Page:Michael Farbman - The Russian Revolution & The War (1917).djvu/28

 it!" In this popular saying you have an illuminating glimpse, not only of the wide gulf between people and State, but of the absence of any feeling that there was a State. Not only was there no eventual unity between people and State, governed and governors, there was no real feeling of unity among the people themselves, and only the most rudimentary idea of there being a State at all. The Revolution suddenly gave Russia a new aspect of life. Russia became a State, a nation, a Fatherland. The idea of the State as something hostile and alien was transformed into an idea of the State as something intimate, or, as a Russian would put it, as "our own." A fact of the Russian temperament is that it is devoid of brag. Russians, as a people, do not habitually over-estimate their gifts and talents or importance. They are far from considering themselves the salt of the earth. In Russia the conception of "Russland ueber Alles" would be quite impossible. On the contrary, Russians have a very modest opinion of them-