XXX A VISIT TO TOLSTO?—CONTINUED

At six o'clock we were summoned to dinner, at which the count appeared. As entrée there were baked fish—for the count, rice cutlets—then a roast and vegetables, of which the count took only the latter; then dessert and black coffee. We drank kvass, later tea, with cakes. Everything was very well prepared. A man-servant waited at table. It is by no means petty to tell all this. The Tolsto?s do not live on locusts and wild honey, but like other good families in Russia. We have, thank Heaven, outgrown the days when genius had to assert itself by extravagant conduct. Brilliant originality is entirely compatible with conformity to custom in all every-day usages, according to our way of thinking. Conversely, all originality immediately becomes suspicious in our eyes when it labors to assert itself in trifles. "A wise man behaves like other people." The individuality of Tolsto? shows in no way the stamp of the idle wish to differentiate itself in each and every particular from other people.

No one will expect me to reproduce every detail[Pg 311] of the conversation, which began at dinner and ended almost six hours later at the house door. I certainly have not forgotten a word of it, but I cannot answer for the order of succession of subjects, nor even for every expression and every turn of speech. I therefore reconstruct from memory only what seems to me the most important, and ask every indulgence for this report. It is as faithful as is possible to human inadequacy after such fatigues and excitements, and with rather tardy notes.

"I am now under the influence of two Germans," began the count. "I am reading Kant and Lichtenberg—selections, to be sure, for I do not possess an original edition. I am fascinated by the clearness and grace of their style, and in particular by Lichtenberg's keen wit."

"Goethe says, 'When Lichtenberg makes a jest, a whole system is hidden behind it,'" I threw in.

"I do not understand how the Germans of to-day can so neglect their writer and go so mad over a coquettish feuilletonist like Nietzsche. He is no philosopher, and has no honest purpose of seeking and speaking the truth."

"But he has an unprecedented polish of style, and an endless amount of temperament."

"Schopenhauer seems to me greater as a stylist. Still, I agree with you that he has a glittering polish, though it is only the facile grace of the feuilletonist, which does not entitle him to a place among the great thinkers and teachers of humanity."

[Pg 312]

"He flatters, however, the aristocratic instincts of the new-Germans, who have attained power and honor, and he works against the evils of socialism."

"What is the condition of socialism in Germany?" asked the count, immediately, with great interest.

"I fear it has lost in depth and strength what it has gained in breadth."

"You may be right," he answered. "I have the same impression. The belief in its invincibility is broken, and its internal strength of conviction begins to weaken. It had to be so. Socialism cannot free humanity. No system and no doctrine can do that—nothing but religion."

"The Church says that, too."

"But she teaches it falsely. What is religion? The striving of each individual soul towards perfection; the subordination to an ideal. As long as a man has that he feels a purpose in life, can endure all sufferings, and is capable of any strain. It does not need necessarily to be a lofty ideal. A man may have an ambition to develop his biceps to an uncommon degree. If he takes this as his particular purpose in life this aim carries him along completely. To be sure, a man's choice of an ideal can be only apparently capricious. In reality we are all products of our environment; and after nineteen hundred years of Christianity we cannot with any true conviction set up ideals which contradict the real Christianity. We can make ourselves believe something else for a while. But the [Pg 313]conscience will not submit to be silenced. Peace is attained only by the religious ideal of perfection and of love of humanity. Nothing is deadly except cynicism and nihilism."

"I remember your metaphor, comparing a society without religion or moral enthusiasm to an orchestra that has lost its leader. It keeps in time for a while, then come the discords."

"We are now in the first measure after his departure. All will go well for a while, but then every one will get out of time; the leaders first, because they are most exposed to temptation; then, class by class, the lower ones also."

"I believe a state is like a magnet, in which every smallest particle must have its direction, or else the whole loses its strength and cohesion."

"Exactly. A state or a society, like the individual, is fit for life only so long as it feels as a whole a reason for being. This life principle of totality is, however, identical with the idea of the individual. It is the stream that encircles each particle and brings it into polarity."

