Page:The Spirit of Russia by T G Masaryk, volume 1.pdf/381

Rh of heroes, and in the case under consideration it is the work of the tsar whom Bělinskii places upon the same footing with God, hero, and nation—for the concepts merge into a single mythical and mystical complex. Bělinskii is so obsessed by this political anthropomorphism, or rather sociomorphism, that in the name "tsar" he discovers, like every Russian, poetic depths and a mysterious significance. "Our tsar" is of course Tsar Nicholas. Bělinskii reiterates the patriarchal theory of the origin of Russian absolutism, and he opposes the Russian state and the Russian folk to Europe; just like the slavophils, and also just like Count Uvarov.

From this standpoint, cosmopolitanism was to Bělinskii a phantom, something hazy and impalpable, and in no sense a living reality; liberalism as a whole was nothing but French chatter. Power, says Bělinskii, with Paul, is from God; the tsar is the real "vicegerent" of God; a president, like the president of the American republic, is doubtless respectworthy, but he is not sacred, for he owes his existence to the revolution.

If we were to judge Bělinskii's article on Borodino solely by political canons, we could appeal on his behalf to the great authority of Hegel. In his acceptance of reality Bělinskii was certainly no worse than Hegel. Whilst Hegel came in the end to discover his mystical and mythical "absolute reason" in the Teutonic world, in the Prussian state and the Prussian monarchy, in Frederick William III of Prussia, Bělinskii, for the same reason and with much the same justification, could be an enthusiast for the Russia of Uvarov and Nicholas. But Bělinskii could appeal to other authority besides that of Hegel. Bakunin approved the article and at this time the views of Bělinskii's friends in Moscow were, speaking generally, far from being clarified and differentiated. Of Belinskii too, it must be said that he lacked philosophical clarity. Besides, in his essay on Borodino he is by no means the orthodox Hegelian that he might be supposed in view of his adopting the proposition concerning the rationality of the real. This is plain from his insistence upon the organic growth of the Russian state, and from his whole conception of the world as an organism, for here Bělinskii inclines more towards Schelling, the romanticists, and the historical school of law, than towards Hegel. Again, he identifies the Russian state with the nation in a manner which is not wholly Hegelian. He stresses the