RUSSIA'S EVIL GENIUS.* N. DE WESSELITSEY'S credentials for the twofold
task he has undertaken in this valuable and timely book may not be known to all our readers, and on that account it may be worth while briefly to summarize them. He is a Russian who has for many years been the London correspondent of the Novae
" Raman and Democracy. By O. de Wesselitsky. With a Preface by Henry Cust. Loudon Published for the Central Committee for Patriotic • Organi. eatione by William floinemann. [IL not.]
Vremya. Before that lie resided for several years in Berlin, and was well acquainted with Bismarck. Moreover, long before the war he took a most active part in promoting a better understanding between Russia and England, and for the last fifteen years has been President of the Foreign Press Association. Lastly, he is not only a publicist of distinction, but he writes with a perfect command of our language in a style at once:lucid and compressed. The marginal headings in which he summarizes his arguments are models of con- densation.
His aim, as we have said, is twofold. It is primarily to reassure and convert those English Liberals who think that Russia is the same as she was at the time of the Crimean War, and who consider an alliance with her incompatible with the struggle of democracy against military despotism. Con- currently, however, with the realization of this aim, of which he never loses sight, he shows us in a luminous historical survey. how the democratic, liberalizing, reforming, and patriotic elements in Russia have all along been thwarted and repressed by the Germanizing policy of the rulers; how the bureaucracy has been controlled by Germanophils ; how, in fine, Russia's progress has been hampered and perverted by German or pro-German. influences. Put briefly, the argument of the book is this—that Russia, real Russia, is at heart demo- cratic; that autocracy was acquiesced in as a necessary means of unifying the nation ; and that her riders, even when thoroughly patriotic in their desire to civilize and de-Oriental ize Russia, turned to Germany for the instruments of edu- cation and organization, and placed implicit confidence in German agents and German Sovereigns. In this way they encouraged a process which has gone on for centuries, and under which unlimited facilities were afforded to German favourites, adventurers, educators, men of business, and farmers for penetrating, colonizing, and controlling Russia. He admits the existence of some thoroughly Russified Slavophil Germans, but in the main the Germanic influence has been exerted entirely in the interests of Germany, to detach, isolate, and weaken Russia, to lure her on into wrong paths and disastrous campaigns, to foment internal dissensions, and to repay her assistance with flattery in words but black ingrati- tude and treachery in deeds. Indirectly the book is a most serious indictment of Russian rule as well as of German duplicity—of blindness in high places, of an infatuated reliance in the integrity of Prussian and Austrian advisers, and of the criminal leniency of the Russian Administra- tion. And the force of M. de Wesselitsky's indictment is enhanced by the fact that he is not a revolutionary or a Socialist or a sympathizer with the intelligentsia, but a strong Monarchist.
In his opening chapter M. de Wesselitsky insists on the essentially democratic character of the primeval organization of the Slav communities in Russia, still preserved in the Mira of to-day. He maintains that even with the establishment of absolutism the strong despotic Tsars leant on the people, while the weak Tsars leant on the aristocracy—e.g., Boris Godunoff, who introduced serfdom. Peter the Great, the first absolute monarch, though he broke the powers of the Boyars and pro- moted democratic reforms, neutralized his services by the encouragement of foreigners, notably the German Barons in the Baltic provinces, by proscribing national dress and customs, by his harsh treatment of dissent (,Raskol), and by his creation of the bureaucratic noblesse. The Court and Government were Germanize& while society became cosmopolitan.