Those of the younger generation understand by "practice," political practice, or, more definitely, revolutionary practice. Hence arises the problem, how an ethical foundation is to be supplied for revolutionary action.
This practical ethical philosophy imposes upon the Russian philosophers of history the important problem of historicism, by which I understand the contention that socio-political demands have an exclusively historical basis. Historicism is a widely prevalent theory, as is natural in view of the extensive development of the historic sense since the eighteenth century We have discussed evolutionism from this aspect (§ 39).
The Russians, following Comte, eagerly accepted positivist historicism, being impelled in the same direction by Hegel and Feuerbach. Marxism is historicism in an extreme form, and is therefore amoral ex hypothesi.
Philosophico-historical contemplation involves, therefore, the consideration of the fundamental problem of history. Has history a meaning, and what is the relationship of individual aspiration and effort to the evolution of the social whole? Apart from the temporary renunciation by Herzen of the teleological conception of history, Russian philosophers of history have been inclined to recognise that evolution, if it has not followed a plan, has at least proceeded in accordance with law; most of them, too, recognise logic (Bakunin) and ethics. Bělinskii protests against the blind fatality of time and fact, and defends the notion of personal freedom; Grigor'ev demurs to the subordination of the individual mind to the historical process of evolution; Bakunin demands a new morality; Lavrov and Mihailovskii attempt to give a "subjective" formula of progress; Solov'ev contrasts the prophetic founders of the future with the men of hard fact; the social revolutionaries and the anarchists reject Marxist historicism in their endeavours to bring about socialism and to effect a revolution. In all cases alike, the problem is this: How far can pursuit of a remote external end (an ultimate end) replace the need for a personal ethical decision—or at least in conjunction with such an ethical judgment be a co-deter- minant of action? I have again and again enunciated my own view of the answer to this question, and that view is further indicated by the fact that, in this summary, I am not devoting an independent section to the philosophy of history.
