Two great nations are peculiarly entitled to be considered modern
in their general character, though each is living under ancient
institutions. They are the _United States_ and _Russia_. Neither of
these nations is a century old, regarded as a power that largely affects
affairs by its action, and into the composition of each there enters a
great variety of elements. The United States may be said to date from
1761, just one hundred years ago, when the American debate began on the
question of granting Writs of Assistance to the revenue-officers of the
crown. The struggle between England and America was then commenced in
the chief court of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay, and the Declaration
of Independence was but the logical conclusion of the argument of James
Otis; but that conclusion would not have established anything, had it
not been confirmed by the inexorable logic of cannon. The last resort of
kings was then on the side of the people, and gave them the victory.
The fifteen years that passed between the time when James Otis spoke
in Boston and the time when John Adams spoke in Philadelphia belong
properly to our national history, and should be so regarded. The
grandson and biographer of John Adams says that Mr. Adams "was attending
the court as a member of the bar, and heard, with enthusiastic
admiration, the argument of Otis, the effect of which was to place him
at the head of that race of orators, statesmen, and patriots, by whose
exertions the Revolution of American Independence was achieved. This
cause was unquestionably the incipient struggle for that independence.
It was to Mr. Adams like the oath of Hamilcar administered to Hannibal.
It is doubtful whether Otis himself, or any person of his auditory,
perceived or imagined the consequences which were to flow from the
principles developed in that argument. For although, in substance,
it was nothing more than the question upon the legality of general
warrants,--a question by which, when afterward raised in England, in
Wilkes's case, Lord Camden himself was taken by surprise, and gave at
first an incorrect decision,--yet, in the hands of James Otis, this
question involved the whole system of the relations of authority and
subjection between the British government and their colonies in America.
It involved the principles of the British Constitution, and the whole
theory of the social compact and the natural rights of mankind."
In the summer of 1762, about seventeen months after Otis had made his
argument, the existence of modern Russia began. Catharine II. then
commenced her wonderful reign, having dethroned and murdered her
husband, Peter III., the last of the sovereigns of Russia who could make
any pretensions to possession of the blood of the Romanoffs. A minor
German princess, who originally had no more prospect of becoming
Empress-Regnant of Russia than she had of becoming Queen-Regnant of
France, Sophia-Augusta of Anhalt-Zerbst was elevated to the throne of
the Czars on the 9th of July, 1762; and a week later her miserable
husband learned how true was the Italian dogma, that the distance
between the prisons of princes and their graves is but short. Catharine
II. founded a new dynasty in Russia, and gave to that country the
peculiar character which it has ever since borne, and which has enabled
it on more than one occasion to decide the fate of Europe, and therefore
of the world. Important as were the labors of Peter the Great, it does
not appear to admit of a doubt that their force was wellnigh spent when
Peter III. ascended the throne; and his conduct indicated the triumph of
the old Russian party and policy, as the necessary consequence of his
violent feeling in behalf of German influences, ideas, and practices.
The Czarina, like those Romans who became more German than the Germans
themselves, affected to be fanatically Russian in her sentiments and
purposes, and so acquired the power to Europeanize the policy of her
empire. She it was who definitely placed the face of Russia to the West,
and prepared the way for the entrance of Russian armies into Italy and
France, and for the partition of Poland, the ultimate effect of which
promises to be the reunion of that country under the sceptre of the
Czar. It was the seizure of so much of Poland by Russia that fixed the
latter's international character; and it was Catharine II. who destroyed
Poland, and added so much of its territory to the dominions of the
Czars. After the first partition had been effected, it was no longer
in Russia's power to refrain from taking a leading part in European
politics; and when her grandson, in 1814, was on the point of making
war on England, France, and Austria, rather than abandon the new Polish
spoil which he had torn from Napoleon I., he was but carrying out the
great policy of the Great Catharine. If we look into the political
literature of the last century, we shall find that Peter I.'s action
had very little effect in the way of increasing the influence of Russia
abroad. His eccentric conduct caused him to be looked upon as a sort of
royal wild man of the woods, rather than as a great reformer whose aim
it was to elevate his country to an equality with kingdoms that had
become old while Russia was ruled by barbarians of the remote East. He
was "a self-made man" on a throne, and displayed all the oddities and
want of breeding that usually mark the demeanor of persons whose youth
has not had the advantages that proceed from good examples and regular
instruction. Of the courtly graces, and of those accomplishments
which are most valued in courts, he had as many as belong to an
ill-conditioned baboon. A railway-car on a cattle-train does not require
more cleaning, at the end of a long journey, than did a room in a palace
after it had been occupied by Peter and his clever spouse. Some of his
best-authenticated acts could not be paralleled outside of a piggery.
The Prussian court, one hundred and sixty years since, was not a very
nice place, and its members were by no means remarkable for refinement;
but they were shocked by the proceedings of the Czar and the Czarina,
some of which greatly resembled those which are not uncommon in a very
wild "wilderness of monkeys." The last of Peter's descendants who
reigned _and ruled_ was his daughter Elizabeth, who died in 1761, and
who was a most admirable representative of her admirable parents.
Neither the manners nor the morals of the Russian court and the Russian
empire had improved during the twenty years that she governed; and as to
policy in government, she had none, and apparently she was incapable of
comprehending a political principle. Had her reign been followed by that
of some Russian prince of kindred character as well as of kindred blood,
and had that reign extended to twenty years' time, Russia would have
fallen back to the position she had held in 1680, and never could have
become a European power. Fortunately or unfortunately,--who shall as yet
undertake to decide which, considering as well European interests as
Russian interests?--the reign of Peter III. was too short to be worth
historical counting, and Elizabeth's real successor was a foreigner,
who not only was capable of comprehending Peter the Great's ideas and
purpose, but who had the advantage of understanding that world the
civilization and vices of which Peter had sought to engraft on the
Russian stock. The grand barbarian himself never could understand more
than one-half of the work to which he devoted his life, as there was
nothing in his nature to which Occidental thought could firmly fasten
itself. He knew little of that the effects of which he so much admired.
