Page:The Spirit of Russia by T G Masaryk, volume 1.pdf/440

414 of the mir, Russia can advance straightway to a higher level of development.

Herzen could invoke the authority of European socialists in support of this assumption that Russia might overleap the capitalist epoch. The matter will be discussed later in detail when we come to consider the identical view of the narodniki.

Of late much emphasis has been laid upon Herzen's "westernist socialism," and Herzen has been praised as founder of the narodničestvo. It is true that Herzen's socialism pave the way for the narodničestvo movement; that he uttered the watchword, Land and Liberty; and that he directed the intelligentsia towards the mužik. Herzen, however, was distinguished from the narodniki by the way in which he stressed the philosophic aspects of socialism, and tended to leave the economic-side of the question out of account. The narodniki developed their views in opposition to Marxism, and their economic and social outlook approximates far more closely than did Herzen's to that of Marx.

Herzen frequently endeavoured to ascertain which among the Russian characteristics would prove especially advantageous to the progress of Russian evolution. He considered that the Russian character exhibited remarkable plasticity, that it was endowed with great capacity for the acceptance and elaboration of the acquirements made by the foreign world. To him this seemed the most human side of the Russian disposition. The Russians, too, precisely because they were so accessible to the universally human, were better able than the French, the Germans, and the English to harmonise theory and practice. Herzen also extolled Russian realism. Finally he regarded the work of Puškin as a titanic manifestation full of glorious promise, the fruit of the vigorous Russian understanding and its capacity for culture.

Nor did Herzen forget to attach due importance to the size of the Russian state. Sixty million people; in less than half a century the number of Russian soldiers would be imposing, of soldiers who had already shown Europe their mettle. The Russians, too, had quite remarkable powers of resistance, for they had been able to maintain their peculiarities under the Tatar yoke and under the regime of German bureaucrats.

When he analysed the defects of the mir, Herzen was also aware of the defects in the Russian and Slav character. Passivity, humility, effeminacy, lack of individuality, char-