The Journal of Leo Tolstoi First. Volume—1895-1899. Лев Толстой. Читать онлайн. Newlib. NEWLIB.NET
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May, 1917.

      THE JOURNAL OF

      LEO TOLSTOI

       I continue 1 2 October 28. Yasnaya Polyana.

      Have been thinking:

      Have been thinking one thing: that this life which we see around us is a movement of matter according to fixed, well-known laws; but that in us we feel the presence of an altogether different law, having nothing in common with the others and requiring from us the fulfilment of its demands. It can be said that we see and recognise all the other laws only because we have in us this law. If we did not recognise this law, we would not recognise the others.

      This law is different from all the rest, principally in this, that those other laws are outside of us and forces us to obey them; but this law is in us – and more than in us; it is our very selves and therefore it does not force us when we obey it, but on the contrary frees us, because in following it we become ourselves. And for this reason we are drawn to fulfil this law and we sooner or later will inevitably fulfil it. In this then consists the freedom of the will. This freedom consists in this, that we should recognise that which is – namely that this inner law is ourselves.

      This inner law is what we call reason, conscience, love, the good, God. These words have different meanings, but all from different angles mean one and the same thing. In our understanding of this inner law, the son of God, consists indeed the essence of the Christian doctrine.

      The world can be looked upon in this way: a world exists governed by certain, well-known laws, and within this world are beings subject to the same laws, but who at the same time bear in themselves another law not in accord with the former laws of the world, a higher law, and this law must inevitably triumph within these beings and defeat the lower law. And in this struggle and in the gradual victory of the higher law over the lower, in this only is life for man and the whole world.

       Oct. 29. Yasnaya Polyana. If I live. 3

       Nov. 5. Y. P.

      I have skipped 6 days. It seems to me, I thought little during this time: I wrote a little, chopped wood and was indisposed – but lived through much. I lived through much, because in fulfilling a promise to S.4, I read through all my journals for the past seven years.

      It seems to me, I am approaching a simple and clear expression of that by which I live. How good that I didn’t finish the Catechism!5 I think I shall write it differently and better, if the Father wishes it. I understand why it is impossible to say it quickly. If it could be said all at once, by what then would we live in the realm of thought? It will never be given me to go farther than this task.

      I just took a walk and understood clearly why I can’t make Resurrection go better: it was begun falsely. I understood this in thinking over again the story: Who is Right?6 (about children). I understood that one must begin with the life of the peasants, that they are the subject, they are positive, but that the other thing is shadow, the other thing is negative. And I understood the same thing about Resurrection. One must begin with her.7 I want to begin immediately.

      During this time there were letters: from Kenworthy,8 a beautiful one from Shkarvan,9 and from a Dukhobor in Tiflis.10

      Have written to no one for a long time. General indisposition and no energy. The stage manager and the decorator11 were here, students from Kharkov against whom I think I did not sin, Ivan Ivanovich Bochkarev,12 Kolasha.13…

       Nov. 6. Y. P. If I live.

      November 7. Y. P.

      I wrote a little these two days on the new Resurrection. My conscience hurts when I remember how trivially I began it. So far, I rejoice when I think of the work as I am beginning it.

      I chopped a little. I went to Ovsiannikovo, had a good talk with Maria Alexandrovna14 and Ivan Ivanovich.15 Waltz’s assistant was here and a Frenchman with a poem…

      November 8, 9. Y. P.

      Have written little on Resurrection. I was not disappointed, but I was weak.

      Yesterday Dunaev16 came. Chopped much yesterday, overtired myself. To-day I walked. I went to Constantine Bieli’s.17 He is very much to be pitied. Then I walked in the village. It is good with them, but with us it is shameful. Wrote letters. Wrote to Bazhenov18 and three others. Thought:

      1) The confirmation of the fact, that reason liberates the latent love in man for justice is the proverb, “Comprendre c’est tout pardoner.” If you forgive a man, you will love him. To forgive means to cease to condemn and to hate.

      2) If a man believes something at the word of another, he will lose his belief in that which he would have inevitably believed in, had he not trusted the other one. He who believes in … etc., ceases to believe in reason. They even say straight out, one ought not to believe in reason.

      3) …

      A very interesting letter from Holland, about what a youth is to do who is called to military service, when he is the sole supporter of his mother.19

      November 10. Y. P.

      Slept with difficulty. Weakness both physical and intellectual and – for which I am at fault – also moral. Rode horseback. Posha20 arrived… A wonderful French pamphlet about war.21 Yes, 20 years are needed for that thought to become a general one. My head aches and seems to crackle and rumble. Father, help me when I am most weak that I may not fall morally. It is possible.

      Nov. 11. Y. P. If I live.

      I write and think: it is possible that I won’t be. Every day I make attempts, and I get more accustomed to it.

      To-day November 15.

      I have been so weak all the time I could write nothing except a few letters. A letter to Shkarvan. There have been here, Dunaiev, Posha, Maria Vasilievna.22 They left yesterday. Yesterday also I went to see Maria Alexandrovna; she is ill. To-day Aunt Tanya23 and Sonya came.