—Incidentally M. de Wesselitsky tells us that the Russian Academy was so permanently Germanized that Mendeleyeff even at the close of the nineteenth century was excluded from it Under the Empress Anna and her favourite Biron a climax was reached—deportation to Siberia was introduced, along with a wholesale system of espionage and torture. There was a slight reaction under the Empress Elizabeth, but her suc- cessor, Peter III., was more pro-German than ever. The acces- sion of Catherine was marked by a slight Russian revival; but Catherine was influenced by German ideas and education, serfdom was extended, the fatal system of German colonies inaugurated, and, though the war with Turkey was popular with the people, the still more fatal partition of Poland crowned her disservices to her country. Then followed ninety- five years of German domination, which reached its climax under Nicholas I. Alexander I. soon renounced his liberal policy at the. instigation of foreign. advisers, and his ill- requited passion for Germany is vividly illustrated in the story of Yermoloff, the famous General, who, when asked to name his reward, replied : "To be promoted German ; rewards would then follow of themselves." Alexander's greatest concessions were reserved for the non-Russian provinces, and M. de Wesselitsky notes that the two chief points in the programme of the Deoembrists of 1825—emancipation of the serfs and national representation—now form an integral part of the legal state of Russia. Under Nioholas I. Germanization was the universal order of the day. He was perpetually assisting the Germanic Powers, without any adequate quid pro quo, but nothing broke down his invincible belief in German discipline, character, and honour. The Diplomatic Service was completely denationalized under Nesselrode—with the exception of the Asiatic Department— and no criticism of Germany was tolerated ; and against Nicholas's services on behalf of Denmark must be set his crushing of Hungary, an act of which he bitterly repented. Yet alongside of the introduction of the Prussian model in the Army, police, and bureaucracy, M. de Wesselitsky notes the emergence of an enlightened public opinion in art and letters. The conservative Slavophils and the Zapadniki or Westernizers were united in advocating the emancipation of the serfs, and it was in this reign that genuine Russified Germans first declared their Slavophil sympathies. M. de Wesselitsky recognizes in Alexander II. a true Russian and a reformer, who was none the less governed by his belief in the superior civilizing mission of Germany and trust in the friendship of the Holienzollerns. His great measure, the emancipation of the serfs, was criticized on both sides—as too revolutionary and as not sweeping enough. M. de Wesselitsky also credits him with rendering justice more accessible to the people at large, the creation of the Zemstvos (a half-way house to the Duma), the extension of municipal government, the relaxation of the Press censorship, and a greater tolerance in religion. But he maintains that Lutherans were always favoured; the only real intolerance was shown to dissenters from Russian orthodoxy. In sum, while Alexander II.'s home policy was enlightened, his foreign policy was guided by his German sympathies, his trust in William T,, and the influence Af Bismarck and Gortohakoff. Authentic Russian public opinion was disregarded, a result due to Prussia's success in the wars of 1864, 1866, and 1870, which changed the balance of power in the Baltic, while the exclusion of Austria from the new Germanic Confederation drove her Balkan- wards. Again, while William I. acknowledged the decisive assistance rendered by Russia in 1870, Germany's gratitude was characteristically shown by stirring up the revolt in Herzegovina which pushed Russia into the war with Turkey. The result of the Berlin Congress was that Germany alone profited, for Austria was committed to her Balkan policy, while England was estranged. The old Emperor William was conscious of the treachery involved in the alliance with Austria, but reluctantly consented : "A high dignitary of the Court of Berlin, very attached to William I. and hostile to " Bismarck, confided to the writer the ' true reason' of that Emperor's consent to the alliance against Russia. That consent was won by Ifismarek's quoting the words
of Frederick II. We kings of Prussia sacrifice to the State, not only our life, but also our honour.' The old courtier added:— • that was of course an argument which the Emperor could never withstand! "
Under Alexander III., though the first quite national Emperor of Russia, the same conflicting tendencies were still shown. Though the alliance of the three Emperors was restored in 1885, Alexander III.'s distrust of Bismarck led to the alliance with France. Yet the German colonizing move- ment in Russian Poland, Western and Southern Russia—a disguised form of conquest—went on unchecked, with the encouragement of the pro-German bureaucracy. Alexander III. was hampered by the lack of good advisers, and his father's reforms were curtailed by reactionary administrators ; but at least he refused to confirm the privileges of the German Barons in Esthonia, Courland, and Livonia, he began to Ruesify " the Corps Diplomatique and the uniform of the Army, his domestic life was above reproach, and in other• respects he proved himself a true Russian.
