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2 by side with Tolstoi and Turgenev and not be eclipsed, there are none. Modern Russian fiction can be compared with that of the generation of the forties in Russia.

This falling off in artistic creation, after so glorious a blossoming, is a phenomenon which is in nowise discreditable to Russian genius, for it can be observed not in Russia alone. There is no continuity of progress in the domain of art such as we see in the domain of abstract thought. Whilst in science every new generation invariably marks a new stride in advance, in every branch of art we notice a modest beginning, after which the summit of perfection is reached, to be followed by a period of comparative inefficiency, protracted until a new historical period remoulds the conditions of life, and gives rise to a new