Tsardom of Russia

“ Why are the peasants so indifferent? Why do they suffer this humiliation? Why do they allow themselves to be robbed of the Tsardom which is the means and end of their perfection?" The Revolution was in fact a day of great anxiety and bitter disappointment to the whitewashers. Their ten years' labour of justification and glorification of Tsardom was torn to pieces. But they were not willing to give up their theory. When they had satisfied themselves that the Tsar's abdication was definite, they made a desperate attempt to save the glory at least of the Tsardom. ”

“ The war was too closely identified with the Tsardom and the old régime to inspire enthusiasm. On the other hand, the upheaval had been too great; people were no longer able to concentrate their minds on the war. They were too busy about other and, to them, more important things. Finally, there was a widespread and sincere belief that the Tsardom has fallen, not only for Russia, but for all Europe, and that the Revolution could not be without effect upon the German people, which was regarded as being under a yoke similar to the Tsardom. ”

“ All this was changed when the independent principalities were transformed into the Tsardom of Muscovy. The Tsars had new reasons for opposing the migration of the peasants and new means for preventing it. The old Princes had simply given grants of land to those who served them, and left the grantee to do with his land what seemed good to him; the Tsars, on the contrary, gave to those who served them merely the usufruct of a certain quantity of land, and carefully proportioned the quantity to the rank and the obligations of the receiver. ”

“ Only from the moment when Russia ceased to be a menace to Germany and Austria, from the moment when Russia repudiated the ambitious aims of Tsardom, did the Burgfrieden in Germany begin to waver. All attempts to break down Germany by external force have led and are bound to lead to a strengthening of Germany's internal unity. The same would be true of England, America, or any other nation. Had the Russian democracy had a fresh and well-equipped army at their disposal, they would none the less first have tried the political method of destroying German unity. ”

“ For a time they seemed to be suffering mutely as the beasts suffer; but there is a limit to the endurance even of the most ignorant. A profound disgust for Tsardom was creeping through these armies of betrayed and wasted men. From the close of 1915 onward Russia was a source of deepening anxiety to her Western Allies. ”

“ For the Tsar is not only the executive and the law-making power of the state, head of the Church, fountain of justice, commander-in-chief of the army and navy, but, more than all these, he is father to his people. His subjects owe him, in theory, a filial respect and obedience; and, with the exception of the Nihilists, they are dutiful children. The relation is an Oriental one, which we of the West can not understand. But it is powerfully operative in Russia. It has not been really weakened by anything that the Nihilists have done, but, on the contrary, strengthened. ”

“ With such a base to the pyramid as is constituted by the peasant proprietors of Russia, aided by the enormous army, recruited almost to any extent from among their ranks, whose chief religion is a superstitious reverence for the "great father," the Tsar is safe in refusing all concessions, all improvements; and the hopeless nature of Russian reform hitherto, mainly hangs upon the conviction of the Government that nothing external can possibly act upon this inert mass. "Great is stupidity, and shall prevail." ”

“ Accustomed to govern themselves within a certain range, the Russians could easily be fitted for participation in the higher duties which a constitutional government would impose upon them. A lower House could be evolved from the seeds of the Tir. An upper House could be created by the Tsar out of abundant existing materials. Thus, without any violent metamorphosis, liberal institutions might be introduced into Russia. They may come, as a spontaneous offering from the throne, sooner than their most sanguine friends in the empire now expect. ”

“ They are not down-trodden; and, out of their 100,000,000 free souls, there is a proportion of Nihilists no larger, probably, than that of Socialists in Germany, Communists in France, “Dynamiters” in London, or Anarchists in Chicago. The Tsar enjoys the confidence and love of the vast majority of his people. Russia may safely challenge the rest of Europe to exhibit a parallel to the comparative progress, social and political, which she has made in the past thirty years. ”

“ What they thought of the problems of their rule I do not know; and I do not know enough of their people to understand what those problems really are. But surely no power could be more beneficently exercised than this man’s must be; and if his spirit could only animate the instruments of his authority and the innumerable officials who are necessary to administer it, the mad asperities of recrimination in Russia would be as impossible to the administration and its opponents as they are to the Tsar himself. ”

“ The crimes of Tsarism are continually on your lips. We, too, denounce these crimes; for Tsarism is our enemy, and what I wrote but recently, I repeat now. But it is likewise the enemy of the intellectual élite of Russia itself. This cannot be said of your intellectuals, who are so slavishly obedient to the commands of your rulers. A few days ago I received that amazing "Address to the Civilised Nations" with which the Imperial army-corps of German intellectuals bombarded Europe ”

“ Take, for instance, what Sir Donald Mackenzie Wallace has written only a few months ago. [8] “The antiquated idea that Tsars are always heartless tyrants who devote much of their time [Pg 128] in sending troublesome subjects to Siberia, is now happily pretty well exploded, but the average Englishman is still reluctant to admit that an avowedly autocratic government may be, in certain circumstances, a useful institution. There is no doubt, however, that in the gigantic work of raising Russia to her present level of civilization, the Tsars have played a most important part. ”

“ Here lies the true cause of the revolutionary movement of more than a century. The last three Tsars of Russia—the two Alexanders and the present Tsar—have taken steps to eliminate the great evil, and if, so far, they have only been partially successful, the fault lies not with them nor with the Russian people, but with the still German mind of their advisers. The abolition of serfdom, repeated constitutional manifestos and the introduction of the Duma system are momentous steps towards a brighter future. ”

