COUNT TOLSTOI AND CHRISTIANITY

Mr.Mathew Arnold contributes to the Fortnightly for December an interesting article on Count Leo Tolstoi, in which a review and study of "Anna Karenine" is followed by an account of the religious position of the Russian realist himself, and of the gospel which he has now set himself to promulgate. This is to be expended in full in "two great works," on which Count Tolstoi has spent six years. But meanwhile Mr. Arnold considers that "the results which he claims to have established in these two works are sufficiently indicated in the three published volumes—' Ma Confession,' ' Ma Religion,' and 'Que Faire.' Their development is to be traced in the account of Levine's religious experiences, which is give in 'Anna Karenine.' Levine, however, is left at the close of that novel with a view of life which is something of a compromise between high religious purpose and the exigencies of daily life.

Count Tolstoi has since advanced to a far more definite and stringent rule of life — the positive doctrine, he thinks, of Jesus. It is the determination and promulgation of this role which is the novelty in our author's recent works. He extracts this essential doctrine, or rule of Jesus, from the Sermon on the Mount, and presents it in a body of commandments — Christ's commandments ; the pith, he says, of the New Testament, as the Decalogue is the pith of the Old. These all-important commandments of Christ are 'commandments of peace,' and five in number. The first commandment is "Live in peace with all men ; treat no one as contemptible and beneath you. Not only allow yourself no anger,but do not rest until you have dissipated even unreasonable anger in others against yourself." The second is : " No libertinage and no divorce ; let every man have one wife, and every woman one husband." The third : "Never on any pretext take an oath of service of any kind ; all such oaths are imposed for a bad purpose." The fourth: "Never employ force against the evildoer; bear whatever wrong is done to you without opposing the wrong doer or seeking to have him punished." The fifth and last: "Renounce all distinction of nationality— do not admit that men of another nation may ever be treated by you as enemies ; love all men as alike near to you ; do good to all alike." If these five commandments were generally observed (says Count Tolstoi) all men would become brothers.
Certainly the actual society in which we live would be changed and dissolved ; armies and wars would be renounced ; Courts of Justice, police, property would be renounced also; and whatever the rest of us may do, Count Tolstoi at least, will do his duty and follow Christ's commandment sincerely. He has given up rank, office, and property, and earns his bread by the labour of his own hands." I believe in Christ's commandments," he says, " and his faith changes my whole former estimate of what is good and great, bad and low, in human life. .. ... Everything which I used to think bad and low— the rusticity of the peasant, the plainness of lodging, food, clothing, manners— all this has become good and great in my eyes. At present I can no longer contribute to anything which raises me externally above others, which separates me from them. I cannot seek fame and praise; I can not seek a culture which separates me from men; I cannot refrain from seeking in my whole existence — in my lodging, my clothing and my ways of going on with people— whatever, far from separating me from the mass of mankind, draws me nearer to them."
After a general objection to Tolstoi's biblical exigesis, on the ground that Christianity cannot be packed into any set of commandments, Mr. Arnold proceeds to the following criticism: — "Count Tolstoi sees rightly that, whatever the propertied and satisfied classes may think, the world, ever since Jesus Christ came, is judged; 'a new earth' is in prospect. It was ever in prospect with Jesus, and should be ever in prospect with his followers. And the ideal in prospect has to be realized. ' If ye know these things happy are ye if ye do them. ' But they are to be done through a great and widespread and long-continued change, and a change of the inner man to begin with. The most important and fruitful utterances of Jesus, therefore, are not things which can be drawn up as a table of stiff and stark external commands, but the things which have most soul in them ; because these can best sink down into our soul, work there, set up an influence, form habits of conduct, and prepare the future. The beatitudes are on this account more helpful than the utterances from which Count Tolstoi builds up his five commandments. The very secret of Jesus, ' He that loveth his life shall lose it, he that will lose his life shall save it,' does not give us a command to be taken and followed in the letter, but an idea to work in our mind and soul, and of inexhaustible value there. Jesus paid tribute to the Government, and dined with the publicans, although neither the Empire of Rome nor the high finance of Judea was compatible with his ideal and with the 'new earth' which that ideal must in the end create. Perhaps Levine's provisional solution in a society like ours was nearer to ' the rule of God, of the truth,' than the more trenchant solution which Count Tolstoi has adopted for himself since. It seems calculated to be of more use. I do not know how it is in Russia, but in an English village the determination of 'our circle' to earn their bread by the work of their hands would produce only dismay, not fraternal joy, among the 'majority' who are so earning it already. There are plenty of us to compete ; as things stand the gardeners, carpenters, and smiths would say, 'Pray stick to your articles, your poetry, and nonsense; in manual labour you will interfere with us, and be taking bread out of our mouths."
Mr. Arnold concludes that "Count Tolstoi has perhaps not done well in abandoning the work of the poet and artist, and that he might with advantage return to it. But whatever he may do in the future, the work which he has already done and his work in religion, as well as his work in imaginative literature, is more than sufficient to signalize him as one of the most marking, interesting, and sympathy-inspiring men of our time— an honour, I must add, to Russia, although he forbids us to heed nationality.
 

 Adelaide Observer S.A.  14/1/1888, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article160772090