The Kingdom of God Is Within You - Leo Nikoleyevich Tolstoy (best non fiction books of all time txt) 📗

bound to carry out

the suggestion—he thinks he cannot stop—but the nearer he gets

to the time and the place of the action, the more the benumbed

conscience begins to stir, to resist, and to try to awake. And no

one can say beforehand whether he will carry out the suggestion or

not; which will gain the upper hand, the rational conscience or

the irrational suggestion. It all depends on their relative

strength.

 

That is just the case with the men in the Toula train and in

general with everyone carrying out acts of state violence in our

day.

 

There was a time when men who set out with the object of murder

and violence, to make an example, did not return till they had

carried out their object, and then, untroubled by doubts or

scruples, having calmly flogged men to death, they returned home

and caressed their children, laughed, amused themselves, and

enjoyed the peaceful pleasures of family life. In those days it

never struck the landowners and wealthy men who profited by these

crimes, that the privileges they enjoyed had any direct connection

with these atrocities. But now it is no longer so. Men know now,

or are not far from knowing, what they are doing and for what

object they do it. They can shut their eyes and force their

conscience to be still, but so long as their eyes are opened and

their conscience undulled, they must all—those who carry out and

those who profit by these crimes alike—see the import of them.

Sometimes they realize it only after the crime has been

perpetrated, sometimes they realize it just before its

perpetration. Thus those who commanded the recent acts of

violence in Nijni-Novgorod, Saratov, Orel, and the Yuzovsky

factory realized their significance only after their perpetration,

and now those who commanded and those who carried out these crimes

are ashamed before public opinion and their conscience. I have

talked to soldiers who had taken part in these crimes, and they

always studiously turned the conversation off the subject, and

when they spoke of it it was with horror and bewilderment. There

are cases, too, when men come to themselves just before the

perpetration of the crime. Thus I know the case of a sergeant-major who had been beaten by two peasants during the repression of

disorder and had made a complaint. The next day, after seeing the

atrocities perpetrated on the other peasants, he entreated the

commander of his company to tear up his complaint and let off the

two peasants. I know cases when soldiers, commanded to fire, have

refused to obey, and I know many cases of officers who have

refused to command expeditions for torture and murder. So that

men sometimes come to their senses long before perpetrating the

suggested crime, sometimes at the very moment before perpetrating

it, sometimes only afterward.

 

The men traveling in the Toula train were going with the object of

killing and injuring their fellow-creatures, but none could tell

whether they would carry out their object or not. However obscure

his responsibility for the affair is to each, and however strong

the idea instilled into all of them that they are not men, but

governors, officials, officers, and soldiers, and as such beings

can violate every human duty, the nearer they approach the place

of the execution, the stronger their doubts as to its being right,

and this doubt will reach its highest point when the very moment

for carrying it out has come.

 

The governor, in spite of all the stupefying effect of his

surroundings, cannot help hesitating when the moment comes to give

final decisive command. He knows that the action of the Governor

of Orel has called down upon him the disapproval of the best

people, and he himself, influenced by the public opinion of the

circles in which he moves, has more than once expressed his

disapprobation of him. He knows that the prosecutor, who ought to

have come, flatly refused to have anything to do with it, because

he regarded it as disgraceful. He knows, too, that there may be

changes any day in the government, and that what was a ground for

advancement yesterday may be the cause of disgrace tomorrow. And

he knows that there is a press, if not in Russia, at least abroad,

which may report the affair and cover him with ignominy forever.

He is already conscious of a change in public opinion which

condemns what was formerly a duty. Moreover, he cannot feel fully

assured that his soldiers will at the last moment obey him. He is

wavering, and none can say beforehand what he will do.

 

All the officers and functionaries who accompany him experience in

greater or less degree the same emotions. In the depths of their

hearts they all know that what they are doing is shameful, that to

take part in it is a discredit and blemish in the eyes of some

people whose opinion they value. They know that after murdering

and torturing the defenseless, each of them will be ashamed to

face his betrothed or the woman he is courting. And besides, they

too, like the governor, are doubtful whether the soldiers’

obedience to orders can be reckoned on. What a contrast with the

confident air they all put on as they sauntered about the station

and platform! Inwardly they were not only in a state of suffering

but even of suspense. Indeed they only assumed this bold and

composed manner to conceal the wavering within. And this feeling

increased as they drew near the scene of action.

 

And imperceptible as it was, and strange as it seems to say so,

all that mass of lads, the soldiers, who seemed so submissive,

were in precisely the same condition.

