William Wilberforce (1759-1833) was an English activist who successfully fought to end the slave trade in Britain; Richard Cobden (1804-1865) was an English political figure, opponent of the Corn Laws, advocate of free trade, and member of Parliament.
The Bell, No. 90, January i5, i86i. Herzen learned about Konstantin Aksakov's death through a letter from the deceased's brother, Ivan. Turgenev wrote to Herzen in February i86i informing him that the article below made a deep impression on readers in Moscow and elsewhere in Russia, and that Turgenev himself appreciated the linking of his name with that of Belinsky and others in the essay "Provincial Universities" (that appeared in the subsequent issue) as much as he would a prestigious government award (Let 3^85). Ivan Aksakov later added that what Herzen wrote was much better than anything published in Russia about his brother or about Khomyakov (who died in September i860). Despite differing on a number of issues, Herzen had deep respect for the Moscow Slavophiles, agreeing with Konstantin Aksakov on the need to emancipate the serfs with land, and on the hopelessness of the government in St. Petersburg. At this point he felt closer in some ways to the Slavophiles than to pro- government liberals or the increasingly intolerant progressive writers. The Ministry of Education banned a speech at St. Petersburg University about Aksakov by Professor Nikolay I. Kostomarov (i8i7-i885) because of Herzen's praise for the deceased in The Bell. Walicki notes that the Aksakov obituary was "lengthy and extraordinarily warm," reflecting an idealization of Slavophilism and a celebration of its utopia at a moment when Slavophiles were about to abandon this vision (Walicki, Slavophile Controversy, 592). Lengthy excerpts from this tribute were included in Herzen's memoir (My Past and Thoughts, 2:549-50).
In the same issue of The Bell, Herzen reported on the "arrest" of the papers of history professor Platon V. Pavlov (i823-i895) in St. Petersburg, in connection with a Kharkov student affair. Pavlov, who had previously taught in Kiev and Moscow, was exiled to Vetlyuga after an i862 speech at a millennium celebration in St. Petersburg, later transformed and immortalized by Dostoevsky in the novel Demons.
Konstantin Sergeevich Aksakov [1861]
Following the powerful fighter for the Slavic cause in Russia, A. S. Khomya- kov, one of his comrades-in-arms, Konstantin Sergeevich Aksakov, passed away last month.
Khomyakov died young, even younger than Aksakov; it is painful for the people who loved them to know that these noble, tireless activists, these opponents, who were closer to us than many of our own, are no more. One cannot argue with the absurd power of fate, which has neither ears nor eyes and cannot even be offended, and for that reason, with tears and a pious feeling we close the lid on their coffins and move on to that which lives after them.
The Kireevskys,1 Khomyakov, and Aksakov finished their work; whether their lives were long or short, when closing their eyes they could with full consciousness say to themselves that they had accomplished what they wanted to accomplish; if they were unable to stop the courier's troika sent by Peter, in which Biron sits and thrashes the coachman to make him gallop along rows of grain and trample people, then they did bring a halt to mindlessly enthusiastic public opinion and caused all serious people to become thoughtful.
The turning point in Russian thought began with them. And when we say that, it would seem, we cannot be suspected of bias.
Yes, we were their opponents, but very strange ones. We had a single love, but not an identical one.
From our earliest years we and they were struck by a single, powerful, instinctive, physiological, passionate feeling, which they took as a recollection and we as prophecy—a feeling of boundless, all-embracing love for the Russian people, the Russian way of life, and the Russian way of thinking. And like Janus or a two-headed eagle, we gazed in different directions while our heart beat as one.
They transferred all their love and all their tenderness to the oppressed mother. For us, brought up away from home, that tie had weakened. A French governess had charge of us and we learned later on that our mother was not she, but a downtrodden peasant woman, which we ourselves had guessed from the resemblance in our features and because her songs were more native to us than vaudeville. We came to love her very much but her life was too cramped for us. It was very stuffy in her little room—all blackened faces looking out from the silver icon frames, priests and deacons— frightening the unhappy woman, who had been beaten by soldiers and clerks; even her eternal cry about lost happiness tore at our heart. We knew that she had no radiant memories, and we knew something else, that her happiness lay ahead, that beneath her heart beat that of an unborn child, our younger brother. [. . .]
Such was our family quarrel fifteen years ago.2 A lot of water has flowed under the bridge since then; we have encountered mountain air that stopped our ascent, while they, instead of a world of relics, stumbled upon living Russian questions. To settle accounts seems strange to us because there is no patent on understanding; time, history, and experience brought us closer together not because they were drawn closer to us or we to them, but because we and they are closer to a true outlook than before, when we relentlessly tore each other to pieces in journal articles, although even then I do not recall that we doubted their ardent love for Russia or they ours.3
Based on this faith in each other and this common love even we have the right to bow to their graves and throw our handful of earth on their deceased with a sacred wish that on their graves and on ours young Russia will flourish powerfully and widely!
January 1/13,1861
Notes
Source: "Konstantin Sergeevich Aksakov," Kolokol, l. 90, January 15, 1861; 15:9-11,
294-96.
Ivan V. Kireevsky (1806-1856), literary critic, editor of The European, and, along with his older brother Petr (1808-1856), one of the founders of the Slavophile movement.
Herzen refers to the years 1844-47.
Herzen: "Only once N. Yazykov insultingly 'lashed out' at Chaadaev, Granovsky, and me. K. Aksakov could not stand it and answered this poet in his own party with sharp verses in our defense. [. . .] Aksakov remained an eternally enthusiastic and infinitely noble youth. He got carried away, was distracted, but was always pure of heart. In 1844, when our quarrels had reached the point where neither we nor the Slavophiles wanted to have any further meetings, I was walking along the street as K. Aksakov went by in a sleigh. I bowed to him in a friendly way. He was about to pass me by when he suddenly stopped the coachman, got out of the sleigh and came up to me. 'It was too painful for me,' he said, 'to go past you without saying goodbye. You understand that after all that has passed between your friends and mine, I won't be coming to see you; it is such a pity but nothing can be done about it. I wanted to shake your hand and bid you farewell.' He rapidly walked back to his sleigh, but suddenly turned; I stood in the same spot because I was feeling sad; he ran toward me, embraced and kissed me. I had tears in my eyes. How I loved him at that moment of quarreling!"
^31 +
The Bell, No. 93, March 1, 1861. In this article, Herzen is most likely taking into account information he received in a February i86i letter from Ivan Turgenev, who said that the emancipation announcement would come soon, perhaps on the sixth anniversary of the death of Nicholas I (February i8). Turgenev believed that the main opponents of this act were Gagarin (either Ivan Vasilevich, Voronezh governor and author of an infamous project to defraud the serfs, or Prince Pavel Pavlovich, a member of the Main Committee on emancipation), Minister of State Properties Count Mikhail N. Muravyov, Minister of Finance Knyazhevich, and Minister of Foreign Affairs Prince Gorchakov. In the following issue of The Bell, Herzen urged Russian tourists to return home to witness this civilizational change, a message he also sent privately to Turgenev, saying that for men of the forties "this is our moment, our last moment—the epilogue" (Gertsen, Sobranie sochinenii, 27:bk. i, 138-40).