Education and Religion
The Communists have placed at the head of their Education Commissariat
a man of remarkable character and great ability. Before we went to
Russia reports concerning Lunacharsky had encouraged us to the belief
that in him we should meet a genuine benefactor of his country. As
a matter of fact I did not meet him at all, as he was not in Moscow
at the time of our visit, but travelling in the south on business
connected with his department.
Friends of his in Moscow discussed him with us and spoke of the
incessant, obvious turmoil of a mind wrestling with two ideals, the
one leading him back to the imaginative, romantic, anarchist system
of a world of the past, with its leisured class and intellectual
aristocracy; the other compelling him to the necessity of bringing
organisation and discipline to bear in order to carry out a programme
of general communisation in education and educational ideal. That he
does not allow himself to be completely subdued by the dominating
Communist passion for disciplined classification and routine, is shown
in the fact that he is said to be an advocate in education of what
might be described as “Luciferism”--his own word; by which he means the
habit of challenging authority, wherever it shows itself.
Moreover, the Communist Government has thought fit to encourage the
artistic proclivities of the Russian people, and Art is by nature
explosive and rebellious.
In Russia the theatre, the concert, dancing, drawing and the rest of it
come under the control of the Minister of Education, as one department
of his branch of work. Almost every school or children’s colony of any
size has its theatre. Self-expression through the body is in every way
encouraged.
In Petrograd, education is in charge of a lady whose name is Lilina.
She is the wife of Zinoviev, the founder, with Balabanov, of what
is known as the Third International, and, I believe, its present
secretary. She is a brisk little woman, of medium height, with a rather
hard face but capable manner. She spoke French with great fluency, but
no English. We spent an interesting half-hour in her room in the great
Education Office before proceeding to inspect some of the schools.
It was stated that in Russia education is free and compulsory for all
children up to the age of seventeen, and that food, clothing and
school materials are supplied gratis. University education is open to
all, and maintenance allowances are granted to workmen and others who
may wish to take the University course but whose means are limited.
They must show capacity and be prepared to serve the State--two
perfectly reasonable conditions.
But a single drive through the city taught us that these regulations
are not universally complied with. On one occasion, I believe it was
during the drive to the Putiloff Works on the extreme edge of the city,
I observed considerable numbers of young children between the ages of
five and fifteen playing in the streets or in the doorways of houses. I
asked Madame Balabanov, who was with us, if she could explain this.
“I thought education in Russia was compulsory, and yet I see
innumerable children everywhere during school hours. Can you explain
it?” was my query.
“Oh, yes,” was the quick reply, “on account of your blockade we are
without the necessary materials. We are short of desks, of pens and
pencils, of books, even of school buildings. Until trade is resumed
with other countries we cannot accommodate all our children with the
things they need.”
“Do the parents appear to be anxious to have their children educated?”
I asked, specially interested in everything that concerned education.
“Have you any difficulty with them?”
“Yes, we have. Many of them do not yet understand the value of
education nor the wisdom of compulsion in the matter. We are slowly
educating the parents to keep the law. When there are enough schools
for the children we shall bring great pressure to bear on the parents.”
The schools we visited in Petrograd were three, and included one said
to be the best in the city. Considering the limited resources of the
authorities it was certainly very good. There was a fine school-house,
fairly well equipped, in which the children took their meals. We sat
down to a typical lunch. We had a large plate of vegetable soup,
followed by a herring and brown bread, with a rather dry and hard piece
of cake and thin coffee to follow. The children are not given coffee,
but the rest of the food we were assured was their customary diet. It
was much better than most meals eaten by the people of Petrograd.
The children slept in a separate building, the boys in one part and the
girls in another. The little beds had a very attractive look, ranged in
their white rows; but a close look here and there revealed a pathetic
improvisation, with such inadequate materials as they had, to meet the
needs of the little pupils.
