A Herzen Reader

The height of his grandeur was the moment when he read Paskevich's dispatch:¹ "Hungary lies at the feet of your highness!" [. . .]

Nicholas triumphed. But near the Winter Palace, i.e., near the Peter Paul Fortress, the Petrashevsky² society was founded. It seems that de­spite all efforts, revolutionary thought was not dead but was fermenting in minds and making hearts beat faster. The appearance of these noble, self-sacrificing, fine young men before the investigating commission was an ominous memento mori for Nicholas. It was not by chance that the ghost of the 14th of December appeared twenty-five years later, flourishing and youthful. What had been achieved by terrible oppression at home and uni­versal baseness?

In addition, after the triumph there was a terrible emptiness. The futility of an autocracy with no goal but itself was fully apparent the day after the victory.

Not a single fruitful thought, not a single improvement, everything turned gray along with Nicholas, growing older and stiffer. There was one thing he could accomplish—to free the serfs, and he wanted to do it, but it is hard, terribly hard for an absolute monarch to give anyone freedom.

[. . .] Nicholaevan rule was lowered into the grave with him. Do not worry, it will not rise again; things may get worse, but they will not be the same.

We know almost nothing about his heir. But his wishes notwithstand­ing, the circumstances of his accession to the throne determine to some degree his situation.

What a difference!

In a shaky manner, Nicholas ascended the throne instead of his older brother. He was greeted by a rebellion that he defeated with grapeshot, but behind the fallen ranks of soldiers a colossal conspiracy came to light. All Russia was involved: the peasant was there as a soldier, the house of Ru- rik represented by princes, generals covered in glory, people covered with honor, literary figures, officers, civil servants in Petersburg, Moscow, and everywhere—all took part in the conspiracy. He was afraid to find out that his friend Adlerberg and Suvorov,³ the grandson of the Italian prince, were implicated, and freed them from prosecution; the emperor Alexander was almost part of the conspiracy—Speransky and Karamzin wrote charters on his order.⁴

Two roads lay ahead of Nicholas—to become the head of the movement, get control of it, and move forward, or to go against the current, while he still had the strength. He chose the latter and until the present war had kept up his role. But the movement which dragged him into war is the best proof that he had neither stopped it nor gained control, and the man who began by disarming everything—mind and hand—finished by calling all Russia, even the serfs, to arms.

What is there in the 18th of February that resembles the 14th of Decem­ber? The new emperor could not answer the bravery at Sevastopol with grapeshot; he could not forbid every kind of speech, when some people were coming to him to say that they would give their blood and others their money for the defense of Russia. Russia did not want this war, is ravaged by it, and obviously did not need it. But the subject here is not what used to be or what one desires, but the salvation and the integrity of the state; the people set off to correct the tsar's mistake with their blood—will the new tsar answer them with Siberia and new oppression? Enough!

In 1825 all Europe stood behind Nicholas, and in 1855 all Europe stands against Alexander. It is easy to disregard the people's groaning when there is no external enemy, but it is difficult to send people to their death with insults and abuse in parting. They have woken up to the extent that it has become a people's war. Once again the people have something in common with the tsar—that is why the tsar will depend on them.

The fourteenth of December was also born in a moment of animation, when the people for the first time after Pozharsky⁵ walked hand in hand with the government. The thought of Russian liberation appeared on the earth that day, when a Russian soldier, tired after battles and long marches, rushed to finally rest in the Elysian Fields.

Can it be that after forty years a gigantic battle in the Tauride will take place with no effect?

Will the Sevastopol soldier, wounded and hard like granite, having tested his strength, present his back to the rod as before? Isn't an armed serf as apt to return peacefully to unpaid labor as a nomadic horseman from the Caspian shores—now guarding the Baltic border—is apt to go missing on his own steppe? Did Petersburg see the English fleet in vain? That is im­possible. Everything is in motion, everything is shaken and strained. what would have to happen for a country that was so abruptly awoken to once again fall dead asleep?

It would be better that Russia perish!