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

220FOURTEEN YEARS AT

disarm human justice. The reason is, that Divine Omnipotence is a reality, whilst that of the Emperor of Russia is a fìetion.

He would have long since pardoned the criminal had he been as great as he pretends to be; but clemency, independently of its being repugnant to his natural disposition, appears to him a weakness by which a king would degrade the kingly offiee: habituated as he is to measure his power by the fear whieh he inspires, he would regard mercy as a violation of his code of political morality.

For my part, I only judge of a man's power over others by that whieh I see him exercise over himself, and I cannot believe his authority safely established, until he can venture to forgive: the Emperor Nicholas ventures only to punish. Pardon might be a dangerous example to a people who are still so rude in the depths of their hearts. The prince lowers himself to the level of his savage subjects; he hardens himself with them ; he does not fear to brutalise them in order to attach them : people and sovereign emulate each other in deceptions, prejudices, and inhumanity. Abominable combination of barbarism and weakness, interchange of ferocity, <'ireulation of falsehood whieh warms the life of a monster ! — a cadaverous body whose blood is poison. Such is despotism in its essence and its aetion.

The husband and wife have lived for fourteen years by the side, so to speak, of the Uralian mines ; for the arms of a labourer like the prince are little suited to the work of the piek-axe. He is there for the sake of being there, and that is all: but he is a con-