Page:The Spirit of Russia by T G Masaryk, volume 1.pdf/302

276 concerned here solely with changes in opinion, for we have to think whether nations and races change anthropologically and ethnically. Does the structure of the skeleton become modified; do the shape and size of the skull vary; if so, what causes the changes? Are they brought about by modifications of diet, by changed methods of work, by modifications in climate or place of residence, etc? Are nations subject in addition to psychical changes? Does the mode of feeling vary? Is the outward, the physiognomical aspect of peoples subject to change?

These are extremely complicated problems, which must be approached methodically and with great caution. Above all, in this connection, we must give due weight to the special problem of racial and national minglings. Using the popular catchword, we have to ask ourselves whether such a thing as a "pure race" really exists, or whether all races and nationalities are not in truth of mixed blood. As far as Russia is concerned, the doubt is of extreme significance, for during the Kievic period we know that as a historic fact a continuous mingling of races and peoples was in progress. In my biographical note on K. Aksakov, the reference to his Turkish grandmother was deliberate. We often hear of the African ancestors of Puškin, of the Tatar ancestors of Ivan Turgenev. Does the essence of the Russian character persist despite such racial minglings; to what extent does it persist; above all if it persists, how is its persistence secured?

What are we to say about denationalisation? When a nation abandons its language to adopt another, or when an individual or a number of individuals belonging to any nation experience such a change, what modification occurs in the national essence? Ševyrev, to whom we shall have to refer again shortly, said of the Russians of his day that they thought as Germans, and expressed themselves as Frenchmen. Were these still genuine Russians?

Such critical enquiries involve numerous and thorny problems, and they are problems to which as yet scant scientific attention has been paid.

Subjectively we have to think of the sentiment of nationality, of the fact that men love their nation, their nationality, their folk, more than they love foreigners.

We love also our country (love of fatherland, patriotism), and in the concrete we love the particular place where we were