His mind was essentially Oriental in its cast, and the creation of his
Northern capital was a piece of work that might have been done by some
Eastern despot; and in the preceding century something like it had
been done by Shah Jehan, when he created the new city of Delhi. In no
European country could such an undertaking have been attempted. It
pleased Catharine II., in after-days, to say of Peter, that "he
introduced European manners and European costumes amongst a European
people"; but this was only a piece of flattery to her subjects, whom
she did so much to Europeanize by making them believe that they were of
Europe, and were destined to rule that continent. She it was who did
what Peter planned, and by making use of Russians as her agents. Her
statesmen, her generals, and her "favorites" were Russians; and it was
after her character and purposes became known that the rulers of Western
Europe were forced to the conclusion that a change of policy was
inevitable. But for the occurrence of the French Revolution, that
Anglo-French Alliance which has been regarded as one of the prodigies of
our prodigy-creating age would have been anticipated by more than sixty
years. By destroying Poland and humiliating Turkey, Catharine forever
settled the character of the Russian Empire; and her successors were
enabled to solidify her work in consequence of the course which events
took after the overthrow of the old French monarchy. Russian support
was highly bidden for by both those parties in Europe which were headed
respectively by France and by England; and it is difficult to decide
from which Russia most profited in those days, the friendship of England
or the enmity of France. One thing was sufficiently clear,--and that
was, that, when the war had been decided in favor of the reactionists,
Russia was the greatest power in the world. In the autumn of 1815, a
Russian army one hundred and sixty thousand strong was reviewed near
Paris, a spectacle that must have caused the sovereigns and statesmen of
the West to have some doubts as to the wisdom of their course in paying
so very high a price for the overthrow of Napoleon. It was certain that
the genie had broken from his confinement, and that, while he towered to
the skies, his shadow lay upon the world. The hegemony which Russia held
for almost forty years after that date justified the fears which then
were expressed by reflecting men. It only remained to be seen whether
the Russian sovereigns, proceeding in the spirit that had moved Peter
and Catharine, would take those measures by which alone a _Russian
People_ could be formed; and to that end, the abolition of serfdom was
absolutely necessary: the masses of their subjects, the very population
from which their victorious armies were conscribed, being in a certain
sense slaves, a state of things that had no parallel in the condition of
any European country.[A]
[Footnote A: At what precise time Russia's policy began to influence
the action of the European powers it would not be easy to say.
Unquestionably, Peter I.'s conduct was not without its effect, and his
triumph over Charles XII. makes itself felt even to this day, and it
ever will be felt. "Pultowa's day" was one of the grand field-days of
history. Sweden had obtained a high place in Europe, in consequence of
the grand part she played in the Thirty Years' War, to which contest she
contributed the greatest generals, the ablest statesmen, and the best
soldiers; and the successes of Charles XII. in the first half of his
reign promised to increase the power of that country, which had become
great under the rule and direction of Gustavus Adolphus and Oxenstierna.
This fair promise was lost with the Battle of Pultowa; and a country
that might have successfully resisted Russia, and which, had its
greatness continued, could have protected Poland,--if, indeed,
Poland could have been threatened, had Russia been unsuccessful at
Pultowa,--was thrown into the list of third-rate nations. Poland was
virtually given up to Russia through the defeat of Charles XII., just
as, a century later, she failed of revival through the defeat of
Napoleon I. in his Russian expedition. But the effect of Sweden's defeat
was not fully seen until many years after its occurrence. Prussia became
alarmed at the progress of Russia at an early day. The War of the Polish
Succession was decided by Russian intervention, in 1733. In 1741 Maria
Theresa relied on Russia, and in 1746 Russia and the Empress of Germany
formed a defensive alliance. The _Cotillon_ Coalition of the Seven
Years' War, formed for the destruction of Frederic II., and the parties
to which were the Czarina Elizabeth, Maria Theresa, and Madame de
Pompadour,--a drunkard, a prude, and a harlot,--brought Russia famously
forward in Europe. In the Eighty-Seventh Letter of Goldsmith's _Citizen
of the World_, published a century ago, are some very just and
discriminating remarks on "the folly of the Western parts of Europe in
employing the Russians to fight their battles," which show that their
author was far in advance of his time, and that he foresaw the growth
of Russia in importance before she had seized upon Poland. In Catharine
II.'s time, the Russian Empire was the object of much adulation from
Western envoys, and the English sought to obtain the assistance of
the barbarians in the American War, but with not such success as they
desired, though they managed to keep our envoy from the court, and to
make Russia unfriendly to us. Our diplomatic relations with Russia did
not begin until a generation after the Declaration of Independence.]
Thus the United States and Russia began their careers at the same time,
as nations destined to have influence in the ordering of Western life.
They were then, as they are now, very unlike to each other. In one
respect only was there any resemblance between them: In this country
there were some myriads of slaves, and in Russia there were many
millions of serfs. Now who, of all the sagacious, far-sighted men then
living, could have ventured to predict that at the end of one hundred
years the American nation that was so soon to be should be engaged in a
civil contest having for its object, on the part of those who began
it, the perpetuation and extension of slavery, while Russia should be
threatened with such a contest because her government, an autocracy,
had abolished serfdom? Many years earlier, Berkeley had predicted that
Time's last and noblest offspring would be the nation that was growing
up in North America; and when he died, in 1753, he would not have
admitted that slavery was an institution which his favorite land could
hug to its bosom, or that America would be less benevolent than that
semi-barbarous empire which was rising in the East,--an empire, to use
his own thought, which Europe was breeding in her decay. Franklin was
then at the height of his fame as a philosopher, and his merits as a
statesman were beginning to be acknowledged; but, wise as he was, he
would have smiled, had there been a prophet capable of telling him the
exact truth as to the future of America. Probably there was not a person
then on earth who could have supposed that that would be which was
written in the Book of Fate. That freedom should come to a people from
a despot's throne was almost as hard to understand as that the rankest
kind of despotism should rise up from among a people the most boastful
of their liberty that ever existed. There are, unhappily, but too many
instances of free nations that have behaved oppressively. The first
African slaves that were brought into the territory of the American
nation came under the flag of a people who had most heroically struggled
for their rights, and the recollection of whose efforts has been revived
by the brilliant labors of the most accomplished of living American
historians. The Greeks, who had so much to say about their own liberty,
believed that they had the right to enslave all other men; and the
Romans, who sometimes talked as if they had a Fourth of July of their
own, assumed that it was in the power of society to enslave any race
whose services its members required. The slaves of free peoples have
generally fared worse than the slaves of men themselves despotically
governed. Thus there is nothing so very strange in the conduct of those
Americans who, concerned for their "right" to trade in black humanity,
and to live on the sweat of black humanity's brows. That which is
strange in the condition of the world is the contrast which is furnished
to the action of our Southern population by the action of the rulers of
Russia. Since American democrats have endeavored to show that no such
contrast exists,--that between the enslavement of black men and the
granting of freedom to white men there is a close resemblance,--and that
the two proceedings are one in fact, how much soever they may differ in
name; that it is not because he is an enemy of slavery, as it is here
understood, that the Czar has become an emancipationist, but because he
is hostile to the slavery of white men,--that, were the Russian serfs as
dark as American slaves, his heart would have remained as hard toward
them as that of Pharaoh toward the Israelites when the plague-pressure
was temporarily removed from his people,--that he would as soon have
thought of washing the Ethiopian white with his own imperial hands as of
conferring freedom upon this race. Such is the theory of those of our
democrats who would still maintain their regard for the Czar and their
worship of Czarism. Alexander has not, they aver, been so bad as the
Abolitionists have drawn him. Like another illustrious personage, he
is not half so black as he is painted. Nay, he is not black at all. He
worships the white theory, and might run for the Montgomery Congress in
South Carolina without any danger of being numbered among the victims
of Lynch-law. Other democrats are not so well disposed toward the Czar,
their feelings respecting him having changed as completely as did those
of certain earlier democrats in regard to Mr. O'Connell, when the great
Irishman denounced slavery in America. It is a sore subject with our
pro-slavery people, this faithlessness of Russia to the cause of human
oppression. How they sympathized with her in the war with the Western
powers, and prophesied the defeat of the Allies in the Crimea, is well
remembered; but when the new Czar announced his purpose to abolish
serfdom, they, as Lord Castlereagh would have said, "turned their backs
upon themselves," and could see no good in the great Northern Empire.
