Page:Russian Realities and Problems - ed. James Duff (1917).djvu/64

 historical studies on the part of Russian and foreign scholars.

It would be a tempting task to distinguish the various elements of Russian economic life as they lie before us at the critical moment when Russia became a great power and definitely entered the European world on equal terms with other nations. It has been contended that the economic evolution of Russia before Peter the Great did not lead to a development of town life in the forms characteristic of Mediaeval Europe. It has also been said that feudalism never existed in Russia. These and other statements of the same sort are at once too absolute and too vague. Now we see clearly enough that Russia had some rudiments of the feudal system, which in a marked manner embodied the principles of feudalism. Again, the town institutions and the regulation of commerce and industry had in Russia before the time of Peter the Great very conspicuous points of resemblance to the more developed forms of Western Europe. We should obtain rather misleading results if we confined ourselves to contrasting the rude, primitive conditions of Russia with the complexity prevailing in Europe. What is really