political writers, the Russian reactionaries rightly understood the nature of revolution. Whereas Stahl thought that one power only, that of Christianity, could overcome the revolution, and whereas de Maistre turned for aid to the authority of the pope, Count Uvarov and the Russian theocrats from Katkov to Leont'ev, pursuing the same end, consistently counterposed the theocracy to the revolution.
§ 204.
IT is comprehensible that the official exponents of philosophy should deny or gloss over its revolutionary effects. In this spirit, during the reign of Nicholas I, the liberal writer Polevoi took up the cudgels on behalf of French philosophy, saying that it had not been the cause of the revolution any more than Christianity had been responsible for the massacre of St. Bartholomew.
True, not every philosophy is revolutionary. Even Kant never attained to clear views upon the problem of revolution. He contended that revolution was inadmissible, and that the utmost the people might do was to refuse to pay taxes. He did not discuss the consequences of such a refusal, nor did he explain why he was sympathetic towards the French revolution, nor why he accepted the ideas of Rousseau. When the king commanded him to refrain from the public discussion of religious questions, Kant complied with the order.[1]
But, in similar circumstances, Kant's successors, Fichte for instance, refused to comply. Hegel's disciples, the Hegelians of the left, had an influence in promoting the events of the year 1848, and some of them were direct participators in the revolutionary movements; but Feuerbach, the founder of the trend, held aloof, explaining that, though a republican, he desired to see a republic established only where men were ripe for republican institutions. For the same reason, the revolutionary Herzen went so far as to invoke maledictions on the year 1848; but his successors persisted in their
- ↑ "A revolution may perhaps lead to a decline in personal despotism and in oppression based upon desire for gain or love of power, but can never bring about a true reform in the realm of thought. The unthinking masses will speedily succumb to the sway of new prejudices." Kant is here referring merely to the effects of a transient revolt, and his remarks do not apply to the great revolution and its sequels.