Russia as the great revolution-queller, reading the Riot Act to the
liberals of Europe, and sending one hundred and fifty thousand men to
"crush out" the nationality of Hungary, and to revivify the power of
Austria, was to them an object of reverence; but Russia the liberator of
serfs, and the backer of France in the Italian War, became an object of
hate and fear. Nicholas might have patronized our Secessionists, for he
was partial to rebels who supported his opinions; but his son can
have no sympathy with men whose every act is a condemnation of those
principles which govern his conduct as a Russian ruler,--though in his
bearing toward Poland and others of the conquered portions of his empire
he may prove himself no more lenient than Mr. Jefferson Davis would
toward a Northern State that had declared itself independent of Southern
supremacy, could he "subdue" it.
It would, however, be most unjust so to speak of Russian serfdom as to
convey the impression that it ever was quite so bad as American slavery
is. It is the peculiarity of American slavery, that it has no redeeming
features. Long before it had become so odious as we see it, and before
its existence was found incompatible with the peaceful prevalence of
a constitutional system of government, its character was emphatically
summed up in a few words by a great man, who called it "the sum of
all villanies." Time has not improved its character, but has made the
institution worse, by extending the effect of its operations. The
political character which American slavery has had ever since the
formation of the Constitution has not only stood in the way of every
emancipation project, but it has made slaveholders, and men who have
sought political preferment through working on the prejudices of
slaveholders, supporters of the institution on grounds that have had no
existence in other countries; and the contest in which this country is
now involved is the natural effect of the more rapid growth of the Free
States in everything that leads to political power in modern times. Had
the Slave States in 1860 been found relatively as strong as they were in
1840, the Secession movement could not have occurred; for most of the
men who lead in it would have preferred to rule the United States, and
would have cared little for the defeat of any political party, confident
as they would have been in their capacity to control all American
parties. As slavery is the foundation of political power in this
country, its friends cannot abandon their ideas without abdicating their
position. Hence the fierceness with which they have put forth, and
advocated with all their strength, opinions that never were held by any
other class of man-owners, and which would have been scouted in Barbary
even in those days when religious animosity added additional venom to
the feelings of the Mussulmans toward their Christian captives, and when
Spain and Italy were Africa's Africa. The slave population of the United
Slates are forbidden to hope. They form a doomed race, the physical
peculiarities of which are forever to keep them out of the list of
the elect. They are slaves, they and their ancestors always have been
slaves, and they and their descendants always must be slaves. Such is
the Southern theory, and the practice under it does that theory no
violence. In Russia the condition of the enslaved has never been so
bad as this, nor anything like it. Between the slave and the serf the
difference has been almost as great as that between the serf and the
free citizen.
Nothing certain is known as to the origin of Russian serfage. Able men
have found the institution existing in very early times; and other men,
of not less ability, and well acquainted with Russian history, are
confident that it is a modern institution. Count Gurowski, whose
authority on such a point he ought to be a very bold man to question,
says,--"In Russia, slavery dates, with the utmost probability, since the
introduction of the Northmen, originating with prisoners of war, and
being established over conquered tribes of no Slavic descent. This was
done when Rurik and his successors descended the Dwina, the Dnieper, and
established there new dominions. In the course of time, the conquerors
cleared the forests, established villages and cities. As, in other
feudal countries, the tower, the _Schloss_, was outside of the village
or of the borough,--so was In Russia the _dwor_ or manor, where the
conqueror or master dwelt,--and from which was derived his name of
_dworianin_. That the genuine Russian of that time, whatever may have
been his social position, was free in his village, is beyond doubt,--as,
according to old records, the boroughs and villages, dependencies of the
manor, were settled principally with prisoners of war and the conquered
population. It was during the centuries of the Tartar dominion that the
people, the peasantry, became nailed to the soil, and deprived of
the right of freely changing their domicile. Then successively every
peasant, that is, every agriculturist tilling the soil with his own
hands, became enslaved. Only in estates owned by monasteries and
convents, which were very numerous and generally very rich, slavery
being judged to be opposed to Christian doctrine, it did not take
root at once. Generally, monks were reluctant to the utmost, and even
directly opposed to the sale of men in the markets, and the dependants
of a monastery were never sold in such a manner." The common view is,
that Borys Gudenoff, who reigned at the beginning of the seventeenth
century, established serfage age in Russia; but though the exact
character of his legislation is yet in dispute, it is obvious that no
Czar, and least of all one situated as was Borys, could have enslaved a
people. His legislation is involved in as much doubt as for a long time
were the Sempronian Laws of Rome. If we could believe that he instituted
the system of serfage, or seriously strengthened it, we should find that
Russian slavery came into existence but a few years before American
slavery; but such a "coincidence" cannot be rigidly insisted upon. It
would, however, we think, be difficult to show that the condition of
the Russian laboring classes was not made worse by the action of the
usurper.
Peter the Great was so affected by the circumstance that men and women
and children could be sold like cattle, as American slaves now are, that
he sought to put a stop to the infamous traffic, but without success.
Catharine II. was a philosopher, and a patron of that eighteenth-century
philosophy which so largely favored human rights, and she regretted
the existence of serfage; but, in spite of this regret, and of some
sentimental efforts toward emancipation, she strengthened the system of
slavery under which so great a majority of her subjects lived. She gave
peasants to her "favorites," and to others whom she wished to reward
or to bribe. The brothers Orloff are said to have received forty-five
thousand peasants from her, being in part payment for what was done by
their family in setting up the new Russian dynasty founded by the German
princess. Potemkin received myriads of peasants. Some outrageous abuses
were practised by wealthy landholders, in consequence of the Czarina
having proclaimed that the laborers in Little Russia should belong to
the soil on which they were at that date employed. Thousands of persons
were entrapped into serfdom through a measure which the sovereign had
intended should lessen the evils of that institution. Catharine's
authority was never but once seriously disputed at home, and that was
by the rebellion of Pugatscheff, which is sometimes spoken of as an
outbreak against serfdom, which it was not in any proper sense, though
the abuses of the owners of serfs may have contributed to swell the
ranks of the pretender,--Pugatscheff calling himself Peter III. The Czar
Paul would not allow serfs to be sold apart from the soil to which they
belonged. It is a curious incident, that, when Paul restored Kosciusko
to liberty, he offered to give him a number of Russian peasants. The
Polish patriot had no hesitation in refusing to accept the Emperor's
offer, for which, in these times, there are Americans who think he was a
fool; but in 1797 certain lights had not been vouchsafed to the American
mind, that have since led some of our countrymen to become champions of
the cause of darkness.