"People try to reach it by the ideal of nationalism and patriotism."

"That is no ideal. It is an absurd idea, which immediately comes into irreconcilable conflict with our better feelings. An ideal that can and does require me to kill my neighbor in order to gain an advantage for the group to which I belong is criminal."

[Pg 314]

"Yet it is dangerous to stand out against it. You had a controversy on that point with Spielhagen, who cast it up to you that you incline people to fling themselves under the wheels of a flying express-train."

"I remember. But Spielhagen does not know how many people already comply with the requirements of the gospel. The Doukhobors are such people."

"But they were obliged to leave the country."

"What difference does that make? They were able to remain true to themselves. That is better than remaining at home. And when we have once changed education, and have taken the sinful glorification of deeds of murder out of the hands of our children, then there will be not merely thousands, but millions, who will refuse to sacrifice themselves, or have themselves murdered for the ambition or the material advantage of a few individuals. And then this chapter of world-history will end."

"But the school is a matter of politics, and the state or the influential classes will be careful not to permit an education that will make their lower classes unavailable for purposes of war."

"Certainly. And as long as there is a church which by its fundamental teaching delivers itself over as an assistant to the state, and which blesses weapons of murder, so long will it be hard to fight against the evil instincts thus aroused. But school, of course, does not end man's education. Later[Pg 315] reading is much more important. We have, therefore, created something that might well be imitated abroad also, our 'Posrednik,' books for the people. The thing that suppresses bad reading among the people is good books, especially stories. The books are sold very cheaply. Our artists design frontispieces for them. You must look at them in Moscow. I will give you a letter to the publisher, my friend Ivan Ivanovitch Gorbunov, who can tell you the details."

He did so. With his kind letter I afterwards looked up Gorbunov in Moscow. Under the pressure of the Russian censorship he accomplishes the immense work of spreading among the people every year several million good books at a cost of a few kopeks each, without having needed to add to his original capital of thirty thousand rubles. I fulfil a duty, and at the same time a wish of Tolsto?'s, in here calling attention most emphatically to this magnificent Russian enterprise, which should be an example for all other nations.

I took up the subject of socialism again, and said, "In the West, Social Democracy is trying to solve the problem of educating the masses and to emancipate them."

"This is certainly meritorious," replied the count. "The mistake lies in the teaching of the Social Democrats that some other organization of society will automatically abolish evil from the world. The principal thing, however, is always to raise the [Pg 316]individual to better morals and better ways of thinking. Without this no system can be permanent. Each leads only to new violence. People ought not to wish to better the world, but to better themselves."

"In that you agree essentially with our Moderns, who likewise take a stand against socialism and preach an extreme individualism. I see in that only a reactionary man?uvre, however."

"How so?" asked the count.

"I believe that all wars for culture are always fought in a small class of thinking people. For the masses, provision for material needs is really the principal thing. In the thinking class, however, there are two parties: one, consisting of the feudalists, the plutocrats, and university-bred business men, fortune-hunters, seeks for itself the privilege of exploiting others; the other consists of the idealists, who desire progress—that is, the education and freeing of the masses. Sometimes the one class, with its aristocratic philosophy of profit, wins the upper hand, sometimes the other. We do not yet know in what Hellenic or Sidonian laws the spiritual ebb and flow will find its consummation. It is certain, however, that each party uses as a means of attraction the declaration that its point of view is the more progressive and that the opposite is the losing side. The individualists, in their scorn of socialism, render the most valuable service towards fundamental and complete reaction to the [Pg 317]aristocratic-plutocratic party of exploitation, because they spread confusion in the ranks of the idealists by discrediting their solidarity. Nevertheless, they call themselves "the Moderns," and dub the advocates of solidarity 'old fogies.' The most modern thing in the West is a vile cult of the Uebermensch (over-man) Renaissance sentimentalism and the cult of beauty in bearing—?sthetic snobism."