 

These are not the soldiers of former days, who gave up the natural

life of industry and devoted their whole existence to debauchery,

plunder, and murder, like the Roman legionaries or the warriors of

the Thirty Years’ War, or even the soldiers of more recent times

who served for twenty-five years in the army. They have mostly

been only lately taken from their families, and are full of the

recollections of the good, rational, natural life they have left

behind them.

 

All these lads, peasants for the most part, know what is the

business they have come about; they know that the landowners

always oppress their brothers the peasants, and that therefore it

is most likely the same thing here. Moreover, a majority of them

can now read, and the books they read are not all such as exalt a

military life; there are some which point out its immorality.

Among them are often freethinking comrades—who have enlisted

voluntarily—or young officers of liberal ideas, and already the

first germ of doubt has been sown in regard to the unconditional

legitimacy and glory of their occupation.

 

It is true that they have all passed through that terrible,

skillful education, elaborated through centuries, which kills all

initiative in a man, and that they are so trained to mechanical

obedience that at the word of command: “Fire!—All the line!—

Fire!” and so on, their guns will rise of themselves and the

habitual movements will be performed. But “Fire!” now does not

mean shooting into the sand for amusement, it means firing on

their broken-down, exploited fathers and brothers whom they see

there in the crowd, with women and children shouting and waving

their arms. Here they are—one with his scanty beard and patched

coat and plaited shoes of reed, just like the father left at home

in Kazan or Riazan province; one with gray beard and bent back,

leaning on a staff like the old grandfather; one, a young fellow

in boots and a red shirt, just as he was himself a year ago—he,

the soldier who must fire upon him. There, too, a woman in reed

shoes and PANYOVA, just like the mother left at home.

 

Is it possible they must fire on them? And no one knows what each

soldier will do at the last minute. The least word, the slightest

allusion would be enough to stop them.

 

At the last moment they will all find themselves in the position

of a hypnotized man to whom it has been suggested to chop a log,

who coming up to what has been indicated to him as a log, with the

ax already lifted to strike, sees that it is not a log but his

sleeping brother. He may perform the act that has been suggested

to him, and he may come to his senses at the moment of performing

it. In the same way all these men may come to themselves in time

or they may go on to the end.

 

If they do not come to themselves, the most fearful crime will be

committed, as in Orel, and then the hypnotic suggestion under

which they act will be strengthened in all other men. If they do

come to themselves, not only this terrible crime will not be

perpetrated, but many also who hear of the turn the affair has

taken will be emancipated from the hypnotic influence in which

they were held, or at least will be nearer being emancipated from

it.

 

Even if a few only come to themselves, and boldly explain to the

others all the wickedness of such a crime, the influence of these

few may rouse the others to shake off the controlling suggestion,

and the atrocity will not be perpetrated.

 

More than that, if a few men, even of those who are not taking

part in the affair but are only present at the preparations for

it, or have heard of such things being done in the past, do not

remain indifferent but boldly and plainly express their

detestation of such crimes to those who have to execute them, and

point out to them all the senselessness, cruelty, and wickedness

of such acts, that alone will be productive of good.

 

That was what took place in the instance before us. It was enough

for a few men, some personally concerned in the affair and others

simply outsiders, to express their disapproval of floggings that

had taken place elsewhere, and their contempt and loathing for

those who had taken part in inflicting them, for a few persons in

the Toula case to express their repugnance to having any share in

it; for a lady traveling by the train, and a few other bystanders

at the station, to express to those who formed the expedition

their disgust at what they were doing; for one of the commanders

of a company, who was asked for troops for the restoration of

order, to reply that soldiers ought not to be butchers—and thanks

to these and a few other seemingly insignificant influences

brought to bear on these hypnotized men, the affair took a

completely different turn, and the troops, when they reached the

place, did not inflict any punishment, but contented themselves

with cutting down the forest and giving it to the landowner.

 

Had not a few persons had a clear consciousness that what they

were doing was wrong, and consequently influenced one another in

that direction, what was done at Orel would have taken place at

Toula. Had this consciousness been still stronger, and had the

influence exerted been therefore greater than it was, it might

well have been that the governor with his troops would not even

have ventured to cut down the forest and give it to the landowner.

 

Had that consciousness been stronger still, it might well have

been that the governor would not have ventured to go to the scene

of action at all; even that the minister would not have ventured

to form this decision or the Tzar to ratify it.

 

All depends, therefore, on the strength of the consciousness