M. de Wesselitsky deals with the reign of the present Emperor in two phases—the period of conservatism, and the period of progress beginning with the Hague Conference, which he describes as the only concrete step in favour of peace which has ever been taken. At the outset the policy of repression carried out by M. Plehve ended in failure. Corruption was rampant, and Germany continued her Machiavellian game of pushing her ally into perilous adventures. Her attempt to form a coalition against Great Britain at the time of the Boer War was foiled by the Russian Emperor, but she was successful in embroil- ing Russia with Japan, and blackmailed her ally for promising to defend the Western Russian frontier by extorting a commercial treaty -which was equivalent to the payment of a tribute. Meanwhile the systematic German colonization of Poland, the Baltic provinces, and South- Western Russia was continued on a larger scale than ever; the revolution of the Letts against the German Barons was suppressed in the interests of the latter ; German schools, fortresses of Germanism, were unduly favoured; Pan-Sla,viem was invented by the Germans as a bogy to frighten the Western world, while Pan-German organs were pampered patriotic journalists were offered hush-money; and the German Ambassador was allowed to exercise a drastic censor- ship which practically exempted Germany from all criticism.
M. de Wesselitsky also notes the growth and application of the German policy of retaining the allegiance of all subjects of German descent, and the double game of German diplo- matists who represented the support of Germany as indis- pensable to the maintenance of the monarchy, while they simultaneously instigated the revolutionaries in their attacks on the established order. Finally, M. de Wesselitsky describes how the initiation and development of internal reforms cleared the ground for the formation of the Triple Entente, and how the rupture between the reigning House of Russia and the German dynasties at last rendered possible the declaration of the true Russian national policy, that of the long misjudged and persecuted Slavophile. The war has united the nation as it has never been united before, it has brought about a Russo-Polish reconciliation, and it has partially relieved Russia of the incubus of Germanism. But the task of de-Germanizing Russia is not by any means complete, and can only be achieved by the determined, unrelenting, systematic action of the Government with the energetic concurrence of all Russian citizens. In this work of emancipation M. de Wesselitsky gives full credit to the Emperor, to whose initiative he attributes the great measure abolishing the State monopoly of alcoholic drinks. The barrier erected between Emperor and people by the Germanized bureaucracy has been broken down ; even the revolutionaries and industrial agitators have rallied to the defence of their country and broken off all relations with its cousins. In fine, he maintains that " the sharp medicine of war is rapidly and thoroughly curing Russia of the German virus which for two centuries has poisoned the organism of that Empire. The Russian Democracy is at last coming to its own again. Its union with Monarchy is indissolubly cemented and consecrated by the wise leadership of the great Slavic Tsar."
In a brief postscript M. de Wesselitsky replies to those who entertain misgivings that Russia, if victorious, will be more dangerous than Germany. After observing that all the European wars of Russia were due to German influence, served German ends to the detriment of Russian interests, and were condemned by the Russian national conscience, he points to the unanimity with which the Russians oppose the annexation of non-Russian populations, the universal approval of the autonomy of Poland, and the identity of Russian interests in the Northern seas with those of other States. Considerations of domestic policy—the essential need of carrying through the internal reforms interrupted by the war—afford an even more powerfal guarantee against the pursuit of conquests and attempts at military domi- nation.
Some of M. de Weaselitaky's statements undoubtedly lay themselves open to criticism. His treatment of the repressive policy adopted towards the revolutionists is perfunctory even in a work where condensation is inevitable. And he says practically nothing at all about the Jews. But, with all deductions, this is a valuable and enlightening book, of which the main text is to be found in a Mentonoe of Mr. Cast's intro- duction: "Russia, half in blindness, half in compulsion, wandered under perfidious guidance from the way, and has to-day regained it,"
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