A history of Russia

by Riazanovsky

  Ministries opposite the Winter Palace, Leningrad, 1819-29.

  Cathedral of Our Lady of Kazan in Leningrad, 1801-11.

  Ivan the Terrible and His Son by Repin.

  View of the Admiralty, 1806-10, and St. Isaac's Cathedral, 1768-1858, Leningrad.

  Petrodvorets (Peterhof), summer palace built by Peter the Great, 1722-50, near Leningrad.

  The Cossacks of the Zaporozhie Writing a Letter to the Turkish Sultan by Repin.

  Cathedral of St. Dmitrii, 1194-7, in Vladimir.

  A church in ancient Suzdal.

  Ivan the Terrible

  Catherine the Great

  Peter I, the Great

  Ivan III, the Great

  Leo Tolstoy

  Fedor Dostoevsky

  Vissarion Belinsky

  Ivan Turgenev

  ideas can be considered creative rather than merely imitative, there is no convincing reason for dissociating Russian intellectual history of the first half of the nineteenth century from that of the rest of Europe, whether in the name of the alleged uniquely religious nature of the ideological development in Russia or in order to satisfy the peculiar Soviet nationalism.

  In particular, two German philosophers, Schelling first and then Hegel, exercised strong influence on the Russians. Schelling affected certain professors and a number of poets - the best Russian expression of some Schellingian views can be found in Tiutchev's unsurpassed poetry of nature - and also groups of intellectuals and even schools of thought, such as the Slavophile. It was largely an interest in Schelling that led to the establishment of the first philosophic "circle" and the first philosophic review in Russia. In 1823 several young men who had been discussing Schelling in a literary group formed a separate society with the study of German idealistic philosophy as its main object. The circle chose the name of "The Lovers of Wisdom" and came to contain a dozen members and associates, many of whom were to achieve prominence in Russian intellectual life. It published four issues of a journal, Mnemosyne. The leading Lovers of Wisdom included a gifted poet, Dmitrii Venevitinov, who died in 1827 at the age of twenty-two, and Prince Vladimir Odoevsky, 1803-69, who developed interesting views concerning the decline of the West and the great future of Russia to issue from the combination and fruition of both the pre-Petrine and the Petrine heritages. The Lovers of Wisdom reflected the romantic temper of their generation in a certain kind of poetic spiritualism that pervaded their entire outlook, in their worship of art, in their pantheistic adoration of nature, and in their disregard for the "crude" aspects of life, including politics. The group disbanded after the Decembrist rebellion in order not to attract police attention.

  A decade later, the question of the nature and destiny of Russia was powerfully and shockingly presented by Peter Chaadaev. In his Philosophical Letter, published in the Telescope in 1836, Chaadaev argued, in effect, that Russia had no past, no present, and no future. It had never really belonged to either the West or the East, and it had contributed nothing to culture. In particular, Russia lacked the dynamic social principle of Catholicism, which constituted the basis of the entire Western civilization. Indeed, Russia remained "a gap in the intellectual order of things." Chaadaev, who was officially proclaimed deranged by the incensed authorities after the publication of the letter, later modified his thesis in his Apology of a Madman. Russia, he came to believe, did enter history through the work of Peter the Great and could obtain a glorious future by throwing all of its fresh strength into the construction of the common culture of Christendom.

