sake of his own personal ends (however much, and however rightly,
he might believe them to be connected or identical with those of
others), which were sacred to him, ends for the sake of which he was
prepared to live and to die. It is for this reason that Herzen so seriously
and passionately believed in the independence and freedom of individuals; and understood what he believed in, and reacted so painfully against the adulteration or obfuscation of the issues by metaphysical
or theological patter and democratic rhetoric. In his view all that is
ultimately valuable are the particular purposes of particular persons;
and to trample on these is always a crime because there is, and can
be, no principle or value higher than the ends of the individual, and
therefore no principle in the name of which one could be permitted
to do violence to or degrade or destroy individuals-the sole authors
of all principles and all values. Unless a minimum area is guaranteed
to all men within which they can act as they wish, the only principles
and values left will be those guaranteed by theological or metaphysical
or scientific systems claiming to know the final truth about man's
place in the universe, and his functions and goals therein. And these
claims Herzen regarded as fraudulent, one and all. It is this particular
species of non-metaphysical, empirical, 'eudaemonistic' individualism
that makes Herzen the sworn enemy of all systems, and of all claims
to suppress liberties i n their name, whether in the name of utilitarian
considerations or authoritarian principles, of mystically revealed ends,
or of reverence before irresistible power, or 'the logic of the facts',
or any other similar reason.
What can Bakunin offer that is remotely comparable? Bakunin,
1 1 2.
H E RZEN AND B A K U N I N ON L I B E RTY
with his gusto and his logic and his eloquence, his desire and capacity
to undermine and burn and shiver to pieces, now disarmingly childlike, at other times pathological and inhuman; with his odd combination of analytical acuteness and unbridled exhibitionism; carrying with him, with superb unconcern, the multicoloured heritage of the
eighteenth century, without troubling to consider whether some
among his ideas contradicted others - the 'dialectic' would look after
that-or how many of them had become obsolete, discredited, or had
been absurd from the beginning- Bakunin, the official friend of
absolute liberty, has not bequeathed a single idea worth considering
for its own sake; there is not a fresh thought, not even an authentic
emotion, only amusing diatribes, high spirits, malicious vignettes, and
a memorable epigram or two. A historical figure remains-the 'Russian
Bear', as he liked to describe himself- morally careless, intellectually
irresponsible, a man who, in his love for humanity in the abstract,
was prepared, like Robespierre, to wade through seas of blood ; and
thereby constitutes a link in the tradition of cynical terrorism and
unconcern for individual human beings, the practice of which is the
main contribution of our own century, thus far, to political thought.
And this aspect of Bakunin, the Stavrogin concealed inside Rudin,
the fascist streak, the methods of Attila, 'Petrograndism', sinister
qualities so remote from the lovable 'Russian Bear' -die grosse Liselwas detected not merely by Dostoevsky, who exaggerated and caricatured it, but by Herzen himself, who drew up a formidable indictment against it in the Letters to an Old Comrade, perhaps the most instructive, prophetic, sober and moving essays on the prospects of
human freedom written in the nineteenth century.
1 As Herzen used to call him after his three-year-old daughter, Bakunin's
friend.
A Remarkable Decade
I
T H E B I R T H O F T H E R U S S I A N
I N T E L L I G E N T S I A
I
M v title- 'A Remarkable Decade'-and my subject are both taken
from a long essay in which the nineteenth-century Russian critic and
literary historian, Pavel Annenkov, described his friends more than
thirty years after the period with which he deals. Annenkov was an
agreeable, intelligent, and exceedingly civilised man, and a most understanding and dependable friend. He was not, perhaps, a very profound critic, nor was the range of his learning wide-he was a scholarly
dilettante, a traveller about Europe who liked to meet eminent men,
an eager and observant intellectual tourist.
It is clear that in addition to his other qualities he possessed considerable personal charm, so much, indeed, that he even succeeded in captivating Karl Marx, who wrote him at least one letter considered
important by Marxists on the subject of Proudhon. Indeed, Annenkov
has left us an exceedingly vivid description of the physical appearance
and ferocious intellectual manner of the young Marx-an admirably
detached and ironical vignette, perhaps the best portrait of him that
has survived.
It is true that, after he went back to Russia, Annenkov lost interest
in Marx, who was so deeply snubbed and hurt by this desertion by
a man on whom he thought he had made an indelible impression, that
in after years he expressed himself with extreme bitterness about the
Russian intellectual fldneurs who Buttered around him in Paris in the
40s, but turned out not to have any serious intentions after ali. But
although not very loyal to the figure of Marx, Annenkov did retain
the friendship of his compatriots Belinsky, Turgenev and Herzen to
the end of his days. And it is about them that he is most interesting.
1 1 4
B I RTH O F THE R U S S IAN I N T E L L I G ENTSIA
'A Remarkable Decade' is a description by him of the life of some
among the early members-the original founders-of the Russian
intelligentsia, between 1 8 38 and 1 848, when they were all young
men, some still at the university, some j ust emerged from it. The
subject is of more than literary or psychological interest because these
early Russian intellectuals created something which was destined
ultimately to have world-wide social and political consequences. The
largest single effect of the movement, I think it would be fair to say,
was the Russian Revolution itself. These rlvoltes early Russian
intellectuals set the moral tone for the kind of talk and action which
continued throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries,
until the final climax in 1 9 1 7.
It is true that the Russian Revolution (and no event had been more
discussed and speculated about during the century which preceded itnot even the great French Revolution) did not follow the lines that most of these writers and talkers had anticipated. Yet despite the
tendency to minimise the importance of such activity by such thinkers
as, for example, Tolstoy or Karl Marx, general ideas do have great
influence. The Nazis seemed to grasp this fact when they took care
at once to eliminate intellectual leaders in conquered countries, as