Isabel Hapgood

“ Thorough repentance, a just estimate of himself, a confession that he is ignorant and unlearned instead of cultured, harsh and immoral instead of kind and moral, lowly, instead of exalted, are what is required. "How am I, so fine a writer, a man who has acquired so much learning and talents, to use them for the benefit of the people?" ”

“ Every effort in the life of the wealthy, says Tolstoi, from their food, clothing, and dwellings, down to their cleanliness and their culture, is directed towards keeping the poor at a distance, and nine tenths of their money is spent in attaining this object alone. His socialistic utterances upon this subject are delightfully unconventional, but those on cleanliness, which is regarded as a moral virtue, though in reality only valued as a mark of class distinction, are of the most radical sort. "White hands love other people's work," is the proverb which he takes for his motto. ”

“ Copies of the article, printed abroad, and under a different title, supply the suppressed passages, which are generally the most interesting of all. Count Tolstoi's idea of a census is to combine works of mercy with the technical labor: if a starving woman should come under the notice of one of the agents, she should be attended to, even if the census proper should go to destruction in consequence, the succor of the suffering being the most important task of our lives. In short, the census should be simply a means to that end. ”

“ He thinks that art and science should not be exempted from serving themselves and others, simply because they are such very beautiful things.
Tolstoi admits that telegraph, telephone, spectroscope, chloroform, and many other inventions and discoveries are wonderful, but he maintains that the condition of the majority - of the working people that is - has been rendered worse by them, since the railways, factories, and so on have only served to make poor men the slaves of capitalists. ”

“ The answer to this is: "I must learn not to live on others, and, having learned this, I must devote to the service of the people hands, and feet, and heart, and brain, and everything that the people may require; for the first and indubitable duty of man is to share in the struggle with nature, for his life and the lives of others." Count Tolstoi regards it as his and every man's first duty to provide his own food, clothing, fuel, and shelter, and thus help others ”

“ Tolstoi declares that if he in any way differs from the average man, on this question of the misapplication of art and science, it is because he, more than the average man, has served and forwarded this false conception of science which is held by the world, has received more applause from the people who belong to the reigning scientific circle, and has therefore sinned more than others and wandered further from the true path. ”

“ I do not give them to people, but I say, 'Give me seventeen rubles, and then I will give them to you.' And as the peasant sells his last sheep in the country, so here the poor student, the teacher, every poor man, deprives himself of necessaries in order to give me this money. ”

“ He believes that the peasant himself is the best judge of what he should be taught, even though the latter does hold the Dogberrian theory that schools need not be permanent institutions, since, if the parents once learn, the following generations will inherit their wisdom. Count Tolstoi's personal experience in the peasant schools has shown him that Russian, Slavonic (the language of the church) , and mathematics, "and nothing else" should constitute the course of study in schools for the people, since these branches of learning are at the foundation of all others. ”

“ Tolstoi's argument on behalf of wearing one shirt a week, instead of paying a laundress to provide him with two clean ones each day, and of making his own cigarettes, is, that the money thus saved can be given to the laundress for less work, or to some superannuated working people. To this he suggests the retort, that "if one goes in dirty linen, and does not smoke, but gives the money to the poor, the latter will be deprived of the money all the same, and an individual drop in the sea will do not good." ”

“ These causes are, the herding together of the poor in towns, the isolation of the rich from the poor, and the shame consequent on the consciousness of being wrongfully in possession of the money with which he tried to assist the poor; money, being in itself an evil thing, cannot be used as an instrument of good. The sum of the matter is contained in the words of John the Baptist: "Let him that hath two garments give to him that hath none, and let him that hath food do likewise." As Tolstoi puts it, it means "to give away everything superfluous, and never more take what is superfluous from men. ”

“ In another, a man who finds a heap of gold by the wayside, and devotes the whole of it to the founding of asylums for orphans and old people, and other works of charity, is rebuked by an angel of the Lord for having even touched the accursed thing. In still another, a poor peasant, who has with difficulty scraped together enough money to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem for the salvation of his soul, spends nearly the whole of it in restoring a starving family to prosperity, and is obliged to return home. ”

“ One day, as he was talking to his sympathizing sister, and to a peasant named Siutaeff, the latter gave him the first real gleam of light on the subject of true charity, and as to the reason why Tolstoi had been unsuccessful with his gifts of money. "True charity," said Siutaeff, "consists in teaching the poor. Take your proportion of the poor, work beside them in the fields, and they will learn; eat at the same table with them, and let them hear your words." At this point the censor intervenes, and cuts out over a thousand words containing reflections on this theme. ”

“ For him who is sincerely pained by the sufferings of those about him, there is the easiest, simplest, and most evident remedy, the only possible one for the alleviation of the evil which environs us, and for conferring on us a consciousness of the legitimacy of our life, the same which John the Baptist gave and which Christ confirmed, - to have but one garment and no money. ”

“ A short personal investigation of city poverty convinced him that these wretched working classes could not be helped, because the very fact of their toil attached them to life more closely than he was himself attached, and because their chief misfortune lay in their being exactly the same as himself. For a long time, a false shame, and a liking for the self-satisfaction of feeling himself to be a benefactor, prevented his abandoning his attempts to render material aid. ”

“ He compares his sensations on that occasion to those experienced on the present one, when he might have given, not only the small change in his pocket, but the coat from his back and the entire contents of his house, and declares that he shall always hold himself to be an accomplice in crime so long as he possesses two garments, while there is any one who has none at all. In the evening he discussed the question with a friend, and unconsciously shouted at the latter, as he says, with tears in his voice, "I can't live so; it is impossible to live so, - impossible!" ”

