revolutionary anarchism, and rejected that doctrine; he realised the defects of the French democracy of his day; but he failed to grasp the essence of the matter [1]
Herzen declared that the revolution effected by Peter had made of the Russians the very worst that could be made of men, for it had converted them into "enlightened slaves"— the enlightened slaves of the theocracy. I may add by way of explanation that Herzen furnished a subjective analysis of this state of enlightened slavery; so did Bělinskii, Bakunin, and others; Mihailovskii's analysis of suicide is on the same lines. "Lapse into tormenting reflection; distractedness of feeling and of consciousness;" thus did Bělinskii characterise the mental state of himself and his fellow progressives. The problem of murder and suicide is discussed in the play written by Bělinskii during his student days.
This is the painful process of disillusionment whose nature
- ↑ I have censured Plehanov for failing, in his polemic against the social revolutionaries, to make an adequate use of Hegel (§ 185). Here is Hegel's explanation why there had been a revolution in France, but not in Germany. The French, he said, had from the theory of enlightenment passed unhesitatingly to practice, but the Germans had confined themselves to theory. Hegel admitted that the first impetus to revolution had come from philosophy; but in Germany theology had itself adopted the enlightenment, whereas in France the philosophic enlightenment had besn directed against theology. The Protestants alone, continued Hegel, could be content with legal and moral reality, for the Protestant church had effected a reconciliation between law and religion. The reformation had brought about enormous improvements in secular matters. Poverty, sloth, unspeakable injustice, intellectual slavery, the disastrous institution of celibacy—all had been abolished. Monarchy was no longer regarded as absolutely divine, but was simply proclaimed to be based upon law.—Šelgunov has a much better grasp of the situation than Herzen. In his Sketches of Russian Life, he compares the Russians with the Germans and the Latins, and comes to the conclusion that what the Russians condemn in the Germans as mechanical routinism, is in truth precision and definiteness of ideas and rules. Now these qualities, he says, are to be found only among Protestant peoples; the Catholics, the French and the Italians, are disorderly, undisciplined, and do not begin to plan their actions until the time has already come to act. According to Šelgunov, Protestantism has disciplined all thoughts and feelings; Martin Luther was a thoroughly practical reformer; Catholicism and the papacy promise wonderful things in heaven, but Protestantism gives promise of the best order on earth. Lutheranism is a school for the organisation of mundane relationships, and provides ethical instruction to fit its scholars to deal with all possible situations. Šelgunov does not state in set terms that the Russian owes his peculiarities to the Orthodox faith, but this is implied. He shows a keen insight into certain traits of the Russian character and contrasts them with the traits exhibited by the Germans; the German character, he tells us expressly, is moulded by Protestantism. A the spiritual influences that formed prepetrine Russia, religion, according to Šelgunov, occupied the first place.
