Our stay at Saigon, the base of French operations in the advance against important
borderlands of China, will in its turn be marked by enthusiasm in the greeting of a
friendly nation. For us Russians, who scarcely ever visit the distant lands of Asia to
study the powers and the means of European colonists, a visit to the central point of the
"Indo-Chinese" empire governed from Paris will be doubly instructive, doubly
useful after seeing the British domains and patriarchally protected Java. This will be the
more appropriate in that every figure, every vivid detail, every living fact, must and
will lead us to reflect in what a marked degree we Russians, as regards our prestige in
Asia, voluntarily resign to every comer from Europe our historical part and our inherited
mission as leaders of the East.
In such an abnormal state of affairs all the gain, as regards material prosperity,
falls to the share of the representatives of Western principles---representatives foreign
in spirit, and in reality hateful to those peoples of an ancient type on whom they have
forced themselves by means of their cannon. Burma, Cambodia, and Annam are no more; Siam
is on the eve of dangerous external catastrophes; Japan is on the threshold of terrible
internal dissensions; China alone, standing guard over its own, and unconsciously over
Russian interests, holds its ground with the wisdom of the serpent, gathers its forces
against the foe from beyond the seas, and anxiously glances toward the silent North, where
is situated the only state from which the Celestial Empire, educated in autocratic
principles, can expect moral support, disinterested assistance, and a practical alliance
based on community of interests.
This northern land of mist, forest, and ice, the extreme east of Siberia, opened up by
Khabaroff, and other bold pioneers like him, the land reunited to Russia by the genius of
Mooravioff-Amoorsky---is still a realm of primitive quiet, of deepest stillness and
stagnation. It is only with the end of the century, with the opening up of new ways of
communication with our eastern coast, that a new era with all its unforeseen consequences
may begin. Meanwhile the land bears the stamp of something unformed and sad, like the life
of its original settlers. All the more attention and unprejudiced judgment, then, is
required of anyone who would draw a parallel between the lands of the Pacific south now
opening out before us, with the emerald island of Java, the inexhaustible natural riches
of the Indo-Chinese soil, the self-confident vitality of the Celestial Empire, and the
marshes and retired nooks, the boundless desert borders of the country whose mission, in
spite of all this, is to be a source of light for the neighboring expanse, with its
countless population.
The tiny kingdom of Holland holds sway in Asia over more than thirty million human
beings (and that, too, at the equator, in an earthly paradise), while in the third part of
the same continent the most important power in it cannot reckon up one half the number.
European colonizers, though not without envy and enmity, have shared among them the best
coast districts of these lands. Towns of such universal commercial importance as Hong Kong
and Singapore are the most eloquent witnesses to the indefatigable enterprise of Europeans
amidst the prevailing Asiatic torpor. But while drawing the juices out of this gigantic
continent, and, wherever possible, holding hundreds of millions in a state of economic
slavery, do the pioneers of civilization hope for final success? Holding on to the brink
and ledges of a precipice, are they not in a state of constant alarm, lest the stones
should give way and hurl them into the abyss? When the whole East awakes, as it will
sooner or later: when it realizes its mighty power and determines to speak its mind, then
threats, violence, and superficial victories will not remedy the internal discord. This is
why it is Russia's part to grow in power unobserved amidst the wastes and deserts of the
North in expectation of the conflict between two worlds, in which the decision will depend
on neither of them.
The idea of invading a complex foreign life, of using Asia as a tool for the
advancement of the selfish interests of modern, so-called civilized, mankind, was
repugnant to us. For more than two hundred years we have remained at home; for our natural
union with Turkestan and the region of the Amur cannot be regarded as political
annexations. We have remained at home with our traditional carelessness and indolence,
while the Pacific has become the arena of western European advance against a native world
with an ancient political constitution and an undoubted civilization of its own.
The results are patent. The strangers have dethroned and oppressed the East. Coming
here to live and make money, they do not find a home (But any Asiatic borderland soon
becomes a home for a Russian.) The natives are not brothers in humanity to them; for them
the land is one of voluntary exile, and the people are considered as miserable and
inferior beings. The latter gradually realize the meaning of these outrageous views, and
repay their "masters" with intense hatred. But where and how are they to find
protection and a bulwark against the foreign foe?
But the mythologizing spirit is still alive amongst them. The more actively Europe
presses on Asia, the brighter becomes the name of the White Czar in popular report and
tradition....
From that remote period when our great golden-domed Moscow, which but a little earlier
was no more than a small town in an insignificant subordinate principality, received the
blessing of the saints and was irradiated by the creative glow of the autocratic idea, the
East, advancing on us with fire and sword, has masterfully drawn toward it the eyes of the
Russians: has wakened in them sleeping powers and heroic daring: and now calls them onward
to deeds of glory, to advancement beyond the bounds of a dull reality, to a bright,
glorious, and ineffable future! There neither is nor ever has been a nation whose past is
so closely bound up with its future, as may be seen in the growth of the Russian Empire.