  Russian intellectual life grew apace in the 1840's and 1850's. Spurred

  by Schelling, by an increasing Hegelian influence, and by German romantic thought in general, as well as by the new importance of Russia in Europe ever since the cataclysm of 1812 and by the blossoming of Russian culture, several ideologies emerged to compete for the favor of the educated public. Official Nationality, which we considered in an earlier chapter, represented the point of view of the government and the Right. While it cannot be included in what Herzen called "intellectual emancipation," it did possess influential spokesmen among professors and writers, not to mention censors and other officials, and played a prominent role on the Russian scene. On the one hand, Official Nationality may be regarded as a culmination of reactionary currents in Russia, which found earlier protagonists in such figures as Rostopchin, Shishkov, Magnitsky, and in part Karamzin. On the other hand, it too, in particular its more nationalistic wing that was typified by the Moscow University professors Michael Po-godin and Stephen Shevyrev, testified to the impact of German romanticism on Russia. The Slavophiles and the Westernizers developed the two most important independent, as opposed to government-sponsored, schools of thought. The Petrashevtsy, by contrast, had a briefer and more obscure history. But they did represent yet another intellectual approach to certain key problems of the age.

  The Slavophiles were a group of romantic intellectuals who formulated a comprehensive and remarkable ideology centered on their belief in the superior nature and supreme historical mission of Orthodoxy and of Russia. The leading members of the group, all of them landlords and gentlemen-scholars of broad culture and many intellectual interests, included Alexis Khomiakov who applied himself to everything from theology and world history to medicine and technical inventions, Ivan Kireevsky who has been called the philosopher of the movement, his brother Peter who collected folk songs and left very little behind him in writing, Constantine Aksakov, a specialist in Russian history and language, Constantine's brother Ivan, later prominent as a publicist and a Pan-Slav, and George Samarin who was to have a significant part in the emancipation of the serfs and who wrote especially on certain religious and philosophical topics, on the problem of the borderlands of the empire, and on the issue of reform in Russia. This informal group, gathering in the salons and homes of Moscow, flourished in the 1840's and 1850's until the death of the Kireevsky brothers in 1856 and of Khomiakov and Constantine Aksakov in 1860.

  Slavophilism expressed a fundamental vision of integration, peace, and harmony among men. On the religious plane it produced Khomiakov's concept of sobornost, an association in love, freedom, and truth of believers, which Khomiakov considered the essence of Orthodoxy. Historically, so the Slavophiles asserted, a similar harmonious integration of individuals

  could be found in the social life of the Slavs, notably in the peasant commune - described as "a moral choir" by Constantine Aksakov - and in such other ancient Russian institutions as the zemskii sobor. Again, the family represented the principle of integration in love, and the same spirit could pervade other associations of human beings. As against love, freedom, and co-operation stood the world of rationalism, necessity, and compulsion. It too existed on many planes, from the religious and metaphysical to that of everyday life. Thus it manifested itself in the Roman Catholic Church - which had chosen rationalism and authority in preference to love and harmony and had seceded from Orthodox Christendom - and, through the Catholic Church, in Protestantism and in the entire civilization of the West. Moreover, Peter the Great introduced the principles of rationalism, legalism, and compulsion into Russia, where they proceeded to destroy or stunt the harmonious native development and to seduce the educated public. The Russian future lay in a return to native principles, in overcoming the Western disease. After being cured, Russia would take its message of harmony and salvation to the discordant and dying West. It is important to realize that the all-embracing Slavophile dichotomy represented - as pointed out by Stepun and others - the basic romantic contrast between the romantic ideal and the Age of Reason. In particular, as well as in general, Slavophilism fits into the framework of European romanticism, although the Slavophiles showed considerable originality in adapting romantic doctrines to their own situation and needs and although they also experienced the influence of Orthodox religious thought and tradition.

  In its application to the Russia of Nicholas I the Slavophile teaching often produced paradoxical results, antagonized t
he government, and baffled Slavophile friends and foes alike. In a sense, the Slavophiles were religious anarchists, for they condemned all legalism and compulsion in the name of their religious ideal. Yet, given the sinful condition of man, they granted the necessity of government and even expressed a preference for autocracy: in addition to its historical roots in ancient Russia, autocracy possessed the virtue of placing the entire weight of authority and compulsion on a single individual, thus liberating society from that heavy burden; besides, the Slavophiles remained unalterably opposed to Western constitutional and other legalistic and formalistic devices. Yet this justification of autocracy remained historical and functional, therefore relative, never religious and absolute. Furthermore, the Slavophiles desired the emancipation of the serfs and other reforms, and, above all, insisted on the "freedom of the life of the spirit," that is, freedom of conscience, speech, and publication. As Constantine Aksakov tried to explain to the government: "Man was created by God as an intelligent and a talking being." Also, Khomiakov and his friends opposed such aspects of the established

