Page:Rebels and reformers (1919).djvu/347

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be perfect all at once. Therefore he says, if you cannot love another as yourself, go as far as you can in that direction; if you cannot live in complete simplicity, live rather more simply, and so on.

By degrees we may be able to get somewhere nearer Tolstoy's ideals, especially if we believe that we are naturally good, and not, as many of us have been taught, "by nature born in sin and the children of wrath."

D. P.

Since this was written a great change has come about in Russia, which may affect the whole of civilized Europe.

The People of Russia—the Workers—have risen against their rulers, and deposed the Czar and his advisers.

It is early days yet to say what the final outcome of the Revolution will be; but the upheaval is a step toward freedom, and behind it the spirit of Tolstoy moves. He, above all others, helped to sow the seed of the Russian Revolution, and maybe of other revolutions yet to come. What joy and thankfulness would have filled his great heart could he have seen the germination of this seed—the downfall of Czarism and the dawning of freedom for the People of Russia!