Alexander, whose reign began in 1801, was moved by a sincere desire to
get rid of serfdom. Schnitzler says that he "solemnly declared that he
would not endure the habit of making grants of peasants, a practice
hitherto common with the autocrats, and forbade the announcement in
public papers of the sales of human beings,"--and that "he permitted his
nobles to sell to their serfs, together with their personal liberty,
portions of land, which should thus become the _bona fide_ property of
the serf purchaser. This was a most important act; for Alexander thus
laid the basis of a class of free cultivators." A public man having
requested an estate with its serfs as hereditary possessions, the Czar
replied as follows:--"The peasants of Russia are for the most part
_slaves_. I need not expatiate upon the degradation or the misfortune
of such a condition. Accordingly, I have made a vow not to augment the
number; and to this end I have laid down the principle, that I will not
give away peasants as property." The Czar was determined to go farther
than this. Not only would he not increase the number of the serfs, but
he would lessen their number. The serfs of Esthonia were first favored,
their emancipation beginning in 1802, and being completed in 1816, the
year in which Alexander may be regarded as having been at the height of
his greatness, for he had completed the overthrow of Napoleon, and had
seen France saved from partition through his influence and exertions.
The Courland serfs were emancipated in 1817. Two years later, the nobles
of Livonia formed a plan of emancipation in their country, and when they
submitted it to the Czar, his answer was,--"I am delighted to see that
the nobility of Livonia have fulfilled my expectations. You have set an
example that ought to be imitated. You have acted in the spirit of our
age, and have felt that liberal principles alone can form the basis of
the people's happiness." So long as Alexander remained true to liberal
principles himself, there was some hope that he might abolish serfdom
throughout his dominions. He abhorred the "peculiar institution" of his
empire with all the force of a mind that certainly was generous, and
which had a strong bias in the direction of justice. Once he made a
solemn religious vow that he would abolish it. It is probable that
he would have made an attempt at complete emancipation, if the
circumstances of his time and his country had enabled him to concentrate
his thoughts and his labors upon domestic affairs. Unhappily for Russia,
and for the Czar's fame, he was soon drawn into the European vortex, and
became one of the principal actors in the grand drama of that age, so
that Russian interests were sacrificed to ambition, to the love of
military glory, and to the Czar's desire to become Don Quixote with an
imperial crown and sceptre. He wished to reconstruct the map of Europe,
which had been so terribly deranged by those terrible map-destroyers and
map-makers, the French republicans. Catharine II. had had the sense to
keep out of the war that had been waged against France, though no person
in Europe--not even George III. himself--hated the revolutionists more
intensely. She wished to see them subdued, but she preferred that the
work of subjugation should be done by others, so that she might be at
liberty to pursue her designs against Poland and Turkey and Persia. The
destruction of Poland she completed, but she was called away before she
could conquer the followers of Omar and of Ali. Paul was a party to the
second coalition against France, and his armies tore Italy from its
conquerors, and but for the stupidity of Austria there might have been
a Russian restoration of the Bourbons in 1709. Alexander resumed the
policy which his father had adopted only to discard, and though at one
period of his reign he appeared well inclined to Napoleon, there never
was any sincerity in the alliance between the two masters of so many
millions. The Czar was easily induced to favor the strange scheme of
an Italian adventurer for the rehabilitation of Europe, which had been
adopted by his friend and counsellor, the Prince Czartoryski, and
which ultimately furnished the basis, and many of the details, of that
pacification which was effected in 1815. We have seen the treaties of
that memorable year torn to tatters by Napoleon III., but the adoption
of Piatoli's project by Alexander affected the last generation as
intimately as the French Emperor's conduct has affected the men of
to-day. It led the Czar away from his original purpose, and converted
him, from a benevolent ruler, into a harsh, suspicious, unfeeling
despot. There could be nothing done for Russian serfs while their
sovereign was crusading it for the benefit of the Bourbons in particular
and of legitimacy in general. "God is in heaven, and the Czar is afar
off!" words once common with the suffering serfs, were of peculiar force
when the Czar, who believed himself to be the chosen instrument of
Heaven, was at Paris or Vienna, laboring for the settlement of Europe
according to ideas adopted in the early years of his reign. Napoleonism
and Liberalism were the same thing in the mind of Alexander, and he
finally came to regard serfdom itself as something that should not be
touched. It was a stone in that social edifice which he was determined
to maintain at all hazards. The plan of emancipation had worked well in
the outlying Baltic provinces, where there were few or no Russians, but
he discouraged its application to other portions of his dominions.
Some of his greatest nobles were anxious to take the lead as
emancipationists, but he would not allow them to proceed in the only way
that promised success, and so the bondage system was continued with the
approbation of the Czar. In his last years, Alexander, though still
quite a young man,--he was but forty-eight when he died,--was the most
determined enemy of liberty in Europe or Asia.
The Emperor Nicholas began his remarkable reign with the desire strong
in his mind to emancipate the serfs,--or, if that be too sweeping
an expression, so to improve their condition as to render their
emancipation by his successors a comparatively easy proceeding. Much of
his legislation shows this, and that he was aware that the time must
come when the serfs could no longer be deprived of their freedom. Such
was the effect of his conduct, however, that all that he did in
behalf of the serfs was attributed to a desire on his part to create
ill-feeling between the nobility and the peasants. Then he was so
thoroughly arbitrary in his disposition, that he often neutralized the
good he did by his manner of doing it. But that which mainly prevented
him from doing much for his people was his determination to maintain the
position which Russia had acquired in Europe, and to maintain it, too,
in the interest of despotism, "pure and simple." A succession of events
caused the Czar's attention to be drawn to foreign affairs. The French
Revolution of 1830, the Polish Revolution of the same year, the troubles
in Germany, the Reform contest in England, the change in the order of
the Spanish succession, the outbreaks in Italy,--these things, and
others of a similar character, all of which were protests against
that European system which Russia had established and still favored,
compelled Nicholas to look abroad, and to neglect, measurably, domestic
government. At a later period, he was one of the parties to that
combination of great powers which threatened France with a renewal of
those invasions from which she had suffered so much in 1814 and 1815.
Turkey was the source of perpetual trouble to the Czar; and his eyes
were frequently drawn to India, where one of his envoys half threatened
an English minister that the troops of their two countries might meet,
and was curtly answered by the minister that he cared not how soon the
interview should begin. The extinction of Cracow served to show how
close was the watch which the Czar kept upon the West, and that he was
ready to crush even the smallest of those countries in which the spirit
of liberty should show itself. Had San Marino lain within his reach, he
would have been induced neither by its weakness nor its age to spare
it. The struggle with the Circassians was long, vexatious, and costly.
Finally, the Revolutions of 1848, leading, as they did, to the invasion
of Hungary, in the first place, and then to the war with the Western
Powers, operated to prejudice the Imperial mind against every form of
freedom, and to provide too much occupation for the Emperor and his
ministers to permit them to labor with care and effect in behalf of the
oppressed serfs at home. It would have been a strange spectacle, had
the man who was trampling down the Hungarians employed his leisure in
raising his own serfs from the dust.