"All that originates with Nietzsche. The mistake, however, does not lie in the principle of individualism, which does not exclude solidarity, but, on the contrary, advances it. For the individual unquestionably attains solidarity in the very struggle towards his own perfection. The mistake lies in the ?stheticism, in the basing of life on externals and on enjoyment. Connected with this is the strangest thing of all, that this resurrection of the madness of the Renaissance has not made use of art. For all that is produced is nothing but pure silliness. I have not laughed so much for years as at an entirely serious account of the contents of Mona Vanna, or at the poems which our ?sthete and decadent Balmont read to me. None of those things are to be taken seriously as art. They will only confuse people through their absurdity, which could not exist if the healthy human understanding had not been brought into discredit. It is no better with you in Germany. Why is your literary product so low?"

[Pg 318]

"Who knows, count? It has already been asserted that since 1870 the gifted minds have turned to more serious and more lucrative callings than literature. But I do not believe it. The sciences show at present just as few geniuses as the arts. It seems as if there were laws of ebb and flow here, too. Sometimes a whole billow of inspired intellects is flung upon the earth, and then there is long drought. We have had no great writers since Gottfried Keller."

"Gottfried Keller? I have never heard the name before. Who was he? What did he write?"

"He was a Swiss who inherited Goethe's free outlook on life, and wrote the best German novels, full of creative art, of racy humor, and of almost uncanny knowledge of human nature. He would give you much pleasure."

"How? You say he inherits to some degree from Goethe. In that case my enthusiasm would be doubtful, for I cannot say I especially love that Goethe of yours."

"Is it possible?"

"There are some of his works I admire without reserve, which stand among the finest things that have ever been written: Hermann and Dorothea, for instance. I once knew his dedication by heart. Yet the lyrics of Heine, for instance, make a deeper impression upon me than Goethe's."

"Pardon the remark, count, but in that case your knowledge of the German language is not [Pg 319]sufficient for you to notice the difference in quality. Heine is a virtuoso, who plays with form. With Goethe, every word breathes the deepest spiritual experience and is uttered from inward necessity."

"The same thing is said here of Pushkin—that his greatness can be appreciated only by those who are most deeply imbued with the spirit of the language. I haven't any too much faith in all that, however. To be sure, a translation is only the wrong side of the carpet; yet I believe really great works hold their own in translation, so the form of phrase cannot be the only test for the value of a writing. But what repels me in Goethe is precisely that play on form of which you accuse Heine. Goethe and Shakespeare are both artists in the sense in which you reproach the Moderns. They are bent only upon ?sthetic play, and create only for enjoyment, and not with the heart's blood."

"I could not admit that, count, without repudiating everything I have ever thought and felt. Not for Shakespeare, in whom, through all the dramatic conventions of the greater part, we hear the heartbeat often enough. As for Goethe, whose poems are partly painful confessions, written only for the reason he himself gives,
"Warum sucht' ich den Weg so sehnsuchtsvoll
Wenn ich ihn nicht den Brüdern zeigen soll?"[15]

[Pg 320]

"I find much more of this feeling for humanity in Schiller."

"He is more rhetorical, appeals more directly to the middle class and contemporaries. But, like the overbearing political tribune he was, he has hardly entered into the joy and sorrow of the human soul."

"And it is exactly this that brings him nearer to me than Goethe and Shakespeare. He is filled with a sacred sense of purpose in his work. He had not the cold ambition of the artist to be merely faithful to his model. He was full of longing that we should be carried away with him. Of the three requirements I make of the great artist—technical perfection, worthiness of subject, and self-identification with the matter—the last is the most important. One may be a great writer even when technical perfection, complete mastery of the tricks of the trade, is lacking, as, for instance, in the case of Dostoyevski. But unless a man writes with his heart's blood he cannot be a great artist."

"I believe the heart's-blood doctrine would rule out all cheerful genre, and that meets perhaps best of all the fundamental purpose of art."

"You say that because you yourself see in art only a means of enjoyment, only play."

