A Herzen Reader

Terror is no more necessary in our time than genius. The active, think­ing part of Russia is moving ahead rapidly, knowing what it wants and re­vealing it in the form of public opinion. At the end of the last reign, in spite of the danger and persecution, the thoughts fermenting in people's minds were so strong that they created an underground literature in manuscripts, which were passed from hand to hand. Subsequently, the same thought process led to expressions of delight with all the fine initiatives of the new government. Half of Peter's work—the most difficult half—is now being done by a chorus. Around Peter, everything was silent; waking earlier than everyone else, he had to rouse others, make guesses, and be inventive. Now many have woken up and gone ahead, waiting to be called to give advice. Except for a very few, everyone opposed Peter's reforms; now the entire na­tion, except for the decayed part of the gentry and old men who have lost their faculties, is ready to further the reforms of Alexander II. As for the sham service oligarchy, all the parvenus from the barracks and the inkwells, the mental hospitals and prison battalions of Nicholaevan students—they have no opinion. Today they beat the serfs who want to be free, and tomor­row they will shoot the gentry who do not want to free them.

However, it could be that the reforms that Alexander II has talked about in his speeches, manifestoes, decrees, orders, and official journals do not coincide with the wishes of thinking Russia, thoughts which have mani­fested themselves in literature and public opinion.

Not at all—they are exactly the same.

This is the boundless, heart-rending irony and tragicomedy of our situ­ation. A government is never so powerful as when it is in agreement with public opinion. [. . .]

The tsar tries very hard to extend a hand to the people, and the people try very hard to take hold of it but they can't get past Panin and company.² It's like a scene out of Aristophanes! Just when the sovereign is completely ready, one of those gray-haired children—Orlov³ or Zakrevsky—stands on tiptoe and touches his extended hand, shouting: "Your majesty, for God's sake! They will bite off your finger!"

Let them just try! The sovereign was in the Caucasus during the troubles there and he loves bear hunting.⁴ What are Circassians and bears to him? Doesn't he daily face dangers from these pillars of the fatherland, who shield him from Russia and create around him a pleasant garland of old men, who, if needed, by moving slightly can form themselves into a noose?

And K. I. Arseniev⁵ taught Alexander Nikolaevich the criminal affair that is Russian history from Peter I to Alexander I.

We have nothing to hide, as we are always saying. Let every reader, with hand on heart, say where in The Bell are to be found impossible demands, political utopias, or calls for rebellion?

The existence of The Bell marks a boundary and a turning point. With the promulgation of the rescript on the liberation of the serfs our path had to change, not in its essence but in its type of activity.⁶ We sacrificed in part our polemics and restricted even more the scope of our questions. We came closer to the government because the government came closer to us. We are concerned with the form of government—we've seen them all in action and none of them will do if they are reactionary, and all of them are suitable if they are contemporary and progressive. We sincerely and frankly believed that Alexander II would replace the bloody era of revolution and would serve as a peaceful and mild transition from antiquated despotism to a humanely free state of Russia.

We may have been mistaken in this, but thinking as we did, for the six months while the rescript was in the works we consistently and almost ex­clusively occupied ourselves with its realization.⁷

What did we demand, and what did we write about?

We demanded that the gentry not snatch emancipation away from the serfs, and that the wish—expressed timidly and with an upper-class lisp by the government—concerning estates and land not be interpreted to the benefit of the landowners. Were we correct? The proof can be found in the eloquent words of Bezobrazov and Blank, in the central committee, in the increased censorship, gentry opposition, and the forced resettlement of serfs on poor land.⁸

Besides, we said that the emancipation of the serfs was not sufficient, that alongside the landowner was a second scourge of the Russian people— the government official, that is, the police and the courts. We said that until the Japanese-style table of ranks fell—while we still had an inquisitorial court behind closed doors along with official secrecy, and while the police admonish people with birch rods and lash them without a trial—until that time the liberation of the serfs would not bring genuine benefit.