  order as the death penalty, government intrusion into private life, and bureaucracy in general. "Thus the first relationship of the government and the people is the relationship of mutual non-interference…" No wonder Slavophile publications never escaped censorship and prohibition for long.

  The Westernizers were much more diverse than the Slavophiles, and their views did not form a single, integrated whole. Besides, they shifted their positions rather rapidly. Even socially the Westernizers consisted of different elements, ranging from Michael Bakunin who came from a gentry home like those of the Slavophiles, to Vissarion Belinsky whose father was an impoverished doctor and grandfather a priest, and Basil Botkin who belonged to a family of merchants. Yet certain generally held opinions and doctrines gave a measure of unity to the movement. The Slavophiles and the Westernizers started from similar assumptions of German idealistic philosophy, and indeed engaged in constant debate with each other, but came to different conclusions. While Khomiakov and his friends affirmed the uniqueness of Russia and the superiority of true Russian principles over those of the West, the other party argued that the Western historical path was the model that Russia had to follow. Russia could accomplish its mission only in the context of Western civilization, not in opposition to it. Naturally, therefore, the Westernizers took a positive view of Western political development and criticized the Russian system. Contrary to the Slavophiles, they praised the work of Peter the Great, but they wanted further Westernization. Also, whereas the Slavophiles anchored their entire ideology in their interpretation and appraisal of Orthodoxy, the Westernizers assigned relatively little importance to religion, while some of them gradually turned to agnosticism and, in the case of Bakunin, even to violent atheism. To be more exact, the moderate Westernizers retained religious faith and an essentially idealistic cast of mind, while their political and social program did not go beyond mild liberalism, with emphasis on gradualism and popular enlightenment. These moderates were typified by Nicholas Stankevich, who brought together a famous early Westernizer circle but died in 1840 at the age of twenty-seven before the movement really developed, and by Professor Timothy Granovsky, who lived from 1813 to 1855 and taught European history very successfully at the University of Moscow. The radical Westernizers, however, largely through Hegelianism and Left Hegelianism, came to challenge religion, society, and the entire Russian and European system, and to call for a revolution. Although few in number, they included such major figures as Vissarion Belinsky, 1811-48, Alexander Herzen, 1812-70, and Michael Bakunin, 1814-76.

  Belinsky, the most famous Russian literary critic, exercised a major in-

  fluence on Russian intellectual life in general. He had the rare good fortune to welcome the works of Pushkin, Lermontov, and Gogol and the debuts of Dostoevsky, Turgenev, and Nekrasov. Belinsky's commentary on the Russian writers became famous for its passion, invective, and eulogy, as well as for its determination to treat works of literature in the broader contexts of society, history, and thought, and to instruct and guide the authors and the reading public. Belinsky's own views underwent important changes and had not achieved cohesiveness and stability at the time of his death. His impact on Russian literature, however, proved remarkably durable and stable: it consisted above all in the establishment of political and social criteria as gauges for evaluating artistic works. As Nekrasov put it later, one did not have to be a poet, but one was under obligation to be a citizen. Following Belinsky's powerful example, political and social ideologies, banned from direct expression in Russia, came to be commonly expounded in literary criticism.

