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

78GREEK rOLICY Ш RUSSIA,

stopped, with that of Catholicism, in Poland. The Russians are warriors, but they fight under the principle of obedience, and with the object of gain; the Polish chevaliers fought for the pure love of glory; and thus, though these people spring from the same stock, and have still many points of resemblance, the events of history have separated them so widely that it will require a greater number of ages of Russian poliey to reunite them than it has required of religion and of social habitudes to part them asunder.

" Whilst Europe was slowly recovering from the efforts she had made during centuries to rescue the tomb of Christ from the unbelievers, Russia was paying tribute to the Mohammedans under TJsbeck, and at the same time drawing her arts and sciences, her manners, religion, and politics, as also her principles of craft and fraud, and her aversion to the Latin cross, from the Greek empire. If we reflect on all these civil, religious, and political influences, we shall no longer wonder at the little confidence that can be placed in the word of a Russian (it is the Russian prince who speaks), nor that the Russian character in general should bear the impress of that false Byzantine stamp which influences social life even under the empire of the Czars — worthy successors of the lieutenants of Bati.

" The unmitigated despotism that reigns over us established itself at the very period that servitude ceased in the rest of Europe. From the time of the invasion of the Mongols, the Slavonians, until then one of the freest peoj)le in the world, became slaves-: first to their conquerors, and afterwards to their own princes. Bondage was thenceforward established