“ I think, from my description, which possesses the merit of accuracy, that it will be recognised what simplicity of life surrounded the rulers of one of the greatest Empires the world has ever known. Simplicity characterised all their doings, the simplicity which was to prove their undoing. The Imperial pair wished to lead the lives of private individuals; they imagined that it was possible. In Russia it has never been popular or possible for a Tsar to be human ”

“ This war, which will end in the collapse of the three Empires, Prussia, Austria, and Turkey, will also result in the advance of the Russian Empire as the controlling power of Continental Europe. The future Peace Congress will realize the dream of ages. Byzantium Tsargrad will become the capital of Holy Russia. ”

“ If by one stroke of the pen the Tsar can sacrifice ninety-three millions of revenue in order that Russia may be sober, it is not very extravagant to hope that in virtue of the same kind of benevolent despotism Russia may secure a liberal constitution and the Russian people be set free. ”

“ What character the temptations of the throne may develop, time only can determine. He is now struggling, against the opposition of the nobles, to emancipate the boors from the slavery of serfdom, being ambitious of elevating all his subjects to the highest manhood. The temporal welfare of perhaps ninety millions of men is placed in the hands of this one monarch. An indiscreet act may plunge all Russia into the horrors of a civil war, or kindle flames of strife through Europe which no power but that of God can quench. ”

“ But as the Russian proverb has it, “one man in the field, is not a soldier.” Hercules, to cleanse the Augean stables, had need of the water of a river, and the anti-German [58] Tsar could not hope to make headway without the co-operation of his army of officials, who themselves were permeated with the Teutonic spirit. And as passive resistance was their attitude, his purging scheme was abortive. As a matter of cool calculation, the only hope of freeing Russia from the meshes of the German net was a war between the two peoples. ”

“ 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 ”

“ They regard themselves as of superior type, a sort of cream of humanity, the “vanguard of the revolutionary proletariat,” as they often call themselves. The Tsarist Government, except in its final degenerate days, was at least Russian in its sympathies. ”

“ Thank God! the crimes of Tsarism never found a defender amongst the great artists, scholars, and thinkers of Russia. Are not Kropotkin, Tolstoï, Dostoievski, and Gorki, the greatest names in its literature, the very ones who denounced its crimes!
Russian domination has often been cruelly heavy for the smaller nationalities which it has swallowed up. But how comes it then, Germans, that the Poles prefer it to yours? Do you imagine that Europe is ignorant of the monstrous way in which you are exterminating the Polish race? ”

“ He then, by conquest, extended his empire over vast realms of barbarians, bringing them all under the simple yet effective government of feudal lords. He consolidated this empire, and by sagacious measures, encouraging arts and commerce, he led his barbarous people onward in the paths of civilization. He gave Russia a name and renown, so that it assumed a position among the nations of the globe, notwithstanding its remote position amidst the wilds of the North. His usurpation, history can not condemn. In those days any man had the right to govern who had the genius of command. ”

“ It is amazing that in spite of such conclusive evidence of the death of the Romanovs, there still thrives in Monarchist circles the mystical belief that the last of the Tsars has been saved, that he still troubles his heart over the fate of his country, firmly believing in the conversion of his "beloved people," which meantime has concentrated all its energies upon the annihilation of civilisation and all moral values, of Holy Russia itself. ”

“ Such was the first introduction to Europe of the Tsar of Russia! They had long heard of this autocrat before whom millions trembled, ruling like a savage despot in the midst of splendors rivaling the Arabian Nights. Now they saw him! And the amazement can scarcely be described. He dined with the Great Electress Sophia, afterwards first Queen of Prussia, and she wrote of him: "Nature has given him an infinity of wit. With advantages he might have been an accomplished man. ”

“ The concord and union of the people and the Tsar are a great moral force, which has created Russia in the course of centuries by protecting her from all misfortunes and all attacks, and has constituted up to the present time a pledge of unity, independence, integrity, material well-being, and intellectual development. ”

“ Yet in these latter years a resisting spirit, nursed and suckled largely in western Europe, has falsely made it appear that all Russia was in arms, storming with chaotic unity at the church, the state and the army, deluging their ancient customs with the destructive and re-creative might of radicalism. Far and wide of the truth is this! Let no one think the vast heart of Russia has changed! Only the few have cast away the ancient quiet; only the few have the modern consciousness instead of the medieval, theocratic one; only the few are not at heart Slavophiles in feeling and in morality. ”

“ To begin with, Russia has been bled in a war ordered by the bloody Tsar. Why should they continue to sacrifice their strong manhood, which could be employed to better purpose for the reconstruction of Russia? ”

“ But the Tsar’s Government, it was added, are about to turn over a new leaf. Large war credits have been voted by the Duma. Far-reaching reforms are planned for the army. Russia, awakened by Germany’s preparations and warned by the Chancellor’s allusion to the struggle between Slavs and Teutons, will make a strenuous effort to fashion her vast millions into a formidable army. ”

“ As the Tsar grew older he drew away from touch with the people, and lived in his palaces, leaving affairs of state to his ministers who were chosen from a small and selfish clique. They brought on the war with Japan, and its failure was due to them. When Russia was defeated, the people were on the brink of a revolution ”

“ In view, too, of many words and acts of the present Emperor, it is not too much to hope, that, ere many years, Russia will become a constitutional monarchy.
So shall Russia be made a power before which all other European powers shall be pigmies.
Before the close of the year in which we now stand, there is to be celebrated at Nijnii-Novogorod the thousandth anniversary of the founding of Russia. Then is to rise above the domes and spires of that famed old capital a monument to the heroes of Russian civilization. ”