Page:The Spirit of Russia by T G Masaryk, volume 1.pdf/293

Rh in especial he defended on peculiar lines the theocratic view ithat the state is of comparatively little value, and even a practical impossibility.

According to Konstantin Aksakov, in the political sphere Russia has a twofold organisation, as country and as state. By "country" he understands the organic fusion of all the individual communes into a single community—the country. The country is the complex of tilled land, the complex of the individual mirs, but the mir is a purely ethical community grounded upon the unanimity of all its members. Aksakov rejects the principle of majority rule as a coercive institution; in their deliberative assemblies the Slavs have ever been willing to take action solely, upon unanimous decisions. The Slavic organisation, pacific in character, based upon free conviction and upon the consciences of all the associated individuals, is termed by Aksakov the way of "inner truth"; contrasted therewith is the "outer truth" manifested in the organisation of the European state by coercive and conquering authority. Where "outer truth" is established there must be law, legal formulation, and written guarantees.

How can we explain the origin of the extant Russian state side by side with the "country"? To this question Aksakov replies that the state is a necessary concession to human frailty. If all men were holy, the state would be superfluous. Aksakov consoles himself with the reflection that while the Russian state did not originate from the people, but was imported and organised from without, this took place because the state was