The children themselves were with their teachers in the large garden,
and very happy and brown they looked. They were utterly fearless of us,
and wound their arms round our waists and kissed us on the cheek with
the freedom and confidence of people who have learnt to expect nothing
but kindness from their fellow-mortals.
It was in this school I saw M. Kerensky’s small son, and it was a great
pleasure to be able to report to his father that the little fellow
looked well and happy.
The second school was not nearly so good. Here the children had a very
ill and underfed appearance. But nothing was seen to indicate that
the very best possible was not being done for them. This also was a
school in the country environs of Petrograd. The third place was for
the special treatment of defective children. A clinic was shown us with
a certain just pride, where skilled scientists devote themselves to
the study and treatment of the imbecile, making an attempt to follow
the splendid lead of certain of the United States physicians in their
treatment of the morally defective as sick and not wicked people.
A very charming feature of the Russian educational system is the
establishment in all parts of the country of boarding-schools for
proletarian children, which they describe as “school colonies.” The
expropriated houses of wealthy persons are being used for this purpose.
The house-buildings have been altered and furnished appropriately,
and the large grounds and park-lands frequently attached serve for
the fresh-air culture of the children, or are turned into farm lands
for the provision of milk and other suitable produce. Although the
regulations on account of the scarcity forbid milk to children in towns
who have passed the infant years, the rule is most happily broken in
the country where it is possible to break it; but sometimes even in the
country milk is very, very scarce, and I visited one children’s colony
in Samara where the despairing teachers confessed that the children got
practically no milk at all.
At some of these children’s colonies we had most entertaining times
with the children. One little fellow, the musical genius of the
place, gave us one of his original compositions on the piano. I have
already written of the little chap who rattled off his father’s or
his teacher’s pet Communist speech, probably without understanding a
word of it. But at one place, a particularly bright boy of twelve or
thirteen put us to shame by demanding to know why the English workers
were fighting the Russian workers, and why we were trying to starve
Russian children with our blockade. This same lad ringingly demanded
that we should “go home and tell the British workmen to turn their
rich people into the streets.”
And here is my sole, real quarrel with the sincere and devoted
educationists of Russia. The great outstanding purpose of their
ordinary education is to teach Communism. They declare this in their
manifestos. The education system has its truly beautiful artistic side,
and so long as that is not stultified the soul of Russia is safe; but,
for the most part, the Russian system is utilitarian, with, I repeat,
Communism as its ultimate purpose, the making of Communists its goal.
I could quote extensively from Communist sources to prove this, as to
prove other matters; and there are those Socialists who would justify
it. But I have been interested in education all my life, and I feel
very strongly that it is a wrong to a child to bend its mind towards
any special theories, Communist or other. To teach a child to read and
write; to think and observe; to sift and weigh evidence; to create in
it a love of beauty and a passion for truth; to develop in it gracious
manners and a consideration for others--this it seems to me is the
whole of the law and the prophets so far as educational ideal is
concerned.
It may be taken as a general rule, however, that in Bolshevist Russia
the children are given very serious consideration. After the needs of
the army have been served come those of the children. The army very
naturally gets 100 per cent of its needs in food satisfied. Then come
the children, who are better fed than the adults, which means in fact
that a very large part of the adult population of the towns gets not
more than 25 per cent of its needs in food unless it can supplement
the ordinary Government rations. A modification of this appalling
state of things lies in the fact that part of a man’s wage is paid in
kind, and that in addition to his roubles he gets food. Otherwise, the
extravagant nonsense of prejudiced newsmongers might come true, and
corpses be found lying about the streets of Moscow and Petrograd.
A noteworthy and admirable feature of the educational system is the
school for Adult Education. These schools are springing up everywhere.
It is realised that the greater part of the Russian people are
illiterate, and the defect is sought to be remedied by giving the
older folk opportunities of attending all sorts of evening classes.
