Page:Phelps - Essays on Russian Novelists.djvu/129

 Such remarks enraged the Slavophils beyond measure, for they were determined to keep out of Russia foreign inventions and foreign ideas. But that Turgenev was right is shown in the twentieth century by an acute German observer, Baron Von der Bruggen. In his interesting book, Russia of To-day, he says: "All civilisation is derived from the West … People are now beginning to understand this in Russia after having lost considerable time with futile phantasies upon original Slavonic civilisation. If Russia wishes to progress, her Western doors must be opened wide in order to facilitate the influx of European culture." The author of these words was not thinking of Turgenev: but his language is a faithful echo of Potugin. They sound like a part of his discourse. Still, the literary value of Smoke does not lie in the fact that Turgenev was a true prophet, or that he successfully attacked those who had attacked him. If this were all that the book contained, it would certainly rank low as a work of art.

But this is not all. Turgenev has taken for his hero Litvinov, a young Russian, thoroughly commonplace, but thoroughly practical and sincere, the type of man whom Russia needed the most, and has placed him between two women, who represent the eternal contrast between sacred and profane love. This situation has all the elements