I could not have denied that this is really my conception, and should, therewith, have hit upon the fundamental opposition between our Western conception of life, as expressed by Goethe, and the[Pg 321] exclusively religio-moral one of Tolsto?. I could not, however, compel myself to fill with a fruitless argument the few hours I had to spend with the honored man. I should have been as little able to convince the apostle of seventy-five, whose ascetic philosophy is the product of definite conditions of civilization, as he to convince me, the west-German, whose light-heartedness and confident belief in culture had ripened in the sunshine of the Rhine bank. I therefore evaded the point, and said:

"I have hitherto not taken your rigorous demands upon art as well as upon life quite literally, count. I thought to myself that when one pulls up a horse suddenly he does not wish it to turn around, but only to stop. I supposed that you wished merely to counteract other powerful impulses."

"No," said the count, after a moment's reflection. "That is not so. I believe in the absolute correctness of my demands. I myself, however, was too weakly or too badly trained to submit to them altogether. I cannot, for instance, keep from enjoying Chopin, although I condemn his music as exclusive art, which addresses itself to the understanding and feelings only of the aristocratically cultivated few."

"It seems to me an unattainable ideal that all men should share in enjoyment of art; and the requirement that the artist shall refrain from all work that could be enjoyed only by a limited number of especially cultivated men is impossible and even[Pg 322] harmful. It would deprive us of the finest works we possess."

"If the requirement is justified in and of itself, it is quite immaterial what sacrifices must be made to it. Nothing is to be considered in comparison with truth."

I could go no further here, again. For I was talking with the man who repudiates his own immortal works because they are beyond the comprehension of most people, and therefore help to widen the gulf between the educated and the uneducated. I could not even make the objection that almost all learning must be condemned on the same ground, for it is well known that Tolsto? does not shrink from even this conclusion.

It is not, however, a matter of indifference to him whether people consider his views to be scientifically founded—i. e., correctly reasoned out or not. He said to me in the course of the conversation:

"I often laugh, and I also often grow angry, when people cast it in my face that my studies are not scientific. I assert in return that the whole of positivism and materialism is unscientific. If I seek a science by which I can live, I seek it only logically and steadfastly, or scientifically, with no contradiction within itself from its premises to its final conclusion. Scepticism, on the other hand, completely denies every concept of life. And yet the sceptic wishes to live, otherwise he would kill [Pg 323]himself. He admits, therefore, by the mere fact that he is alive that his whole philosophy is nothing for him but an idle exercise of the intellect which has no bearing on his life. That means that it is not in the least true for him. I, however, seek the premise from which I can not only live, but live peacefully and cheerfully. This premise is God, and the duty for us that of perfecting ourselves. I follow the consequence of that premise to the end, and feel that I am right not only in words but also in deeds."

No truly scientific thinker needs to be reminded that Tolsto? here, in the a priori assumption that life must have a meaning, departs from the fundamental principle of all scientific reasoning—namely, the starting without a hypothesis, and, like Kant, to whom he feels drawn not without reason, works with postulates instead of with conclusions. But who will not rejoice that the poet, who above all things was and is a passionate human creature, has saved himself from the despair of agnosticism by a bold leap to the rock of faith, which lies beyond all science, and can neither be supported nor shaken by it? How many of the proud agnostics do not secretly cast furtive glances at that rock, where they would like to reserve themselves a place against emergencies? While Tolsto? sincerely acknowledges that without this foundation under his feet he would no longer be able to live. He needed this quieting as to the outcome of things to be able[Pg 324] to follow his poetic impulse to look at the world as it is. Only entirely barren, abstract natures find their satisfaction in the voluntarily limited logical sequence of science, confined as it is to the empirical. All men of imagination, including Goethe and Bismarck, have had their share of mystic confidence in that beneficent course of the universe which in popular language is called God or Providence. This poetic faith has, of course, nothing whatever to do with science.

