Page:Russian Realities and Problems - ed. James Duff (1917).djvu/185

 of science and learning. This can be traced, for instance, in the works of Radishchev, one of the most enlightened Russian writers of the 18th century, an outspoken critic of despotism and an irreconcilable foe to serfdom.

This variety of influences had, however, one serious defect: it was wanting in unity. And Russian secular thought could attain this unity only after growing independent and in this sense national. Such a unifying national thought was needed, in order to work out this second-hand knowledge and perfect it by discoveries of its own.

National spirit was already very strong in the Muscovite State; but, being intimately connected with Orthodoxy, it could not actively promote secular thought. In the next century this connection was relaxed and foreign predominance produced a national reaction, shown for instance in the animosity, which arose in the Academy between Lomonosov and his German colleagues: he firmly believed in his own creative powers and urged his countrymen to "display their merit." But it was only after the wars which freed Russia and other countries from the dominion of Napoleon, that this national spirit manifested itself in a corresponding doctrine. Byelinsky wrote in 1834: "Romanticism was the principle proclaimed in the times of Pushkin, nationality is the alpha and omega of our own times," and in the name of this "national spirit" Nadezhdin required from his countrymen appreciation of their national individuality, and proper pride in themselves. This doctrine was developed by the Slavophiles—Kiryéevsky, Homyakov, and Aksakov,