Various

“ If it should ever happen to a philosopher to look through the archives of Peter’s secret acts, he would shudder with horror at what was done against the monarch. We who were the servants of that great sovereign sigh and shed tears, when we sometimes hear reproaches against the hard-heartedness and cruelty which were not in reality to be met with in him. If many knew what he endured and by what sorrows he was cut to the heart, if they knew how indulgent he was to the weaknesses of humanity and how he forgave crimes that did not deserve mercy they would be amazed. ”

“ Nicholas I died as grandly as he had lived, in the firm assurance that he had done his duty. The nations of Europe watched him shining as a pillar of fire amid the clouds of anarchy which beset the dawn of his reign. They stood aghast at his aggressions on Turkey and the relentless severity with which he crushed the Polish and Hungarian rebellions. For a generation he was the sword drawn against revolution. He saved Austria from dismemberment, and checked the premature creation of a democratic German Empire. ”

“ It is not so long ago—when western Europe was agitated by aspirations after wild, unbridled freedom; when the people overthrew lawful authority and thrones; when I decided to give a helping hand to my brother and ally, the monarch of Austria—that you, commander, led my soldiers to a new warfare: you tamed the hydra of rebellion. In six weeks you had finished the war in Hungary, you supported and strengthened the tottering throne of Austria, Ivan Feodorovitch. You are the glory of my twenty-five years’ reign. ”

“ I esteem France and the French, and I trust that they will enable me to help them. I honour the courage and glory of all the brave men against who I have been fighting for two years and whom I have learned to respect in every position in which they have found themselves. I shall always be ready to render to them the justice and the honour which are their due. Say then, gentlemen, to the Parisians, that I do not enter their walls as an enemy, and that it only depends on them to have me for a friend, but say also that I have one sole enemy in France, and that with him I am irreconcilable. ”

“ Amongst the great administrative reforms accomplished during the reign of the emperor Alexander II, the liberation of the peasants occupies incontestably the first place and served as the chief foundation for all the reforms that followed. All further changes were directly or indirectly called forth by the abolition of the law of serfdom. This glorious accomplishment which gave new life to Russia, which breathed a new soul into the millions of Russian peasantry, was the most important of all the great deeds of the emperor Alexander II, and the brightest jewel in the crown of his glory. ”

“ Frederick, however, became a hero; his father was never anything more than a corporal. Peter III pushed his soldato-mania to a ridiculous point, fancying he made Frederick his model. He loved soldiers and arms, as a man loves horses and dogs. He knew nothing but how to exercise a regiment, and never went abroad but in a captain’s uniform.
Paul, in his mode of life when grand duke, and his conduct after his accession, so strongly resembled his father that, changing names and dates, the history of the one might be taken for that of the other. ”

“ The paramount idea of Peter’s whole life displayed itself in the siege of Azov, his first military enterprise. He wished to civilise his people by beginning with the art of war by sea and land. That art would open the way for all the others into Russia, and protect them there. By it the czar was to conquer for his empire that element which, in his eyes, was the greatest civiliser of the world, because it is the most favourable to the intercourse of nations with each other.
But ignorant and savage Asia lay stretched along the Black Sea, between Russia and the south of Europe. ”

“ Napoleon, who thought only of ardently pursuing a war which has become national, without foreseeing that it might in one moment annihilate his whole army, now finding in every inhabitant a soldier ready to repulse his perfidious seductions, and seeing the firm resolution of the whole population to present, if need be, their breasts to the sword directed against their beloved country—Napoleon, in fine, after having attained the object of his vain and foolhardy thoughts, namely that of shaking all Russia by rendering himself master of Moscow, has suddenly made up his mind to beat a retreat. ”

“ Thus there can be no doubt that as a prince Ivan ranks high and belongs to the number of those regents who decide the fate of their people and land for many years, and are a blessed or a cursed remembrance to posterity: but neither can it be denied that his greatness and fame lose much when we come to consider him as a man, and see the harshness of his character, his unlimited pride, his contempt of all human rights, his wild and passionate nature, and his greed of power. ”

“ A contemporary who was at the same time a poet writes: “You see arising before you that beautiful spirit that was welcomed with such joy in 1801; you see that glorious czar to whom Russia owes the years 1813 and 1814; you see the comforter of the people after last year’s inundation; you see that gracious, benevolent man who was so amiable in personal intercourse,” and who, in the words of Speranski, will ever remain a true charmer. There was much that was ideally beautiful in his soul, he sincerely loved and desired good, and attained to it. ”