We visited one of these adult evening schools, and saw grown men and
women with young people and children join together in singing, dancing
and dramatic performances; saw their sewing and their painting, their
sculpture and their design; and without being a Communist one could
heartily congratulate those who were responsible for bringing so much
light and happiness into the lives of men and women for whom these
good things had been unattainable in the past.
The perfect pleasure of this occasion was once more marred by one of
those incidents, become painfully numerous by this time. I was asked by
a young Communist if I would take a letter to his relative in Berlin:
“But please,” he said, “I will not hand it to you openly or it would be
necessary to explain and there might be trouble.” How I got the letter,
I shall not disclose; but I handed it to its owner in the hotel in
Berlin, who rejoiced with mingled tears and smiles to learn that her
loved one was alive and well.
The education of village children is at present, even in design, more
modest and less complete than that of town children. It is carried on
during the winter months only, as the children are required for field
work in the summer; and it is given to children between the ages of
eight and thirteen only. Some day it is hoped to educate everybody, but
the official estimate of the number of children actually in receipt of
education is about 25 per cent of the whole. This is probably a very
generous estimate, as is the estimate that two million children are
being housed and fed at the expense of the State in children’s boarding
schools and colonies. If the statement which was made to us is even
approximately true, that one child in three in Russia is without either
one parent or both, it is a sad reflection on modern civilisation,
and should be an added spur to the resolve to make peace as soon as
possible so that no more children may be orphaned.
The State has taken religious teaching out of the schools, which, to
men and women in England who have seen in the quarrels of sectarians
a real barrier to progress in education, may have some merit in it.
But the Communists have gone further. The use of the word God is
forbidden to the teachers. Holy pictures and ikons are not supposed
to be used, but actually are used, and the authorities do not think
it wise to interfere. At the head of almost every little bed in the
children’s dormitories was a picture of Jesus or of the Holy Mother;
in the Putiloff Works large ikons stood, some covered up it is true,
but others undraped. The view of the Communist leaders on this matter
is well-expressed in their manifestos. They declare that “religion was
one of the means by which the bourgeoisie maintained their tyranny
over the working masses; that the Russian Communist party must be
guided by the conviction that only the realisation of class-conscious
and systematic social and economic activity of the masses will lead
to the disappearance of religious prejudices.” They declare that
“the aim of the party is finally to destroy the ties between the
exploiting classes and organisations for religious propaganda, at
the same time helping the working class actually to liberate its mind
from religious superstitions, and organising on a wide scale secular
and anti-theological propaganda. It is, however, necessary to avoid
offending religious susceptibilities of believers which leads only to
the strengthening of religious fanaticism.”
The last phrase explains, doubtless, why there is no interference with
attendance at church; and it is certainly to be noted that the churches
are crowded to the doors and, apparently, most of the time. Some hope
and believe that the separation of State and Church and the obligation
placed upon believers to maintain their own churches out of their
own pockets will have this good effect at least: that the quality of
religious preaching will improve and the standard of the ministry be
raised. If the poor duped populace can be successfully delivered from
the brigandage and trickery of unscrupulous and avaricious priests, of
whom there has been a great host in the past, it will be a benefit not
only to the suffering people but to the cause of true religion itself.
And what I describe as “true religion,” the living spirit of goodness
in the hearts and minds of men, is growing in the very land where God
is regarded as counter-revolutionary and banished, officially, as a
traitor to mankind. Not by the decrees of Lenin nor of any other
person will that which is rooted in the nature and needs of men be cast
out--the need of worship and the aspiration after the ideal.
The Communists realise that “Logicians may reason about abstractions
but the great mass of men must have images,” to this extent, at least,
that they have placed in every school and public building portraits
and busts of Karl Marx and Lenin. The only time some of us saw Lenin
he was sitting for the sculptor, who was busy preparing his new graven
image! And whether they realise it or not, it remains the fact that the
Communists have not destroyed religion. They have simply changed the
creed. And for the Inquisition, with its thumb-screws and its flaming
faggots, the Extraordinary Commission supplies an adequate substitute!