I said ‘Ah!’ and made my usual gesture of approval at what I heard, and I walked on.
Next day I sent to inquire how Struménski was, and was told that he had received the sacrament and was dying.
It was my brother Michael’s name-day,14 and there was to be a parade and a special service. I said I was unwell after my journey through the Crimea, and I did not attend the Mass. Diebitsch returned, and again reported about the plot in the Second Army, reminding me of what Count Witte had told me before my visit to the Crimea, and of the report of the non-commissioned officer Sherwood.
Only while listening to the report of Diebitsch, who attached such immense importance to all these attempted conspiracies, did I suddenly feel the full significance and strength of the change that had taken place within me. They were conspiring in order to alter our system of government and introduce a Constitution – the very thing that I had wanted to do twenty years back. I had made and unmade Constitutions in Europe, and what and who is any the better for it? And above all who was I that I should do it? All external life, all arrangements of external affairs and all participation in them – had I not participated in them and rearranged the life of the peoples of Europe? – seemed unimportant, unnecessary, and not at all my business. I suddenly realized that none of it was my business, that my business was with myself – my soul. All my old desires to abdicate – formerly ostentatious, with a wish to reveal the grandeur of my soul and to astonish people and make them regret me – now returned with fresh force and complete sincerity. I no longer thought of what other people would think, but only of myself, my soul. It was as if my whole life, a brilliant one in the worldly sense, had been lived only that I might return to that youthful desire – evoked by repentance – to abandon everything; but to abandon it without vanity, without thought of human fame, only for my own soul’s sake and for God. Then it had been a vague desire, now it was the impossibility of continuing to live as I had done.
But how? Not so as to astonish people and to be praised, but on the contrary, to go away with suffering and with no one’s knowledge. And this thought so pleased and delighted me that I began to think of how to accomplish it. I employed all the powers of my mind and all my characteristic cunning to effect it. But the execution of my intention was surprisingly easier than I had expected. My plan was to pretend to be ill and dying, and having persuaded and bribed a doctor to have the dying Struménski put in my place, to go away, to fly – concealing my identity from everyone.
It was as if everything happened expressly for the success of my project. On the 9th,15 as if on purpose, I fell ill with intermittent fever. I was ill for about a week, during which my intention became stronger and stronger and I considered my plan thoroughly. On the 16th I got up feeling well.
That day I shaved as usual, and being deep in thought, cut myself badly near the chin. I lost much blood and, feeling faint, fell down. People came running and lifted me. I saw at once that this would help the execution of my plan, and though I felt quite well I pretended to be very weak, went to bed, and had Dr Vimier’s assistant called. Vimier would not have agreed to any deception, but I hoped to be able to bribe this young man. I disclosed my intention and plan to him, and offered him eighty thousand rubles if he would do what I demanded. My plan was this: Struménski, as I had learnt that morning, was near death and not expected to live beyond the evening. I went to bed and, pretending to be vexed with everybody, would not let anyone in except the physician I had bribed. That night he was to bring Struménski’s body in a bath, put it in my place, and announce my sudden death. Strange to say, everything happened as we had planned, and on the 17th of November16 I was a free man. Struménski’s body, in its closed coffin, was buried with the greatest pomp, and my brother Nicholas ascended the throne, having banished the conspirators to forced labour in Siberia. I afterwards met some of them there. I experienced sufferings trifling in comparison with my crimes, and the greatest and quite undeserved happiness of which I will speak in due course.
Now, on the brink of the grave, at the age of seventy-two, having understood the vanity of my former life and the significance of the life I have lived and am living as a wanderer, I will try to tell the story of my former life.
MY LIFE
12th December, 1849. Siberian Forest-swamp near Krasnorechinsk
TO-DAY is my birthday, I am seventy-two. Seventy-two years ago I was born in Petersburg in the Winter Palace, in the apartments of my mother the Empress, then the Grand Duchess Mária Fëdorovna.
I slept pretty well last night. After yesterday’s indisposition I feel rather better again. The chief thing is that the spiritual torpor I was in has passed, and I can again communicate with God with my whole soul. Last night I prayed in the dark. I was clearly conscious of my position in the world. My whole life is something required by Him who sent me here, and I can do what He requires or not just as I please. By doing what He requires I conduce towards the welfare of the whole world. By not doing it I deprive myself of welfare – not of all welfare, but of the welfare that might be mine; but I do not deprive the world of the welfare destined for it. What I ought to have done will be done by others, so that His will may be accomplished. That is what my free will consists in. But if He knows what will be, if everything is ordained by Him, is there any freedom? I don’t know. Here thought reaches its limits and prayer begins, the simple prayer of childhood and old age. ‘Father, not my will but Thine be done.’ Simply: ‘Lord forgive and have mercy. Yes, Lord forgive and have mercy, and forgive and have mercy. I cannot express it in words but Thou knowest the heart. Thou Thyself dwellest therein.’
I fell soundly asleep. As usual, from the weakness of old age, I woke five or six times and dreamt I was bathing in the sea and swimming. The water was greenish and beautiful, and I was surprised that it held me up so high that I did not sink at all. Some men and women were on the shore hindering me from getting out, for I was naked. The meaning of this dream is that the vigour of my body still hinders me, but that the exit is near at hand.
I rose before daybreak and struck a flint, but for a long time could not light the tinder. I put on my elk-skin dressing-gown and went out. Behind the snow-clad larches and pines glowed a rosy-orange sky. I brought in the firewood I chopped yesterday, lit the stove, and chopped some more wood. It grew lighter. I ate some moistened rusks. The stove had grown hot and I closed the damper and sat down to write.
I was born just seventy-two years ago, on the 12th of December, 1777, in Petersburg, in the Winter Palace. By my grandmother’s wish I was named Alexander, to betoken, as she told me herself, my becoming as great a man as Alexander the Great and as holy as Alexander Névski. I was christened a week later in the large Palace Church. I was carried on a brocade pillow by the Duchess of Courland. My coverlet was held up by officials of the highest rank. The Empress was my godmother, and the Emperor of Austria and the King of Prussia were my godfathers. The room allotted to me had been arranged to my grandmother’s plan. (I don’t remember it at all, but know of it from hearsay.) In the middle of that spacious room with its three large windows between four pillars, a velvet canopy was fastened to the ceiling with silk hangings descending to the ground. Under the canopy was placed an iron cot with a leather mattress, a small pillow, and a light English blanket. Beyond the hangings was a railing nearly five feet high, to prevent visitors from approaching too near. There was no other furniture in the room, except a bed behind the canopy for my wet-nurse. Every detail of my physical nurture was thought out by my grandmother. Rocking me to sleep was forbidden; I was swaddled in a special way; I wore no socks; was bathed first in warm and then in cold water, and had special clothing without seams or ribbons, but which could all be put on at once. As soon as I could crawl I was placed on the carpet and left to my own devices. I have been told that at first my grandmother herself used often to come and sit on the carpet to play with me. I don’t remember anything of this, nor do I remember my wet-nurse at that time.