“ The shadow of barbarism, by veiling the horizon of Russia, hid Europe from its sight at the very time at which enlightenment was beginning to spread there; when the people began to shake off slavery, and the towns to contract alliances for their mutual guarantee against oppression; when the invention of the compass extended navigation and commerce; the time which saw the foundation of universities, in which fine manners began to soften, etc. During this period Russia, oppressed and torn asunder by the Mongols, was collecting all her forces merely that she might not perish. ”

“ In this were interested all the personal partisans of Catherine, those “chosen sons of the people,” who had stirred up the empress to put herself at the head of the movement. They were far more interested in the matter than Catherine herself: the change had been brought about by all classes of society, by the whole nation, not by her; no one could even think of the detested Peter ascending the throne a second time—it was not on Catherine that the malcontents would revenge themselves, that is if there were or would be any, but on the “chosen of the people.” ”

“ As a dying tree is strangled by parasitical growths, so was Alexander in his decadence attacked by the enemies of human progress. When Metternich and Araktcheiev gained the mastery, all hope of domestic reform and consistent foreign policy disappeared. But despite the shadows which darkened his declining years, Alexander I of Russia will stand out in history as one of the few men born in the purple who rightly appraised the accident of birth and the externals of imperial rank; who held opinions far in advance of his age, and never wittingly abused his limitless powers ”

“ 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. ”

“ Moscow was the only city in the empire on the allegiance of which he could rely; but even there the people had imbibed from their late excesses an alarming propensity to disorder and mutiny. To meet all the dangers thickening round him Shuiski had neither an army nor money; for Dmitri’s profusions and the pillage of the Kremlin had exhausted the imperial treasury. His chief strength lay in his renown for orthodoxy, which insured him the favour of the clergy. ”

“ The soldiers’ love for the emperor, their joy and rapture at seeing him acted like living water on the wounded; everyone that could move strove to rise, to stand up, to take courage; they stretched out their hands to the czar, kissed his raiment and blessed his name. It was only after the fall of Plevna when the war clearly inclined to the advantage of the Russians, and further success was entirely secured that the emperor, bidding farewell to his troops, left the active army and in the beginning of December, 1877, returned to Russia. ”

“ Russia, O czar, had given into your hands the supreme power, and how have you exerted it? Blinded by ignorance and passion, you have sought power for its own sake and have forgotten the interests of the country. You have consumed your life in reviewing troops, in altering uniforms, and in signing your name to the legislative [576] projects of ignorant charlatans. You have created the detestable institution of press-censorship that you might enjoy peace and remain in ignorance of the needs and complaints of your people. ”

“ Nature had given Peter a colossal vigour of body and mind, capable of all extremes of good and evil. It is impossible to review his whole history without mingled feelings of admiration, horror, and disgust. That he was not altogether a monster of wickedness was not the fault of Sophia and her minister, whose deliberate purpose it was to destroy in him every germ of good, that he might become odious and insupportable to the nation. They succeeded only in impairing the health, corrupting the morals, and hardening the heart of the youthful czar ”

“ But the empress Catherine, generally so acute, was singularly deceived concerning Potemkin, the Prince of Darkness, as he was afterwards called from a play on his name. He was the son of an insignificant nobleman of Smolensk, a retired major, and bore a name till then unknown in Russian history; a man of doubtful capabilities, ignorant, and in fact distinguished by nothing but a boundless and unscrupulous egotism, by an immense craving for coarse, extravagant pleasures, and by the nefarious energy with which he pursued his selfish desires. ”

“ We now find ourselves at one of the most important turning points of Russian political history, when by a regulated system of succession and by the incorporation of the independent principalities with the grand principality, the Russian monarchy began to establish itself firmly and to extend its bounds; when the hitherto terrible defiance of over-powerful nobles and of princes who claimed equal rank with the grand prince submits to the restraints of a common obedience; when no more dangers threaten Russia from the side of Novgorod and the Tatars ”

“ The sacking of Rome did not disturb the brush of Michael Angelo. In a word, the most beautiful things are born amid tears and it is in the midst of struggle, in the atmosphere of sorrow and suffering that humanity develops itself, that the human mind displays the most energy and activity in all directions. ”

“ Nicholas is more skilful. I am struck with admiration for this man who is secretly struggling, with all the strength of his will, against the work of Peter the Great’s genius. He is restoring individuality to a nation which has strayed for more than a century in the paths of imitation.”
Without ceasing to borrow diligently from Europe her inventions and arts, her progress in industry, in administration, in the conduct of land and sea armies—in a word, all the material improvements which she devises and realises, he endeavoured to close Russia to her ideas on philosophy, politics, and religion. ”