Undervaluation of one's own qualities, however, and enthusiasm for the complementary ones, is a familiar psychological fact. The poet Tolsto? wishes to be a cut-and-dried philosopher. He repudiates his poetry, and likewise speaks coldly—indeed, even with hostility—of the spirits akin to him, of Goethe and Shakespeare. There is only one opinion among lovers of art, and that is that Tolsto?, in the natural spontaneity of his characters and incidents, is to be compared with these two alone, and in the abundance of his psychological traits with Shakespeare only. Yet at present Tolsto? is engaged in writing a book, soon to appear, against Shakespeare and the study of Shakespeare. In our conversation he came back to the indefensible over-estimation of this artist.

"If people were capable of approaching Shakespeare impartially they would lose their unreasonable reverence for this writer. He is crude, immoral, a toady to the great, an arrogant despiser of[Pg 325] the small, a slanderer of the common people. He lacks good taste in his jests, is unjust in his sympathies, ignoble, intoxicated with the acquaintance with which a few aristocrats honored him. Even his art is over-estimated, for in every case the best comes from his predecessors or his sources. But people are quite blind. They are under the spell of the consensus of opinion handed down for centuries. It is truly incredible what ideas can be awakened in the human mind by consecutive treatments of one and the same theme."

I believe that one will not go astray in finding in the above-mentioned book against Shakespeare a prosecution at the same time of Tolsto?'s campaign against the ?sthetic-artistic view of life in general. His purpose is to overthrow one of the chief idols of the ?sthetic cult. As far as the arguments on the moral side are concerned, he will certainly have a following. The son of a tavern-keeper, himself an actor, Shakespeare was certainly not the ideal of a gentleman. Tolsto? will, however, have difficulty in abolishing wonder at the artistic power of this most sumptuous of all geniuses.

Tolsto? dealt with the influence of general opinion again in another connection. He was speaking of the mischief that the newspapers do in the world, but chose, in my opinion, a very inappropriate example of this.

"During the Dreyfus case," said he, "I received at least a thousand letters from all parts of the[Pg 326] world asking me to express an opinion. How could I have responded? Here I am in Russia; the transaction was in France. It was absolutely impossible to get a correct idea of the proceedings, for every paper reported it differently. In and of itself, what was the thing that had happened? An innocent officer had been condemned. That was an unimportant occurrence. There were much greater crimes committed by those in power. But the whole world took the alarm. Everybody had an incontrovertible conviction as to the guilt or the innocence of a man whom nobody knew, and whose judges nobody knew. A thing like that is an epidemic, not thinking."

One must certainly travel a very strange and lonely road to fail to appreciate that in this very instance the press accomplished an enormous work in arousing mankind, and in showing them the danger threatening from the Jesuits. The Dreyfus affair belongs to world-history as an epoch-making event. Perhaps the deliverance of the whole white race from the octopus-like embrace of clericalism and militarism is its work. And Count Tolsto?, who regards it as his mission to fight militarism, lives through the chief battle and does not suspect it! One certainly ought not to forget that he is in Russia, where the incarceration of innocent men is an every-day affair, and that the Russian papers think they fulfil their duty to an allied nation by treating the matter from the stand-point of Méline and Marcier.

[Pg 327]

Tolsto?'s antipathy to this affair does not come at all from any possible anti-Semitic feeling. He does not love the mercantile Jews, who have not the slightest trace of Christian spirit. He condemns anti-Semitism, however, in the most emphatic way. "Anti-Semitism," he said, "is not a misfortune for the Jews, for he who suffers wrong is not to be pitied, but he who does wrong. Anti-Semitism demoralizes society. It is the worst evil of our time, for it poisons whole generations. It makes them blind to right and wrong, and kills all moral feeling. It changes the soul into a place of desolation in which all goodness and nobility are swept away."

In regard to other matters, Tolsto? does not use strong expressions. He parries them good-humoredly but decisively. When we were talking of the new romanticists, I used some severe language. I explained the uproarious applause of certain gifted but degenerate and perverse artists as a cynical attack on the inborn moral sense, and said, speaking from my own experience, that I had yet to meet one of those devotees of immorality whom I had not found on closer acquaintance to be morally deficient. When, however, I spoke of literary support of vice, the count raised his hand to stop me, and said:

"Let us be gentle in our judgment of our fellow-men." Then he added, "Go on."

