Page:The Spirit of Russia by T G Masaryk, volume 1.pdf/394

368 were as little able as Gogol himself to find a way out of the difficulty.

Bělinskii carries on his campaign against mysticism with the aid of the philosophy of history as well as with that of the philosophy of religion. The contrat between mysticism and rational knowledge is the standard by which he judges Russia and Europe, the standard he applies to the old Russia and the new. The disciple of Feuerbach and Strauss recognised in the old Russia a well-developed national and independent life, but this life was one of unconscious contemplation, essentially mystical, such as is characteristic of the east, of Asia. The Russian consciousness awakened with the coming of Peter; Russia began to live the European life of willing and knowing; the Russian struggled towards the light and endeavoured to strengthen his individuality. But since the days of Peter, Russia had been cleft in twain, for the people continued to live as of old, whilst the world of society had abandoned and forgotten the ancient tradition, and continued to stride forward along the path of Europeanisation.

The agreement with Čaadaev and also with the slavophils is plain, but the agreement with the slavophils extends only to the recognition of the difference between Europe and Russia and the difference between prepetrine and postpetrine Russia. When the difference comes to be appraised, there exists between Bělinskii and the slavophils the difference between Europe and Old Russia, the difference between rationalism and mysticism—if we may use these concepts summarily in Bělinskii's sense. The word mysticism is applied by Bělinskii to religious mysticism, but he uses it also to denote the theological outlook in general, the entire outlook of Old Russia on the universe.

Dostoevskii tells us that Bělinskii, when he went for a walk, was fond of going to watch the building of the first railway station at St. Petersburg. "It cheers me to stand there for a while and watch the work going on. At last, I say to myself, we are going to have one railway at least. You can’t imagine how this raises my spirits!" Dostoevskii here gives us the real Bělinskii. His delight in the building of the railway is his faith in Europe and in Young Russia, his faith in the saving power of knowledge, his faith in the deliverance of Russia from the slackening bonds of theocratic absolutism.

Bělinskii fights superstition, and, as he uses the term, superstition embraces religion and theology in general. Feuer-