The Emperor Nicholas died in March, 1855, having lived long enough after
the beginning of that great war which he had so rashly provoked to see
his armies everywhere beaten and his fleets everywhere blockaded, while
the Russian leadership of Europe was struck down at a blow, never to be
resumed, unless there should be a radical change effected in Russian
institutions. Nearly thirty years of the most arrogant rule ever known
to the world came to an end in a moment, because the Emperor took "a
slight cold." A breath of the Northern winter served to stop the breath
of the Emperor of the North. He slept with his fathers, and his
son, Alexander II., reigned in his stead. The new Czar, who has the
reputation of being a much milder man than his father, and to bear
considerable resemblance to his uncle, as that uncle was in his best
days, was soon reported to be an emancipationist; but as the same
reports had prevailed respecting both Alexander I. and Nicholas, the
world gave little heed to what was said on the subject. It was not until
he had reigned for almost two years that something definite was done in
relation to it by the Czar; and then as many obstacles were thrown in
the way of the reform as would have served to disgust any man who had
not been in downright earnest. The Czar then took matters into his own
hands, so far as that was possible, and the work was pushed forward
with considerable speed. There was much discussion, and there were many
disappointments, in the course of the business; but through all the Czar
held to his determination, with a pertinacity that was not expected of
him, and which leaves the impression that his character has not been
properly understood. The history of the undertaking is yet to be
written, but, from what little is known of its details, we should say
that Alexander II. experienced more opposition, and that of an extremely
disagreeable character, from the nobility, than Alexander I. would
have encountered from the nobles of his time, had he resolved upon
emancipation in good faith, and adhered to his resolution, as his nephew
has done. Persons who suppose that a Russian Czar cannot be drowned,
because belonging to that select class who are born to be strangled,
would have it that the question would be settled by an application of
the bowstring, or the sash of some guardsman, to the Imperial throat;
and so a successful palace revolution lead to the postponement of the
plan of emancipation for another quarter of a century. But Russian
morality is of a much higher character than it was, and the members
of the reigning house are models of decorum, and know how to defer to
opinion. The nobles, too, are men of a very different stamp from their
predecessors of 1762 and 1801. The Russian polity is no longer a
despotism tempered by the cord. Fighting the good fight with something
of a Puritanical perseverance, the Czar was enabled to triumph over all
opposition to his preliminary project; and on the 3d of March, (N.S.,)
1861, the "Imperial Manifesto" emancipating the serfs was published.
In the opening paragraph of this document, the Autocrat declares, that,
on ascending the throne, he took a vow in his innermost heart so to
respond to the mission which was intrusted to him as to surround with
his affection and his Imperial solicitude all his faithful subjects of
every rank and of every condition, from the warrior who nobly bears arms
for the defence of the country to the humble artisan devoted to the
works of industry,--from the official in the career of the high offices
of the State to the laborer whose plough furrows the soil; and then
proceeds to say,--"In considering the various classes and conditions
of which the State is composed, we came to the conviction that the
legislation of the empire, having wisely provided for the organization
of the upper and middle classes, and having defined with precision their
obligations, their rights, and their privileges, has not attained the
same degree of efficiency as regards the peasants attached to the soil,
thus designated because either from ancient laws or from custom they
have been hereditarily subjected to the authority of the proprietors, on
whom it was incumbent at the same time to provide for their welfare.
The rights of the proprietors have been hitherto very extended and very
imperfectly defined by the law, which has been supplied by tradition,
custom, and the good pleasure of the proprietors. In the most favorable
cases this state of things has established patriarchal relations founded
upon a solicitude sincerely equitable and benevolent on the part of
the proprietors, and on an affectionate submission on the part of the
peasants; but in proportion as the simplicity of morals diminished,
as the diversity of the mutual relations became complicated, as the
paternal character of the relations between the proprietors and the
peasants became weakened, and, moreover, as the seigneurial authority
fell sometimes into hands exclusively occupied with their personal
interests, those bonds of mutual good-will slackened, and a wide opening
was made for an arbitrary sway which weighed upon the peasants, was
unfavorable to their welfare, and made them indifferent to all progress
under the conditions of their existence. These facts had already
attracted the notice of our predecessors of glorious memory, and they
had taken measures for improving the condition of the peasants; but
among those measures some were not stringent enough, insomuch as they
remained subordinate to the spontaneous initiative of such proprietors
as showed themselves animated with liberal intentions; and others,
called forth by peculiar circumstances, have been restricted to certain
localities, or simply adopted as an experiment. It was thus that
Alexander I. published the regulation for the free cultivators, and that
the late Emperor Nicholas, our beloved father, promulgated that one
which concerns the peasants bound by contract. ... We thus came to the
conviction that the work of a serious improvement of the condition
of the peasants was a sacred inheritance bequeathed to us by our
ancestors,--a mission which, in the course of events, Divine Providence
called upon us to fulfil."
It will be observed that the Czar goes no farther back than the
beginning of the reign of his uncle, sixty years since, in speaking of
the measures that have been taken for the improvement of the peasants'
condition; and he names only his father and his uncle as reforming
Emperors, though his language is such as to warrant the belief that
all his ancestors, who had reigned, had been friends of the serf,
and anxious to promote their welfare. But Alexander II. is too well
acquainted with the history of his family to venture to speak of the
actions of either the Great Peter or the Grand Catharine toward the
peasants. Gurowski tells us of the effect of one of Peter's acts in very
plain language. "In 1718," he says, "Peter the Great ordered a general
census to be taken all over the empire. The census officials, most
probably through thoughtlessness or caprice, divided the whole rural
population into two sections: First, the free peasants belonging to the
crown or its domains; and, secondly, all the rest of the peasantry,
the _krestianins_, or serfs living on private estates, were inscribed
_khrepostnoie kholopy_, that is, as chattels. The primitive Slavic
communal organization thus survived only on the royal domain, and there
it exists till the present day. The census of Peter having thus fairly
inaugurated chattelhood, it immediately began to develop itself in all
its turpitude. The masters grew more reckless and cruel; they sold
chattels separately from the lands; they brought them singly into
market, disregarding all family-ties and social bonds. Estates were no
more valued according to the area of land they contained, but according
to the number of their chattels, who were now called souls. In short,
all the worst features of chattelism, as it exists at the present day in
the American Slave States, immediately followed the publication of this
accursed census."[B] The same authority states that Nicholas in reality
was the first Emperor who granted estates excepting therefrom the
resident peasantry.
[Footnote B: _Slavery in History_, pp. 245, 246.]
