A Herzen Reader

Why are we entering a new decade without that radiant hope or firm ex­pectation with which we greeted the epoch of Russia's renaissance?

Alexander II, like Faust, called forth a spirit stronger than himself and was frightened. A kind of exhausting indecisiveness, an unsteadiness in all his actions, and by the end, completely retrograde behavior. It is obvious that he wishes to do good—and fears it.

What happened? Was there a war? An insurrection? Is the government collapsing? Are the provinces seceding? Nothing of the sort! The financial situation is poor, but that is just normal Russian management—everything looks splendid and yet we have not a penny to our names! Besides, reaction­ary moves do not help the financial situation.

What frightened the sovereign? What are people afraid ofin a cemetery?..

That is what human immaturity means, that people are afraid of non­sense and don't see the real danger, and that they lean against a rotten tree that is right next to a healthy one. Chasing fantasies, they let reality slip out of their hands; fearing ghosts in Jacobin caps, they pet jackals in a general's epaulets; fearing democratic pages in journals, they are unafraid of the oli­garch's official document in a velvet cover.

You cannot travel two paths.

No matter what kind of Janus you are, it is impossible to go in two oppo­site directions at the same time, you can only move with one of your halves in reverse, getting in your own way and helplessly rocking in place.

You cannot desire open discussion and strengthen the censorship.

You cannot desire enlightenment and drive students away from the uni­versity gates.

You cannot respect your people as subjects and then not allow them to take their children abroad.

You cannot stand on the side of the people and call yourself "the first nobleman."⁶

You cannot desire open courts and keep as your thief of justice Panin.

You cannot desire the rule of law and have in your own chancellery an entire division of spies.

You cannot begin new construction and take your helpers from the workhouse of the past. [. . .]

This vacillation will make us lose patience and fall not into despair, but into deep sorrow, all the more because it is completely unnecessary and comes from taking decoration for the real thing, probably from a habit of seeing in a man first of all the kind of collar and buttons he is wearing.

If the sovereign would look carefully, he would notice that he is sur­rounded by an entire world of phantoms, and that Panin, for example, is not in fact the minister of justice, but a marionette, and made very poorly of sticks. Gorchakov⁷ does not exist at all—there is just a uniform with a hole in the back in which the conjurer Mukhanov has thrust his fingers, as he pretends that the deceased is still alive, to the distress of the Polish people.

And with whom could you replace these experienced, venerable servants of the throne? Experienced in what? In the emancipation of serfs or the es­tablishment of open courts?..

Here's another example: was Moscow really worse after Zakrevsky? Surely Tuchkov is ten times better than him. If Zakrevsky⁸ had not read so many French novels and hadn't composed his own sentimental episode a la George Sand, he would still be oppressing Moscow, and the sovereign would believe that he was necessary to the tranquility of the ancient capital!

The cap of Monomakh is not only heavy, it is also large, and it can slip over one's eyes. If only it were possible for a moment to lift it up and show the sovereign—not in the manner of loyal subjects, but in a simple human way—all that is living and dead in Russia, all that will follow his lead if he himself does not abandon the path of development and liberation, and show everything that will oppose him... one would give a great deal for that to happen.

What strange times these are: we have no secrets, and we passionately want to show the sovereign all there is to know. But the Dolgorukovs and Timashevs,⁹ his professional ears, keep many secrets from him and conceal everything except harmful gossip. And ever more carefully they conceal the fact that the highest layer of the Russian nobility is not only not the sole true support of the throne, but because of its sickly state is itself looking for something on which to lean. The era has passed in which the Petersburg government existed not only by the grace of God but with the help of boyar oligarchs and German generals. Back then there was joint management and a system of mutual guarantees: the government allowed the nobles to rob the people and beat them with a rod, and the nobility helped the govern­ment to gather up more lands and beat their inhabitants with a whip.