Page:The Spirit of Russia by T G Masaryk, volume 1.pdf/365

339 Čaadaev the westerniser as in that of the early slavophils. But even before Čaadaev and Kirěevskii, such liberal westernisers as Odoevskii and Galič expressed themselves as decisively opposed to scepticism, demanding that there should be "ﬁrm convictions for the conduct of life." Galič, a Schellingian, declared, "One cannot live without conviction." "To be happy," wrote Odoevskii, "man must have a luminous axiom, an axiom of wide implications, one that is all-embracing, one that brings deliverance from the torment of doubt." In harmony with this aim, Odoevskii considered that it was the fundamental characteristic of his time "to flee from scepticism, always to believe in something," and his beliefs were grounded on the sciences.

For these reasons enthusiasm was demanded and stimulated in all fields. Such was the dominant spirit in the circle of Stankevič, who then exercised great influence. Stankevič declared that a frigid man was necessarily a rascal, and was himself an enthusiast for music (Schubert) and literature. His most intimate friends were of like mood. It is noteworthy that the primary ideas of the westernisers and the slavophils were struck out in personal intercourse, and that the literary formulation of these views came later. Neither Čaadaev nor Stankevič nor Granovskii was a proliﬁc writer. They were all concerned quite as much with new ideals of life, with new trends, as simply with ideas and views. Both parties to the conflict we are considering were believers, enthusiastic believers, the westernisers in European ideals and the slavophils in Russia.

But as regards the content of their respective beliefs there is this great divergence between the westernisers and the slavophils, that the westernisers turned away from the Orthodox creed, whereas the slavophils clung to it, though in idealised form.

Philosophically the difference between the westernisers and the slavophils is tantamount to the difference between Hegel and Schelling. Cherishing Hegel, the westernisers cherished the rationalism condemned by the slavophils, and Schelling's belief in the absolute was replaced by Hegel's relativism. Whereas, with de Bonald, the European philosophy of restoration and reaction declared reason to be an emanation of the devil, the westernisers, though they frequently admitted the one-sidedness of rationalism, were of the school which does not underestimate the importance of reason.