      I didn’t sleep at night and therefore didn’t work. But I wrote on the girl Konefsky24 and a little in my journal. I am reading Schopenhauer’s25 “Aphorisms.” Very good. Only put “The service of God” instead of “The recognition of the vanity of life,” and we agree.

      Now 2 o’clock, I shall write out later what I have noted down.26

       December 7. Moscow.

      Almost a month since I have made any entries. During this time we moved to Moscow. The weakness has passed a little, and I am working earnestly, though with little success, on the Declaration of Faith.27 Yesterday I wrote a little article on whipping.28 I lay down to sleep in the day and had just dozed off – I felt as if some one jerked me; I got up, began to think about whipping,

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<p>1</p>

With the words, “I continue,” Tolstoi begins a new note-book of the Journal; this note-book presupposes another which the editors have only in separate fragments. The previous note-book ended with the following note:

“October 8, 1895, Y. P.

“(I am beginning an entry to-day with just what I finished two days ago.)

“I have only a short time left to live and I feel terribly like saying so much: I feel like saying what we can and must and cannot help believing – about the cruelty of deception which people impose upon themselves; the economic, political and religious deception, and about the seduction of stupefying oneself – wine, and tobacco considered so innocent; and about marriage and about education and about the horrors… Everything has ripened and I want to speak about it. So that there is no time for performing those artistic stupidities which I was prepared to do in Resurrection.

“But just now I asked myself: but can I write, knowing that no one will read? And I experienced something of disappointment; but only for a time; that means that there was some love of fame in it. But there was also the principal thing in it – the need before God.

“Father, help me to follow the same path of love. And I thank Thee. From Thee flows everything.”

<p>2</p>

These superior figures refer to the editor’s notes which begin on page 299.

<p>3</p>

In the original, merely the initials of the phrase are used. Thus Tolstoi would often finish what he had written during the day with I. I L. (If I live), marking ahead in this fashion the date of the following day.

<p>4</p>

Countess Sophia Andreevna Tolstoi, born Behrs, 1844, wife of Tolstoi. In the Journal, Tolstoi calls her S., S. A., or Sonya.

<p>5</p>

“Catechism” Tolstoi called that systematic exposition of his philosophy in the form of questions and answers which he had begun about this time. In the text, he calls this work, The Declaration of Faith, or simply, The Declaration. (See entries December 23, ’95, and further.) In the following year, 1896, Tolstoi abandoning the catechism form, continued and finished the work, which, in 1898, was published under the title Christian Doctrine by The Free Press (Swobodnoe Slovo) issued by A. and V. Chertkov, England, and later in 1905, it appeared also in Russia.

<p>6</p>

Tolstoi never returned to the continuation and revision of the plot of the story Who is Right? which had been begun by him about this time, and so it has remained unfinished. The beginning of the story as it was written by Tolstoi, is printed in his collected works (see the full collection of works by Tolstoi, edited by P. Biriukov, published by Sytin, 1913).

<p>7</p>

I.e., with Katiusha Maslov and not with Nekhliudov, as the first form of the novel was begun.

<p>8</p>

John C. Kenworthy, an English Methodist minister, a writer and lecturer, who shared at that time the opinions of Tolstoi and who founded in England an agricultural colony composed of his co-thinkers. The author of the work, Tolstoi, His Life and Works, London, 1902. There was printed abroad in the Russian Language in the journal of The Free Press (1899, No. 2, England) his The Anatomy of Poverty. They were lectures to the English workingmen on political economy, which struck Tolstoi favourably and which he included in the manuscript which was then being issued under the title of Archives of L. N. Tolstoi, No. II, and to which he even wrote an introduction. In later life, Kenworthy fell ill of nervous prostration and was taken to a sanatorium.

<p>9</p>

Albert Shkarvan, a Slav, who shared Tolstoi’s opinions. An army surgeon in the hospital in Kashai (Hungary), he resigned from this service in February, 1895, for religious reasons, for which he was imprisoned for four months.

<p>10</p>

The Russian sect of Dukhobors, living in the Caucasus in 1895, to the number of several thousand souls, upon the suggestion of their leader, Peter Vasilevich Verigin, who was at that time in exile, gave notice to the authorities that they would no longer take the oath or serve in military service, and, in a word, would no longer take any part in governmental violence, and in the night from the 28th to the 29th of June of that year, burned all their weapons. Cossacks were sent against them and after some executions, two hundred were put in prison, many were exiled from their native land and forced to live in Armenian, Georgian and Tartar villages in the Province of Tiflis; about two or three families in a village, without land and with the prohibition against intercourse among themselves. Those Dukhobors who remained in active service and refused to serve, were sent away to disciplinary regiments. (See Dukhobors, by P. Biriukov, 1908, publishers, Posrednik; besides there is much material pertaining to the history and the movement of the Dukhobors printed in various issues of The Free Press.)

<p>11</p>

The manager of the Moscow Little Theatre, Walts, used to call on Tolstoi for the purpose of receiving information about the staging of his drama, The Power of Darkness.