Alexander II., in his Manifesto, expresses his confidence in the
nobility of Russia, which compliment is pronounced ironical, inasmuch as
they did not yield their consent to emancipation until they discovered
that the Czar and the serfs had united to extort it. "It is to the
nobles themselves," says the Czar, "conformably to their own wishes,
that we have reserved the task of drawing up the propositions for the
new organization of the peasants,--propositions which make it incumbent
upon them to limit their rights over the peasants, and to accept the
_onus_ of a reform which could not be accomplished without some material
losses. Our confidence has not been deceived. We have seen the nobles
assembled in committees in the districts, through the medium of their
confidential agents, making the voluntary sacrifice of their rights as
regards the personal servitude of the peasants. These committees,
after having collected the necessary _data_, have formulated their
propositions concerning the new organization of the peasants attached
to the soil in their relations with the proprietors. These propositions
having been found very diverse, as was to be expected from the nature
of the question, they have been compared, collated, and reduced to a
regular system, then rectified and completed in the superior committee
instituted for that purpose; and these new dispositions thus formulated
relative to the peasants and domestics of the proprietors have been
examined in the Council of the Empire." Invoking the Divine assistance,
the Czar says that he is resolved to carry this work into execution. In
virtue of the new dispositions, the peasants attached to the soil are to
be invested with all the rights of free cultivators. The proprietors are
to retain their rights of property in all the land belonging to them,
but they are to grant to the peasants for a fixed regulated rental the
full enjoyment of their _close_, or homestead; and, to assure their
livelihood, and to guaranty the fulfilment of their obligations toward
the Government, the quantity of arable land is fixed, as well as other
rural appurtenances. In return for the enjoyment of these territorial
allotments, the peasants are obligated to acquit the rentals fixed
to the profit of the proprietors; but in this state, which must be a
transitory one, the peasants shall be designated as "temporarily bound."
The peasants are granted the right of purchasing their homesteads, and,
with the consent of the proprietors, they may acquire in full property
the arable lands and other appurtenances which are allotted to them as a
permanent holding. By the acquisition in full property of the quantity
of land fixed the peasants will become free from their obligations
toward the proprietors for land thus purchased, and they will enter
definitively into the condition of free peasants, or landholders. A
transitory state is fixed for the domestics, adapted to their callings,
and to the exigencies of their position. At the close of two years,
they are to receive their full enfranchisement, and some temporary
immunities. "It is according to these fundamental principles," says the
Manifesto, "that the dispositions have been formulated which define
the future organization of the peasants and of the domestics, which
establish the order of the general administration of this class, and
specify in all their details the rights given to the peasants and to
the domestics, as well as the obligations imposed upon them toward the
Government and toward the proprietors. Although these dispositions,
general as well as local, and the special supplementary rules for some
particular localities, for the lands of small proprietors, and for
the peasants who work in the manufactories and establishments of the
proprietors, have been, as far as was possible, adapted to economical
necessities and local customs, nevertheless, to preserve the existing
state where it presents reciprocal advantages, we leave it to the
proprietors to come to amicable terms with the peasants, and to conclude
transactions relative to the extent of the territorial allotment, and to
the amount of rental to be fixed in consequence, observing at the
same time the established rules to guaranty the inviolability of such
agreements." The new organization, however, cannot be immediately put in
execution, in consequence of the inevitable complexity of the changes
which it necessitates. Not less than two years, or thereabout, will be
required to perfect the work; and to avoid all misunderstanding, and to
protect public and private interests during this interval, the existing
system will be maintained up to the moment when a new one shall have
been instituted by the completion of the required preparatory measures.
To this end, the Czar has deemed it advisable,--
"1. To establish in each district a special court for the question of
the peasants; it will have to investigate the affairs of the rural
communes established on the land of the lords of the soil.
"2. To appoint in each district justices of the peace to investigate
on the spot all misunderstandings and disputes which may arise on the
occasion of the introduction of the new regulation, and to form district
assemblies with these justices of the peace.
"3. To organize in the seigneurial properties communal administrations,
and to this end to leave the rural communes in their actual composition,
and to open in the large villages district administrations (provincial
boards) by uniting the small communes under one of these district
administrations.
"4. To formulate, verify, and confirm in each rural district or estate
a charter of rules, in which shall be enumerated, on the basis of the
local statute, the amount of land reserved to the peasants in permanent
enjoyment, and the extent of the charges which may be exacted from them
for the benefit of the proprietor, as well for the land as for other
advantages granted by him.
"5. To put these charters of rules into execution as they are gradually
confirmed in each estate, and to introduce their definitive execution
within the term of two years, dating from the day of publication of the
present manifesto.
"6. Up to the expiration of this term the peasants and domestics are to
remain in the same obedience towards their proprietors, and to fulfil
their former obligations without scruple.
"7. The proprietors will continue to watch over the maintenance of order
on their estates, with the right of jurisdiction and of police, until
the organization of the districts and of the district tribunals has been
effected."
In the concluding portion of the Manifesto, the Czar expresses his
confidence in the nobility, and his belief that they will so labor as to
perfect the great work upon which all parties in Russia are engaged; but
there is something in the language he employs that sounds hollow, as
if he were not altogether so certain of support as he claims to be. He
speaks less like a man stating a fact than like one appealing to the
controllers of powerful interests. He also warns those persons who
have misunderstood the Imperial purpose, "individuals more intent upon
liberty than mindful of the duties which it imposes," and whose conduct
was not beyond reproach when the first news of the great reform became
diffused among the rural population. The serfs are called upon, with
much unction, to appreciate and recognize the considerable sacrifices
which the nobility have made on their behalf. They are expected to
understand that the blessings of an existence supported upon the
basis of guarantied property, as well as a greater liberty in the
administration of their goods, entail upon them, with new duties toward
society and themselves, the obligation of justifying the protecting
designs of the law by a loyal and judicious use of the rights which are
now accorded to them. "For," says the Autocrat, "if men do not labor
themselves to insure their own well-being under the shield of the laws,
the best of those laws cannot guaranty it to them." These are "noble
sentiments"; but the shrewder portion of the serfs will probably attach
more importance to the declaration, that, "to render the transactions
between the proprietors and the peasants more easy, in virtue of which
the latter may acquire in full property their homestead and the land
they occupy, the Government will advance assistance, according to
a special regulation, by means of loans, or a transfer of debts
encumbering an estate."
Such are the principal details of this great measure, the most important
undertaking of modern days, whether we refer only to the measure itself,
or take its probable consequences into consideration. That forty-five
millions of human beings should be lifted out of the slough of slavery,
and placed in a condition to become _men_, would alone be a proceeding
that ought to take first rank among the illustrations of this age. But
we cannot consider it solely by itself. Every deed that is likely to
influence the life of a nation that is endowed with great vitality and
energy must be considered in connection with its probable consequences.
