrassed. For his aunt, having
learned about the affair, forbade the chambermaid her presence, and
gently scolded her nephew. She intended, after the fashion of
benevolent mistresses, to punish the one whom she had formerly favored
by marrying her off to one of the stable boys. But since they were all
married already, and since, for the honor of the house, there had to be
a husband for the pregnant woman, she selected me as the worst of all
the servants. In the presence of her husband, my mistress informed me
of this as though it were a special favor. I could not stand this abuse
any longer. 'Inhuman woman!' I cried. 'You have the power to torment me
and to wound my body; you say the laws give you the right to do this. I
hardly believe it, but I know full well that no one can be forced to
marry.' She listened to my words in ominous
silence. Then I turned to her husband and said: 'Ungrateful son of a
generous father, you have forgotten his last will and testament,; you
have forgotten your own promise, but do not drive to despair a soul
nobler than yours! Beware!' I could say no more, because, by command of
my mistress, I was taken to the stable and whipped mercilessly with the
cat-o'-nine-tails. The next day I could hardly get up out of bed from
the beating, but I was brought before my mistress again. 'I will forgive
you your impudence of yesterday,' she said; 'marry my Mavrushk; she begs you to, and I
want to do this for her, because I love her even in her transgression.'
'You heard my answer yesterday,' I said; 'I have no other. I will only
add that I will complain to the authorities against you for compelling
me to do what you have no right to.' 'Then it's time for you to become
a soldier!' my mistress screamed in a fury-- A traveler who has lost
his way in a terrible desert will rejoice less when he finds it again
than I did when I heard these words. 'Take him to be a soldier!' she
repeated, and the next day it was done. Fool! She thought that being
made a soldier would be a punishment for me, as it is for the peasants.
For me it was a joy, and as soon as they had shaved my forehead, I felt
like a new man. My strength was restored. My mind and spirit began to
revive. O hope, sweet solace of the
unfortunate, remain with me!" A heavy tear, but not a tear
of grief and despair, fell from his eyes. I pressed him to my heart.
His countenance was radiant with new joy. "All is not yet lost," he
said; "you arm my soul
against sorrow by making me feel that my misery is
not endless." From
this unfortunate man I went to a group in which I saw three men
fettered in the strongest irons. "It is amazing," I said to myself as I
looked at these prisoners, "now they are downcast, weary, timid, and
they not only do not want to become soldiers, but the greatest severity
is required to force them into that status; but as soon as they become
accustomed to the execution of their hard duty, they grow alert and
spirited, and even look with scorn upon their former condition." I
asked one of the bystanders who, to judge from his uniform, was a
government clerk: "No doubt you have put them in such, heavy fetters
because you are afraid they will run away?" 277 "You
guessed it. They belonged to a landed proprietor who needed money or a
new carriage and got it by selling them to crown peasants, to be levied
into the army." I.-
"My friend, you are mistaken. Crown peasants can't purchase their
brothers." He.- "It isn't done in the form of
a sale. Having by agreement received the money, the master sets these
unfortunates free; they are presumed to be 'voluntarily' registered as
crown peasants of the commune which paid the money for them; and the
commune, by common consent, sends them to be soldiers. They are now
being taken with their emancipation papers to be registered in our
commune." Free
men, who have committed no crime, are fettered, and sold like cattle! O
laws! Your wisdom frequently resides onlyin
your style! Is this not an open mockery? And, what is worse, a mockery
of the sacred name of liberty. Oh, if the slaves weighted down with
fetters, raging in their despair, would, with the iron that bars their
freedom, crush our heads, the heads of their inhuman masters, and
redden their fields with our blood! What would the country lose by
that? Soon great men would arise from among them; to take the place of
the murdered generation; but they would be of another mind and without
the right to oppress others. This is no dream; my vision penetrates the
dense curtain of time that veils the future from our eyes. I look
through the space of a whole century. I left the crowd in disgust. But
the fettered prisoners are free now. If they had any fortitude, they
would put to naught the oppressive intentions of their tyrants. Let us
go back to them.-- "My
friends," I said to the captives, these prisoners of war in their own
country, "do you know that if you do not freely wish to enter the army,
no one can now compel you to do so?"
"Stop making fun of poor wretches, sir. Even without
your jesting, it was hard enough for us to part, one from his poor old
father, another from his little sisters, a third from his young wife.