I had, however, gained command of myself and[Pg 328] begged pardon for my vehemence. I could not go on, however, for what had been on my tongue was only more bitter words.

He looked at me kindly, and merely said, "Thank you."

It is self-evident that Tolsto? did not mean by this to express sympathy with the Diabolics and other eccentrics. Moreover, he spoke flatly against art for art's sake, which he calls tiresome more than anything else. "Agonized productions of the search for originality, welcomed by idleness, and intended for the applause of the critics of so-called fine taste." He shrugged his shoulders over the fact that a monument had been erected to Baudelaire. He agreed with me, however, when I traced the interest in exotic suggestion in the creative arts, as for everything eccentric and bizarre, back to the tendency towards an entirely external naturalism, which would completely rule out from art the personality of the artist. He returned again to his text.

"Without the deepest sympathy and complete identification with the subject no work of art can ever be produced."

He does not admit, however, that this identification with the subject is found in the experiments of these latter-day writers. He sees in them only a sudden change from the fashion for objectivity to the fashion for subjectivity. When, however, I spoke of the good-fortune of the Russian in not[Pg 329] being obliged to take part in all these fashions, because he had already showed in his deep-hearted realism that it is possible to be true to reality, and yet be full of warmth and meaning, he again raised his hand to stop me, and blushed. I could not tell whether it was from modesty or whether he does not wish any longer to hear of the works of his "literary" period. I believe, however, that the noise of all this no longer reaches his ear. When I spoke with warm enthusiasm of the debt we all owe him, said that his art was a revelation to us, that through him we had first learned what poetic power lies in the simplest and deepest fidelity to nature, he stopped me in his gentle way. Only philanthropy is now a matter of any importance for him. Everything else is empty trifling. He said to me:

"You are still buried deep in materialism. You must see that you free yourself from that."

Nevertheless, he was good enough to recognize my honest purpose of seeking the truth, even though I do not succeed in finding it in all points as he believes he has found it.

I must certainly admit that in the late hours of the night, as he sat opposite me, his fine head leaning far back and resting on one hand, his glowing eyes making him seem as it were transparent, I had great difficulty in preserving a conventional bearing. Here was one of the greatest men of all times, who had risen out of the purely human and had [Pg 330]become a saint upon whom rests the divine light. The kindness and tenderness of his voice and the gentleness of his words are indescribable. He has the love and the dauntless courage of the prophet and the apostle without their passion and wrath. It is doubtful whether any mortal has ever had more understanding of human weakness than he. He combats only institutions, never men. And yet no other man has had such influence upon our consciences as he, most compassionate of all judges in spite of the pitiless keenness of his vision.

It was midnight when the count's sleigh took us to Kozlovka, the nearest station to the estate. In leaving I could not conceal the extent to which I was moved. When I think of the final moments, when the count stood at the head of the stairs and called a last word after me, while I turned to him to say good-bye once more and forever, it seems to me that I never in my life experienced anything more overwhelming. I carried away an impression that the whole hall was filled with the light of his eyes. Yet it was only a prosaic bit of advice for our return trip to Moscow, to give which he had hurried after us after the adieus in his study. The Countess Sasha, however, stood in the starlight by the door, lovely as a goddess of hospitality. It was gratifying to know that the saintly old man was in the care of this lovely creature.

Under the twinkling stars we sped at a brisk trot past black forests and over the silent, deep-buried[Pg 331] fields. Within us re-echoed the saying of Kant, "Two things there are that always fill me with reverent awe: the starry heavens above me and the moral consciousness within." The man whose hand I had just grasped embodies the moral consciousness of our century.
FOOTNOTE:

[15] "Why do I seek the way so ardently, if not that I might show it to my brothers?"

THE END