The man of the West (the German, the Frenchman, the Englishman, the Italian) must cross
the seas to find relief from the pressure which overwhelms him at home. Far from his
native land, he must build his temporal prosperity on a foundation of sand, and the more
firmly he takes root there under conditions of the most favorable nature, the more evident
does it become that his old home, and he the voluntary exile, belong to two perfectly
alien worlds. Beyond the seas, away from the life of his native land, he may gain money
and position, but cannot (except artificially and but for a short time) retain completely
untouched the spirit of his people, their ideals and traditions.
Russia alone does not know what it is annually to send forth to foreign lands thousands
of her sons who cannot find food and shelter amid the superfluity of wealth and labor
falling to the share of their countrymen. With us there is work for all---work to last for
hundreds of years; with us everyone who has hands to work is a welcome guest on our
eastern, or, rather, southeastern borders, where a vigorous flow of life breaks forth in
an inexhaustible spring, and the charms of an untrammelled life are an everlasting
attraction. Properly speaking, in Asia we have not, nor can have, any bounds, except the
boundless sea breaking for ever on her shores, an ocean as unfettered as is the spirit of
the Russian people itself. When one states such an evident truth, one generally hears the
reply: "What do we want with it? We have land enough already. As it is, we have
spread and grown to a monstrous size, to the prejudice of the government of the state and
to the direct harm of our radical population." But for Russia there is no other
course than either to become what she is destined to be----a great power uniting the West
with the East, or ingloriously and imperceptibly to tread the downward path, because
Europe of itself would crush us with its external superiority, while the races of Asia,
awakened from their slumber by other hands than ours, would be in time even more dangerous
to Russia than the nations of the West. Naturally we cannot, even in thought, admit of our
ruin or future humiliation! The unavoidable growth of our historical heritage, our triumph
over inimical principles, the coming supremacy of Russia in the greatest and most populous
of continents, is perfectly evident to our spiritual eyes. In days of old, when
communication with distant borderlands was far more difficult than in our days, vast
empires, nevertheless, easily came into being, grew powerful, and extended their
boundaries on the borders of semi-barbarous Europe and the East, fluctuating in form, but
immutable in its essence. At the present time, when railways, the telegraph, the
telephone, to say nothing of other inventions and improvements of importance, have
simplified communication between all lands and nations to the last degree, there is
scarcely any reason to fear either distance or the estrangement of the several parts of a
single whole. Practically distance is almost nonexistent. What to our ancestors appeared
simply near at hand now seems to lie immediately before our eyes.
All that used to be matter of report, a dream of a fabulous land on the very borders of
the world, is now accessible by a journey of a few weeks. The twentieth century promises
us even greater surprises in this respect. We must not blind our thoughts and our
imagination by prejudices and fancied terrors to the undoubtedly coming events which will
change all things. If on the threshold of a future of growing complexity we really thirst
for moral healing, for great knowledge and unheard-of deeds in the cause of Russia and the
Czar, we must first call to mind whence and how our native land came into being, whose
blood it is that flows most abundantly in our veins, what are the brilliant traditions of
our past. A predominant part in it has always fallen to the share of Asia. It was Asia
that devastated us, and it was she, on the other hand, that renovated us. It is owing to
her alone that the Russian mind has developed the idea of a Christian autocrat placed by
Providence above all earthly vanity, amid a throng of heterodox but sympathizing races. An
old Russian poem gives a characteristic view of the position of our sovereigns on the
throne of Moscow---
"Our White Czar is a king above kings,
And he holdeth fast to the Christian faith,
To the Christian faith, to the faith of prayer:
He standeth forth for the faith of Christ,
And for the house of the Holy Virgin.
All the hordes have bowed down to him,
All the tribes have submitted to him,
Because the White Czar is king over kings."
The popular songs of Russia present us with a similar view of the secular prince of
Moscow. In the letter of Ivan the Terrible to Prince Koorbsky there is a still clearer
realization of the divine origin of all true autocratic thought and constant care for the
good of the people: "The earth is ruled by the mercy of God and the grace of the
Immaculate Virgin; by the prayers of the saints and the blessing of our fathers, and last
of all, by us, its sovereigns." Where and when, in what European sovereigns, can we
find more or as much humility in the estimate of their position? Such words could be used
only by a sovereign deeply imbued with the Oriental view that the world is plunged in sin
and falsehood; that he himself, a weak mortal, was strong and "wide ruling" only
by the unseen favor of a bright and spiritual power, creating and maintaining all around
him.
It is this sacred conviction which has given birth to the steadfast belief both of our
rulers and of the ruled, that Russia is the source and center of an invincible might,
which is but increased by the attacks of her foes. The East believes no less than we do,
and exactly as we do, in the preternatural qualities of the Russian national spirit, but
values and understands them just in the same measure as we treasure the most precious of
our national traditions---autocracy. Without it, Asia would be incapable of sincere liking
for Russia and of painless identification with her. Without it, Europe would find it mere
child's-play to dismember and overpower us as thoroughly as she has overpowered and
dismembered the Slavs of the West, now suffering a bitter fate. The question is: In whose
name and by whose single will shall the heritage of Russia be ruled in the future?
Source:
From: Prince E. Ukhtomskii, Travels in the East of Nicholas II, Emperor of Russia
When Cesarewitch 1890-1891, 2 vols., (London, 1896), II.142-143, 444-446.
Scanned by Jerome S. Arkenberg, Cal. State Fullerton.
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© Paul Halsall, November 1998