Russia stands in the fore-front rank of the leading nations of the
world. In the European Pentarchy, she is the superior of Austria, the
controller of Prussia, and the equal of France and England. The growth
of the United States in political power having received a check through
the occurrence of the Secession Rebellion, the relations of the great
empires, which our advance had threatened to disturb in an essential
manner, will probably remain unchanged; and so Russia, unless she should
become internally convulsed, will maintain her place. Assuming that the
work of emancipation is to be peacefully and successfully accomplished,
it would be fair to argue that the power of the Russian Empire will
be incalculably increased through the elevation of the masses of its
population. The Czar is doing for his dominions what Tiberius Gracchus
sought to do for the Roman Republic when he began that course of much
misunderstood agrarian legislation which led to his destruction, and to
the overthrow of the constitutional party in his country. As the Roman
Tribune sought to renew the Roman people, and to substitute a nation of
independent cultivators for those slaves who had already begun to eat
out the heart of the republic, so does the Russian Autocrat seek to
create a nation of freemen to take the place of a nation of serfs. If
the Roman had succeeded, the course of history must have been entirely
changed; and if the Russian shall succeed, we may feel assured that his
success will have prodigious results, though different from what are
expected, perhaps, by the Imperial reformer himself. His motives
of action are probably of that mixed character which governs the
proceedings of most men. Undoubtedly he wishes well to the millions for
whose freedom he has labored and is laboring; but then he would improve
their condition in order that he may become more powerful than ever
were his predecessors. He would rule over men rather than over slaves,
because men make better subjects and better soldiers than slaves ever
could be expected to make. The Russian serf has certainly proved himself
to be possessed of high military qualities in the past, but it admits
of a good deal of doubt whether he is equal to the present military
standard; and Russia cannot safely fall behind her neighbors and
contemporaries in the matter of soldiership. The events of all the wars
in which Russia has been engaged since 1815 prove that her armies
have not kept pace with those of most other countries. The first of
Nicholas's wars with Turkey would have ended in his total defeat, if the
Turks had been able to find a leader of ordinary capacity and average
integrity. The Persian War was successful because Persia is weak, and
she had not the means of making a powerful resistance to her old enemy.
The Poles, in 1831, held the Russians at bay for months, and would have
established their independence but for their own dissensions; and even
then Russia was much assisted by Prussia. The invasion of Hungary was a
military promenade, and the failure of the patriots was owing less to
the ability of Paskevitch than to the treason of Görgei. In the contest
between Russia and the Western powers, (1854-6,) the former was beaten
in every battle; and when she had only the Turks on her hands, in 1853,
her every purpose was foiled, and not one victory did her armies in
Europe win over that people. The world saw that a new breed of men had
taken the places of those soldiers who had been so prominent in the work
of overthrowing Napoleon; and even the heroes of 1812-15 were admitted
to be inferior to _their_ predecessors, the soldiers of Zürich and
Trebbia and Novi. It is the fact, and one upon which military men can
ruminate at their leisure, that the Russian armies showed more real
power and "pluck" a century ago than they have exhibited in any of
the wars of the last sixty years. They fought better at Zorndorf and
Kunersdorf, against the great Frederic, than they did at Austerlitz
and Friedland, against the greater Napoleon, or than we have seen them
fight, at the Alma, and at Inkerman, and at Eupatoria, against Raglan,
and St. Arnaud, and Omar Pacha. There was no falling off in the soldiers
of Suvaroff; but personal character had much to do with his successes,
as he was a man of genius, and the only original soldier that Russia
has ever had; and the men whom he led to victory in Turkey, Poland,
and Italy were trained by officers who had learned their trade of the
warriors who had fought against Frederic. But in the nineteenth Century
the change in the Russian army was perceptible to all men, and in none
could that change have produced more serious feelings than in the
present Czar and his father. Nicholas is supposed to have died of
mortification because his army, the instrument of his power over Europe,
had been cut through by the swords of the West; and Alexander II.
succeeded to a disgraced throne because his troops had proved themselves
unworthy successors of the men of Kulm. Wishing to have better soldiers
than he found in his armies, or than had served his father, Alexander
II. hastened that scheme of emancipation which he had been thinking of,
we may presume, for years, and which, he asserts, is the hereditary
idea of his line. We do not suppose that he is less inclined to rule
despotically than was his father, or that he would be averse to the
recovery of the position which was held by his uncle and his father. We
find not the slightest evidence, in all the proceedings of the Russian
Government, that the _people_ whom the Czar means to create are to
be endowed with political freedom. A more vigorous race of Russians,
morally speaking, is needed, and, except in some parts of the United
States, there are no men to be found capable of arguing that any portion
of the human family is susceptible of improvement through servitude. The
serf is naturally clever, and can "turn his hand" to almost anything.
The inference that freedom would exalt his mind and improve his
condition is one that was logically drawn at St. Petersburg and Moscow,
though they reason differently at Richmond and Montgomery. An army
recruited from slaves could not, in these times, when even bayonets
think and cannon reason much more accurately than they did when Louis
XIV. was a pattern monarch, ever look in the face the intelligent
trained legions of France or England or Germany. A combination of
political circumstances, similar to those of 1840, might give victory to
a grand Russian army, like that laurelless triumph which was then won
in Hungary, when the victors were nothing but the bloodhounds and
gallows-feeders of the House of Austria; but of _military_ glory the
present Russians could hope to have no more. To regain the place they
had held, it was necessary that they should be made personally free.
That they might be the better prepared to enslave others, they were
themselves to be converted into men. The freedom of the individuals
might be the means of supplying soldiers who should equal the fanatics
who followed Suvaroff, or the patriots who followed Kutusoff, or the
avengers who followed the first Alexander to Paris. The experiment, at
all events, was worth trying; and the Czar is trying it on a scale that
most impressively affects both the mind and the imagination of mankind,
who may learn that his works are destined greatly to bear upon their
interests.
In war, it is not only men that are wanted, and in large numbers, but
money, and in large sums. Always of importance to the military monarch,
money is now the first thing that he must think of and provide, or his
operations will be checked effectually. War is a luxury that no poor
nation or poor king can now long enjoy. It is reserved for wealthy
nations, and for sovereigns who may possess the riches of Solomon
without being endowed with his wisdom. Having impressed so many agents
into its service, and subdued science itself to the condition of a
bondman, war consumes gold almost as rapidly as the searches and labors
of millions can produce it. The only sure, enduring source of wealth
is industry,--industry as enlightened in its modes and processes as
imperfect man will allow to exist. Russia is an empire that abounds with
the means of wealth, rather than with wealth itself. It is a country, or
collection of countries, of which almost anything in the way of
riches may be predicated, should intelligent labor be directed to the
development of its immense and various resources. Russian sovereigns
have frequently sought to do something for the people; but Alexander
II., a wiser man than any of his predecessors, is willing that the
people should do something for themselves, because he knows that all
that they shall gain, each man for himself, will be so much added to the
common stock of the empire. The many must become wealthy, in order that
one, the head of all, may become strong. Time and again has Russia found
her armies paralyzed and her victories barren because she was moneyless;
and but for the gold of foreign nations she must have halted in her
course, and never have become a European power. With a nation of freemen
all this may be, and most probably it will be, changed,--though it is
not so certain that the change will be attended with exactly that
order of results which the Czar may have arranged in his own mind. The
mightiest of monarchs are not exempt from the rule, that, while man
proposes, it is God who disposes the things of this world. Not one of
those reforming kings who broke down the power of the great nobles of
Western Europe, and so created absolute monarchies, appears to have had
any just conception of the business in which he was engaged; but all
were instruments in the hands of that mighty Power which overrules the
ambition of individuals so that it shall promote the welfare of the
world.
