Page:Anthology of Modern Slavonic Literature in Prose and Verse by Paul Selver.djvu/41

Rh speaking about death. We had many arguments on religious questions; he denied and I affirmed.

It was Nadson who introduced me to the poet Pleshtcheyev, editorial secretary of the "National Annals." I can still see the gaunt and narrow shoulders wrapped in a plaid, and I can hear the hoarse, hollow cough, and the bellowing voice of Saltykov Shtchedrin, whose quarters were in the editorial sanctum.

My first appearance in public was, if I am not mistaken, in the year 1882, with a poem which was printed in the "Illustrated Review," under the management of Scheller-Mikhailov. My subsequent works were issued in the "National Annals." After I had passed out of the High School in 1884, I entered the historical-philological faculty of Petrograd University. I am scarcely more indebted to the University than to the High School. So that really I grew up without any schooling as well as without fatherly guidance.

During my time as a student I was a warm adherent of positivism—Spencer, Comte, Mill, Darwin. But as from my childhood I had heen religious, I had a dark inkling that positivist philosophy was unsound, I sought a solution, but found none, and was consumed by grief and doubt.

In the students' Historical Society, I debated with the convinced positivist Vodovosov, and