Page:Leo Tolstoy - The Russian Revolution (1907).djvu/99

 82 virtuous man, and that if he be not such, then the subjects may and should cease to obey him. But I think that such a teaching is merely a justification of power, and as unsound as the teaching of Paul circulated amongst the European nations, which affirms that the powers are of God. The Chinese people cannot know whether their Emperor is wise and virtuous, just as the Christian nations could not know whether our power was granted by God to this ruler and not to that other one who fought against him.

These justifications of power could stand when the evil of power was not much felt by the people; but now that the majority of men feel all the disadvantages and injustice of power, of the power of one, or a few, over many, these justifications are not effective, and nations have to alter one way or another their attitude to authority. And the Western nations have long ago made this alteration: it is now the turn of the East. It is I think in such a position that Russia and Persia, Turkey and China now find themselves. All these nations have attained the period when they can no longer remain in their former attitude towards their rulers. As was correctly remarked by the Russian writer Gertzen: a Gengis Khan with telegraphs and electric motors is impossible. If Gengis Khans or men similar to them still exist in the East, it is clear that their hour has come and that they are the last. They cannot continue to exist both because owing to telegraphs and all that is called civilisation their power is becoming too oppressive, and because the nations, owing to the same civilisation, feel and recognise with especial keenness that the existence or non-existence of these Gengis Khans is for them not a matter of indifference as it used to be of old, but that almost all the calamities from which they suffer are produced precisely by this power to which they submit without any advantage to themselves but merely by habit.

In Russia this is certainly the case; I think that the same is true also of Turkey and Persia and China.

For China this is especially true, owing to the peaceful disposition of its population and the bad organisation of its Army