The two years that are set apart for the completion of the plan of
emancipation will be the trial time of Russia. They may expire, and
nothing have been done, and the condition of the peasants be no more
hopeful than it was in those years which followed the "good intentions"
of Alexander I. It is not difficult to see that there are numerous and
powerful disturbing causes to the success of the project. These causes
are of a twofold character. They are to be found in the internal state
of the empire, and in the relations which it holds to foreign
countries. There is still a powerful party in Russia who are opposed to
emancipation, and who, though repulsed for the time, are far from being
disheartened. One-half the nobility are supposed to be enemies of the
Imperial plan, and they will continue to throw every possible obstacle
in the way of its success. There is nothing so pertinacious, so
unrelenting, and so difficult to change, as an aristocratical body. The
best liberals the world has seen have been of aristocratical origin,
or democracy would have made but little advance; but what is true of
individuals is not true of the mass, which is obstinate and unyielding.
There is nothing that men so reluctantly abandon as direct power over
their fellows. The chief of egotists is the slaveholder, unless he
happen to be the wisest and best of men. Man loves his fellow-man--as
a piece of property, as a chattel, above all things. It is a striking
proof of superiority to be able to command men with the certainty of
being as blindly obeyed as was the Roman centurion. The sense of power
that is created by the possession of slaves is sure to render men
arbitrary of disposition and insolent in their conduct. The troubles of
our own country ought to be sufficient to convince every one that there
must be nobles in Russia who would prefer resistance to the Czar to the
elevation of millions whose depression is evidence of the power of the
privileged classes. But for the conviction that the United States could
no longer be ruled in the interest of the slaveholders, the Secession
movement would have been postponed for another generation, and certain
traitors would have gone to their graves with the reputation of having
been honest men. There are Secessionists in Russia, and for the next two
years they may be able to do much to prevent the completion of the work
so well begun by Alexander II. But he appears to be as resolute as they
can be, and even fanatically determined upon having his way. Supported
by one-half the nobles, and by all the serfs, and confident of the
army's loyalty, he ought to be able to triumph over all internal
opposition. What he has already effected has been extorted from a
powerful foe; and that costly step, the first step, having been taken,
the Russian reformers, headed by the Emperor, ought to prove victorious
in so vitally important a contest as that in which they have voluntarily
engaged.
The greatest danger to the emancipation project proceeds from the side
of foreign countries. As we have seen, both Alexander I. and Nicholas
were led away from the pursuit of a policy that might long since have
converted the Russian serfs into a Russian people, through their desire
to interfere in the affairs of other nations. They could not reform
Russia and crush reformers elsewhere. That they might decide grand
contests in which Russia had no immediate interest, it was necessary
that Russians should remain enslaved. What was it to Russia whether
Bourbons or Bonapartes should reign over France? If she had an interest
in the question, it was rather favorable to the Bonapartes, whom she
overthrew, than to the Bourbons, whom she set up in order that the
French might again overthrow them. The old Bourbons were never friendly
to Russia, and would gladly have headed a coalition to drive her back to
her forests; and the first Bonaparte was very desirous of being on good
terms with the Northern Colossus, as if he were dimly forewarned of his
coming fate at its hands. Led away from the true path, Alexander I.
squandered on foreign affairs the time, the industry, and the money that
should have been devoted to the prosecution of those internal reforms
that were necessary to convert his subjects into men. Nicholas inherited
from his unwise brother that policy which he so vehemently supported,
and which caused him to waste on France and Austria the attention and
the energy which, as a conscientious sovereign, he was bound to bestow
upon Russia. The danger now is that Alexander II. will walk in the same
wrong path that was found to lead only to destruction by his uncle and
his father. The world was never so unsettled as it is now, and wars of
the most extensive character threaten every country that is competent to
put an army into the field. The Italian question is yet to be solved,
and its solution concerns Russia, which is strongly interested in
every movement that threatens to break up the Austrian Empire, or that
promises to create in the Kingdom of Italy a new Mediterranean nation.
The Schleswig-Holstein question is yet to be settled, and Russia has an
immediate interest in its settlement, as Denmark, she expects, will one
day be her own. The Eastern question is as unanswerable as ever it has
been, and it is but a few weeks since the belief was common that Russia
and France were to unite for the purpose of settling it, which could
have meant nothing less than the partition of the Turkish Empire,--the
union of one of the "sick man's" old protectors with his enemy, for the
perfect plundering of his possessions. This arrangement, had it been
completed, would have led to a war between France and Russia, on the one
side, and England and Austria on the other, while half a dozen lesser
nations would have been drawn into the conflict. But if an alliance for
any such purpose was ever thought of by the Autocrat and the Stratocrat,
it is supposed that it fell through in consequence of the occurrence of
troubles in Russian Poland,--the Polish question, after having been kept
entirely out of sight for years, having suddenly forced itself on the
attention of Europe's monarchs, to the no small increase of their
perplexities. Here are four great questions that are intimately
connected with Russia's interests, any one of which, if pressed by
circumstances to a decision, would probably plunge her into a long
and costly war, one of the effects of which would be to postpone the
emancipation of the serfs for many years. No empire could effect an
internal change like that which the Czar has begun, and at the same time
carry on a war that would require immense expenditures and the active
services of a million of men. The Czar is in constant danger of being
"coerced" into a foreign war; and the enemies of emancipation would
throw all their weight on the side of the war faction, even if they
should feel but little interest in the fortunes of either party to
a contest into which Russia might be plunged. Leaving aside all the
questions mentioned but that of Turkey, that alone is ever threatening
to bring Russia into conflict with some of her neighbors. Neither
England nor Austria could allow her to have her will of Turkey, no
matter how excellent an opportunity might be presented by the death of
the Sultan, or some similar event, to strike an effectual blow at that
tottering, doomed empire. So that war ever hangs over the Czar from that
side, unless he should, for the sake of the domestic reform he so much
desiderates, disregard the traditions and abandon the purpose of his
house. Were he to do so, it would be a splendid example of self-denial,
and such as few men who have reigned have ever been capable of affording
either to the admiration or the derision of the world. But could he
safely do it? Then it does not altogether depend either upon the Czar or
upon his subjects whether he or they shall preserve the peace of their
country. Suppose Poland to rise,--and she has been becoming very wakeful
of late,--then war would be forced upon Russia; and that war might be
extended over most of Continental Europe. A Polish war could hardly
fail to draw Prussia and Austria into it, they being almost as much
interested in the maintenance of the partition as Russia; and France
could scarcely be kept out of such a contest, she having been the patron
of Poland ever since the partition was effected.
Considering the matter in its various bearings, and noting how
inflammable is the condition of the world, and observing that a Russian
war would be fatal to emancipation, we can but say, that the freedom of
the serfs is something that may be hoped for, but which we should not
speak of as assured. Alexander II. wishes to complete his work, but he
is only an instrument in the hands of Fate, and things may so fall
out as to cover the present fair prospect with those clouds and
that darkness in which have been forever enveloped some of the best
undertakings for the promotion of man's welfare. We may hope and pray
for a good ending to the reform that has been commenced, but it is not
without fear and trembling that we do so.
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