Page:The Spirit of Russia by T G Masaryk, volume 2.pdf/307

Rh as the manifest victory of non-sense over sense, of chaos over cosmos. In a letter to Tolstoi, Solov'ev expressed his dissent from the latter's views in respect of one concrete particular, the doctrine of the resurrection.

Kant versus Plato, criticism versus myth and mysticism, such is the momentous contrast.

OLOV'EV'S general trend and the purport of his philosophical and religious aspirations make him appear as a successor of the slavophils and a continuer of their work, that of Kirěevskii and Homjakov at least. But in Solov'ev the mystical element is much stronger, is denser, I might say, and more opaque. His criticism and negation of Byzantium and Old Russia has much in common with Čaadaev, for Solov'ev and Čaadaev displayed similar leanings towards Catholicism.

Solov'ev's critical side brought him into association with the westernisers and the liberals, although these by no means approved of his mysticism. Čičerin and Kavelin both protested against Solov'ev's mysticism, being concerned, of course, not solely with the distinction in individual points of teaching, but with the entire trend and mood. Compare, for example, Solov'ev with Mihailovskii; how great is the contrast between the positivist critic, the "profane" man, and the mystical prophet.

Mysticism and the philosophy of religion brought Solov'ev for a time into association with Katkov and Leont'ev, the latter, during his closing years, being much disquieted by Solov'ev's philosophy of history and by his criticism of the Russian church and of the Orthodox church in general. Solov'ev defended Dostoevskii against Leont'ev's accusation of "new" Christianity, but it was characteristic that Solov'ev should have completely failed to recognise the devastating internal struggle with nihilism that was taking place in Dostoevskii's mind.

Solov'ev shunned intercourse with the socialists and the narodniki, for he detested economic materialism and "economism" in general. Religious prejudice (I can use no other term) made it impossible for Solov'ev to understand socialism. If he regarded socialism as nothing more than the extremest manifestation of bourgeois civilisation, it was because his