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THE EVOLUTION OF THE STATE ii
ii
first called into being than when freedom made its
appearance in England. The promulgation of the Russian
constitutional Magna Charta gave to the Empire a franchise
which was framed on much more democratic lines than
that which England obtained when her barons wrested the
Magna Charta from their sovereign. Moreover, the work
of the town Dumas, the Zemstvos (county councils), and
the Volostnia Oupravlenia (district councils) bears witness
to the spirit of self-government which animated Russian
public life and may be compared with analogous institutions
of self-government in Great Britain.
There is no use in speaking of barbarism, where barbarism
does not exist, as there is also no use in assuming that the
specific individuality of a civilised nation has not the right
of existence. Amongst civilised nations there must
necessarily be differences in the mode of life, qualitatively, without
necessarily entailing a quantitative gradation in the degree
of culture. There are many different forms of culture, all of
which have the right to exist in accordance with differences
of climate and race, based on broad-mindedness, tolerance,
and justice, and avoiding a narrow-minded tendency to
reduce the beautiful diversity in the life of nations to one
universal pattern of culture.
It is a truism that Russia, in comparison with Great
Britain, is backward in education, means of communication,
industry, and enterprise, but at any rate and to all intents
and purposes the Russian nation can vindicate for itself a
deep-rooted spirit of Christian love and forbearance, a true
democratic conception of social life, and a firm will to
progress in the evolution of human existence. A nation
endowed with such ideals can truly be called a cultured
nation. After having been estranged from European
civilisation for nearly two hundred years (from the thirteenth to
the fifteenth century) by the vile Tartar yoke, after having
passed through a not altogether pleasant Kindergarten period
of German pedantic schooling, after having, during the
present war, been sorely tried by the invasion of an implacable
enemy, Russia has become more and more alive to her true
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