<p>12</p>

Ivan Ivanovich Bochkarev (died 1915), former revolutionary Slavophile who suffered much for his convictions. He became acquainted with the group of people around Tolstoi because of his belief in vegetarianism, to which he arrived independently of any one. In his personal conversations with Tolstoi, Bochkarev disputed his religious convictions, heatedly denying all his religious metaphysics. At this time he lived near the village of Ovsiannikovo, six versts from Yasnaya Polyana, on the estate of Tolstoi’s daughter, T. L. Sukhotin.

<p>13</p>

Prince Nicholai Leonidovich Obolensky, the grandnephew of Tolstoi – later married to Tolstoi’s daughter, Maria Lvovna.

<p>14</p>

Maria Alexandrovna Schmidt, an old friend, who shared Tolstoi’s opinions and whose personality and whole life, Tolstoi esteemed very highly. In the Journal of February 18, 1909, he wrote, “I never knew and do not know any woman spiritually higher than Maria Alexandrovna.” In the eighties, when class-teacher in the Nicholaievsky Orphan Asylum in Moscow, Mme. Schmidt made the acquaintance of the forbidden works of Tolstoi, upon which she left the asylum and went to live on the land, and up to her death supported herself by the labours of her own hand. The last ten years of her life she lived near the village of Ovsiannikovo, on the estate of T. L. Sukhotin, procuring her livelihood by the sale of the berries and vegetables from her own garden and the dairy products from her cows. She died October 18, 1911.

<p>15</p>

With Bochkarev.

<p>16</p>

Alexander Nikiphorovich Dunaev, an old friend of the Tolstoi family, later one of the directors of the Moscow Commercial Bank.

<p>17</p>

Constantin Nicholaievich Zyabrev, nick-named “Bieli” (White), a peasant from Yasnaya Polyana, who was also called by the villagers, “the Blessed.” Tolstoi liked to speak with him. He lived in the greatest poverty and never bothered about the next day. At the time of the visit, mentioned in the Journal, he was already near death and soon passed away. Some years before this, Tolstoi helped him to rebuild his cabin.

<p>18</p>

Dr. Ivan Romanovich Bazhenov, who lived at this time in Vladivostok, sent Tolstoi his manuscript essay on the necessity of calling an ecumenical council and asked his opinion on this question. In the copy of the Journal at the disposal of the editors, and perhaps in the original of the Journal, it was written Bozhanov.

<p>19</p>

A letter from G. F. Van-Duyl from Amsterdam. In the letter of November 18th, Tolstoi answered his letter as follows:

“Once a man has understood and is permeated with the consciousness that his true happiness, the happiness of his eternal life, that which is not limited by this world, consists in the fulfilment of the will of God and that against this will … then no consideration can force this man to act against his true happiness. And if there is an inner struggle and if, as in that case about which you spoke, family considerations come out on top, it only serves as a proof that the true teaching of Christ was not understood and was accepted by him who could not follow it; this only proves that he wanted to appear as a Christian, but he was not so in reality.”

<p>20</p>

Paul Ivanovich Biriukov, one of Tolstoi’s nearest friends and followers, who later wrote his biography (two volumes, published by Posrednik, Moscow). Tolstoi often calls him Posha in the Journal.

<p>21</p>

The editors were unable to discover the title of this pamphlet.

<p>22</p>

Maria Vasilievna Siaskov, an amanuensis, who was employed for many years in the publishing house of Posrednik.

<p>23</p>

Tatiana Andreevna Kuzminsky (born Behrs), a sister-in-law of Tolstoi, wife of Senator A. M. Kuzminsky.

<p>24</p>

Konevski, this is the way Tolstoi called the novel, Resurrection, which he had begun then, the subject of which he adopted at the end of the eighties from stories told by the well-known Court-worker, A. Th. Koni.

<p>25</p>

Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860), the great German philosopher. Tolstoi evidently read the translation by Ph. V. Chernigovitz, Aphorisms and Maxims, in two parts, 1891–1892. Tolstoi, as early as 1869, wrote to A. A. Fet: “Do you know what the present summer meant to me? Continual enthusiasm over Schopenhauer and a pile of spiritual pleasures which I never have experienced before… Schopenhauer is one of the greatest geniuses among people.”

<p>26</p>

That which was noted down in his pocket note-book – Tolstoi had the habit of putting down thoughts which came to him and which seemed to him important in a pocket note-book which never left him. Later he copied the most valuable thoughts into his Journal, revising, more or less, as he went along. In rewriting from the note-book Tolstoi often began the entry with these words, “I have been thinking” or “I have it noted.”

<p>27</p>

See Note 4.

<p>28</p>

This essay, entitled Shameful, pointing out the cruelty and senselessness of corporal punishment which the law at that time applied to the peasants, was printed with omissions and alterations in the Russian newspapers and later abroad in full in Leaflets of The Free Press, No. IV, England, 1899; later it was printed in The Full Collected Works of L. N. Tolstoi, published by Sytin, subscribed and popular editions, volume XVIII.