Littell's Living Age/Volume 127/Issue 1637/Russian Nihilism
RUSSIAN NIHILISM.
An enterprising correspondent of the Daily News has published a report which, if it is authentic, throws a curious light on the social and political state of Russia. The document purports to be the judicial record of an inquiry into the religious and communistic organization of the Nihilists. Bakounin, the leader or prophet of the sect, having long been an exile, enjoys almost unlimited facility for producing lucubrations which are afterwards circulated by contraband methods within the empire. Even if the account is spurious, it probably represents a general belief which is in some degree founded on the actual state of facts. The principles of communism admit only of limited variety, although the preachers of the system naturally adapt their doctrines to the tastes and prejudices of the various communities which they address. In the western parts of the Continent and among English artisans the agitation is hostile to every form of religion. Among the agricultural labourers attacks on property are generally connected with phrases borrowed from the popular language of dissent. The hereditarily devout Russian peasant would probably refuse to listen to any demagogue who neglected to prove that the spoliation of the rich was the command of heaven as well as the interest of the poor. Neither religious fanaticism nor infidelity has any necessary connection with schemes for the abolition of social distinctions and for the equal partition of property. The object is in itself sufficiently atractive to large classes in every community, but experience shows that even selfish cupidity desires to veil itself in a theoretical or imaginative disguise. The anarchists and assassins of the Paris Commune professed to have discovered the secret of universal reformation; and they have so far succeeded in imposing on their contemporaries that even in England romances have since been written in their honour. Since the days of the first French Revolution Jacobins and Socialists have been rather a sect than a party, and it is by an accident that they have become irreconcilably hostile to the only form of Christianity which has been brought to their knowledge. Their tenets are substantially the same with those which the Anabaptists of Munster professed to derive from divine inspiration, or from a literal interpretation of selected Scriptural passages. Although the Russian peasantry know nothing of the Bible, demagogues who address them can have no difficulty in contending that spiritual and temporal equality ought to begin on this side of the grave. In more cultivated regions, and in higher social ranks, men are always ready to be convinced that the evils which they suffer are grievances or wrongs inflicted by others rather than unavoidable misfortunes.
The Russian heresy of Nihilism corresponds in character, as might be expected, rather with the theological communism of the sixteenth century than with the subversive atheism of modern French demagogues. The numerous nonconformist sects which have openly or secretly separated themselves from the orthodox Church in Russia are, like the earlier English Nonconformists, impelled by excess and not by defect of religious zeal to desert the lukewarm majority. Some of the sects practice or profess the wildest asceticism. The Nihilists fancy themselves to be a chosen people; and their religious and political opinions are closely connected. One doctrine which they hold in common with the anarchists of France, Spain, and Germany is recommended by indigenous tradition. The demagogues of the West projected an arbitrary and artificial return to barbarism in the abolition of central government, in the autonomy of local communities, and in the equal participation of property. The Russians have from time immemorial been familiar with the tenure of land in common by all the inhabitants of a village. Among them the institution of property is imperfectly developed, nor is it strengthened by the existence of minute social gradations. The neighbouring lord and his agents are probably regarded as strangers, if not as enemies; and when the illiterate village priest is no longer the representative of an inspired Church, he also is likely to be deemed an intruder. The emperor is probably still an object of loyal and superstitious reverence to the masses of the population; but it seems that the Nihilists recognize no authority beyond the limits of the parish, and that human regeneration in Russia, as at Paris, is to consist in a kind of cellular organization of society. It is probable that the conscription presents to the people the most tangible operation of imperial power. The Russian peasant, though he is capable of becoming an excellent soldier, abhors military service, which, until lately, involved a lifelong separation from home. The denunciation of capital which is common to anarchical reformers in all parts of the world probably assumes in rural Russia the form of hatred of money-lenders and Jews.
According to the alleged Act of Accusation, the Nihilists resemble in influence and in ubiquity the Jesuits of melodramatic fiction. Not confined to remote villages or restricted to the rank of peasants, they are, according to the supposed Act of Accusation, to be found among university students and professors and among the higher nobility, and some of them are generals or governors of provinces. An ex-judge is said to have expended some thousands of pounds in propagating the doctrines of the sect, and a rich proprietor has become the travelling distributor of prohibited Nihilist book's. It is more credible that ladies of good family have devised for themselves occupation and amusement in the management of the widely-spread conspiracy. The frivolous and weary life described in Russian novels justifies the well-known epigram on a society which was rotten before it was ripe. It is possible that, instead of a round of corrupt and frivolous intrigue, young men and women in search of excitement may dabble in revolutionary and anarchical projects. If it is true that in one large province the local board of nobles subscribes in support of the agitation, it may be inferred that the upper classes desire to use for their own purposes the discontent of the peasantry. It has long been the policy of the imperial government to exclude the gentry from political influence, and to rely on the devotion of the mass of the people. The conspiracies of former generations were always managed by nobles, and it is possible that they may in their turn express their dissatisfaction by allying themselves with plebeian malcontents. The emancipation of the serfs, of which the emperor not unjustly received the credit, was effected at the expense of the landed proprietors. Although common enmities may for a time unite the most dissimilar associates, it is certain that Nihilism will make no real progress among the upper classes. They at least have no rehgious enthusiasm which could tempt them to encourage a revolution which would only be accomplished at their own expense. Although the tenets of the sect extend to the negation of other institutions as well as of property, those who have something will instinctively revolt from the doctrine of nothing. It is more probable that teachers of Nihilism may be found in the universities, for sophistry and pedantry have often an affinity for revolution.
Although it is probable that many extravagant doctrines are taught in the wide expanse of the Russian empire, there is no reason to suppose that they involve any serious danger to the government. There is no instance in history of great results produced by secret societies, although they may sometimes, as in southern Italy and Sicily, and from time to time in Ireland, render exceptional measures necessary for the preservation of public order. Since the accession of Nicholas there has been no symptom of disaffection in the army, which is strong enough to suppress with the greatest ease any popular rising. It is not improbable that the government may regard with indifference theoretical conspiracies which are directed more immediately against private property than against the State. The spread of disaffection with social institutions would furnish an additional reason for strengthening the central power. To the peasantry Nihilism can mean little except the abolition of the rents and other payments which have since the emancipation of the serfs been substituted for personal services. The commune, which is, according to the doctrines of the sect, to be the sole political organization of the future, already exists. The burdens of the conscription and of imperial taxation are imposed by irresistible force; and they are probably regarded as dispensations not less inevitable than pestilence or conflagration. No considerable part of the Russian population, except in the large towns, depends on wages; and the mention of the proletariat as a principal element of society indicates the importation of French phrases and fallacies. It is not known that distress is common among a rural population which is scattered over a vast territory. Ignorance, superstition, and the exertions of agitators are much less effective agents than hunger, though they may easily produce a crop of delusions. The domestic troubles to which Russia may perhaps, like other countries, be at some time exposed are probably remote. The middle class is small and feeble; the nobility have no political influence; and the mass of the people are incapable of understanding any but an absolute government. On the whole, Russian society is in a position of stable equilibrium which would be immediately resumed if it had been temporarily disturbed.