Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow by Irina Reyfman (top 10 novels of all time .txt) 📕

permit, enlighten, and dispose them to the good: here you have why truly great rulers are so rare.

“Convinced of the usefulness of publishing, the government granted permission to all; but convinced even more that curbs on thoughts would invalidate the good intention of the freedom to publish, it entrusted censorship, or the supervision of editions, to the Department of Public Morals. In this respect, its duty can only be to ban the sale of offensive works. However, even such censorship is superfluous. It only takes one stupid police official to do the greatest harm to enlightenment and for many years bring to a halt the progress of reason: he can forbid a useful invention, a new idea, and deprive all of something great. There is an example in a small thing. A translation of a novel was submitted for approval to the police. Following the author, when speaking about love, the translator dubbed it ‘a crafty god.’ The censor in uniform, imbued with the spirit of piety, blacked out this expression saying ‘it is improper to call a Deity crafty.’ If you don’t understand something then stay right out of it. If you want wholesome air, then place the smokery at a distance from yourself; if you want light, then cast aside obscurity; if you want a child not to be cowed, then banish the birch from school. In the house where whips and cudgels are in use servants are drunkards, thieves, and even worse.*

“Let everyone print whatever comes into their mind. Anyone who finds himself insulted in print should be granted a trial as per the regulation. I am not speaking in jest. Words are not always acts nor are thoughts crimes. These are the rules of the Instruction about the new law code.82 But an insult in speech remains an insult in print as well. It is not permitted by law to insult anyone, and everyone has freedom to make a complaint. But if someone tells the truth about another, whether this should be considered libel or not is not in the law. What harm can there be if there are books in print without the police seal? Not only is there no harm, but there is advantage, advantage from the first to the last, from the smallest person to the greatest, from the Tsar to the last of citizens.

“The usual rules of censorship are: to underline, black out, forbid, shred, burn everything contrary to natural religion and revelation, everything contrary to government, every personal affront; anything antithetical to morality, order, and public peace. Let us review this in detail. If a madman in his raving, not only to himself in his heart, but in a loud voice says: ‘There is no God,’ in the mouths of all madmen a loud and hasty echo will resound: ‘There is no God, there is no God.’ Well, what of it? An echo is a sound; it will strike the air, cause it to vibrate, and disappear. In the mind it will rarely leave a trace, and a weak one at that; but in the heart, never. God will always be God, sensed even by those who do not believe in Him. But if you think that the Almighty will be offended by blasphemy, how can a clerk in the office of the police be a plaintiff on His behalf? The Almighty does not place His confidence in one who brandishes a rattle or strikes the tocsin to sound an alarm. He who wields thunder and lightning, to whom all the elements obey; He who dwells beyond the boundaries of the universe and shakes all hearts, abhors it if revenge is taken for His sake even if this is by the Tsar himself, who fancies himself His deputy on earth.—Who, indeed, can be the judge of an offence to the Eternal Father?—He gives offence who thinks: I am able to judge about His insult. He will answer to this before Him.

“The apostates of revealed religion have done more harm to this day in Russia than the deniers of the existence of God, atheists. Of the latter, we have few since there are still few among us who think about metaphysics. The atheist loses his way in metaphysics, but a Schismatic becomes deluded in the matter of three fingers.83 We call Schismatics all Russians who depart in any manner from the general teaching of the Greek church. Of these there are many in Russia, which is why their liturgy is permitted. But is there any reason to prohibit the manifestation of any error? The more apparent it is the sooner it will crumble. Persecutions used to make martyrs, cruelty was a prop of the very Christian religion. Schisms can sometimes have dangerous effects. Prohibit them. They spread by example. Destroy the example. It is not because of a printed book that a Schismatics will immolate themselves, but because of a sly example. To forbid foolishness is tantamount to encouraging it. Give it free rein, everyone will see what is stupid and what is smart. What is forbidden is wanted. We are all the children of Eve.

“But in banning freedom to publish, timorous governments do not fear blasphemy, they fear having critics. Anyone who in hours of madness does not spare God will in hours of lucidity and reason not spare unlawful power. The one who does not fear the Almighty’s thunderbolts laughs at the gallows. This is why liberty of thought is terrifying to governments. Shaken to his very core, the freethinker will reach out to the idol of power a bold but powerful and unwavering hand, tear off its mask and cloak, and expose its build. Each will see its feet of clay, each will retract the support he granted it, power will return to its source, the idol will fall. But if power does not rest upon a fog of opinions, if its throne stands on a sincere love of the general good, will it not be strengthened by the