  Both Herzen and Bakunin became prominent in the 1830's and 1840's, but lived well beyond the reign of Nicholas I. Moreover, much of their activity, such as Herzen's radical journalistic work abroad and Bakunin's anarchist theorizing and plotting, belonged to the time of Alexander II and will have to be mentioned in a subsequent chapter. Yet their intellectual evolution in the decades preceding the "great reforms" formed a significant part of that seminal period of Russian thought. Herzen, whose autobiographical account My Past and Thoughts is one of the most remarkable works of Russian literature, came from a well-established gentry family, like the Slavophiles and Bakunin, but was an illegitimate child. He became a leading opponent of Khomiakov in the Muscovite salons and a progressive Westernizer. Gradually Herzen abandoned the doctrines of idealistic philosophy and became increasingly radical and critical in his position, stressing the dignity and freedom of the individual. In 1847 he left Russia, never to return. Bakunin has been described as "founder of nihilism and apostle of anarchy" - Herzen said he was born not under a star but under a comet - but he began peacefully enough as an enthusiast of German thought, especially Hegel's. Several years earlier than Herzen, Bakunin too left Russia. Before long he turned to Left Hegelianism and moved beyond it to anarchism and a sweeping condemnation of state, society, economy, and culture in Russia and in the world. Bakunin emphasized destruction, proclaiming in a signal early article that the passion for destruction was itself a creative passion. While Herzen bitterly witnessed the defeat of the revolution of 1848 in Paris, Bakunin attended the Pan-Slav Congress in Prague and participated in the revolution in Saxony. After being handed over by the Austrian government to the Russian, he was to spend over a decade in fortresses and in Siberian exile. Both Herzen, disappointed in the

  West, and Bakunin, ever in search of new opportunities for revolution and anarchism, came to consider the peasant commune in Russia as a superior institution and as a promise of the future social transformation of Russia - a point made earlier by the Slavophiles, although, of course, from different religious and philosophical positions - thus laying the foundation for subsequent native Russian radicalism.

  The Petrashevtsy were another kind of radicals. That informal group of two score or more men, who from late 1845 until their arrest in the spring of 1849 gathered on Fridays at the home of Michael Butashevich-Petra-shevsky in St. Petersburg, espoused especially the teaching of the strange French Utopian socialist Fourier. Fourier preached the peaceful transformation of society into small, well-integrated, and self-supporting communes, which would also provide for the release and harmony of human passions according to a fantastic scheme of his own invention. Many Petrashevtsy, however, added to Fourierism political protest, demand for reform, and general opposition to the Russia of Nicholas I. The government took such a serious view of the situation that it condemned twenty-one men to death, although it changed their sentence at the place of execution in favor of less drastic punishments. It was as a member of the Petrashevtsy that Dostoevsky faced imminent execution and later went to Siberia. The Petrashevtsy, it might be added, came generally from lower social strata than did the Lovers of Wisdom, the Slavophiles, and the Westernizers, and included mostly minor officials, junior officers, and students.

  Several trends in the intellectual history of Russia in the first half of the nineteenth cent
ury deserve attention. If we exclude the Decembrists as belonging ideologically to an earlier period, Russian thought moved from the abstract philosophizing and the emphasis on esthetics characteristic of the Lovers of Wisdom, through the system-building of the Slavophiles and, to a lesser extent, the Westernizers to an increasing concern with the pressing issues of the day, as exemplified by the radical Westernizers and, in a different sense, by the Petrashevtsy. At the same time radicalism grew among the educated Russians, especially as German idealistic philosophy and romanticism in general disintegrated. Moreover, socialism entered Russian history, both through such individuals as Herzen and his life-long friend Nicholas Ogarev and through an entire group of neophytes, the Petra-shevsty. Also, the intellectual stratum increased in number and changed somewhat in social composition, from being solidly gentry, as the Slavophiles still were, to a more mixed membership characteristic of the Westernizers and the Petrashevtsy. All in all, Russian thought in the reigns of Alexander I and Nicholas I, and especially the "intellectual emancipation" of the celebrated forties, was to have a great impact on the intellectual evolution of Russia and indeed on Russian history all the way to 1917 and even beyond.