“ 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. ”

“ If we follow the development of the Russian intelligentia we notice at once that all the currents of its intellectual life are, at the present time at least, converging into one centre, swelling the stream, that is already running high, to a vast and mighty ocean, which is sending its waters, through many channels, all over Europe. This centre is literature. Since the foundation of the Academy of Science by Peter the Great Russian achievements in the domains of science, technical education, art, sculpture, music, painting, history and philosophy have been very small. ”

“ The wounds of war may be healed, but moral degradation leads nations to the tomb. During the peace that followed the battle of Villmergen up to the time of the French revolution Switzerland suffered more calamities than in all the wars against Burgundy and Austria. For during the eighty years of repose during which the swords of the Winckelrieds, the Fontanas, the Halhwyls, and the Erlachs were tarnishing, the rust of egoism and of pride succeeded in eating away the tablets on which was engraven the loyal union of the ancient Swiss; and like a corpse the old confederation was rotting away. ”

“ In 1598 Boris Godunov, by the voice of the electors and through the intrigues of his friends, ascended the throne of Russia. A crown obtained by indirect and fraudulent measures could not be preserved without tyranny. Boris, conscious of the jealousies which his elevation engendered in the minds of the nobles, and especially in the family of the Romanovs, who were allied to the race of Rurik but not to the Moscow line, was constantly haunted by apprehensions, and sought to lose them in the revel, and to propitiate them by the sacrifice of all persons whom he suspected. ”

“ They rallied, order was restored, and Russia was preserved. But the danger was no sooner over than the Shuiski returned in all their former strength, seized upon Moscow in the dead of the night, penetrated to the couch of Ivan, and, dragging him out of his sleep, endeavoured to destroy his intellect by filling him with sudden terror. The primate, whose mild representations had displeased them, was ill-treated and deposed: and the prince Belski, who could not be prevailed upon to link his fortunes with their desperate courses, was murdered in the height of their frenzy. ”

“ Alexander’s gloomy views, more sad than stern, were reflected in its inhabitants. Many people said: What does he want more? He stands at the zenith of power. Each one explained after his own fashion the inconsolable grief of the emperor. For a man who must live to all eternity, who was famed as the friend of liberty, and who had out of necessity become her oppressor, it was grievous to think that he must renounce the love of his contemporaries and the praise of posterity. ”

“ Henceforward there can be no English, French, Russian, Prussian, or Austrian policy; there can only be a general policy, involving the salvation of all, admitted in common by kings and peoples. It is for me, the first of all, to declare my appreciation of the principles on which I founded the Holy Alliance. An opportunity presents itself; it is the Greek insurrection. Certainly no event appeared more adapted to my personal interests, to those of my subjects, and to the feelings and prejudices of the Russians, than a religious war against Turkey ”

“ But Feodor declared to him that neither peace nor a truce was wanted unless the Swedes would yield, besides the lands belonging to Novgorod which they had invaded, Revel and all Esthonia. In short, Russia declared war.
Up to that time, Godunov had only shone by his genius in interior and exterior politics. Always prudent and inclined to peace, not warlike nor aspiring to glory through arms, he yet wished to prove that his love of peace did not arise from cowardice on this occasion when, without being ashamed or failing in the sacred use of power, bloodshed could not be avoided. ”

“ Russia has quickened her development in the realm of literature. Her decades were centuries. Rapidly she has lived through phases of growth and evolution, of achievement and reflection which have filled long periods in other people’s lives. The peaks of Russian creative power in this domain, the productions of Pushkin and Turgeniev, of Lermontov, Dostoievski and Tolstoi proudly face the heights of literary western Europe. ”

“ Exhausted in the effort to spread over too large expanses, or broken up into fragments, all these races have the more easily submitted to the domination of one rule; and under this domination they have been the more rapidly unified and mingled. From this fusion, begun centuries ago under the Christian empire and the Muscovite sovereignty, have sprung the Russian people—that mass of about 129,000,000 souls, which, compared with other peoples, resembles the sea devouring its own shores, a sea dotted with islands which it swallows one by one. ”

“ The principles which govern the policy of Russia are very simple. They are the maintenance of peace, of order, and of prosperity in all classes of the population. The means employed to compass these ends are equally free from complexity. Those who fill responsible positions are expressly informed by our government that the assumption of sovereignty over alien nationalities must not be attempted without very serious deliberation, inasmuch as such become, on annexation, Russian subjects, children of the czar, and invested with every privilege enjoyed by citizens of the empire. ”