We know that our master sold us as recruits for a thousand rubles." "If
you did not know it before, you must know now that it is against the
law to sell men as recruits, that peasants cannot legally buy men, that
your master has set you free, and that the purchasers intend to
register you in their commune, as though of your own free will." "O, sir, if that is really so, we
do thank you. When they line us up for muster, we will all say that we
do not want to become soldiers and that we are free men." "Add
to it that your master sold you at a time when such a sale was not
legal, and that they are delivering you up as recruits in violation of
the law.'" One can easily imagine the joy that lighted up the faces of
these unfortunates. Leaping up from their places and vigorously shaking
their fetters, they seemed to be testing their strength, as though they
would shake them off. But this conversation could have gotten me into
serious trouble, for the recruiting officers, having heard what I said,
rushed toward me in violent anger, and said, "Sir, don't meddle with
other people's business, and get away while the getting's good!" When I
resisted, they pushed me so violently that I was forced to leave this
crowd as fast as I could…. 278 THE
EMPRESS CATHERINE II'S NOTES
ON THE JOURNEY [The
starred pages here refer to the pages of Radischev's original edition
of the Journey.] No.1
This
book was printed in 1790 without mention of the printing press and
without any visible permission at the beginning, although at the end it
says: "With the permission of the Department of Public Morals." This is
probably a lie, or else carelessness. The purpose of this book is clear
on every page: its author, infected and full of the French madness, is
trying in every possible way to break down respect for authority and
for the authorities, to stir up in the people indignation against their
superiors and against the government. He
is probably a Martinist
or something similar. He has learning enough, and has read many books.
He has a melancholy temperament and sees everything in a very somber
light; consequently he takes a bilious black and yellow view of things.
He
has imagination enough, and he is audacious in his writing…. The
author is maliciously inclined on page *60. This is particularly
evident from the following pages. Pages *72, *73. They show clearly
enough the purpose for which this whole book was written. It is a safe
bet that the author's motive in writing it was this, that he does not
have entree to the palace. Maybe he had it once and lost it, but since
he does not have it now but does have an evil and consequently
ungrateful heart, he is struggling for it now with his pen. On page
*75. Our babbler is timid. If he stood closer to the sovereign, he
would pipe a different tune. We have seen a lot of such humbugs,
especially among the Schismatics.
The firmer their hearts, the more they change when the time comes. I
do not know how great the lust for power is in other rulers; in me it
is not great. Page
*76. The fledglings teach the mother bird. Malice is in the malicious;
I have none of it. "The
murder called war": What do they want, to be left defenseless to fall
captive to the Turks and Tatars, or to be conquered b)\ the Swedes? In
criticizing the poor execution of our commands, they are accusing
themselves. Pages
*77, *78 are written with a seditious purpose, and the care taken in
rooting out an evil is criticized adversely.... Page
*81 is full of abuse, invective, and evil-minded interpretation of
things. This villainy continues through the following pages: *82, *83,
*84, and *85. But withal they were unable to censure the intentions,
and so were obliged to turn to their fulfillment; hence they are
criticizing society, and not the Sovereign's good heart or
intentions.... Page
*88 He refers to "information: what I have had the good luck to learn."
I think that information was picked up in Leipzig; hence the suspicion
falls on Messrs. Radischev and Chelishchev,
the more so since they are said to have established a printing press in
their house. Pages
*92, *93, *94, *95, *96, *97 preach the doctrines of the Martinists and other
theosophists. Page
*98 is so indecent that it can-not even be mentioned. *99,
*100, *104 Speaking of Novgorod, of its free government, and of Tsar Ioann Vasil'evich's
cruelty to it, he does not say anything about the cause of this
punishment, which was that, having accepted the union, Novgorod had
surrendered to the Polish Republic; consequently the Tsar punished the
apostates and traitors, in which, to tell the truth, he did not keep
within bounds. *102.
The author cries: "But what right did he have to rage against them?
What right did he have to take Novgorod for himself?" Answer: the old
right of sovereignty and the law of Novgorod and of all Russia and of
the whole world, which punishes rebels, and apostates from the Church.
But the question is raised here only to deny monarchical rights, and
should therefore be left without an answer 279 On
*l03. The questions brought up here are the ones over which France is
now being ruined. No.5
Tell
the author that I have read his book from cover to cover, and that in
the course of reading it I have come to wonder whether I may in some
way have offended him. For I do not want to judge him without hearing
him, although he judges sovereigns without hearing their justification…. *410, *411, *412, *413,
*414, *415, *416 continue to describe the miserable condition of the
peasants. On
*418 begins the eulogy on Lomonosov,
which continues to the end of the book. This contains praise of
Mirabeau, who deserves not once but many times over to be hanged. Here
the Empress Elizabeth Petrovna
is treated with disrespect. Here it is evident that the author is not a
true Christian. And it seems probable that he has appointed himself the
leader, whether by this book or by other means, in snatching the
scepters from the hands of monarchs; but, since one man alone could not
do this, and since there are indications that he has a few accomplices,
he should be questioned on this matter, as well as on his real
intentions. And, since he himself writes that he loves the truth, he
should be asked to say how the matter stood. If, however, he does not
write the truth, I shall be compelled to seek evidence, and things will
be worse for him than before. On
*453 the author promises a continuation of this book "on our return
journey." Where is this work? Was it begun, and where is it? Of
the line "With the permission of the Department of Public Morals" I
will say that it is a deceitful and contemptible act to add anything to
a book after the permission has been signed. It must he determined how
many copies were published and where they are. |