“ For this reason, he thinks that the solution of the question which he has found for himself will fit the case of all sincere people, who have put the same question to themselves, namely, "What is to be done?" First of all, he has resolved not to lie, either to others or to himself, not to fear the truth, no matter whither it may lead him; since he firmly believes that in whatever position truth and conscience may land him, however terrible it may be, it cannot be worse than one that is founded on a lie. ”

“ The popular idea of the grades among the upper classes is thus defined: Culture signifies fashionable clothing, political conversation, and clean hands. In the circle next above, a knowledge of French, the ability to play the piano and to write a letter in Russian free from orthographical errors, and a "still greater degree of outward cleanliness" are the requisites. The next step in the social scale brings a knowledge of English, a diploma from one of the higher institutes of learning, and still greater personal cleanliness. ”

“ He denies that art and science have given a great deal to mankind, as is usually affirmed. Hey have not devoted themselves to the interests of the people, and those who exercise them simply live on the necks of the laboring classes. "We have become so accustomed," he says, "to our weakly and tenderly cared for representatives of mental labor that it seems barbarous to us that a learned man or an artist should till the soil or cart manure. ”

“ His chief objection to these latter lies in the fact that they are the outcome of the division of labor, and cannot exist on any other conditions than those of rendering many people slaves, for the production of the necessaries of life for those engaged in them. "Science has now become a distributor of premiums on idleness. ... With frightful struggles and conflicts men have freed themselves from many delusions. And now a new and still worse delusion has sprung up in their path, - the delusion of science. ”

“ According to his views, the province of science is to teach the poor man what axe is the best to cut with, what is the swiftest saw, the best way to mix bread and the proper flour to use, how to set and bake it, and how to build an oven, also the right sort of food and the best utensils. He complains that instead of doing this, science has enumerated two million beetles. ”

“ Physical exertion spurs up his mental faculties, and the nearer it approaches rude agriculture, the closer and more affectionate is his communion with men, his enjoyment of art and learning, and the true happiness of life. ”

“ It alters it completely, at once frees me from those moral sufferings which I experienced at the sight of the sufferings and vice of men, and instantly annihilates all those causes of my inability to help the poor which I discovered while seeking the reason of my failure. ”

“ I know how to do nothing but eat, and talk, and listen, and write, and sleep. ... The only wonder is that I should ever have had so stupid a thought as helping people who are good for something," is his conclusion. "I have never done anything in my life. ”

“ The result of his reflections has been suppressed by the censor. It is, that the first cause of peculiar poverty of the city, which he was unable to alleviate, lies in the fact that he deprives the country people of their necessaries, and carries them off to town with him. The second cause is, that he employs the goods which he has collected in the village in senseless luxury, thereby demoralizing those country people who follow him thither, in the hope of in some way recovering a portion of their property. ”

“ He predicts that before long people of his class will consider it not disgraceful to make calls in boots made with the outside of the leather in, but disgraceful to wear overshoes in the presence of people who have no shoes at all; that it is not disgraceful to be ignorant of French, but disgraceful to eat bread, and not to know how it is made; that it is not disgraceful not to have starched shirts and clean clothes, but disgraceful to about in clean clothes, thereby demonstrating one's idleness ”

“ When Tolstoi first went to Moscow to live, he took up the habit of going to the Sparrow Hills to saw wood with a couple of peasants, for the sake of the exercise. One night he walked into town with them, and gave twenty kopeks to an old man who begged of them, thinking what a good impression such charity would make on Semyon, one of the peasants. Semyon pulled out his purse, gave the man a three-kopek piece, and asked for two kopeks in change. ”

“ They are written in the simplest, most concise peasant language, and in accordance with his theory that the people always speak good Russian, while the educated classes do not. They are all ingenious, though, at times, the moral truth which he seeks to convey is rendered difficult of perception by the involved allegories by which it is obscured. "Love one another, resist not evil, despise money:" such is the burden of his exhortation, and as a rule, it is beautifully and touchingly expressed. ”

“ In the country, he says, he had done very little for the poor, but the demands upon him were so moderate that this little created an atmosphere of love and union with the people, which enabled him to believe what he had always heard, namely, that wealth is the gift of God, and that one can help the poor while continuing a life of luxury. ”

“ It is worth noting that he permits the use of scientific improvements, and his perfect man will use a steam plough, if obtainable, or will scratch the soil with a hoe, if nothing better be within his reach; and people, perceiving his efforts, will strive to render his work as profitable as possible. Others, observing a handful of "lunatics tilling the soil and making shoes, instead of smoking cigarettes and playing cards," will comprehend what it behooves them to do, will cease to ruin each other, and will find happiness. ”

“ He had gone there with the idea that he should find people in need of immediate assistance, and he saw petty artisans of various sorts, all cheerful and busily working. Where help was required, it had already been given by the poor people themselves. What these people needed, like people in the higher ranks, was to have their false views of life corrected. A comparison between the miserable women whom he found in this house and ladies of the higher classes has been suppressed by the censor. ”

“ His deductions do not meet with the favor of the censor, who has cut out some reflections on the source of Tolstoi's fortune. "A part," says the author, "I inherited from my father. The peasant sold his last sheep to furnish me with it. Another part has come from the sale of my books. If my books are injurious, then I only lead people astray with them by selling them, and the money which I receive for them is ill-gained; but if they are helpful to people, my case is even worse. ”