Russia in 1839 -Empire of the Czar: A Journey Through Eternal Russia

304RESUME OF

tained by fear; and I have drawn from the spectacle a lesson very different from the one which I came to seek. Russia is a world scarcely known to foreigners: the Russians who travel to escape it, pay, when at a distance, in crafty encomiums, their tribute to their country; and the greater number of travellers who have described it to us have been unwilling to discover in it any thing but that which they went to find. If people will defend their prejudices against evidence, where is the good of travelling ? When thus determined to view nations as they wish to view them, there is no longer a necessity for leaving their own country.

The following is the resume of my journey, written since my return to Ems.

In Russia, all that strikes the eye, every thing that passes around, bears the impress of a regularity that is startling; and the first thought that enters the mind of the traveller, when he contemplates this symmetrical system, is that a uniformity so complete, a regularity so contrary to the natural inclinations of men, cannot have been established, and cannot be maintained except by violence. Imagination vainly implores a little variety, like a bird uselessly beating its wings against a cage. Under such a system, a man may know the first day of his life all that he will see and do until the last. This hard tyranny is called, in official language, respect for unity, love of order; and it is a fruit of despotism so precious to methodical minds, that they think they cannot pay too dear for it.